SafeMinds has developed a brochure providing information on the flu vaccine that is available to communicate the risks still posed by this thimerosal- containing vaccine. We encourage you to distribute this brochure in your doctor's office and other places you think people will pick up. Please feel free to download the file here or e-mail eksafeminds@gmail.com to receive copies of the brochure in the mail.

Fundraise for SafeMinds!
SafeMinds is a volunteer run organization. As such, we need your help to raise funds for critical research. We owe it to those children who have already been tragically injured not to give up on our research efforts. Interested in helping fundraise for this important cause through holding an event, volunteering, working with your company? Contact Elizabeth Kilpatrick at eksafeminds@gmail.com

SafeMinds Withdraws Support for Autism Research Strategic Plan, Asks Daschle to Investigate.

JANUARY 16, 2009 – In a highly unusual departure from procedure, government representatives to the Federal Interagency Autism Advisory Committee (IACC) voted this week against conducting studies on vaccine-autism research despite approval of the same studies at their prior meeting. The research was supported by numerous autism organizations and requested by IACC’s scientific work groups and Congress.  The maneuver to re-vote on the vaccine-autism studies was initiated by the IACC’s representative from the CDC and pushed through by the IACC Chair, Dr. Tom Insel, Director of the National Institute of Mental Health of NIH.

Read complete statement.

December 11, 2008 [rev 12-14-08]

RE: Concerns on IACC Strategic Plan Discussions

Dear Members of the IACC:
In November, several autism organizations sent a letter to IACC members which outlined concerns with the draft Strategic Plan for autism research. Most of these issues have been resolved with revised language submitted for consideration at the November 21 IACC meeting. However, the discussions and voting on the language raised several concerns, and we write again asking the
IACC to address them at the next meeting on December 12.

Read entire letter

NIH & AUTISM: A Case Study in Barriers to Progress in Environmental Medicine

Mark Blaxill, Sallie Bernard, Theresa Wrangham, SafeMinds

Introduction
Medical practice for chronic illnesses has been slow to integrate the etiological principle that most human disease has an environmental component. Chronic disease medicine emphasizes diagnosis, intervention after symptom onset, and finding "disease genes." The environmental health disciplines emphasize pollution reduction and environmental remediation. Neglect of environmental considerations in healthcare for specific diseases has negative consequences by perpetuating preventable conditions and hindering development of effective treatments.

Autism is a case in point. Autism spectrum disorders now affect 1 in 150 children and cost billions of dollars in lifetime care. Despite evidence of autism’s environmentally-induced underpinnings and resulting alterations in multiple organ systems that are not necessarily developmentally determined, a “brain disorder/genetic heritability” paradigm prevails. Autism healthcare continues to be managed by psychiatric/behavioral professionals who carry the assumption that autism is a lifelong condition requiring services centered around diagnosis, therapies, and behavioral interventions that have the goal to merely improve the functioning of a defective organism rather than promote the recovery of an injured child.

Read more (pdf)

Download poster

Public commentary on the Strategic Plan has begun and budgetary materials are available, on request (download 8/8/08 meeting slides and cost estimates). SafeMinds will issue an analysis of the continued disparity regarding the continued heavy funding of genetic/genomic studies and the lack of funding for environmental factor X gene interaction, vaccine specific research and the associated lack of expertise in the strategic planning process early next week. It is important that the public is aware of the opportunity to provide feedback to NIH and SafeMinds strongly encourages participation in this crucial stage of the process.

Responses will be accepted until September 30, 2008 via email to iacc@mail.nih.gov. Responses should be limited to two pages (approximately 1,000 words) and marked with the RFI identifier NOT-MH-08-021 in the subject line. The collected information will be reviewed by the IACC, may appear in reports, and shared publicly on the IACC website. Download the draft plan. Respondents are asked to organize their comments by sections of the draft Strategic Plan:
Introductory Material (including the Introduction, Vision Statement, Mission Statement, Core Values and Cross-Cutting Themes):

1. When Should I Be Concerned?
2. How Can I Understand What Is Happening?
3. What Caused This To Happen And Can This Be Prevented?
4. Which Treatments And Interventions Will Help?
5. Where Can I Turn For Services?
6. What Does The Future Hold?

