Mercury out, autism rates still going up

A study, published in the Archives of General Psychiatry this week, looked at the number of cases of autism in California BEFORE thimerosal preservative was removed from the standard recommended vaccination series in 2001 and AFTER. Guess what? The rates of autism are still climbing in California. This is the same thing that Denmark found when they removed thimerosal preservative from their childhood vaccines back in 1992.

Anti-vaccine folks will try to argue the technical flaws in the study, blame the number of vaccines themselves and not the thimerosal, or state that there is still thimerosal preservative in flu vaccines offered to pregnant women.  We don't think any study will ever change their minds.

For everyone else, this is yet one more study that shows we've still got a problem with rising rates of autism and need to continue to aggressively search for the cause. It appears that thimerosal ain't it.

Comments

[wniles]

Autism is one of my worst nightmares. I had a flu shot in my 4th month of pregnancy and I'm not sure if it was thimerosal free, or not (I did, however, inform my GP of my pregnancy). How much of an effect will it have on my unborn child with regard to autism? Should I not have had the flu shot? I complete agree with vaccinations and will vaccinate my child, but this question is frightening me.