Help on a Anti-Vax Article

[ShadowSot]

So, I rarely post here except to make a fool of myself, but I got involved in a Anti-Vax debate over on another forum and want some help.

I'm starting to edge out of the territory I'm familiar with and could use a hand finding the information, but also knowing where to find the information and how to look for it,

Deadly Immunity (http://www.icnr.com/articles/thimerosalcoverup.html)

it's an article by Robert Kennedy.

I'm a bit slow and have a hard time figuring out things. Was hoping for one, a good refutation of the article, but also some help for how to look at these things critically, What questions to consider when reading an article like this and how to verify information in the article.

[Sawbones79]

Skimming though the article, I find very little science. On the other hand it's got all the hallmarks of basic CT design: A secret meeting of a cabal of those "in the know", scary but unsupported quotes, appeals to authority etc.
Refuting it is IMHO a matter of demanding a single example of a well designed study showing a clear correlation between tiomersal vaccines and development of autism.

[Estellea]

Go to: http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/

And search for "kennedy" and/or "deadly immunity" and you will get a plethora of blogposts dismantling the bollocks. Check out other sceptic sites for the same if you want more, perhaps http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2005/06/robert_f_kenned.html and check out Seth Mnookin's Panic Virus.

Este

[dropzone]

I liked his dad. I liked his uncles. Like them, Bobby Jr doesn't know squat about science. Jack, at least, had people to know stuff for him.

[MaxMurx]

I haven*t read the article because I know the people. As a physician and working in research I have nothing against vaccinations with one very severe limitation: http://www.whale.to/vaccine/west_edda.html

[Estellea]

I haven*t read the article because I know the people. As a physician and working in research I have nothing against vaccinations with one very severe limitation: http://www.whale.to/vaccine/west_edda.htmlYou cite whale.to as a source for your one exception to vaccination as a research physician?

Este

[muzungu100]

I haven*t read the article because I know the people. As a physician and working in research I have nothing against vaccinations with one very severe limitation:

A physician who considers whale.to a reliable source for anything is better left in research.

[Tomblvd]

So, I rarely post here except to make a fool of myself, but I got involved in a Anti-Vax debate over on another forum and want some help.

I'm starting to edge out of the territory I'm familiar with and could use a hand finding the information, but also knowing where to find the information and how to look for it,

Deadly Immunity (http://www.icnr.com/articles/thimerosalcoverup.html)

it's an article by Robert Kennedy.

I'm a bit slow and have a hard time figuring out things. Was hoping for one, a good refutation of the article, but also some help for how to look at these things critically, What questions to consider when reading an article like this and how to verify information in the article.

Start by pointing out that the article was pulled by Salon (and Rolling Stone) after it was thoroughly dismantled:

Correcting our record
We've removed an explosive 2005 report by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. about autism and vaccines. Here's why (http://www.salon.com/about/inside_salon/2011/01/16/dangerous_immunity)

The piece was co-published with Rolling Stone magazine -- they fact-checked it and published it in print; we posted it online. In the days after running "Deadly Immunity," we amended the story with five corrections (which can still be found logged here) that went far in undermining Kennedy's exposé. At the time, we felt that correcting the piece -- and keeping it on the site, in the spirit of transparency -- was the best way to operate. But subsequent critics, including most recently, Seth Mnookin in his book "The Panic Virus," further eroded any faith we had in the story's value. We've grown to believe the best reader service is to delete the piece entirely.

[Chris Haynes]

I haven*t read the article because I know the people. As a physician and working in research I have nothing against vaccinations with one very severe limitation: http://www.whale.to/vaccine/west_edda.html

Let me introduce you to Scopie's Law (http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Scopie%27s_Law): In any discussion involving science or medicine, citing Whale.to as a credible source loses you the argument immediately ...and gets you laughed out of the room.

[luark]

I haven*t read the article because I know the people. As a physician and working in research I have nothing against vaccinations with one very severe limitation: http://www.whale.to/vaccine/west_edda.html

This is really interesting. It talks about vaccine adjuvants, which exaggerate the immune response to a vaccination.
This is similar to a treatment for allergies and food sensitivities that I may try - enzyme-potentiated desensitization (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enzyme_potentiated_desensitization). This uses the enzyme beta-glucuronidase, which is injected along with tiny amounts of allergens, similar to the amount in an allergy skin-prick test. Beta-glucuronidase is said to potentiate the desensitizing effect of the injection of allergens.
However, similar to what's said about vaccine adjuvants, the big snag with EPD according to the EPD FAQ (http://www.dma.org/~rohrers/allergy/epd_faq.htm) is that if you have allergens already in your body, so the beta-glucuronidase is encountering a higher concentration of allergens than are in the tiny injection, you can get hypersensitized rather than desensitized! Usually after awhile a hypersensitized person will get desensitized, but it may be something of a passage through hell.
So the beta-glucuronidase is thought to act as a kind of adjuvant for a mini-allergy shot.

[Sawbones79]

Let me introduce you to Scopie's Law (http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Scopie%27s_Law):

This particular physician had never heard of that site, but scrolling through it randomly this was the first thing I happened to read

"Juxtaposed to heart wrenching testimonies of shattered health and ruined lives is the military's defiant stonewall and denial that a squalene laced anthrax vaccine was injected into thousands of its people without their informed consent - this despite the fact that the FDA and independent researchers have tested and identified varying amounts of squalene in specific lots of the vaccine."

Science as a Twilight novel- very little substance, smothered in adjectives.

[ehcks]

Squalene is a natural organic compound originally obtained for commercial purposes primarily from shark liver oil, though plant sources (primarily vegetable oils) are used as well, including amaranth seed, rice bran, wheat germ, and olives. All plants and animals produce squalene, including humans. Squalene has been proposed to be an important part of the Mediterranean diet as it may be a chemopreventative substance that protects people from cancer.

Wikipedia, take it as you will.

Of course, I have no reason to disbelieve squalene is entirely safe. Anti-vaxxers live to make stuff up, claim it to be scary, then give absolutely no supporting evidence.

[Kid Eager]

Squalene is most readily found in the groove around the side of the nostrils on the outer surface of your nose. So far the squalene exudation has not caused any unusual nasal events, so I think we're pretty safe....

[pgwenthold]

Wikipedia, take it as you will.

Of course, I have no reason to disbelieve squalene is entirely safe. Anti-vaxxers live to make stuff up, claim it to be scary, then give absolutely no supporting evidence.

If squalene weren't present in vaccines, the same people who currently rant against it would be taking it as "supplements."

In fact, it is actually being sold that way, in pill form, so they already ARE taking it.

[VanillaCone]

You might also mention the studies conducted in Denmark which pretty much settled this supposed "controversy" as far as actual scientists are concerned. Like this one here (http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa021134).