Sunday-David Kirby-Merucry

[Guest]

A contact of mine told me about David Kirby author of Evidence of Harm will be on Meet The Press Sunday (tomorrow) and I thought I'd pass the info along to all of you. Here's a website that tells more about it if your interested: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3898804/

 

Carolyn

[Chemar]

I taped the show but havent had a chance to watch it yet.

Hoping it will have maximum impact! and increase public awareness

[kim]

Thanks to Karen B. from asd_solutions!

 

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TRANSCRIPT OF MEET THE PRESS:

 

AUGUST 7, 2005

 

David Kirby & Dr. Harvey Fineburg

 

debate the use of thimerosal in vaccines

 

and the potential connection with autism.

 

 

 

Coming next, autism: what we know and what we don't know. Dr.

Harvey Fineberg of the Institute of Medicine and David Kirby, author

of "Evidence of Harm: Mercury in Vaccines and the Autism Epidemic,"

a medical controversy, next, right here on MEET THE PRESS.

 

 

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: The controversy over childhood vaccines and autism,

after this brief station break.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: And we are back.

Dr. Fineberg, Mr. Kirby, welcome both.

In your book, Mr. Kirby, you raise early on two questions. "Why did

the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and

Drug Administration (FDA) allow mercury exposures from childhood

vaccines to more than double between 1988 and 1992 without bothering

to calculate cumulative totals and their potential risks? Why ...

was there a corresponding spike in reported cases of autism spectrum

disorders? Why did autism grow from a relatively rare incidence of 1

in every 10,000 births in the 1980s to 1 in 500 in the late 1990s?

Why did it continue to increase 1 in 250 in 2000 and then 1 in 166

today?" Have you answered those questions?

MR. DAVID KIRBY: No, nobody's answered those questions. And we have

to answer those questions as soon as possible. We need to solve this

mystery. We need to get this controversy behind us so we can go on to

find ways to help these kids. Mercury is toxic. It's a known

neurotoxin. If it gets into the brain, it could stay there virtually

forever. Children born in the '90s received mercury far in excess of

federal safety limits. That's indisputable. And yet we're looking at

a neurotoxin. And yet most of the evidence developed by the public

health sector has been looking at the epidemiology. And we really

need to look at what this mercury is doing inside the bodies and

brains of these children if we're going to solve this mystery one way

or the other.

MR. RUSSERT: Dr. Fineberg, in your 2004 report from the Institute of

Medicine, you said this: "While some information suggests that

autism rates may be rising, it is not clear whether the observed

increase is real or due to factors such as heightened awareness of

the disorder or the use of a broader diagnostic definition. ..."

Do you think there's an epidemic of autism or do you think it's

simply a change in defining it?

DR. HARVEY FINEBERG: There's definitely a huge number of cases

diagnosed with autism, Tim. What is clear is that number recognized

has increased dramatically. It's also clear that the definition was

broadened markedly in the 1980s and 1990s, and there were increased

incentives to recognize children from increased awareness and

availability of services. No one knows with certainty what part of

the increase is genuine, a genuine increase in numbers, and what part

is from increased recognition of people who were already there but

not previously recognized. Remember we're talking about a spectrum

of diagnoses here, autism spectrum diseases, which range in severity

from relatively mild to relatively severe.

MR. RUSSERT: For a layman, in a few words, how would you explain

autism?

DR. FINEBERG: Autism is a severe neurodevelopmental disorder that is

characterized by social withdrawal, by repetitive behaviors and by

some kind of focal attention in its classic form. Basically, it's an

inability to relate to others.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me go back and review two of the studies that the

Institute of Medicine did because this has helped feed much of this

controversy and discussion. Back in 2001, the headline on your press

release was "Link Between Neurodevelopment Disorders And Thimerosal

Remains Unclear. Current scientific evidence neither proves nor

disproves a link between the mercury-containing preservative

thimerosal and neurodevelopmental disorders in children, says a new

report from the Institute of Medicine... While very few vaccines

given to children in the United States today still contain

thimerosal, prudence dictates that precautionary measures be taken to

decrease thimerosal exposure even further. ... It is medically

plausible that some children's risk of a neurodevelopmental disorder

could rise in part through increased mercury exposure from thimerosal-

containing vaccines."

