Dr. Jay Gordon’s Response to Vaccine Court Decision
Well, we’re all about vaccines lately. This is a post from one of my online support groups. It is an email sent to everyone on his list by Dr. Jay Gordon, who is an avid supporter of attachment parenting as well as a vaccine “safety” advocate. Here’s his website. A few posts ago, I wrote about another doctor, Lauren Feder, who gives a lot of anti vaccination information on her website as well. Dr. Jay Gordon seems to be not only against vaccines but very much caught up in the conspiracy theory thinking that goes along with anti-vaccine propaganda. This letter was accompanied on my online support group by an enthusiastic endorsement from the poster, and once again, I find it alarming that the misinformation is not only coming from parents but from doctors.
Here’s the letter as it was posted on our bulletin board.
From Dr. Jay Gordon, Recent Vaccine Court Decisions, February, 16, 2009
This past week three decisions were handed down denying that vaccines caused autism in three children. The cases are known as “Cedillo,” Hazlehurst,” and “Snyder” and were decided by three separate “Special Masters.”
The simplest analogy involves the countless dozens of court decisions about cigarettes and cancer over the past fifty years. There was no “proof” which satisfied courts, judges and juries for decades. Common sense and eventually the scientific community and the government finally acknowledged that the tobacco industry was at fault. The same will be found true of the vaccine manufacturers, but I hope it doesn’t take fifty more years.
The pharmaceutical industry controls which research gets into journals and which does not. This creates public perception of vaccine risks and benefits which may be at odds with what is actually observed in the medical community.
The “Vaccine Court” has already awarded over two billion dollars in compensation to families who successfully showed that they or their
children had suffered harm from routine vaccination.I have worked with hundreds of parents who are completely certain that their children were “normal” prior to receiving certain vaccines and then developed autism and other problems within a short period of time after getting the shots.
This is most definitely not scientific proof, but I cannot ignore
thirty years of my own personal observations and experience.I’ve received a lot of email this week about the rulings of the
Special Masters of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. The complete
decisions can be found here:http://www.uscfc.uscourts.gov/node/5026
“It’s a great day for science and I’d like to think it’s also a great
day for children with autism,” said Dr. Paul Offit, chief of
infectious diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and co-
inventor of the rotavirus vaccine (a standard childhood immunization that does not contain thimerosal).The latest estimate is that Dr. Offit’s share of the Rotateq revenues
is $29,000,000 to $55,000,000. I think he has a conflict of interest
here.Selectively and slowly vaccinating our kids is the safest course of
action.JNG MD
Best,
Jay
Okay, my initial reactions to this, and I’m curious to hear everyone elses:
First, the comparison to tobacco companies is misleading and irresponsible, and worst of all, very effective because it’s so scary. What sucks is that yes, tobacco companies did all these terrible things. But in the case of vaccines, it seems that Andrew Wakefield is really the one to compare to tobacco companies. He’s the one who was in the pockets of these lawyers trying to prove a connection between autism and vaccines. So he manufactured that connection, and as a result, measles is back and two kids in the UK have died from it. The evil sellout here is on the anti-vaccine side.
Second, Gordon’s claim about Offit’s conflict of interest doesn’t make sense either. If you want to grouse about a conflict of interest, you don’t have to look any further than the original faked study concerning vaccines and autism.
Oh, it just makes me so darn mad.
Ticktock Said,
February 18, 2009 @ 12:48 pm
They were perfectly satisfied when Hannah Poling received her compensation, and they exploited that girl’s victory to the fullest. Young Ms. Poling proves that these people celebrate and propagandize any win but persistently deny their actual loss.
Nancy Said,
February 18, 2009 @ 3:05 pm
It’s worth reading Offit’s new book Autism’s False Prophets. Interestingly many of the people who accuse Offit of having a conflict of interest (n.b you can not develop a vaccine commercially if no one has patented it), have taken out patents on their own quack treatments for autism. Funny how they get a free pass, isn’t it?
The other thing that bugs me beyond belief is this idea that the court is “denying” that vaccines cause autism – as if it’s some received wisdom beyond question, like the sun rises, vaccines “cause autism”. No hint that the evidence was lacking. Unbelievable.
Arrogance and ignorance are a nauseating combination aren’t they?
Julie Said,
February 18, 2009 @ 3:31 pm
“Denying” also really ticked me off.
The language these folks use is just so false and misleading, and yet sooooo emotional and persuasive.
Julie Said,
February 18, 2009 @ 3:35 pm
Okay, and I’d be interested to get advice about this as well: there seems to be a polite truce about vaccines on these bulletin boards. I mean, there are women now desperately trying to get the separate mumps vaccine, even with all this news that has just come out. And I sort of think to myself, yeah, I want to help them out with information, but in the end, there’s not much I can do to influence a bunch of faceless women that I only know from my online support group. I just post articles and leave it at that. I have to assume that we must treat everyone like an adult who can sort through information and make decisions, and that’s as far as it goes for me. I can’t get into posting, “Hey…what the heck is the matter here? Why are you all in such a panic when right now you should be breathing huge sighs of relief that all the evidence says vaccines are not only safe but hell, truly necessary, considering what’s starting to happen when we don’t vaccinate?”
I really feel like this will not be greeted well, so I just don’t do it. Instead I get on my soap box over here and occasionally post a link. That’s all I can stands. I can’t stands no more!
catgirl Said,
February 19, 2009 @ 7:50 am
If ‘Big Pharma’ controls what get published, then why did they allow the Wakefield study to get published in the first place? Also, why do they think that pharmaceutical companies promote vaccines just for the money? Vaccines are one of the least profitable products to make.
molly Said,
February 19, 2009 @ 11:40 am
Julie, ime you can always tell an antivaxxer but you can’t tell ‘em much. ha ha. No seriously though: I had an experience on a popular “advice” blog where things have taken a sharp turn for the anti-science. I still read out of habit, but I once posted what I thought was a jokey lighthearted jab at homeopathy and I got CREAMED. Not only did they revile my statements, they seemed personally wounded over it. It never, ever goes over well. Third rail indeed.
Julie Said,
February 19, 2009 @ 12:42 pm
That’s what kills me. The righteous indignation. The personal hurt.
I just try to focus on the free baby items.
Theresa Said,
February 20, 2009 @ 9:46 am
re. the “polite truce”: Here too. I just bite my tongue when I see anti-vaccine stuff on my neighborhood parents’ list. Sadly, the pro-vaccine people don’t seem to go on as many lecture tours; if they did I would kindly announce them.
It’s too bad, really, that I avoid the issue as if it was religion or politics… that is, a matter of opinion/feelings. It’s science! But in practice, if you’re not at a scientific conference (and maybe even if you are) — it has become impossibly fraught.
Check out Ben Goldacre at badscience.net and guardian.co.uk for cathartically angry and trenchant critiques of the MMR scaremongers.
moriah Said,
May 9, 2009 @ 3:43 pm
Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.