While I have sympathy for her (I daresay raising an autistic child is a big challenge), this does not change the fact that she panders to and propagates antiscience nonsense. For which she should rightly be mocked. There is no excuse for credulously accepting and expounding such rubbish.

Certain Autistic behaviors can be aggravated by certain foods. I have observed this with the Autism in my family, but jeez, it almost goes without saying at the chemical level, folks*. It’s possible that it may be similar to the link between dyslexia and certain foods (which I am experiencing as I type this).

Look at it this way: all a “drug” is, is a substance that, when put in the body, causes the body to act chemically different, in certain ways, than it would have if the drug was not there. This also describes many foods. Just two examples of obvious drug-foods: chocolate, coffee. At the chemical level, dairy can be a drug to some people. So, in the autustic body, foods can aggravate symptoms. And don’t forget, Autism is a spectrum, not a single condition.

*you know you’re getting old when you unironically use the word “folks”!

It just looks wrong to take a mother with an autistic child and use her scientific ignorance as a platform to make a joke about apparent similarities with some politicians ignorant view on science. It’s just not cricket. Even if she is a celebrity.

I also don’t like the idea of labeling people with words such as ‘anti-science’. I have no doubt you are technically correct with certain aspects of what you are saying, being that certain beliefs of certain support groups may condone anti-scientific ideas etc, but to label her, as an individual as ‘anti-science’, well , it’s just arrogant, and rude.

I’m sure you may think I am not getting the point, but the bigger issue here is tact. It does not matter how correct someone is, if they are tactless in their presentation of the facts, people generally will switch off. It may also be the case that it was not your intention to be tactless, but you were. It undermines credibility.

Yes, one of the great tragedies happening right now in the autism community is that many well-meaning parents are falling for the DAN! therapies hook, line, and sinker. There is no adequate pro-science counter-balance to DAN! and the government does not seem to care one way or the other.

One of the few web sites taking the pro-science approach is http://www.asatonline.org. ASAT stands for Association for Science in Autism Treatment. I would urge any parent of an autistic child to check out a prospective therapy on

http://www.asatonline.org/resources/treatments_desc.htm

before deciding to pursue it. They list them all from animal therapy to vitamin therapy. It will tell you the real scoop on what scientific research (or usually lack thereof) is backing the particular therapy.

Apology accepted… and in your point, as just stated, I would tend to agree with you, although my belief is that the court system is ultimately charged, as its goal, with finding the truth. That is its one and only purpose. As for whether or not that always happens and whether or not politics enters the equation, well, that’s another discussion.

@Tom Marking -
Thank you for your links and more information on DAN!. It’s a group I’ve heard mentioned recently by the people I know with Autistic children but one I knew little about… and the name sounds so positive for such a dangerous, junk science organization. I’ll be sure to gently give them the information on this group you’ve provided so they can be as educated as they can about their sources for support. Thanks again.

http://www.909shot.com/Issues/state%20exemptions.htm

The following 19 states allow vaccination exemptions based on philosophical beliefs:
Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Idaho, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin

All but 2 states (Mississippi and West Virginia) allow exemptions based on religious beliefs.

Sorry for the snarky comment. I only meant to cast doubt on the veracity of the courts and their commitment to the search for truth. I do not doubt yours.

So many apologists for the bimbo it makes me want to puke! People, you don’t understand what is going on. McCarthy is just the celebrity mouthpiece for DAN! (Defeat Autism Now!). Why do you think Dr. Jerry Kartzinel, a well-known DAN! doctor, appeared with her on the Larry King show? Do you think that’s a coincidence? BTW, the transcript of that show is at:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0709/26/lkl.01.html

And why did the same Dr. Kartzinel write the introduction to McCarthy’s new book? This is all part of the DAN! agenda to get vaccines banned and chelation accepted as mainstream autism treatment. There are powerful people pushing the message McCarthy is spewing. I doubt she would even be smart enough to do any of this on her own. McCarthy is a DAN! puppet controlled by DAN! puppet-masters.

http://www.defeatautismnow.com – IMHO the most dangerous medical organization in America.

My nephew has been diagnosed with ‘Phenylketonuria’ PKU for short. The best summation of it I could find follows…

“A genetic disorder of the metabolism which will result in brain-damage during the first years of life unless special dietary measures are taken. Inadequate production of the enzyme which converts the amino acid phenylalanine into another amino acid, tyrosine. The extra phenylalanine accumulates in body fluids and converts to several chemicals that damage the brain. Symptoms include mental retardation as well as some of the symptoms of autism. PKU has been eliminated by screening all children immediately after birth so proper dietary measures can be taken.”