Thimerosal being a preservative that is put into the vaccine. Then

about three years later in May of 2004, the Institute of Medicine

issued this headline: "MMR Vaccine And Thimerosal-Containing

Vaccines Are Not Associated With Autism, IOM Report Says. Based on a

thorough review of clinical and epidemiological studies"--I always

destroy that word--"neither the mercury-based vaccine preservative

thimerosal nor the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine are associated

with autism, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine..."

What changed in those three years?

DR. FINEBERG: When you're dealing with a problem as complex as

autism, Tim, you have to look at it from many different points of

view and assemble evidence from many different vantage points.

Biological evidence in humans and in animals, toxicologic evidence,

how does the body deal with toxins, and evidence looking at the

actual experience in populations. When the 2001 report was written,

there was a lot of suggestive information about the toxic properties

of mercury and the problem of autism incompletely understood. By

2004, the main change was that there were completed additional

studies that were actually looking in the population at the

relationship of receipt of vaccines containing thimerosal and the

development of autism.

These studies were carried out in the United States, in Great

Britain, in Denmark and Sweden. These studies covered hundreds of

thousands of individuals, children, in these populations. They

compared systematically in different ways whether you received

vaccine with no thimerosal, with some thimerosal, with more

thimerosal, and they looked at the relationship of those experiences

with the development of autism. Uniformly, the best of those studies

all show no association between receiving vaccine of different

amounts with thimerosal or without and the development of autism. It

was the absence of that association which was the main reason for

reaching the conclusion that the evidence points to no association

between vaccines and autism.

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Kirby?

MR. KIRBY: Well, I think those flawed epidemiological studies range

from severely flawed to seriously questionable. And I also think

that you cannot rely solely on epidemiology to prove or disproof

causation. In fact, I have right here--this is from the federal

court system, but they ruled that epidemiology is not acceptable to

prove there is no causal link between an adverse event and a

pharmaceutical.

MR. RUSSERT: Explain that in layman's language.

MR. KIRBY: Well, it means that you really, like the doctor said, you

can look at the kids as well as look at the large population

studies. You need to look at the biology, the toxicology; you need

to look at the cellular level. You need to look at immunology, and I

would say that what the IOM did last year--I was at that meeting on

February 9. Virtually half of the evidence that was presented

against the theory was epidemiological--I have the same problem as

you. The other half supporting the theory was largely biological.

And yet the committee gave a preponderance of evidence or emphasis to

the epidemiological evidence and rather, I would say, gave short

shrift to the biological evidence.

Dr. Fineberg has mentioned that there are 215 references in the

report. I counted them up. By my count, it's roughly a 2:1 ratio,

about 115 references for epidemiology, 60 references for biology, and

of those, only seven were toxicological reports. Now, we're talking

about a known neurotoxin, and there were no toxicologists on the

committee, either. So I think even Dr. McCormick, the chairwoman of

the committee, told me that there was definitely an emphasis on the

epidemiology over the biological evidence.

MR. RUSSERT: When we announced this program, as you might expect, we

heard from both sides who are very emotional and passionate about

this topic. The National Autism Associations, Dr. Fineberg, wrote a

letter to us including this: "The five studies the Institute of

Medicine based its conclusion upon are fatally flawed, have never

been replicated and have ties to the CDC"--Center for Disease Control-

- "(or foreign equivalent mandating vaccines in other countries)

and/or the pharmaceutical industry. However, the Institute of

Medicine chose to completely ignore the biological and clinical data

supporting the link between thimerosal exposure and injuries to

children conducted by independent, appropriately- credentialed

researchers."

DR. FINEBERG: Tim, the Institute of Medicine panel that came

together represented a spectrum of experts who were asked to look at

all of the evidence, and they did. They assessed the evidence that

bears on the question. Some of it is biological, as I mentioned;

some of it has to depend on what you actually find when you go out

and look in the population. Is there or is there not an

association? Keep in mind that there are many neurotoxins in the

world. Dozens of natural and industrial substances have neurotoxic

properties. When you're trying to assess a specific association,

there are biological studies that are relevant, and there are

epidemiological studies that are relevant. All of these studies are

not equally valid. Some have more deficiencies and limitations than

others.

