Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Link Between Autism and Vaccines Makes It To The Supreme Court

The link between vaccines and autism in children returns to the courtroom this week. The judicial discussion has become a interest of mine as I learn more about autism and it's unfortunate attack on children. In my post, "Federal Court Rules: There Is No Link Between Autism and Vaccine", I spoke about the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on upholding that there is no connection between vaccines and autism in children. A ruling for Cedillo v. Secretary of Health and Human Services. The issue appears again now in the Supreme Court on behalf of the parents of a girl who allegedly suffered serious health problems from a childhood vaccine. The justices are hearing arguments from the couple, attempting to persuade them to allow the manufacturer of the vaccine to be sued.

This case could open drug makers to a flood of lawsuits over the side effects of vaccines, including those from families of autistic children claiming that mercury-based thimerosal is linked to autism. Numerous studies have addressed vaccines and autism and found no link as in Cedillo v. Secretary of Health and Human Services. I will continue to follow this issue and keep you all up to date.

My Opinion: I think it sucks if your child all of a sudden gets autistic out of the blue and there is no one to suffer for it. It seems as mothers especially, when something happens to our children we want somebody to pay. It's just that mother bear instinct I guess.

4 comments:

  1. I absolutely agree with your opinion! I remember being stuck in the rain at a bus stop with a researcher on autism when I was still at UCLA, and he said that symptoms do not manifest until a child is usually past 1 years of age.

    Is a mother's anger over autism augmented by the fact that she loses the child she thought she had? Angry that she had a "normal" child for a year, but s/he is now gone? So that her grief is greater than the mother of a child with Down's Syndrome, which can be detected while in utero?

    I would hate to think that it is an existential inability to grapple with grief that is the cause of all this hoopla.

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  2. Thanks for your comment, Jenn. I think it has an a great deal to do with our inability to grapple with the grief. When a child has autism, it is equal to a loss. It's as if the essence of the child you knew, dies. You have to re-learn thier personalities again, in addition to the special schooling and attention. Some mothers even have to quit their jobs and home school. I think that something or someone should take the blame. But the courts are just sorting through where the cause lies and where to place it. The pharmaceutical companies can of course afford more experts and counsel, so we both know what that means.

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  3. There is all this debate about whether vaccinations are the cause of autism. Sure there may be evidence to show that autism appeared after a vaccination, but there is also evidence that suggests vaccinations aren't the MAIN culprit.
    Link between vaccines and autism

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  4. I cried or screamed at the tv through most of this debate. Today, I'm equally heartbroken. The news just posted a new rate of autism 1:50. How long before its every child? And equally as frustrating: why does simple medicine get recalled immediately if just a few people report negative reactions yet the vaccines that parents and even some health care profesionals are screaming this damaged or killed my child/ loved one, gets to keep being administered. If it were anything else, the FDA would have pulled it, maybe even permanently. Absolutely disgusting and heartbreaking.

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