SCOTTISH PARENTS DENIED ACCESS TO AUTISM REPORTS
Wednesday, October 22, 2003 (13:50:55)

Posted by sylvia

Glasgow UK - Sunday Herald, 24/08/2003

Studies quoted by the Scottish Executive as evidence of the safety of vaccines containing mercury - linked by some studies to autism in children - are being withheld from the public.

"Factsheets" issued by the Committee on Safety of Medicines to those concerned about research which suggests that vaccines containing mercury can trigger autism in some children claim that two new studies prove that the jabs are safe. But these studies have not been scrutinised by independent experts as part of the peer review process, which all scientific studies must go through to be considered valid.

Autism campaigners have accused the Executive of arrogance for telling parents to "just take their word" that the jabs are safe. The diphtheria, tetanus, and whooping cough vaccine (DTwP), which contains thimerosal - a mercury-based preservative - is given to hundreds of thousands of babies aged between two and four months every year.

Following research suggesting that mercury can cause autism in children, the Scottish Executive announced that parents would be allowed to choose mercury-free jabs for their babies. But parents have complained that they struggle to persuade doctors to administer the alternative jabs. The mercury-free vaccine, Infanrix, is more expensive.

The Scottish Executive has ruled out a ban on vaccines containing mercury. Dr Andrew Fraser, deputy chief medical officer, said the Executive was committed to finding mercury-free alternatives but that the government was still waiting for what it considered to be a "licensed, equally effective alternative" to become available, before banning vaccines containing thimerosal.

In answer to the question: "Are the levels of thimerosal in vaccines used in the UK safe?" the Scottish Executive says: "Two recent independent population-based studies involving over 100,000 children have examined this issue. These two studies specifically set out to assess the safety of thimerosal in vaccines used according to the UK childhood immunisation schedule. Both these studies produced very reassuring results. Neither found any link between thimerosal exposure from the UK childhood immunisation programme and developmental and behavioural disorders."

Bill Welsh, chairman of the group, Action Against Autism, and the grandfather of an autistic child, said: "This is astonishing arrogance. Basically they are saying: 'We cannot show you this evidence, but just take our word for it.' My understanding is that the use of unpublished studies is highly irregular and goes against a core scientific principle."

According to the CSM, one of the studies was funded by the World Health Organisation and Britain's Public Health Laboratory Service and used data from the General Practice Research Database. The other was funded by the Department of Health and used data from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Pregnancy and Childhood.

A spokeswoman added: "The studies haven’t been published. They have yet to be peer reviewed. This is confidential data and we are not in a position to be able to make it available. It is going to be published in due course."