"Rubbish!" That is what Bennett Leventhal was quoted in the Chicago Sun-Times as saying in reply to a reporter's question regarding my position. I had said that the increase in autism is real, and that vaccinations are a prime suspect as a cause of the increase (ARRI, 9/3, 1995, 12/1, 1998). Leventhal, who is a professor of child psychiatry and pediatrics at the University of Chicago, says the autism/vaccine link is just a coincidence and "there is increasingly powerful evidence that this is a genetic disorder."
How ironic! "rubbish" is what Leventhal's predecessor at the University of Chicago, Bruno Bettelheim, said in response to my insistence in the mid-1960s that genetics played an important role in causing autism! No doubt genetics do play an important role in some cases of autism. Neither is there any doubt, despite the strange skepticism of Leventhal and many others, that the prevalence of autism is increasing at an alarming rate in the U.S., the U.K. and elsewhere in the world (see graph). The only open question is the role vaccines may play as a potential causal agent in the autism epidemic. There is no plausible alternative to vaccines as the most likely cause. I have never heard of a genetic epidemic disease.
That said, let us look more closely at the vaccine issue, which has been presented to the public in a grossly distorted fashion. First note that the billion-dollar medical establishment, including the huge drug companies, powerful governmental agencies and medical schools, and most physicians, want us to believe that the vaccines are both perfectly safe and highly effective. Those, like me, who question vaccine safety are said to be wild-eyed radicals who want to abolish vaccinations. Not true! What I believe is that:
1. Vaccines are by and large effective, although not nearly as effective as their proponents would have us believe. (ARRI, 12/1).
2. Because vaccines probably do more good than harm, vaccinations should not be abandoned.
3. Vaccines, as they are presently manufactured and used, do cause a great deal of underreported harm, including many cases of autism and other disabilities. Therefore, the production and use of vaccines should be conducted much more cautiously and rationally.
4. The link between vaccines and autism is far stronger than the medical establishment is willing to admit, and very careful and well-reasoned research is an urgent priority.
There is a good deal of evidence--none of it yet conclusive--implicating the MMR as causing the autism epidemic. The evidence includes both clinical research studies and thousands of parent reports linking autism to a vaccine--especially the MMR. Parents advocacy groups are not misled by the media blitz asserting that vaccines are so safe they do not need to be studied. They insist upon honest, effective research conducted by independent researchers. Our children deserve better.
Although the headlines alarmed us all when some people died as a result of the swine flu vaccine and some people died when exposed to Legionnaire's disease, it is even more interesting that most people survived.
Why? Why are some children injured by MMR shots and others not?
The answer is that people are very different, in many ways. Part of the difference is genetic. Another part is environmental.
We can't do much about the genetic part right now, but we can do a lot about each person's susceptibility to disease, including vaccine-induced disease, by dealing intelligently with the environment.
Return to Contents Page