Controversial Autism Study Canceled

Health officials have canceled a study planned to examine a controversial autism treatment that many critics say is an unethical experiment on children.

In a statement on Wednesday, The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) said that it has discontinued the study intended to assess the effectiveness of chelation (kee-LAY'-shun) treatment.

The agency has plans to test other related therapies for autism spectrum disorders with the money that was intended for the study.

Health officials placed the study on hold due to safety concerns. A study last year linked a chemical used in treatment to long-term brain problems in mice.

Chelation therapy is a technique used to treat individuals suffering from metal or lead poisoning. Its use as a potential autism treatment is based on the theory that mercury in vaccines in the form of the preservative, thimerosal, triggers autism. 

Chelation is the standard protocol if a child has a heavy load of lead.  Parents of autistic children, writing to the web site, Age of Autism, are skeptical that the canceled study has to do with safety.  

In 2006, initial permission was given to move forward, according to NIMH’s statement.

“No subjects were enlisted for this clinical trial,” according to the statement.

Based on new data, in February 2007, an NIH Institutional Review Board reevaluated the risk-benefit ratio of the study. The board found no decisive evidence that would directly benefit the children who would participate in the trial and said the study presents more than a minimal risk to the child, it added.

Many medical experts and studies have dispelled the belief that the heavy metal mercury, used in vaccines as the preservative, thimerosal, causes autism. A growing number of parents and critics point to the studies underwritten by manufacturers of vaccines.

However, many parents of autistic children strongly support that it does based on their anecdotal evidence of observation. Even Bernadine Healy, former director of the National Institutes of Health has said that the government is too quick to dismiss their concerns and observations.

She points to the possibility that a subset of children have undiagnosed pre-existing conditions that make them susceptible to the live viruses and/or heavy metals in vaccines, as the case of 9-year-old Hannah Poling established earlier this year.

See the Institute for Vaccine Safety to check the current load of thimerosal in vaccines.

Autism is a brain disorder that affects a person's ability to communicate, form relationships, and respond to the environment.

At present it impacts one in 150 children and has grown at epidemic proportions. Thimerosal is still present in many vaccines including the flu vaccine. Critics point out that even trace amounts are too much.

Individuals can have mild, moderate or severe autism. Some people with autism are highly functional while others are mentally retarded, mute, or have severe problems with language. It is generally accepted that autism is caused by abnormalities in brain structures or functions. About one-third of children with autism develop seizures, starting either in early childhood or adolescence.

At present, there is no cure for autism and the condition cannot be outgrown.

A previous study, published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, found that the number of autism cases among California children continued to increase from January 1995 to March 2007 despite the purported discontinuance of the mercury containing preservative in vaccines.

Rick Rollens of the M.I.N.D. Institute at the University of California, Davis and a member of the California Legislative Blue Ribbon Commission on autism points out that only when Gov. Schwarzenegger mandated the preservative be removed from childhood vaccines in December 2006 under penalty of law did the recall really begin.  #