Sorry Larissa sarcasm doesn’t translate into text!

Thanks for clearing that up, Jax

Jax, that would only be the case if Autism was an infection which your immune system could fight. They give you a small dose of the flu so your immune system can become accustom to fighting the flu virus. Autism is not an infection.

Jax, you should really use your /sarcasm font next time.

How cruel to inflict a man made disease on other species.
Autism didn’t exist a few years ago.
Now one in every 100 US children have it. (and one in every 60 boys)
If it increases at this pace one in every 2 children will have it within a few short years.
There will be not enough resources and money in the world to deal with that crisis (without even taking into account all of the other diseases birth defects etc)
Yet all big pharma want to do is start another profit war and keep the general public in the dark.
There are obvious factors that are increasing the cases of Autism, terminal diseases and birth defects etc in humans that every simple farmer and true animal lover understands.

Here are some cases where Autism seemed to have been reversed.
For anyone concerned, it would be worth while contacting the practitioners and therapists who handled the cases.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwuyxyBUmwY

First diagnosis was 1943. It didn’t mean autism didn’t exist before this, it just means that it was formally recognised. It’s only recently recognised as a spectrum disorder which is why more kids are diagnosed. There is no epidemic and it’s not a man made disease..in fact it’s not a disease at all. It’s a different way of being.

John Neary, as a child I had many in my school who were called “simple”. My parents generation the same. I think if you truly check history you will find that surprisingly the incidence of “simple” has massively decreased as modern science and psychiatry is able to give “simple” a real diagnosis. But hey who cares about facts, let’s all go buy some tin foil hats. Hey sure did you know epilepsy is also man made? Yes, thousands of years ago it didn’t exist. Although back then the incidence of people thrashing around with demonic possession was much higher, I’ll grant you that.

Autism has always existed. You should do some research before posting.

Autism does not occur in animals.
Only the unfortunate ones that humans tamper with, like the unfortunate Monkeys in the article.

Simple does not equal Autism John.

Please provide your research that Autism always existed Denise.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qR6aDkVjYY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=426tIOS3Jdk
(No monkeys were tampered with in the making of these videos)

YouTube is not the same as research.

These are brave children, parents, practitioners and therapists who have managed to reverse Autism and who have decided to share their stories via youtube.
Why would anyone have an issue with that?

I know it’s not exactly a study sponsored by a pharmaceutical company that sells patented toxic chemicals (with severe side effects) for profits.
Or Scientist who intentionally molest monkeys and other animals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yn4SBNSkg4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XimasKn9Bmo

Again Johnneary, anecdotes are not research. If a drug company told you an anecdote I’m sure you wouldn’t trust it, because “big pharma” etc.

Without anecdotes we would no longer exist John.
Crooked self certified pharma “research” has little to no use to humankind, only it’s demise.

What’s your issue with a people who reversed a condition (that Big Pharma have declared as incurable) sharing an anecdote?
Anecdote “a short amusing or interesting story about a real incident or person”.

I have and continue to study the subject and it is a commonly held belief that autism had always existed in humans. I am currently reading Steve Silberman’s Neurotribes for example, which impeccably researches the history of autism. He begins with Henry Cavendish aka the Wizard of Clapham Common or the man who weighed the world, in the 18th century. I can bombard you with links to studies if you like but I think you are not willing to accept the fact that it had always existed and without individuals with autism, we would be living in a vastly different and

Less technogically advanced world.

Your ‘research’ on the other hand, is basically quackery! Trying to reverse autism is like trying to reverse the colour of a person’s eyes, or their sexual preferences. It proves that autism awareness and education has a very long way to go! It is a neruological difference, not a disease to be cured. I do not for one moment believe any of those brave parents who claim to have reverses their child’s autism. I know families who have spent tens and hundreds of thousands of euro doing just that, only to eventually give up abd finally accept their child. How damaging must that be for a child?

Also, have you got proof that autism doesn’t exist in animals?

Are you trying to insult and discredit the children in the many testimonials?
They were all diagnosed by allopathic/conventional medical profession to have autism, and got the all clear from the same allopathic/conventional medical profession after they reversed their Autism.
Would it not be better to investigate what these people have done right rather than label them Quacks and cry in support frankenstein experiments on such a beautiful intelligent species?

Ask anyone with autism, related to or connected to someone with autism and ask them if they “more or less accept” there will never be treatment.

