April 14, 2008

AAP Takes Two Steps Forward, One Step Back [Amended]

[FINAL UPDATE: Apparently the missing paragraph was some sort of over site and is now back on the page. Stan has checked into tell us that everything is going well with the AAP. Yay! Sorry for causing any worry!

[UPDATE: From what I can put together this change was made only a few hours after the statement was released (probably morning of April 2) and as such it probably does not represent a positional change. Since this was well before the DAN conference, I don't think it means much. Whew.]

This just in from Pamela Felice:

The AAP has removed the last paragraph from their original press release that they are working with DAN!.

This paragraph specifically:

“Autism is a challenge for pediatricians, their patients and families. By working together, we stand the best chance of helping these children to realize their full potential,” Dr. Jenkins said. “The Academy is committed to working with researchers and treatment groups like Defeat Autism Now! to get closer to finding answers to the multiple causes of autism and determining effective therapies."

although it is still dated April 1 http://www.aap.org/advocacy/releases/apr08autismday.htm.

This is interesting...and disheartening. I told my husband that something didn't add after watching Tayloe on the Larry King debate. The AAP can not stand on safety to the point of out right lying and then be sincere about working with DAN!

Pamela
http://theeducateparent.blogspot.com


I gotta wonder what those meetings inside the AAP are like right now. Clearly they have some decisions to make and waffling like this does not present a united front.

Again... rise up wise and prudent pediatricians and demand that your leadership cut the crap and do the right thing.

UPDATE: I am told through some back channels that things between DAN! and the AAP are going smoothly and progressing. I very much want that to be true. But you know me, I am from Missouri now. Show me.

3 comments:

Tom said...

Ginger,

I tried to e-mail you last night about this latest news, but your box was full.

I've sent a comment on this info. to Age of Autism; it should be posted soon, and there are other comments there, as well, on Dr. Blaylock's work, and the implications of this information.

The bottom line, as far as I can see, is that parents will continue to be the ones pushing for change.

Help is not coming from the CDC, from the FDA, from HHS, or any other bureaucracy in Washington, D.C.

It is not even coming--God help us--from our "trusted" pediatricians.

Please do check out comments over at AOA as well.

I want this man-made epidemic to stop, and I am directing most of my efforts in that direction now.

I want this man-made epidemic of illness to stop.

My number one goal regarding autism and vaccines is going to be to educate myself more and more and to educate parents.

Not to say, "Oh, you need to educate yourself before you vaccinate," because that line didn't work on me, and it didn't work on lots of people.

I work as a Rescue Angel for Generation Rescue, and I am sick of parents coming to me "after the fact."

A few--just a very few--are starting to come to me for information about vaccines. And I'm getting bolder in giving it out.

I'm going to educate myself more and more about vaccines, and I'll tell them everything that I know.

Following the "program," at this point, is more dangerous than opting out of MOST of it.

The following shots are either dangerous or worthless: the Hep B (at least for infants and children; I'm studying what adult populations might benefit), the flu shot, the chicken pox shot, and the MMR.

Look again--the shots I've just listed should not be given to children.

Young women should have the rubella vaccination (but before pregnancy, not during!) because of the great potential of damage to the fetus if the mother catches rubella.

We need to stop taking baby steps and proclaim our vaccine knowledge from the rooftops, because help is just NOT COMING.

Man, I wish I didn't have to know this. I wish I didn't have to do this. Don't you?

Terri Lewis

Robin Nemeth said...

Ginger writes:
The AAP has removed the last paragraph from their original press release that they are working with DAN!.

Ginger,

That’s what Autism Speaks did with the quotation in the Wall Street Journal, in February 2007. Alison Singer was quoted on the front page of the newspaper as saying “the only thing that parents of autistic children do wrong is they have bad genes.” How many hundreds of thousands of people read that? And what did she do by way of clarification—by way of publicizing the idea that there’s something else going on here besides simple genetics? There was a sentence on the Autism Speaks web site. It was there for a few days, and then it was gone. How many people do you think saw that? A tiny fraction of the number who read her statement in the WSJ.

It just seems likely to me that when an organization is sending mixed messages like this, somebody is going to end up getting the shaft.

What scares me about DAN! Doctors working with the AAP is the same thing that scared me when I kept hearing, a few decades ago, about how China and the USSR and the United States were becoming more alike. People automatically, for some reason, presume that that means that they are getting more like us here in the US. The implication being that this would be a good thing. But what I am afraid of is that DAN! doctors will have to sacrifice so much in the way of principled medicine, in order to get the backing of the AAP, that in the end we’ll be left with little of value from either organization.

I’ve heard, from mothers here in my area, that there are good DAN! doctors, and there are bad ones. It’s been my understanding that there isn’t even an official certification process in place for a doctor to become a DAN! doctor. Do you know if that is true?

I know that I’ve been very pessimistic and I’ve been trying, especially with the recent developments with Jenny, to shake the mood. But there is so much money being thrown behind the people who want to hide the truth about this that I fear that DAN! will succumb too.

I was reading back over the article that was published in my most recent Autism Society of Greater Cleveland newsletter about the Hannah Poling case, and I noticed there was a quote from Dr. Tayloe. The name meant nothing to me when I first read over the newsletter, but it sure means something to me now. I wondered, when I read the article, what on earth would make the ASGC choose that story in particular to publish in their newsletter—such a very negative story from the perspective of those who’ve seen improvements in their children and from those who see hope—when there was so much available to choose from about such a historic event. Anyway, I’ve been so angry with their stand on this issue (no stand at all, they are totally spineless) that I’ve told them I’ve had enough of their organization. (I have to say that this is really getting old—this being so peeved at most everyone that I have no choice but to tell them (in so many words) to go *&%# themselves. . . )

And so I’m trying to look on the bright side here. But the whole idea that DAN! says they want to work with the AAP and that the AAP is saying they will work with DAN! disturbs me and I can’t even pinpoint exactly why. I’ve seen Autism Speaks go over to the dark side. I know that sounds melodramatic but I don’t know how else to put it. Okay maybe not every last person with them, but the organization as a whole. And I’ve seen most everyone around me here succumb to the notion that the big organizations must be trusted to do what is right, and if we only have them on our side, all is well.

I’m just not sure that I buy it. I haven’t liked one bit what I’ve seen done by the large organizations around here that purport to want to help.

Is AAP support going to be required in order for parents to ever get health insurance coverage for DAN! doctors? Is that why everyone is so anxious to get their support?

Robin Nemeth

Stan Kurtz said...

Hi Everyone,

The paragraph in question ("Autism is a challenge...) is now on the AAP site. There was no malice involved. It was just a mistake. The AAP is truly making efforts to work with Defeat Autism Now! I'll publish more details on that soon.

http://www.aap.org/advocacy/releases/apr08autismday.htm

Stay positive.

Stan