The committee went through very carefully and assessed each of those

studies representing its strengths and weaknesses. All of this is

laid out in its report, which is available for download to anyone who

wants it from the IOM Web site, www.iom.edu. And anyone can read for

themselves how the committee evaluated critically and carefully all

of this evidence.

When the letter you read states that these five studies were not

replicated, I can't help but think that each one of them has been

replicated four times. We have now a growing body of evidence, while

imperfect, altogether convincing and all reaching the same

conclusion, even though they vary in their methods and in their

approaches. And that conclusion was no association between the

receipt of vaccines containing thimerosal and the development of

autism.

MR. RUSSERT: Why was thimerosal then taken out of the vaccination?

DR. FINEBERG: There's no question that mercury is a neurotoxin. And

if there were ways, which there are, to protect vaccines without

using mercury-containing substances, it was prudent to remove it, not

because there was evidence that it caused autism or even definitive

evidence that the amounts in those vaccines caused any neuro

problems, but because it was an added measure of precaution that was

sensible and correct. And I might add that the latest vaccines that

contained any thimerosal as a preservative, with the exception of

some flu vaccines, were completed in 2001 and outdated in 2003. So

anyone watching this program, any parent can be confident that when

they take their child to the pediatrician to be immunized this year,

they will receive vaccines without thimerosal as a preservative.

MR. RUSSERT: But prior to this year, there may be some concern?

DR. FINEBERG: Prior to 2003, there were some that still had

thimerosal, but the concern is not reaching the level of evidence

related to the development of autism. The concern is a more general

concern about mercury as a potential neurotoxin.

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Kirby?

MR. KIRBY: Well, if I could get back to the IOM report, that meeting

was held 14--or the report was actually issued 14 months ago. This

story is moving very, very fast. In those last 14 months, there has

been an equally growing body of evidence, again on the biological

side, that would suggest that, in a small subset of children with a

certain genetic predisposition, they are unable to properly process

the mercury that they were exposed to. And, by the way, the rates of

exposure were quite high in the 1990s. At two months of age,

children got three shots for a total of 62.5 micrograms of mercury.

For their body weight, that's 125 times over the EPA level. For me

to reach that level, that would be about 1,125 micrograms.

We know that certain children with autism, again, seem to have higher

levels of mercury accumulating in their body. We know that when we

give mercury to infant primates, the--there's two types of organic

mercury: ethyl mercury in vaccines, methyl mercury in fish. What

they found was that the ethyl mercury, once it got into the brain, it

converted to inorganic mercury very, very quickly. Inorganic mercury

basically gets trapped in the brain, and there's evidence to suggest

that, in an infant brain, in the first six months to a year when the

brain is still growing, when inorganic mercury gets trapped in that

brain, you're going to have this hyper neuro inflammation, or the

rapid brain growth that we see in autistic children.

These are the types of things that I think need to be researched

further. Yes, we need to look at the epidemiology. There's a whole

lot of new biology. This has all been published. None of the biology

was published at the time of the IOM hearing. It has since been

published, and I actually wonder if the IOM would consider

reconvening a new committee or a new hearing to consider the evidence

that's come out in the year and a half since the last report.

MR. RUSSERT: Would you?

DR. FINEBERG: Tim, Mr. Kirby's description about the certitude of

this evidence, I think, exceeds the actual balance of evidence that

is produced when you look at the totality. It's true that mercury is

handled differently in the body when it's in the form of so-called

ethyl mercury, which is in vaccines, and methyl mercury, which was

actually the form which was--on which the standards of exposure were

based. That's the type found in fish, as has been mentioned. But

when you look back at the studies of actual poisonings of children

with large amounts of methyl mercury and ethyl mercury, most

toxicologists believe that the ethyl form of the mercury is less

toxic than the methyl form--less toxic to the nervous system. And

that's based on many experiences with poisoning by these different

forms of mercury.

MR. RUSSERT: Many parents have written us over the last couple of

days saying that they have put their child in the process of

collation, which removes the mercury poisoning from the system, and

they say they've seen vast improvement. Wouldn't that suggest that

there may be some relationship between the mercury from thimerosal

and the removal from the child?

