Tag Archives: pseudoscience

Blind chiropractor who fiddled whilst patient lay dying suspended for 12 months

Posted in Chiropractic, Scam by

Dr Forte’s title of Doctor does not imply that he has any academic medical qualification. He does not. It is a courtesy title only and, ethically, is only utilised in the context of his chiropractic practice.

From Inquest finding into death of James Halloran, S.A. April 1st 2010

Mario Forte progressively lost his sight over many years.

Although holding a diploma in sports massage and working part time for himself, his loss of vision demanded a professional downgrade. By the mid 1980’s he would see only shades of light and dark. By the late 1990’s he would be totally blind. As a masseuse he would be subject to reviews, retraining, infrequent accreditation and occasional inspection. There would be… standards. Problems were foreseen (no pun intended).

Could there possibly be a related discipline that allowed contact with patients whilst you pretend to be doing something but actually do nothing? Where you just make stuff up and claim it is of the highest standard? Of course – Chiropractic! In 1978 he began training with a qualified chiropractor for a period of three years.

In the same year he began his own practice at home, whilst still working part time with his trainer. In 1979 he was accepted as a member of the United Chiropractors’ Association of Australasia Limited. When the Chiropractors Act 1981 popped up he became registered under it and has remained so ever since.

In December 2006 Mr. James Halloran visited Forte at his practice at the rear of Forte’s elderly father’s address. At some point Mr. Halloran collapsed and became “convulsive, unconscious [and] unresponsive” on the floor. Australian Doctor report that Forte rang a colleague (4 minutes) discussing options. He then rang a local doctor’s practice, whereupon he was advised to call 000. He ignored this advice.

Three minutes later he tried to call another general practice without success. Then he called 000. Time wasted: 9 Minutes. He fetched his elderly father and Forte claims they did their best to administer “late and inadequately executed” CPR.

Forte had guessed Mr. Halloran was suffering an epileptic fit. As he is totally blind and chose to work alone, a couple of problems with this spring to mind. Although he had no idea of Mr. Halloran’s medical history, for my money, if you’ve got to pick something along the spectrum from “practical joke” to “massive stroke or other cardiovascular event”, then epileptic fit is as good as any.

However, the S.A. Health Practitioners Tribunal, past whom no detail no matter how small shall pass without scrutiny noted that Forte was:

… effectively unable to monitor the patient’s vital signs because he was blind

Yay verily. They continue their astonishing insight:

In other words he did nothing effective towards assisting his patient during this time… He could not check pupil dilation and the other things that would depend upon vision, such as skin pallor or foaming at the mouth. The fact that he could not do so and had that limitation should have occurred to him.

Combining up to the minute health practice knowledge and 2 years hindsight of a 37 page Coronial Inquest Report they offer with blistering understatement:

[Even] if Mr Halloran was to die, Dr Forte’s negligence and incompetence remains just as grave, not in respect of the outcome but in respect of the fact that he did nothing.

This last statement is made due to the fact that Forte was cleared of contributing to Mr. Halloran’s death despite the Deputy State Coroner noting:

Dr Forte at times in his evidence had a reluctance to give a responsive answer to the question asked of him and was unduly intractable and argumentative. […]

In the event, I have not needed to resort to the evidence of the admission to make any finding about whether Dr Forte applied force to the cervical spine, but I do say that [“an impressive professional individual and indeed an impressive witness” – an attending paramedic’s] evidence raises a nagging doubt in my mind as to whether Dr Forte was being completely frank with the Court.

In short Forte had admitted manipulating the spine to paramedics yet testified that no such conversation took place and denied manipulation. As it eventuated the cause of death could not be isolated to having originated from his manipulation. There was pathology evidence pointing to a vertebral artery embolus that had originated elsewhere. This could have caused a respiratory arrest followed by a cardiac arrest. But this cannot be determined. The rare event of vagal inhibition leading to cardiac arrest was raised and dismissed.

In any event death resulted from lack of oxygen to the brain as a probable and direct consequence of Forte’s apathy. From the Inquest finding:

One thing that Dr Gilbert was certain about was that the global brain injury suffered by Mr Halloran was entirely consistent with his cardiac arrest and the consequent lack of oxygen delivery to the brain during that hypoxic period. Dr Gilbert suggested that a brain could survive without oxygen and not be damaged for a period of the order of 2 to 3 minutes. […]

If he was obtaining effective CPR, the 9 minutes that had been suggested might not be regarded as a full 9 minutes of hypoxia. The damage to the brain might not be as extensive as it would be if there had been a period of 9 minutes without CPR. Nine minutes of deprivation of oxygen would, however, involve a lethal insult to the brain and would cause a global severe anoxic injury incompatible with life. […]

All that said, it will be remembered that whatever the position was, Mr Halloran did suffer a severe global anoxic brain injury which signifies very strongly that there was a significant period of time following his cardiac arrest during which he was receiving no oxygen regardless of the competence of any CPR.

