----- Original Message ----- From: "Gary Denton" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Killer Bs Discussion" <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, June 21, 2005 1:01 AM Subject: Re: Cover-up or protection?
On 6/20/05, Dan Minette <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > So, does anyone know if the diagnosis of autism has fallen off by, say, 80% > over the last few years? I'd guess that, if that happened, someone would > have noticed. I am wondering if Robert Kennedy Jr. engaged in a bit of overstating his case. Autism was defined before thimerosal was in use. The linking of children's vaccines to autism was widely rumored for years and dismissed as email based conspiracy theory. >The main element of his story, the evidence of a CDC cover-up, looks >pretty impressive. Given a presupposition towards the view that anything that helps corporations in any way must be against the public interest, I can see that. But, I asked the question, "what would have happened if the CDC made a public announcement that they were looking into the link?" Would a number of people decide to not vaccinate their kids? Would lawyers be able to convince juries that someone with autism who had taken a vaccine had the right to a settlement in the tens of millions? Would the few remaining vaccine makers (IIRC, there is only 1-2 flu vaccine manufacturers in the world), decide that the modest profits available to them are no longer worth the risk? What are the odds that the study would be reproduced....or would it be like all those power line claims....which people still believe in, scientific studies be damned. Given that Kennedy's claim is easily falsified by the data, I'd tend to wonder if the CDC ordered study that did take pace is really valid....it's just that they couldn't convince every lawyer, like RFK Jr., of that. What exactly is wrong with Institute of Medicine Study? How does a lawyer tell good science apart from bad? Why trust him as a source when his claims are trivial to falsify? >I have heard some people saying they thought locally that autism cases >had plateaued or were even dropping in the last couple of years. They >were attributing it to bad economic times for nerds. "Hearing some people say" is not a valid scientific study. :-) Dan M. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