DR. FINEBERG: Tim, autism is a complicated illness, and children

with a variety of treatments and non-treatments show improvement over

time, which is all to the good. But when you have a single story and

a repeated story of an experience that a parent has with a treatment

like chelation, you have to keep in mind that the history of medicine

is strewn with discarded treatments that people at one time believed

in very, very strongly. When you have one case after another, it's

one anecdote after another, and the plural of anecdote in scientific

terms is not evidence. The only way to know whether a treatment

works or does not work compared to other things is to do the clinical

trial, comparing those who are given the treatment in a systematic

and balanced way with those who are not.

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Kirby, in your book, you talk about a conference on

June 7 to 8 in 2000 in Simpsonwood, Georgia. We've gotten many e-

mails and letters about a government conspiracy, that the CDC and the

FDA and the Institute of Medicine and everyone has gotten together

and really tried to deny information to the parents of children with

autism. Do you believe that?

MR. KIRBY: Well, I think the word "conspiracy" and "cover-up," those

are very loaded words and I never use them. I do think there has

been a lack of transparency and I would think Dr. Fineberg would

probably agree with that statement. In this entire process...

MR. RUSSERT: Do you agree with that?

DR. FINEBERG: I don't agree that the lack of transparency had had

any bearing on conclusions, and I'm not sure what we mean by a lack

of transparency.

MR. RUSSERT: Right now many parents are seeking information from

studies from the CDC through the Freedom of Information Act, and

they're being told that the HMOs now have that information and they

cannot share it because of privacy. And the parents are saying

that's outrageous. It could easily be obtained by the CDC and

disburse that science, that data so people can look at it and make

their own judgments. Should the CDC at least do that?

DR. FINEBERG: In fact, Tim, the Institute of Medicine looked

separately in a different study at this system that was in place and

did urge the CDC to make these records more available to qualified

researchers. But that is not the same as a lack of transparency in

the studies or in the reports. All anyone has to do in the case of

the Institute of Medicine report is to read the report. All of the

logic is laid out, all of the weighing of considerations. Not

everyone may agree with each assessment, but they have all the

relevant evidence right before them.

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Kirby, you have said, "I am totally willing to

accept there are other factors at play. It may turn out not to be

thimerosal at all." What do you think should be done?

MR. KIRBY: Well, I think, first of all, we need clinical trials for

treatments. We need to try to help these children as best we can.

There is a clinical trial of chelation therapy under way right now at

University of Arizona. Dr. Fineberg said we need these trials. I

wish the government was funding them. We need to listen to these

parents as well. And I think that they've gotten a lot of dismissal

from the scientific community. Parents were telling scientists that

their children were born normally and then regressed. A lot of people

dismissed that and said that couldn't be the case. We now know from

a brand- new study from the University of Washington using videotapes

of one-year birthday and two-year birthday that is indeed the case.

If the parents were right about regression, maybe they're right about

chelation.

Just getting back to transparency for one second if I could and this

whole safety data base that we're trying to get access to from the

report that Dr. Fineberg cited, it says right here, "The lack of

transparency of some of the processes also affects the trust

relationship between the NIP, the National Immunization Program, and

the general public." The lack of trust and the lack of transparency

is what's threatening the vaccine program, not talk about mercury.

So the doctor's own committee said that there was a lack of

transparency again inside this process of analyzing this data that

was presented at that conference in Georgia.

MR. RUSSERT: Many of the National Autism Association and other

groups, Doctor, point to Task Order 74.

DR. FINEBERG: Yes.

MR. RUSSERT: This is the arrangement between the CDC and the

Institute of Medicine, a one-page memo which helps define the study

and why it won't be released. Is there a reason?

DR. FINEBERG: I don't know what exactly that's referring to, Tim,

but when the Centers for Disease Control contracts with the Institute

of Medicine to undertake a study, they do pay the actual costs of the

study. But keep in mind that the panel of experts that are assembled

by the Institute of Medicine receive no compensation whatsoever for

their volunteer service. And when a government agency conveys money

to the Institute of Medicine, it's not the agency's money. It's the

American people's money. And our obligation is to do the best we can

to assess the evidence on behalf of the American public.

