Yesterday's USA Today featured a full-page ad sponsored by Generation Rescue, a non-profit advocacy group that promotes the idea that developmental disorders, such as autism, have been caused by environmental factors. The main environmental factor that much of the controversy focuses on is mercury toxicity from childhood vaccines and this is the topic of Generation Rescue's website -- specifically the thimerosal in vaccines.

The full-page ad was pointed directly at the CDC and directed readers to a website: www.putchildrenfirst.org. There they explain their position on the CDC "covering up" the true cause of autism.

I'll admit that when the theory that autism was caused by vaccines was first presented to me, it sounded UNBELIEVABLE. How could it be that the government was promoting a childhood vaccine schedule that was actually poisoning so many children? Parents of children with autism, a devastating disorder for both the child and family, must just be frantic and over-reacting, looking for someone to blame. BUT, the statistical evidence is damning -- a 6000% increase in the last 30 years. Since autism has traditionally been thought of as a genetic disorder, it is impossible to believe that a genetic disorder can multiply so rapidly in a generation. That fact alone sent researchers on the trail to find environmental causes.

It is interesting living in Atlanta - home of the CDC and Simpsonwood (the site of a "secret" CDC meeting) and the epicenter of this controversy. The controversy is levied squarely at the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention). The article in yesterday's Atlanta Journal Constitution cries out that Controversy over autism eats at credibility of CDC, but doesn't zero in on what thousands of parents and doctors believe to be the core issue -- that childhood vaccines containing thimerosal were not safe and caused thousands of cases of autism and that the CDC was aware of the link but made no moves to remove thimerosal from vaccines for several years after the relationship was known. Advocates contend that the "cover up" of the data showing a direct link between thimerosal and autism is similar to the tobacco companies denying the link between smoking and lung cancer.

One would like to believe that CDC has nobler reasons for wanting children to be vaccinated than the tobacco companies did for wanting to sell cigarettes. The CDC cites the importance to public health of a vaccinated population. But the use of thimerosal in vaccines remains at the core of the whole controversy. (FYI - thimerosal, as of around 2002, has been removed from most of the vaccines received by children in the US. However, it is still used in the flu vaccine AND is still possibly in vaccinations given to children overseas, including those coming from institutions in several countries where international adoption is common.)

The interesting thing about this controversy is that it is gaining momentum in congress. A letter, sent by Sen. Joseph Lieberman on February 22, and signed by seven other members of congress, called for a new study examining the vaccine-autism issue. The letter specifically asked that the CDC NOT take the lead in the study.

So while it may be unfathomable to believe that the CDC, along with the FDA and other health organizations designed to protect public health would actually acquire data showing a link between vaccines and autism and then cover it up, there does seem to be evidence pointing in that direction.

Meanwhile, parents and doctors who believe there is a link between thimerosal and autism aren't standing idly by waiting on the federal government to confirm their beliefs. They are working on interventions to help children "recover" from autism. And anecdotally there is a great deal of success.

So, we will continue to watch this story unfold. There does seem to be solid data pointing to an environmental factor (or factors) in autism. And there does seem to be data linking vaccines to autism. And there is growing anecdotal evidence that children with autism and other neurological disorders are being helped through biomedical interventions.