Bad Astronomy, Penn and Teller, etc.

[HungLikeJesus]

The Bad Astronomy blog is written by Phil Plait and published by Discover Magazine. Through the blog, Phil Plait discusses science, and he also takes on bad science.

Here Penn and Teller discuss vaccination. Well, Teller doesn't say much.




In this article, Plait discusses how photons from an exploding cruise missile can set a plane on fire. The article includes cool pictures of things exploding.

Lots of interesting stuff. I've subscribed to the e-mail feed for a few years.

[Happy Monkey]

Plait has a new show - Bad Universe. Sort of a science-specific Mythbusters. The first episode had lots of explosions, but I was hoping for a bit more. I'll give it a few more chances, as his blog is excellent.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by HungLikeJesus

Here Penn and Teller discuss vaccination.

Drama is so cute. My best count shows about 35-38 pins still standing on the right hand side. I had no idea that 65% of all children died prior to the 1950s. Those are some very sobering numbers indeed.

[HungLikeJesus]

Or perhaps Teller's just not a very good bowler.

He should probably have only taken out about 30 to 40%, but that depends on the age range we're considering.

[jinx]

"Which it fucking doesn't"

He must have missed the interview with Dr. Julie Gerberding, former director of the CDC, admitting that yes, it does. Funny skit though.

"Go ahead! Look it up! I know you won't bother..."
Izzard

[HungLikeJesus]

Is that Dr. Julie Gerberding, the president of Merck's Vaccine division?

[jinx]

Yes, the same.

[HungLikeJesus]

Originally Posted by jinx

...
He must have missed the interview with Dr. Julie Gerberding, former director of the CDC, admitting that yes, it does. Funny skit though.

"Go ahead! Look it up! I know you won't bother..."
Izzard

I can't find it. Need more clues, please.

[jinx]

[jinx]

"children that have a rare, mitochondrial disorder"

Mitochondrial dysfunction, impaired oxidative-reduction activity,
degeneration, and death in human neuronal and fetal cells induced by
low-level exposure to thimerosal and other metal compounds

[HungLikeJesus]

Interesting. Do they still use that?

[jinx]

At all? Yes. You could easily look up in which products.

[Lamplighter]

Originally Posted by jinx

"children that have a rare, mitochondrial disorder"

Mitochondrial dysfunction, impaired oxidative-reduction activity,
degeneration, and death in human neuronal and fetal cells induced by
low-level exposure to thimerosal and other metal compounds

Jinx, I'm sorry, I don't know how to deal with this reference,
other than to say that the actual research in the article sited above
has no direct connection to autism.
The authors mention their own study in the Introduction (literature review),
and while discussing some other articles about toxicity studies in cell lines,
and again later in their Acknowledgment (of funding) and the References.
There is no reference cited to connect cell line data with patients diagnosed with ADs

As an example I quote:

Additionally, the effects induced by Thimerosal in the present study, as well as from previous studies
(Deth et al. 2008; Herdman et al. 2006; Humphrey et al. 2005;
James et al. 2005; Parran et al. 2005; Waly et al. 2004; Yel et al. 2005),
are consistent with recently emerging evidence documenting the brain pathophysiology present in patients diagnosed with ADs.

Their actual research is done only with 3 cell lines (kinds of cells in tissue culture),
and their cell lines are NOT from patients with any of the diseases that they discuss.
No patients with any of these diseases was involved in this study.

This was a simple toxicity study of how much (Thimerosal)
it takes to cause toxicity (mitochondial-dysfunction) or cytology (visual) changes.
You can do the same kind of study with many other chemicals, and get similar results.
All the authors say is that their data "is consistent with" ....

The authors, themselves, to not attempt to equate their results
with any kind of direct cause-and-effect with autism,
or with patients with the rare mitochondrial diseases
mentioned in their literature review.

While I do have my own beliefs about the usefulness of tissue culture studies in medical research
and about the causality of vaccination and autism, I won't get into any of that here.
It has been discussed endlessly on TV and probably here in The Cellar.

I apologize for being so blunt.

[Clodfobble]

When they are actually tested, a huge percentage of children with autism are found to have mitochondrial dysfunction (see below for relevant references.) Of course, the only people who will test them for this are the people who believe in the vaccination connection. Everyone else says, "No, we won't run a test for mitochondrial dysfunction, because we know your child has autism, not mitochondrial dysfunction." And when autistic individuals are confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt to have mitochondrial dysfunction (e.g. Hannah Poling,) suddenly it becomes evidence that they never had autism to begin with.