It must be noted that the emergency dispatch operator had offered to give CPR instructions to Forte’s parents who were present. Forte agrees with this. CPR was not commenced until 19 minutes after Forte called the other chiropractor to discuss options. At a minimum Forte spent 13 minutes alone with the deceased before physically going to fetch his parents.

However long beforehand Forte had taken guessing an epileptic fit is simply not known. His information is, for whatever reason, flawed. There were two emergency calls, the second including the offer of CPR instructions, yet he at first insisted there had been only one. The paramendic observed “very, very blue” extremities suggesting no effective CPR had taken place. Forte holds a lapsed St. John’s First Aid certificate.

This tragic event highlights much of what is wrong with the pseudoscience of chiropractic masquerading as a health provision service. There is no question of Forte’s ability to manage and triumph over his blindness. Yet one must seriously query exactly what support or interventions were instigated on behalf of the Chiropractic Association and the more responsible Chiropractic Board of Australia to address Mario Forte’s obvious needs and the consequential risk to each and every of his patients. This in turn raises serious questions about accreditation and basic standards.

Let me spell it out. How the hell can a practising chiropractor not hold a current First Aid certificate? There is simply no excuse.

Ill people are fooled by the abuse of the title “Dr.” and the absurdly ambitious claims made by this careless, arrogant and woefully trained sham discipline. Had proper CPR been administered and anoxic brain injury averted Mr. Halloran may likely be alive today. A method for coping adequately with such events should have been available and well drilled. Despite Forte’s shortfalls as an honest witness he has certainly been failed by his profession.

As for the cause of Mr. Halloran’s cardiac arrest we can only glean a possible hint from 3.6 of the Inquest report:

Mr Halloran had not consulted Dr Forte prior to the occasion in question. It is not known whether, at any time prior to Mr Halloran’s arrival at Dr Forte’s clinic, Mr Halloran had any appreciation of the fact that Dr Forte was blind, but it would have been obvious once he arrived.

Obvious indeed.

 

Victorian skeptic & school teacher Adam Vanlangenberg discusses his lunchtime class

Posted in Big Placebo, Denialism, Health, Scam, Science by

The rise of pseudoscience has been significant since cheap, rapid access to information has been the norm.

Regrettably the extreme beliefs held by many have been massaged by those who benefit such that Choice and Point of view (no matter how wrong) is taking the place of Evidence and Peer review. The trendy phrase that bothers me most is “health freedom”.

It’s one thing for hanky panky nonsense to make promises from shop windows and festivals. Yet quite another when it begins to shape the quality of science education on offer in Australian Universities. This rise in what I consider outright scams driven by those who are motivated by ego, self serving ideals and profit has a long history. I accept that many have genuine beliefs in the “wellness” industry. But I am yet to be availed of any evidence that consumer service and health is taking precedence over a vindictive confrontational trend by the many Enemies of Reason.

Recently the group Friends of Science in Medicine formed to address this:

A group of concerned Australian health care researchers and providers has set up an organisation that aims to discourage universities from offering accreditation in unproven medical therapies. The group would also like such therapies to be removed from claimable benefits by health funds.
Currently 19 (out of 39) Australian universities offer courses in unproven and often bizarre treatments such as iridology, aromatherapy, homeopathy and chiropractic.

Keeping up to speed with the norm of attacking Australian Skeptics as the proxy demon for anything evidence based, Meryl Dorey of the Australian Vaccination Network fallaciously wrote on this development:

There is an organisation in Australia which hates every natural therapy. They hate the healthcare practitioners and they hate the healthcare consumers who ‘turn their backs’ on Western medicine in favour of a range of other modalities which put no money in their pockets and take away their prestige. Worst of all, they hate anyone who chooses not to use  vaccines! That is the ultimate heresy, as far as they are concerned.

But it’s OK – because they have a plan and they have the money and media backing, they think, to bring this plan to fruition.

This group, the Australian Skeptics, has been instrumental in setting up the organisation, Stop the AVN.

