(late night, my edits of grammar from google translate might be wobbly. Link to original news story at the end).

“No link between mercury and autism
3. September 2003 10:09

A Danish research team can be the first in the world finds no link between mercury in vaccines and autism in children.

On the contrary, as the number of children with autism rose after mercury in vaccines was removed.

Mercury was used as a preservative in vaccines.

Surprising result
The researchers had decided that they would investigate allegations that mercury compound thimerosal, which has been used to preserve vaccines, can increase the risk of children developing autism.

But instead of finding a decrease in the incidence of autism since thimerosal was phased out of childhood vaccines, the result was the opposite. The number of children who were diagnosed with autism rose.

Research Fellow Kreesten Madsen of the Department of Epidemiology and Social Medicine at Aarhus University has led the study, published in the American medical periodical Pediatrics.

He believes that the rise in autism could be because we are getting better at diagnosis and that altogether there has have been more focus on the disorder.

Mercury until 1990
This study is based on information from Danish registries for vaccines and psychiatric diagnoses.

956 children in Denmark were diagnosed with autism in the years 1971 to 2000.

Until 1990, when thimerosal was used in Danish vaccines, there was no increase in the incidence of autism.

But from 1991 more and more children were diagnosed with autism.

Denmark was the first country in the 1992 phase out thimerosal as a preservative in vaccines.

No mercury in vaccines umbrella
Thimerosal was used in Denmark for only two childhood vaccines, di-te-pol and the Hib vaccine, which protects against meningitis.

Thimerosal has never been used in the umbrella MMR vaccine, because it would destroy the vaccine.

Kreesten Madsen and his colleagues could a year ago to publish an investigation of links between MMR vaccine and autism.

It built on more than half a million children, and it could not demonstrate any increased risk by being vaccinated.”

So clearly, the discussion should have ended in 2003. Right?

http://www.dr.dk/Nyheder/Indland/2003/09/03/100914.htm

http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.1000114

Any Torchwood fans out there that agree?

But one huge mistake, in my view, was Tony Blair’s refusal to disclose whether his own son had had the vaccine. He claimed it was a matter of personal privacy but once the media started speculating he should have swallowed that pride and just said “Yes, he had it”. Because as it stands it looked to everyone like he hadn’t (and maybe he hadn’t, we don’t know) and that was a PR disaster for MMR.

…Along with the rise in the belief that flu shots cause the flu or can result in debilitation or even death. These risk factors are miniscule compared to the benefits, but media hype and random rumor abound.

New York just passed a law requiring flu vaccination for all health care workers with patient contact, and already I’ve heard employees and even nurses saying they will try to find a way to avoid vaccination due to these concerns. Strangely, these are the same people that are on expensive extract supplements for cholesterol. If this kind of thinking can persist in a health care environment, we are REALLY doing a poor job of getting the right information out there.

Thanks Dr. Novella!