Pastural E, et al. Novel plasma phospholipid biomarkers of autism: Mitochondrial dysfunction as a putative causative mechanism. Prostaglandins Leukot Essent Fatty Acids. 2009 Oct;81(4):253-64.

Clark-Taylor T, Clark-Taylor BE. Is autism a disorder of fatty acid metabolism? Possible dysfunction of mitochondrial beta-oxidation by long chain acyl-CoA dehydrogenase. Med Hypotheses 62(6): 970-5.

Filipek PA, Juranek J, et al. Mitochondrial dysfunction in autistic patients with 15q inverted duplication. Ann Neurol 53(6): 801-4, 2003.

Fillano JJ, Goldenthal MJ, et al. Mitochondrial dysfunction in patients with hypotonia, epilepsy, autism, and developmental delay: HEADD syndrome. J Child Neurol 17(6): 435-9., 2002.

Gargus JJ, Imtiaz F. Mitochondrial energy-deficient endophenotype in autism. Am J Biochem Biotechnol 4(2): 198-207, 2008.

Holtzman D. Autistic spectrum disorders and mitochondrial encephalopathies. Acta Paediatr.2008 Jul;97(7):859-60.

Lerman-Sagie T, et al. Should autistic children be evaluated for mitochondrial disorders. J Child Neurol 19(5): 379-81, 2004.

Lombard, J. Autism: a mitochondrial disorder? Med Hypotheses 50(6): 497-500, 1998

Oliveira G, Diogo L, et al. Mitochondrial dysfunction in autism spectrum disorders: a population-based study. Dev Med Child Neurol 47(3): 185-9, 2005.

Palmieri L, et al. Altered calcium homeostasis in autism-spectrum disorders: evidence from biochemical and genetic studies of the mitochondrial aspartate/glutamate carrier AGC1. Mol Psychiatry. 2010 Jan;15(1):38-52.

Palmieri L, Persico AM. Mitochondrial dysfunction in autism spectrum disorders: Cause or effect? Biochim Biophys Acta. 2010 May.

Poling JS, et al. Developmental regression and mitochondrial dysfunction in a child with autism. J Child Neurol 21(2): 170-2, 2006.

Pons R, Andreu AL, et al. Mitochondrial DNA abnormalities and autistic spectrum disorders. J Pediatr 144(1): 81-5, 2004.

Ramoz N, Reichert JG, et al. Linkage and association of the mitochondrial aspartate/glutamate carrier SLC25A12 gene with autism. Am J Psychiatry 161(4): 662-9, 2004.

Rossignol DA, Bradstreet JJ. Evidence of mitochondrial dysfunction in autism and implications for treatment. A J Biochem Biotechnol 4(2): 208-217, 2008.

Segurado R, Conroy J, et al. Confirmation of association between autism and the mitochondrial aspartate/glutamate carrier SLC25A12 gene on chromosome 2q31. Am J Psychiatry 162(11): 2182-4, 2005.

Silverman JM, Buxbaum JD, et al. Autism-related routines and rituals associated with a mitochondrial aspartate/glutamate carrier SLC25A12 polymorphism. Am J Med Genet B Neuropsychiatr Genet, 2007.

Shoffner J, et al. Fever Plus Mitochondrial Disease Could Be Risk Factors for Autistic Regression. J Child Neurol. 2009 Sep 22.

Smith M, Spence MA, Flodman P. Nuclear and mitochondrial genome defects in autisms. Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 1151:102–132, 2009.

Weissman JR, et al. Mitochondrial disease in autism spectrum disorder patients: a cohort analysis.PLoS ONE.2008;3(11):e3815.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by HungLikeJesus

He should probably have only taken out about 30 to 40%, but that depends on the age range we're considering.

No, according to the National Institute for Health, the childhood infectious disease death rate was already at .25% by 1910 (yes, that decimal is in the right place.) By 1920 that number had dropped to .15%, and it was down to .02% by 1950. That's 1 in 5000, back in 1950.

They also acknowledge that the current rate has not dropped at all since 1986, despite the fact that approximately two-thirds of the current vaccination schedule was added after 1986.