Development Process for the IACC Strategic Plan for Autism Spectrum Disorder Research References

The next meeting of the Strategic Plan Implementation Workgroup addressing budgetary requirements will be held on September 10th. Register for 9/10 meeting. There is also a meeting of the IACC Subcommittee on Services scheduled for September 15th. Register for the 9/15 meeting.

The IACC Strategic Planning Work Group will meet on Friday, August 8th to discuss future budgetary requirements for the IACC Strategic Plan for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) Research. Workgroup findings will be forwarded to the IACC for consideration and discussion at the next committee meeting on November 21, 2008.

We urge the public to participate in this meeting. Your feedback is important to the process.

The workgroup meeting will be open to the public through a conference call phone number and a web presentation tool on the Internet. Individuals who participate using these electronic services and need special assistance, such as captioning of the conference call or other reasonable accommodations, should submit a request prior to the meeting.

Members of the public who participate using the conference call phone number will be able to listen to the meeting but will not be heard. There may be an opportunity for members of the public to submit written comments during the workgroup meeting through the web presentation tool. Submitted comments will be reviewed after the meeting. If you experience any technical problems with the conference call-in phone number or web presentation tool, please contact GoToWebinar at (800) 263-6317.

To attend this meeting, the following computing capabilities are required:

1. Internet Explorer 5.0 or later, Netscape Navigator 6.0 or later or Mozilla Firefox 1.0 or later;
2. Windows® 2000, XP Home, XP Pro, 2003 Server or Vista;
3. Stable 56k, cable modem, ISDN, DSL or better Internet connection;
4. Minimum of Pentium 400 with 256 MB of RAM (Recommended);
5. Java Virtual Machine enabled (Recommended).

Read details about public attendance

Read SafeMind's Letter to NIH

WXYZ.com Detroit Action News

Anchor Lead:
It’s the controversy that won’t go away. Is the skyrocketing rate of Autism in children due in any way to the mercury long contained in childhood vaccines? It’s an issue our chief investigative reporter Steve Wilson has stayed with from the start…and Steve will science ever answer this one?

Wilson Live Open:
It could happen one day but only if researchers keep looking… and with 1 in 150 children now diagnosed with Autism in this country—more than 100 new, young victims every single day—a lot of skeptical parents and others believe there’s a big incentive for industry and government to cover up the truth. 

To see which vaccines still include thimerosal, visit the website below:

http://www.vaccinesafety.edu/thi-table.htm

Tissue Bank for Developmental Disorders and ARI Provide Ongoing Registration to Advance Autism Research

Download brochure

Watch Interview

May 1, 2008 – Dallas, TX – A paper published in the medical journal Health & Place found that children living next to a mercury polluter have a higher risk of developing autism. The research, from University of Texas Health Science Center (San Antonio), by researchers Raymond Palmer, PhD and colleagues, determined that a community’s distance to a coal-fired powered plant, or other industrial mercury source, significantly predicts future autism rates in the community’s schoolchildren. 

Read more.

When American scholar Warren Bennis said, "Bureaucracies are beautiful mechanisms for the evasion of responsibilities and guilt," he might well have been speaking of the current state of affairs inside the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Once revered around the world, hardly a month passes without another news report questioning the credibility, scientific independence, and integrity of the nation's premier health agency.

Over the past four years headlines frequently chronicle a disturbing litany of allegations charging top CDC officials with wasting money on questionable research priorities, public relations stunts, distorting or ignoring health concerns raised by their own scientists, and retaliation against those who object to the censorship of scientific findings.

The past three years have been particularly unpleasant for CDC Director, Dr. Julie Gerberding, but apparently not as bad as she and her managers are making it for many CDC scientists.

Read more.