Dear Paleo Guys and Gals,
I am posting this even tho it is not directly related to our diet. It is
related to paleo in a way, as the only treatment I have found for my son is
a paleo diet.
The allopathic professionals suggest taking anti-inflammatory drugs for
this measles infection of the gut. I certainly would appreciate it if anyone
else could email me with ideas. Also, I am posting it so anybody with a
newborn can educate themselves carefully before they make the decision to
give the child the MMR.
Hope this helps even one child/family....
Moira
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From the Autism List
I apologise for stepping into this debate at such a late stage but I have
been following events from Madrid (en Espanol and via Satellite TV) and
have only just had the opportunity to read the papers and the debate on
the list.
Perhaps some of the following comments have already been recorded here
but may, in any case, be worth repeating.
As is well known, Andrew Wakefield is a paediatric gastro-enterologist of
repute. He was struck by the numbers of young children who were appearing
at his hospital with the symptoms of Crohn's Disease which had, until
recently, been a very unusual disorder in children. When he investigated the
bowels he found what looked like evidence of viral involvement and having
studied all the available texts came upon a number of possibilities and
measles was one of these. He (and his team) performed gut biopsies on a
number of these subjects and reported the presence of evidence of measles
infection. Since these cases had all arisen since the introduction of the
triple MMR he hypothesised that the measles element of this could be a
factor.
This made the press and was spotted by a number of parents of children
with autism. A number of these are known to me and always been convinced
that the MMR triple vaccine precipitated the onset of symptoms and, in
particular, the loss of bowel function. They contacted Wakefield and
persuaded him to look at their children. At first he was not keen and
wondered whether or not it was ethical to examine children, from whom it
is difficult to get informed consent in this way. However, if these had
been asymptomatic children who had lost bowel function in this way then
they would have been examined. Is it right that children with
disabilities should be penalised by not having their symptoms thoroughly
investigated? (His point not mine)
The first of the 5 papers came out last week after very severe scrutiny.
Normally papers are sent to 2 reviewers; this was sent to 4. It was
accompanied in the Lancet by a hostile editorial and a brief report
appearing to cast doubt on Wakefield's previous papers linking the MMR to
Crohn's (and IBS). What a coincidence!
In fact, in spite of the fact that his data are actually quite good,
Wakefield's claims are comparatively understated. The bottom line is
"Further investigations are needed to examine this syndrome and its
possible relation to this vaccine."
I hope no-one would argue with that.
Surely no-one thinks that these results should have been suppressed. I
know that the researchers went through a lot of soul searching on this
one. The results were not what they wanted or expected and they have, in
my opinion, acted totally correctly throughout. The parents of the
children who were studied also deserve credit for keeping quiet in spite
of various inducements from the press.
I don't have any real quarrels with the editorial. There are some very
good points and some rather silly ones too but it would take a very big
effort to satisfy all the requirements of the editorial and make a 100%
watertight case. It requires a proper investigation of individual cases
and not just statistical manipulations of epidemiological data.
The other article, by Afzal, Minor, Begley et al. and entitled "Absence
of measles-virus genome in inflammatory bowel disease" is a fascinating
piece of work in that it has been quoted as destroying the Wakefield
argument about the role of the MMR in Crohn's disease (and IBS etc)
whereas it actually does completely the opposite. It adds credence to it.
In the original Wakefield paper, he reported on children who had been
exposed to the MMR vaccine and measles particles had been found. Afzal
looked at a sample of people with Crohn's disease and, using a very
sensitive technique, did not find any evidence of measles of any sort in
the guts.
Interestingly, the ages of Afzal's patients are not (as far as I can see)
quoted but there are clues in the text. Only "Five of the thirty patients
had a history of measles vaccination" and since all 30 had antibodies we
can assume they must have been exposed to wild measles strains at some
time. Since about 1988 we have had vaccination figures of around 90% (?)
with the MMR and before that for (and I am guessing here) we used the
monovalent measles vaccine. It seems most unlikely, therefore,that this
was a population of children.
Therefore: Adults with Crohn's Disease (and no MMR) = No Measles in guts;
Children with Crohn's (and MMR) = Measles in guts.
Their concluding sentence was "We concluded that with the best available
RT-PCR-nested PC technology, measles virus genome is not present in gut
mucosal biopsies from patients with Crohn's disease or ulcerative
colitis." It seems a rather dogmatic statement compared to Wakefield's.
This does not prove that the MMR caused the problem but it certainly does
not prove that it doesn't and yet that is how it is being used.
No-one doubts that measles, mumps and rubella can be life threatening and
serious diseases. It may well be that vaccination is the best way to
control them but let's just be sure that the methods we use are as safe
as they possibly can be.
Apologies for the length - congratulations on getting to the end.
Paul Shattock
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