The Independent: Italian court rules MMR vaccine did trigger autism

[proverbialwisdom]

15. I urge you to please spend some time reading this 2012 HARVARD HEALTH PUBLICATION.

Read Martha Herbert's new book about autism (she 'strongly encourages vaccination. That said, we need more data on how children who have autism and perhaps other known or unseen vulnerabilities respond to the current vaccination protocol,' so you should have absolutely no remotely valid objection):

INTRODUCTION: From Seeing What You Believe to Believing What You See

This book is based on real stories of children and adults with autism who didn't follow the textbooks. They got better - some dramatically so. Although I changed their names and was vague on details to protect their privacy, I was meticulous in sticking to the facts of their stories and letting their experiences direct how I explained the science.

Textbooks do not include the possibility that people with autism get this much better. Neither does a lot of scientific research.

In that sense, you may say that I have gotten ahead of the science. Not everyone will be able to get such fabulous results for themselves or their child. But I have confidence that science and medicine will make these advances possible to many more people going forward.

As I have dug into current research to write this book, I have been stunned by how much science there is to support the approaches parents are taking to get their kids better. Karen Weintraub, an experienced science journalist who has shared this journey with me, has been equally amazed. Every day our internet alerts and Listservs overflow with research publications and news stories asbout every area we discuss, and their findings are largely resonant with what we are explaining in this book.

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Why are my ideas about autism so different from many other people's? I think there are three answers. One, as I'll describe in the first chapter, patients in my pediatric neurology practice at Harvard didn't fit what I had been taught. Two, my research yielded insights I could never have expected. And three, I lucked out in terms of timing. My rethinking of autism coincided with an explosion of science on so many different levels.

This book has been informed by entirely new fields with names like epigenetics, systems biology, gut microbioogy, nutrigenomics, and metabolomics, as well as new revelations in neurology, gastroenterology, environmental science and immunology. We have new tools that allow us to screen tens of thousands of genes in less time than it used to take us to find one. We can now examine single neurons or watch how clumps of them interact. We can explore how the balance of microbes in people's guts changes their health and their brains. New technologies and new research have uncovered previously hidden interconnections, allowing us to frame autism in a way that simply wasn't possible even five years ago.

But this is fundamentally not a science book. It is a book of success stories that make sense biologically.

I believe these triumphs have huge implications for medicine and science and the way we think about autism - and perhaps for much more. I believe it is so dramatic that it calls for a revolution in how we think and what we do.

MARTHA HERBERT, MD, PhD

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http://www.health.harvard.edu/books/the-autism-revolution

After years of treating patients and analyzing scientific data, prominent Harvard researcher and clinician Dr. Martha Herbert offers a revolutionary new view of autism and a transformative strategy for dealing with it.

Autism is not a hardwired impairment programmed into a child’s genes and destined to remain fixed forever, as we’re often told. Instead, it is the result of a cascade of events, many seemingly minor: perhaps a genetic mutation, some toxic exposures, a stressful birth, a vitamin deficiency, and a series of infections. And while other doctors may dismiss your child’s physical symptoms—the diarrhea, anxiety, sensory overload, sleeplessness, immune challenges, and seizures—as coincidental or irrelevant, Dr. Herbert sees them as vital clues to what the underlying problems are, and how to help. In The Autism Revolution, she teaches you how to approach autism as a collection of problems that can be overcome—and talents that can be developed. Each success you achieve gives your child more room to become healthy and to thrive.

Drawing from the newest research, technologies, and insights, as well as inspiring case studies of both children and adults, Dr. Herbert guides you toward restoring health and resiliency in your loved one with autism. Her specific recommendations aim to provide optimal nutrition, reduce toxic exposures, shore up the immune system, reduce stress, and open the door to learning and creativity—all by understanding and truly meeting your child’s needs. As thousands of families who have cobbled together these solutions themselves already know, this program can have dramatic benefits—for your child with autism, and for you, your whole family, and your next baby as well.

A paradigm-changing book that offers hope and healing for the millions of families who have autism in their lives, The Autism Revolution shows that there’s plenty you can do every day to give someone you love the best possible gift: a life lived to the fullest potential.

Martha Herbert, MD, PhD, is an assistant professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School and a pediatric neurologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, where she is the director of the TRANSCEND Research Program. She sits on the Scientific Advisory Committee for Autism Speaks.
Karen Weintraub, MA, is an award-winning journalist and freelance health writer for outlets like The Boston Globe, USA Today, and the BBC. A past recipient of a prestigious Knight Center for Science Journalism fellowship, she also teaches journalism at the Harvard Extension School and Boston University.

For more info visit www.AutismRevolution.org