We should never accept that something will be impossible forever!

How many times have we said that in last 100 years and then find something we all thought never possible.

I for one will always live in hope that one day there will be a massive breakthrough for sufferers and those connected to help ease the affects on and don’t think anyone should give up.

Fintolini, I have a child with aurism and I accept that he will always be autistic. There you go.

Fintolini, I too have a son with autism and I accept him 100%. I accept that there is no cure because there is nothing wrong with him.

Thanks, Donnachain, you put it much better than me.

Wow…. Where did I say that you shouldn’t accept your child with autism?

I have a son with autism, I 100% accept him.

What I don’t accept is that there may never be a form of treatment available to him if he wishes to help aid him in life. Autism, at least for my son will limit his opportunities in life, do I want him to have every opportunity in life, of course I do. That was my point, nothing else.

If some parents don’t want that, that’s ok, but don’t assume there are not many parents who do.

Fintolini, that is fair enough, I am sure we all want to make it easier for our children to navigate a neurotypical world. But words like “treatment” and “sufferers” imply they are broken and need fixing for this world to accept them. The aim is to make the rest of the world to meet them half way and also accept them, as different but not broken.

In fairness, if the monkeys knew the possible benefits of this, I’m not entirely sure they wouldn’t volunteer for it. Seriously though… while it’s sad for the monkeys, it’s sort of necessary and i think the end may justify the means.

If your anti this then you shouldn’t take medicines or look for treatment for any disease you suffer from as most research is done this way….. Otherwise your a hypocrite

They ARE killing the monkeys, after they subject them to horrific vivisection studies. Google monkey brain experiments if you want to see what will happen these macaques with autism. And yes, I know a lot of medicines currently require animal testing, but there are more ethical alternatives and we should be pushing for those instead.

What are the more ethical alternatives Ross?

http://animalresearch.thehastingscenter.org/facts-sheets/alternatives-to-animals/

Also, within animal testing, there is the principle of replacement, reduction and refinement to avoid unnecessary cruelty. Unfortunately, most companies are under no pressure to follow this principle and govts don’t force them to. Resulting in cruelty and needless deaths well beyond what is needed for their studies

Ross, in that link that you provided pretty much every alternative which would be relevant to the study of Autism has a note attached which says that the results would still need to be confirmed through animal testing.

In this case, there is no alternative.

Jason, more ethical alternatives can mean the choice to test on 10 macaques after other avenues are explored, or testing on 200 to cut time and costs. The needless cruelty and death is the main ethical issue. In a country like China, with their terrible human rights record, you can only imagine how little value is place on a macaques life or tolerance of pain. If a way to treat autism arrives, then great, but we should all make sure that is by the most ethical way possible- that after all is the ‘humane’ way
https://www.ahc.umn.edu/rar/ethics.html

A professor from the University College London said “this is a potentially very important scientific development…[but ]there are also significant welfare issues. These would need to be taken into account in assessing the future of this research programme”

It’s a hard to know really if it’s totally okay to use animals this way but we do need to discover how to possibly prevent or treat Autism.

The alternatives suggested by those animal cruelty organizations are universally performed in all research but come before the step of animal testing. Can anyone against animal research truly say yes to their doctor who wants to try and test a new drug when he/she says “we tested it on some cells in a jar”.

yes it is disgusting. But absolutely necessary. You know animals do some awful things to each-other. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzwbOZKfrUQ

So your against it, but quite happy to benefit from it… hmmmmm…

As I said, I do my homework on the companies!

If you were against it you wouldn’t accept the medicines… You like to think your against it because it seems like a good thing to do or looks good written down.. in reality your like the rest of us and you don’t really care where medicines come from as long as they do the job

Mark Ryan, just because one recognizes that animal testing might be a necessary ‘evil’ doesn’t mean one has to applaud it.

Mark Ryan, just because one recognizes that animal testing might be a necessary ‘evil’ doesn’t mean one has to applaud it

Chantelle, it’s an unfortunate fact that this sort of experimentation is highly effective. They can study the live effects of the disease and develop possible treatments in a timely manner without the need for human experimentation.

In this case the ends really do justify the means.

Mark, if drug companies want to test their drugs on animals because its cheaper than more ethical alternative tests, then that’s not the consumers fault. If there were similar drugs that were ethical then the consumer would have a choice. To make choice available, govt laws can urge drug companies to adopt ethical testing more urgently and we should all be urging this to happen.
It’s not as simple as ‘if you’re against it, don’t take the drugs’

Mark, you don’t know the first thing about me so, please don’t make assumptions. Please and thank you.

