Overloaded? Mercury and Autism
A few weeks ago I posted on a study that suggested a blood test may predict autism. This related to glutathione, a chemical in the body that is vital for detoxing the body of heavy metals. Mercury is a heavy metal so this is an important step forward in the mercury / autism debate.
You can find an in-depth and comprehensive article entitled Overloaded? New Science, new insights about mercury and autism in susceptible children over on the Environmental Working Group web site. Their site also has a tuna calculator that tells you how much tuna you eat a week without risk of heavy metal poisoning. It has extra advice for young child and women planning to have children. There is also a whole section on mercury in seafood.
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September 7th, 2005
Autism, Food and Drink, Web/Tech
Comments on: Overloaded? Mercury and Autism
My first thought as I was going through “Overloaded” was DUH!! It seems very obvious to me that mercury in vaccines doesn’t cause autism in every child that is vaccinated (otherwise all children that received vaccinations would be autistic – duh!)
How the IOM can say with a straight face that there is no connection between mercury (or other environmental toxins) and autism if they’ve not taken into account this very basic fact is beyond me. (If I had turned in an experiment report like that back in school, I’d have likely flunked.)
I don’t know if there is a connection or not, but it is in everyone’s interest to find out one way or another. The sooner we know what causes autism, the sooner we can figure out the best way to approach treatment, cure, whatever.
Posted by: Brett September 7th, 2005 at 10:40 pm
It does seem obvious that if we don’t know if there is a link between autism and mercury then we should try and find it out. But certain aspects of the scientific community and government seem to believe that if an idea doesn’t fit into their model of the world then it can’t be true.
On the flipside, it may be coincidence that autism appears to start at around 18 months, the same age that children get vacinated.
One problem is that we lump all autistic children together under one very loose diagnosis. Maybe we should start refering to ‘Mercury Enabled Autism’, ‘Congential Autism’ and ‘We Have No Idea Why Autism’.
Posted by: Chris Tregenza September 8th, 2005 at 8:54 am
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