Quite a lot of hatred to go with the free speech they are usually accused of suppressing. This is of course as noted before, simply scurrilous deflection from presenting any evidence or explaining missing funds. Stupidly many believers have taken up the trend. Meryl is under instruction from the Alliance for Health Freedom Australia to maintain the “enemy behind the curtain” slur on all things skeptical but ultimately it is very telling that Godwin’s Law out paces evidence provision in this matter.

Being tricked into conflict and betrayed by connivance is really what’s happening to many innocent minds. The big regret in some aspects is that heated young minds are misled as to the notion of skepticism and the aim of skeptic movements. Recently Adam Vanlangenberg, a Victorian school teacher and skeptic spoke on TV about the popularity of his lunchtime skeptic class.

Adam manages to capture in a few minutes a great deal of the bipartisan respect, tolerance and quest for verifiable knowledge that real skepticism is known for.

Adam Vanlangenberg on The Circle

Vaccination saved us from…what, exactly?

Posted in AVN, Health, Judy Wilyman, Meryl Dorey, Science by

So goes one heading over at the No Compulsory Vaccination blog, leading to a screed of disturbingly accusatory silliness borne of the confidence from one graph.

Dr Raymond Obomsawin is one of the few to knock up a bogus graph that cites decreasing incidence of measles infection rather than the boring old general mortality we’ve come to expect from antivaxxers. The obvious conclusion of course is that lethal viruses were being tamed by clean water, less wandering poo and yummy food.

Robert Webb succinctly explains where the problems lie here and also points to a further mincing of Obomsawin by David Gorski at Science Based Medicine. I quite like Gorski’s sub-heading. Intellectual dishonesty at it’s most naked.

What surprises me still however, is just how many angles these purveyors of fiction will try. As I touched on in some satire recently, Meryl Dorey’s hilarious poker face revelation on Radio 3CR whilst chatting (or rather, lying) to Helen Lobato pre Woodford was a beauty.

A lot of the credit that’s been given to vaccines for the decline in deaths and infectious diseases has nothing to do with vaccines. Because it all happened before the shots were introduced. Engineers did more to improve the health of Australians than doctors ever have.

Whilst antivaxxers have been a little more vocal of late, they seem to have really only dug their hole deeper. If not attacking those who ask questions of them, engaging in a bit of fraud or libel, it seems to be silliness as usual. Judy Wilyman is a splendid offender with this myth, claiming there is “no historical evidence” for the success of any vaccine schedule. Her trick is to use mortality rates. Usually Judy just plonks up infant fatality rates from 1900 onwards and uses the rapid decline up till 1950 to mount her case.

Let’s ignore what two World Wars did to the birth rate and consequently infant fatalities in English speaking nations over that period, and just focus on the absurdity of mortality alone. There’s no doubt improvements in sanitation, hygiene and quality of food improved our health vastly. But did it also impact on viral behaviour and immunity as is being suggested?

Bogey sites such as Child Health Safety with Vaccines Did Not Save Us – 2 centuries of official statistics excel in exploiting this myth of “mortality = disease”. As amusing as such nonsense may be, it shows the lengths some go to in protecting the vaccine-autism myth. That blog provides graph after graph of fatalities which are virtually irrelevant to disease incidence. It is only once vaccines enter the timeline do we see disease incidence almost vanish.

To me, a drop in mortality coinciding with a healthier population indicates improved rate of recovery from illness. It doesn’t say much about infection other than to hint at better general immunity that comes with better health. But better immunity is not specific immunity, and this is what antivaxxers are really claiming – even if they don’t realise it.

More so, this claim would also demand rising herd immunity before widespread vaccination programmes, on a trajectory that would have matched the herd immunity achieved by mass vaccination. Acceptance of the value of herd immunity refutes the claim infection control arose from better living. That’s one reason antivaxxers deny it. Strangely, there is silence about success of the Hib vaccine, which they should be able to explain.

Being the lovers of science they claim to be, Hib has falsified the claim of improved living standards, not vaccination, controlling certain diseases. In time, perhaps shortly, we may see this repeated with a hepatitis C vaccine and I predict the antivaxxers will have just as little to say by way of explanation of their “theory”.

Yet ultimately it is antivaxxers themselves who debunk this nonsensical myth. If improved living standards controlled or wiped out vaccine preventable diseases then how do we explain this present resurgence on the back of low immunisation rates? Surely living standards haven’t dropped, anymore than they improved over the 12 years from 1993 in which Hib vaccination demonstrated it’s efficacy. Added to this is the bizarre belief that children are meant to catch these diseases. Which by the way we’re told, are harmless, even “marvellous”, in the case of returning measles.