You shouldn’t be a hypocrite either larissa… That’s the stance your taking, your either against something or your not… Going online and saying you don’t like it is pointless…. It would be like 5 people in a room getting treated for cancer and one standing up to tell the others how much they are against the medicine

@ross or the people who buy the drugs could refuse to use them to send a message… I just hate this faux outrage from people who don’t really care but think it’s looks good to post up that they do. If these experiments leads to cures for cancer etc then they are worth it

Feels strongly, so you would like it to be different but your happy to avail of benefits of current experiments.. That’s a little bit more clear on your position

Mark, it is real outrage from people who do care but have no choice. It’s not like deciding not to buy a Mars bar. For some people, deciding to boycott drugs means death. You can only imagine being in that kind of position and how hard a choice it is to make. However they decide, they still have a right to complain about the manufacture of the drugs, just as they’d have a right to complain about the cost of the drugs.

Nope, again.. You are not getting what I’m saying but reading between the lines.

What choice would you make ross?

I am chantelle. Your happy with yourself that you don’t agree with the testing it and that fact makes you feel better about using any of the treatments which are provided by the testing…

Mark, I make conscious decisions about products when I can. In regards to meds in general, I know they all would have been tested on animals, I know there are years between clinical trials and meds being sold to people BUT I am dead set against it!! Hopefully we’re nearing a time where testing on animals comes to an end. Science is amazing! So finding other ways to do clinical trials shouldn’t be that hard when you look at what they can do now, there’s no excuse! I’ve learned a lot in recent months about regenerative medicine and in what they can do with stem cells, tissue engineering etc

Very well explained Chantelle, unfortunately some people do not have the cognitive ability to see the complexity of the issues involved.

C O’Neill….read up on a term called ‘dosage’.
Fascinating stuff.

They stopped using thimerosal (the preservative that contains mercury and that kicked all this off) in vaccines in the US in 2001, just in case. Still waiting to see the drop in autism rates in young kids due to this “prevention” strategy…

15 years down the line, it is fairly safe to say that the link between autism and ethyl mercury has been completely debunked.

My primary job duties while working in the Immunization Safety Branch from 2000 to ’06 were lead or co-lead three major vaccine safety studies—the MADDSP MMR Autism Cases Control study was being carried out in response to the Wakefield Lancet study that suggested an association between the MMR vaccine and an autism-like health outcome. There were several major concerns among scientists and consumer advocates outside the CDC in the fall of 2000 regarding the execution of the Verstraeten study. One of the important goals that was determined up front in the spring of ’01 before any of these studies started, was to have all three protocols vetted outside the CDC prior to the start of the analyses so that consumer advocates could not claim that we were presenting analyses that presented our own goals and biases. We hypothesized that if we found statistically significant effects at either 18 or 36 month thresholds, we would conclude that vaccinating children early with MMR could lead to autism-like characteristics or features. We all met and finalized the study protocol and analysis plan. The goal was to not deviate from the analysis plan to avoid the debacle that occurred with the Verstraeten thimerosal study published in Pediatrics in ’03. At the September 5th meeting, we discussed in detail how to code race for both the sample and the birth certificate sample. At the bottom of Table 7 it also shows that for the non-birth certificate sample, the adjusted race effect statistical significance was huge. All the authors and I met and decided sometime between August and September ’02 not to report any race effects for the paper. Sometime soon after the meeting, we decided to exclude reporting any race effects, the co-authors scheduled a meeting to destroy documents related to the study. The remaining four co-authors all met and brought a big garbage can into the meeting room and reviewed and went through all the hard copy documents that we had thought we should discard and put them in a huge garbage can. However, because I assumed it was illegal and would violate both FOIA and DOJ requests, I kept hard copies of all documents in my office and I retained all associated computer files. I believe we intentionally withheld controversial findings from the final draft of the Pediatrics paper. (quote from Dr. William Thompson of the CDC) – See more at: http://healthimpactnews.com/2015/will-cdc-whistleblower-on-vaccines-testify-before-congress/#sthash.w5cTEdH6.dpuf

Kids here judge without even reading the material or looking at the videos. If Dr Andrew Wakefield is proven to be correct the entire system would be shamed. He appears to be a very genuine person driven by altruistic concerns. Red thumbs on the Journal are usually an expression of ignorance by the ignorant. His campaign has beeb ongoing for some time and to dismiss him completely could be disastrous.