So not agreeing with what either she or McCain says, this is what I see as a blurring of some factual info, some suspicion and some outright BS. PKU can be controlled with diet, and it can lead to autism-like symptoms so maybe she is confusing some crap with some facts.

Or maybe her breasts are cutting off the oxygen to her brain.

And to Lab Lemming, let the Europeans add shariah law. When Gen. Sir Charles Napier was in India, he was told the Indians had a custom of burning the widow on the funeral pyre with their husbands. His reply:
“You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also
have a custom: When men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around
their necks, and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it,
my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And
then we will follow ours.”
We should follow the same advice with shariah law.

I will stand by the claim that Jenny McCarthy is antiscience. Her own statements, posted all over the ‘net, make that very clear. There is a difference between “being not scientific” and being antiscience. It’s a matter of activism, I would say, and of clutching at ideas that are clearly against all the evidence accumulated over the years. Ms. McCarthy falls into the latter category.

Do vitamins and diet help? I’d bet they can’t hurt, and I would guess that anyone who has a healthy diet will probably do better in life than someone who doesn’t.

But Ms. McCarthy is on record as having made all sorts of outrageous claims about alleviating her son’s autism. This is *at best* anecdotal data, and at worst will turn people away from medical treatment that might in fact help.

I cannot make any claims about individual accounts with the medical establishment. I have had a series of bad doctors when it comes to a particular ailment I have, for example. That happens. But I don’t say the entire medical establishment is suppressing a cure for me, nor do I turn to acupuncture or homeopathy or some other quackiness to ameliorate myself. I just continue researching what I can, using skepticism when I look over medical claims, and try to find a doctor who will actually help.

As far as the autism/vaccine case, that’s a court case, and not a medical finding. Please read this article by Orac, and then this one.

And I will state it again: I sympathize greatly with parents of autistic children. But railing against vaccines is incredibly bad. Not only are they wasting their own time in a cause that is scientifically shown to be wrong, they can tie the hands of scientists who might otherwise figure out what is really going on. They are shooting themselves in the foot, wasting millions of dollars, and potentially harming millions of children.

The kids are the real focus here – and pushing an expensive litany of false cures does not help a child if there is less stability and other resources left in the home as a result, or if the child is denied actual working physical and speech therapies because their parents are now convinced that if they can leverage enough fish oil down their child’s throat they’ll be cured.

I don’t think anyone here is interested in surpressing the truth, either. So I’m not sure what the point of your comment was. My post was made in an attempt to bring the truth to light, and that is that the mis-conception that the courts had found a link between autism and vaccines is just plain inaccurate. People who read the story in the media, or are just relayed the story, might be lead to believe that this ruling was made in a civil or criminal court and thus carries a burden of proof that in fact it does not… and I think that is a very important distinction where this matter is concerned.

I have two autistic children in my close circle of family and friends, one a nephew, one the child of a very close friend. So please don’t get all sanctiminious with me. And although I’m not a parent of an autistic child and don’t fully know what it’s like, I know full well the struggle that the parents of those children endure, and pinning their hopes on anti-science solutions is not only a waste of time and money, but also leads understandably desperate people to follow those misguided beliefs, and thus shift the focus away from the real science and therapies that will actually help these kids, in additioan to potentially subjecting their own children needlessly to illnesses that these vaccines prevent.

I understand you having a dislike for her clutching at any and everything out there as giving her hope for her child, if it doesn’t meet your exacting scientific specifications. Whatever gives Ms McCarthy hope to deal with this situation is fine by me. It’s a horrible situation for a parent to be in with their child. And believe you me, if your own child were in it, and Science wasn’t giving you ANY answers whatsoever at this point, you would be grasping at any hope out there.

In the article you linked, (which was a cheap local tv network which gave us more info on her hair color and who she was dating than it did on Autism) Her plea was simply was to get the word out that vitamin supplements and diet was helping children like hers in the families she networks with, and apparently, the medical community wasn’t responding to her experience.

She’s got every right to reach out to other parents. American Doctors, in my experience concerning autism (and in many other parent’s experience) aren’t very helpful or even concerned as they simply wait for your all-omniscient scientific community to solve the problem for them. Well, good luck with that- but until then, I am sure if her advice gets to a few parents of autistic children and it does help even in the tiniest bit, it was well worth the “cost” of her merely speaking out.

I don’t think parents of these children are worried about lawyers and their jurisprudence. These parents really are interested in finding out the truth. Not just feigning “the search for truth” like the lawyers and judges in courtrooms do.

Well, with mature commentary like that, how can people disagree?

(rolls eyes)

Can you people understand, EVER, how the name calling does NOT help us win?

Authism cannot be cured

Authism? Wait, isn’t that the one where a person has a compulsion to write?