Simply put, if improved living standards can suppress these diseases we should see them eliminated, not returning. Nor does the rise of chiropractic, homeoprophylactic, herbal and other “immune boosting” hanky panky make real sense. All of this exposes the fact that it is herd immunity sustained by vaccination that largely protects those who refuse vaccination. That’s another reason to deny the value of herd immunity.

As the lie becomes harder to sustain new myths are fabricated. The pertussis vaccine has caused the outbreak. Vaccination causes the disease it is meant to prevent. “Vaccine shedding” places the unvaccinated at risk. Viruses are intentionally released into the community. Vaccination causes immune dysfunction leading to later infection. Vaccination doesn’t provide proper immunity.

It would seem it is approaching the End Game in more ways than one for this myth. It isn’t hard to answer Ms. Dorey’s question.

Vaccination saved us from the returning diseases children are not being vaccinated against.

Vaccination And Improved Living Standards

Vaccine induced autism – how Meryl Dorey misled her Woodford audience

Posted in Anti-Vaccination Lobby, Health, Legal, Scam, Science by

Meryl Dorey is shown to have presented material to the audience at Woodford that in two cases argues vaccine induced autism where there is clearly none. In one case the word “autism” has been inserted, additionally, in a descriptive or qualitative fashion on her slide yet it is not present in the court ruling or transcript from where she sourced her text. In another instance there are no cases of autism following, or because of, vaccination. One awaits an explanation from Meryl Wynn Dorey.

There is an awful amount of misinformation on Meryl Dorey’s Woodford slides. Let’s examine the fatally flawed attempt to exhume the “vaccines cause autism” corpse. This is the heading of slide 18:

Meryl Dorey’s Woodford slide number 18

Not much ambiguity there I’d say. But there was seemingly intentional manipulation of a source document providing more misinformation on that slide. Dorey has usurped the case of Bailey Banks.

Bailey was indeed compensated for a vaccine injury. Was it autism, as alleged on Dorey’s slide? No.

The US Court of Federal Claims case file states clearly in it’s opening index: “Non-autistic developmental delay”.

A search of the Claims case file yields a very similar text to that which Dorey provided to her Woodford audience. There is only a one word difference. “[Autism]”. Here is the original text on page 27 of the claims file:

The Court found that Bailey would not have suffered this delay but for the administration of the MMR vaccine, and that this chain of causation was not too remote, but was rather a proximate sequence of cause and effect leading inexorably from vaccination to Pervasive Developmental Delay.

That is all. It seems Meryl Dorey needs to explain this striking addition that quite plainly seeks to falsify the court ruling. The evidence is damning indeed.

On page 2 the fact that compensation is not for autism is stressed implicitly [Bold mine]:

Pervasive Developmental Disorder, Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS) is a ‘subthreshold’ condition in which some – but not all – features of autism or another explicitly identified Pervasive Developmental Disorder are identified. PDD-NOS is often incorrectly referred to as simply “PDD.” The term PDD refers to the class of conditions to which autism belongs. PDD is NOT itself a diagnosis, while PDD-NOS IS a diagnosis. The term Pervasive Developmental Disorder – Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS; also referred to as “atypical personality development,” “atypical PDD,” or “atypical autism”) is included in DSM-IV to encompass cases where there is marked impairment of social interaction, communication, and/or stereotyped behavior patterns or interest, but when full features for autism or another explicitly defined PDD are not met.
It should be emphasized that this ”subthreshold” category is thus defined implicitly, that is, no specific guidelines for diagnosis are provided. While deficits in peer relations and unusual sensitivities are typically noted, social skills are less impaired than in classical autism.

On page 6 [Bold mine]:

Among the physicians treating Bailey, a neurologist named Dr. Ivan Lopez personally examined Bailey and diagnosed Bailey as follows:

This patient has developmental delay probably secondary to an episode of acute demyelinating encephalomyelitis that he had at 18 months of age after the vaccine. He certainly does not ___ [sic] for autism because over here we can find a specific reason for his condition and this is not just coming up with no reason.

And [Bold mine]:

As Petitioner’s testifying expert witness, Dr. Lopez maintained, reiterated, and elaborated upon this threshhold diagnosis.

Dr. Lopez’s diagnosis appears to conflict with the diagnosis given by Bailey’s pediatrician on 20 May 2004, who saddled Bailey’s condition with the generalized term “autism”; however, that pediatrician later acknowledged that use of the term autism was used merely as a simplification for non-medical school personnel, and that pervasive developmental delay “is the correct [i.e. technical] diagnosis.” Another pediatrician’s diagnosis noted that Bailey’s condition “seems to be a global developmental delay with autistic features as opposed to an actual autistic spectrum disorder.”

