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Of course she does.
Jenny McCarthy Calls Autism Retraction Censorship
When the Lancet fully retracted Andrew Wakefield?s controversial study linking autism to vaccines, most of the scientific community breathed a huge sigh of relief. Now we can move on to other topics, right? Like finding a real cure for autism?
Not quite yet. Some people stood right by Wakefield and his controversial research, though. Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey came out swinging, calling the Lancet?s retraction ?censorship?.
Jenny, honey, the science has left the building. Why are you still here?
When Wakefield?s autism research was first published in 1998, it was taken seriously. Doctors, scientists and government agencies all over the world launched further research into the claims. Japan and Norway suspended the MMR vaccine from their vaccine schedules for several years while investigating its safety.
They all came up empty-handed. No one other than Wakefield was able to demonstrate any link between autism and either the MMR vaccine or the trace amounts of mercury used as a preservative in vaccines. The countries with the highest autism rates, in fact, were ones that had never allowed thimerisol to be used in their vaccines.
Even as study after study was debunking the potential links between autism and vaccines, a movement was gaining ground among worried parents eager to safeguard their children.
Fine. I get that. Ten years ago, reading about the ?vaccine controversy? in newspapers, I thought the case for a vaccine-autism link sounded pretty plausible too.
But it doesn?t now. The Lancet retraction came on the heels of Britain?s General Medical Council finding that Wakefield had acted unethically in conducting the research that led to his original 1998 paper linking vaccines with autism. These two events should be the final nails in the coffin of Wakefield?s research, which has been increasingly questioned as time passes and no other links between autism and vaccines can be found.
Science may disagree with him, but at least he?s got starlets on his side. Jenny McCarthy still believes in Wakefield, and she thinks you should, too. Motherlode ran a guest post from a mom whose child suffers from autism a few weeks ago about why you shouldn?t.
Like the snake-oil salesmen of yesteryear, they offering suffering families a false hope of a fast, easy cure to a terrible illness. Most kids won?t be helped by their methods though, and their antics distract from the real, slow, boring work being done by doctors and scientists.
Some of that science has also been published this week, showing a link between advanced maternal age and autism.
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Via Strollerderby.
Re: Of course she does.
Crap...I Mean Crafts
Wasn't her son "cured" by a low-to-no-sugar and no glutten diet or something like that?
I've said it before - I must be autistic. I've got serious quirks and I was fully immunized.
Yes, TT. She has her son on a strict diet, and she claims that he's "cured."
I'm willing to bet that her son is still considered on the spectrum, but is maybe more high-functioning than he was as a small child. From what I've read, it's fairly normal for Autistic children to become more high-functioning as they grow up. So the improvements that people like Jenny McCarthy attribute to gluten free diets, etc. are more likely just a natural part of the kid maturing.
Crap...I Mean Crafts
I (obviously) don't know what goes through that woman's head, but I'll take a stab at this.
I think a lot of parents feel some degree of irrational guilt. Even when we know it's irrational. There was a post last week on 6-12 about preemie moms feeling guilt for not carrying their babies longer. (Well, it started as a post about adjusted age in people's tickers, which of course devolved into drama.) Some moms blame the sushi or lunchmeat they ate for their kid's birth defect. I felt bad when I gave DD my cold. A lot of parents feel a huge amount of responsibility (EK excluded) and thus, when things go wrong, blame themselves to some degree.
So I think JM is so fvkking rabid about vaccines b/c if she blames them, then she is, by definition, not at fault. Even though no one was blaming her to begin with. If it even crossed her mind to wonder whether she couldn't have prevented it, then vaccination provided a scapegoat so she could let herself off the hook. So now she'll go to crazy lengths to protect this theory of hers, even when it's so obviously false.