Pathetic.

he won’t ever be proven to be correct though,will he? no other scientists could replicate his findings. there are probably children dead because of this doctor and his fraudulent study.

I used what you call conditioning with my son when he was younger. I avoided punishment but I am well aware it cause him, me, and my entire family great anguish at the time. However, it was in his best interest and with his long-term happiness and comfort in mind. His life would be so completely different now and significantly more limited had he been left to his own devices. He can enjoy concerts, regular screening at the cinema, crowds, flashing lights, eating out, traveling. Just a few of the things he loves to do but would never have been able to if I had taken the option of not trying to help him within with what you would call a nurotypical world but we(my son and me) just call the world. Denying him that because it makes you uncomfortable would be cruel.

Carol, I never suggested not helping. There is a big difference between helping and classical conditioning. A conditioned response is not the same thing as a voluntary response. I believe that the type of conditioning involved in ABA is counter productive. A child’s response to a stimulus like flashing lights might change over time. You cannot teach a child to accept something that causes him great pain and suffering without causing more pain and suffering.

Leo, no offence but you are talking rubbish. Do not presume to tell me about my son’s suffering. I’ve lived with him for 21 years. You’ve never met him. My own version of ABA was literally life changing in a positive way for him. As ABA has been for many autistic children. I get a sense you’re on the spectrum from the way you refer to the nurotypical world. You views are typically insular. If I had listened to anyone like you years ago, my lad would have a very different and vastly more difficult life today.

Is that any way to address somebody who you think is on the spectrum? Do you think that it is acceptable to insult somebody that you just suspect of having a developmental disorder. It would appear that you had one attitude toward typically developing children and another toward those with autism. There are many people who are not just happy but quite proud of their autistic traits. In spite of your claims you appear to know very little about autism in general. There is a saying that if you have met one person with autism then you have met one person with autism. It is not a disease, it is just a different way of thinking. No two people are the same.

Leo, I don’t understand why you say there is no such thing as an autistic gene etc and then go on to talk about behavioural therapy. What is the connection?

Do you know what is like to experience pain like darts piercing your eyes when you see certain lights? Do you know what it is like to hear the screams of everybody in a crowded room when they are just talking? Do you know the pain involved in hearing a car or a burglar alarm? Did you ever experience pain so bad that you had to cover your ears to try and stop your head from exploding? Do you know what it is like to listen to somebody ask you a question and not understand what they have said until 10 minutes or 10 hours have passed? Do you know what is like to look at somebody stare at you like an idiot just because you have just repeated their question that you have not understood? Do you know what it is like for somebody to tell you how to behave when you are screaming in agony, screaming for help?

Miss, What I am saying is that no individual gene has been identified as a gene that causes autism. It is thought that it may be influenced by several or a combination of several genes. There is help available, my gripe is with behavioural therapy such as ABA. The outcome might appear as though the person with autism is behaving naturally just like a neurotypical person. This is not a cure but it gives the impression that the person with autism has been successfully transformed. Depending on the delivery method, this can cause great stress to the person under treatment. ABA has been refined and is not as bad as it once was. Is such a therapy designed for the good of the patient or is it designed to make others feel more comfortable?

Oh Leo, I have not met one person with Autism, I have met hundreds. I’ve never had an attitude with any except those small few who have tried to silence parents or tried to make them feel bad about helping their children with ABA. Autism is hard enough to live with without someone(anyone autistic or not) trying to make parents ashamed about ABA. You have the right, of course, to be happy with your autism and even be proud. What you cannot do is tell others who are also living with Autism and who are not happy or proud that they cannot or should not seek means of making their loved one’s life easier. You don’t need to educate me on Autism either. I didn’t call it a disease. You must understand that many with Autism would die without full-time care. People like my son who are incapable of caring for themselves ever. That “different way of thinking” would mean certain death in terms of evolution for many. So I do hope one day for some sort of a cure for those who want or need it. Lastly, autism doesn’t protect you from criticism. If you can articulate a comment as you have, you are capable of debating that comment.

There is an online course on anthropology at https://www.open2study.com It might help you understand evolution. You are misrepresenting everything that I have said. I will just put it down to your lack of understanding.