A footnote on page 16 reads [Bold mine]:

Respondent seems to have abandoned the earlier argument that Bailey suffered from autism, instead of PDD. The Court notes the various similarities between Bailey’s condition and autism as defined above, but nonetheless rules that PDD better and more precisely describes Bailey’s condition and symptoms than does autism. Respondent’s acknowledgment serves to reaffirm the Court’s conclusion on this point.

So, what does all this mean? The opening text of the ruling informs us that the court accepts that Bailey, “suffered a seizure and Acute Disseminated Encephalomyelitis” leading to PDD. The court also accepts that compensation should be paid because the court is of the view the seizure and condition would not have occurred without the administration of MMR.

Is the court right? It doesn’t matter. The legal decision must be respected. What we can clearly see is that PDD is considered quite different from autism. Bailey suffered a single traumatic event – not a gradual decline into autism as the customary antivaccination lobby tale goes. Autism is a collection of symptoms with a genetic component. Clearly in this case Bailey does not fit, nor has been found to fit a diagnosis of autism.

This makes his case no less tragic. I can’t stress that enough. What I will stress is that Meryl Dorey sourced her one liner from the same document I have quoted above. She is certain to have read that this child does not have autism and was not compensated for autism brought on by vaccination. She would have read that PDD is not the same as autism. But Meryl Dorey chose to select one line and alter it fallaciously to mislead her audience into believing compensation had been paid for autism brought on by MMR.

Meryl Dorey has again committed plagiarism and fraud in her quest to mislead the Australian public. Her disdain for this young boy is clear. Her disrespect for court proceedings and this ruling is manifest. Her callous disregard for Aussies at Woodford Folk Festival is exposed for all to see.

You may wonder where are all the other Baileys? Well, let’s meet 83 similar cases – an old trick of Meryl’s debunked back in May 2011 and covered here in June 2011. Just like PDD may produce symptoms like autism, so do many other types of brain injury. Add these to autistic children who are vaccinated and the language in VICP case files is easily abused.

Also on Meryl’s slide was this ambiguous claim. I’ve made it kind of easy to spot the semantics. “Associated”? Where is the cause? So, here we are almost 8 months since it was debunked and the best Meryl Dorey can manage is a semantic trick. The URL leads here to a PR Newswire article that has the same heading as on her slide.

It’s a SafeMinds.org media release. Safe Minds is non scientific and partisan. Led by parents of autistic children they seek to increase research into neurological damage from exposure to mercury in medical products.

I for one find it strange that Dorey was billed as an expert on autism yet was unable to source the original paper I’ve linked to below. Is this because she gets more bang for her buck with the tone of this heading? The article is biased in the extreme. There appears to be little doubt that the Safe Minds media release colours the issue in Dorey’s favour and away from the cautious approach of scientific inquiry.

Just how unreliable is this source from our self appointed vaccine expert? Back on June 7th, 2011 I wrote a piece called The “Groundbreaking” Vaccine-Autism Investigation Release of May 10th 2011. It addresses this caper which can only be described as an insult to her audience.

I focused primarily on the pseudoscience and demonstrably false fear mongering cobbled together under the auspices of “research scholar” Mary Holland. Mary is a vaccine-autism profiteer and co-author of Vaccine Epidemic: How Corporate Greed Biased Science and Coercive Government Threaten Our Human rights, Our Health and Our Children.

I also exposed Meryl Dorey’s stupendous deception a full week later on 102.9 KOFM that “hundreds perhaps thousands of families” had been compensated because their children “have become autistic after vaccination”. That it was “a fact” that vaccines cause autism.

There had been ample media prodding in the lead up to May 10th with the word “groundbreaking” popping up quite a lot. The Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) had been “quietly” and “secretly” working in the shadows it seemed “paying off” vaccine injured children with autism. On May 10th itself, Meryl Dorey claimed:

You cannot hold the truth back forever. And when that dam breaks, the flood will wash away those who have suppressed these facts to the detriment of our kids. It is time for the piper to be paid.

Oh my!

The “groundbreaking investigation” turned out to be an enormous flop. As promised at high noon on Tuesday May 10th 2011 Holland’s team assembled on the steps of the US Court of Claims at 717 Madison Place in Washington DC. They were presenting a paper of sorts, Unanswered Questions from the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program: A review of compensated cases of vaccine induced brain injury. By the end of the lengthy live press statement, the caper had been largely dismissed and debunked as wordplay.