MR. RUSSERT: Since thimerosal is now out of the vaccine, latest as

of 2003, we will know in a few years whether or not there is a

connection...

MR. KIRBY: That's correct.

MR. RUSSERT: ...definitively by the number of cases?

MR. KIRBY: I think so, but again I think we need to look at the

biology, but the epidemiology is very important. If the case rates

start to drop in the next couple years, I think that will be hugely

significant. If I could also just get back to this commission by the

CDC of the report, I'd like to do that as well.

MR. RUSSERT: Real fast.

MR. KIRBY: Well, there's evidence that there was pressure put on the

committee by the CDC, and we have internal transcripts. I think

that's what you were referring to. There are transcripts of private

meetings. Some of them were leaked. They're not obtainable through

the Freedom of Information Act. Many people are trying to get copies

of the other transcripts, and I do hope that the IOM will make those

available in the name of transparency in this.

MR. RUSSERT: Was there pressure?

DR. FINEBERG: Absolutely not, Tim. In fact, the whole reason why

the Institute of Medicine, the National Academy of Sciences, the

National Research Council exists is to be an independent voice

outside of government to work on behalf of the needs of the American

people. That's what we do. Agencies do not always hear from us what

they want to hear. Sometimes the evidence does not point in a

direction that is welcome. Stem cell guidelines or information about

climate change or, for example, the ways to fix the Hubble Telescope

which came out of the national academies--all of these are studies

undertaken on behalf of the American public and the same was true for

our assessment of vaccine safety.

MR. RUSSERT: You're absolutely convinced there's no connection

between thimerosal and autism?

DR. FINEBERG: I'm convinced that the best evidence all points to the

lack of an association. These studies can never prove to the point

of absolute certainty an absence of an association. But I would say

this, other avenues of research looking at other possible causes

today are much more promising ways to spend our precious resources.

MR. RUSSERT: And our viewers should know that there is no thimerosal

now in vaccinations, other than flu vaccinations, and so it's safe

for your children to do--have that done.

DR. FINEBERG: And even some flu vaccines for children are now

available without thimerosal, as well.

MR. RUSSERT: You believe there is a possibility of a connection?

MR. KIRBY: Absolutely. And I think one day we'll find out that

there might have been--this has contributed to some of the cases in

autism in this country.

MR. RUSSERT: Thank you for a very civil discussion. To be

continued. We'll be right back.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: And we are back.

Forty years ago, August 6, 1965, Lyndon Baines Johnson signed into

law the Voting Rights Act. One year later, Dr. Martin Luther King

Jr. appeared on MEET THE PRESS and talked about that very legislation.

(Videotape, August 21, 1966):

MR. ROWLAND EVANS (Publishers Nsp. Syndicated): You said recently

that the "extravagant promises" made a year ago in connection with

the Voting Rights bill, have now become a shattered mockery. What

exactly did you mean by that, Dr. King?

DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. (SCLC): Well, I mean that this Voting

Rights bill came into being to end not only discrimination in its

overt expressions and voter registration but also to remove the

atmosphere for intimidation, for economic reprisals and for the

creation of fear that cause people not to vote. And one of the things

we have found is that when you have federal registrars in

communities, many more Negroes go out to register because they see a

different atmosphere and they are not overarched or undergirded with

the fear of intimidation and economic reprisals as much as they do in

dealing with some of the local registrars that they have dealt with

so long.

Now, the problem is that after that bill came into being, very few

registrars were sent into the South; I mean, federal registrars, and

even today, all too few have been sent, and this is even true in some

communities where we know that there are outright patterns of

discrimination.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT: Yesterday, thousands marched in Atlanta, Georgia, to

commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act and to urge

the re-authorization of some of its expiring provisions.

We'll be right back.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: Well, much more information on today's discussion on

autism and our guests--you can find many helpful links on Viewer

Resources page of our Web site, mtp.msnbc.com. Viewer Resources.

That's all for today. We'll be back next week. If it's Sunday, it's

MEET THE PRESS.

© 2005 MSNBC Int

 

 

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