As you can read in the post linked above, certain media outlets were contacted by Pace Law School students, using the Pace Law School name. This was of course, news to Pace Law Administration. From Lisa Jo Rudy writing for About.com [bold mine]:

I just heard from a representative from the Public Relations department at Pace University School of Law. She wondered why a press release cited in my earlier blog would say that members of their law school had been involved with the investigation into and presentation of “Unanswered Questions From the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program: A Review of Compensated Cases of Vaccine-Induced Brain Injury,” when there was no such involvement in either the investigation or the presentation.

I did respond to Danielle Orsino, who sent out the press release, asking the question:
Were there cases in which the vaccine court awarded a settlement for damage that manifested itself as the symptoms of an autism spectrum disorder? Was the term “autism” ever used to describe the outcome of vaccine damage (eg, “the child suffered from neurological damage resulting in autism”)?
Danielle responded quickly, saying “The study strongly suggests a link between autism and vaccines. The study found that of those who had been compensated for brain damage due to vaccines, a much-higher-than-average number also had autism. The study makes an extremely strong case for the vaccine-autism connection, which is why the study’s authors are urging Congress to investigate the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program.”
This response seems to suggest that the simple answer to my question is “no”.

I wrote at the time, Reading the document reveals ample use of terms such as “settled cases suggesting autism”, “language that strongly suggests autistic features”, “published decisions that used terms related to autism”, “payment of vaccine injured children with autism”, and not – as Seth Mnookin pointed out – “because of their autism”. More so, the authors spend some time arguing why there should be no distinction between autism and autism-like symptoms. This is a major concession they award themselves. The paper includes caregiver opinion, parental opinion, phrases from doctors who gave evidence at hearings and provides a case table of “Language suggesting autism or autistic-like symptoms”.

It further emerged that only 21 cases came from the VICP case files. 62 were gathered by phone calls and social communication questionnaires with other compensated families. It went as far as referencing The Age of Autism: Mercury, Medicine and a Manmade Epidemic [2010] by Dan Olmsted and Mark Blaxill. There was no ethics approval, and no independent evaluation. Many were children with autism who received a vaccination and reacted. Others were children with mitochondrial enzyme disorders known to lead to encephalopathy. Most were genuine cases of encephalopathy following vaccination at the rate of about 1 in 1 million. That’s up to 1,000 times less than measles induced encephalopathy.

For our purposes, we need to note that Meryl Dorey was claiming “possibly thousands” of compensation cases when only 21 already dismissed cases could be found. Then before heading to Woodford Meryl spoke to Helen on 3CR and, whilst now aware of the sample size, still falsely claimed:

Um, autism is I believe, related very strongly to vaccination… and in the United States they’ve actually paid compensation to at least 83 families who children became autistic after vaccination whilst claiming that vaccines can’t cause autism.

Meryl’s other slide – number 17 – can be dismissed instantly. Her claim on that slide is that diagnoses are rising. This has nothing to do with vaccination and everything to do with diagnostic technique. Her cited South Korean study sampled students in mainstream schools managing 12 hour days six days per week. This is indicative of how wide the spectrum is. The autism rate in Australia is officially 1 in 160. In the UK and USA it is 1 in 100 – 1%. Some research suggests 1% in Australia also.

There are five reasons posed for the rise in autism. None mention vaccination.

  • The actual frequency of autism may have increased, meaning more children have it
  • There is increased case reporting, leading to greater findings, better use of funding and hightened awareness
  • Changes in the DSM-III-R and DSM-IV diagnostic criteria may account for more cases
  • Earlier diagnoses have essentially added a new younger demographic to the the existing demographic of children – ie; it spans more years
  • When we examine rising autism figures we find a corresponding drop in other types of mental disability and retardation, meaning they are now within the autism spectrum

Research using modern diagnostic criteria on adults also finds a 1% rate in adults, suggesting changes in mode of diagnosis play a huge role in perceived “epidemics”. In Brugha’s survey [ doi:10.1001/archgenpsychiatry.2011.38] he found not one adult diagnosed with autism knew they had the condition. This tells us the criteria to diagnose them a generation ago did not exist.

All up it seems Meryl Dorey has a lot of explaining to do. Debunked scams, fraud, a useless “association” and unverified musings. It’s nice to know some things remain predictable.

For Aussies, the news remains good. Vaccines do not cause autism.