HN Theater @HNTheaterMonth

Posting this now before finishing the article to be an early poster. (see edit below for my comments after finishing the article)

The article refers to missteps and errors doctors have made concerning vaccinations. One misstep/error that is concerning to me is the use of thimerosal as a preservative/adjuvant.

Around 1999, the FDA began to pressure manufacturers to remove thimerosal from all childhood vaccines due to safety concerns. The following link is a great summary why that presents pro/con perspectives. Thimerosal is no longer used in childhood vaccines, and has been largely replaced by aluminum-based adjuvants. https://www.fda.gov/vaccines-blood-biologics/vaccines/thimer...

In 2004, FDA official William Egan stated that no clinical trial had been done to evaluate the safety of thimerosal, a preservative/adjuvant that was commonly used in vaccinations. Except for a poorly run 1930 study. See the following link for the testimony. It's from an anti-vax youtube channel, but the testimony is real and uncut. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBRwOohhHuA

A few years ago, after about 15 years of studying biochemistry and personal experimentation (including obtaining an environmental engineering degree), I identified the root cause of my crippling illness that took away my ability to walk. Chronic mercury toxicity. Thimerosal contains mercury. Maybe I got the mercury somewhere else, but I have no other known exposures. Never ate much fish, and my symptoms started long before I ever ate any.

I have reversed the course of my illness using a medication that specifically binds to mercury and facilitates easier excretion from the body. I've been using this therapy for 3 years now with consistent improvement. If it was a placebo effect it would not produce consistent results for such a long period of time.

For those curious, the medication I'm using is emeramide. It is currently going through the FDA approval process for the treatment of mercury toxicity, and looks like it will be approved within 10 years.

Edit:

After finishing the article I'd like to address two points:

(1) I see that the author discussed the FDA's removal of thimerosal. They point out how experts "talked out of both sides of their mouths", claiming thimerosal was safe, but insisted it be removed as expeditiously as possible. Toxicity is very very complex science. During my 4 years as an environmental engineer I noticed a huge amount of politicking around toxicity issues because it's so hard to prove if some compound is safe or not. My interpretation of the expert's behavior regarding thimerosal is that they became so uncomfortable with the unproven safety profile of the compound that they pushed for it's removal, while simultaneously saying it was fine in order to cover their asses. It's career suicide to admit you supported the use of a compound all the while insisting it was safe, only to flip-flop and say it was dangerous all along. So the experts do the right thing, banning the compound, while covering their asses. I saw this phenomenon over and over while working in pollution remediation.

(2) The author spends considerable time discrediting Wakefield's MMR study. MMR never contained thimerosal, so discussion of that study with respect to thimerosal's safety is not applicable. Also, Wakefield's study was ONE study, and it's so strange how the pro-vax movement keeps talking about how terrible it was like it is still relevant. There have been hundreds if not thousands of other studies much more worthy of discussion. The healthcare industry has published numerous fraudulent studies from all sorts of perspectives. It's not a phenomenon only associated with people who question vaccine safety. See Merck's fraudulent study demonstrating Vioxx's safety. They just removed 3 participants so the numbers looked good.

⬐ perl4ever

I read something once that said, if low levels of mercury really made a difference in anything important, it would be apparent on a large scale particularly in Japan, due to seafood consumption.

So that's my rationale for not obsessing over it in general.

Compare to, say, lead, where you can see that the places that were/are last to have it in gasoline are the most violent places in the world.

When you start worrying about an insidious problem affecting a huge number of people, it seems to me the first response should be to ask what natural experiment exists.

⬐ secstate

I think Vioxx is a great case study in why people are growing skeptical of not just vaccines, but pharma solutions to daily problems in general.

I find it hard to be too critical with people who are skeptical of modern medical science, given we know the Replication Crisis [0] has yet to be resolved. Between the human brain's chronic inability to parse statistics properly and the incredible amount of money to be made in solutions that make chronic conditions or deadly diseases go away, I do my best to be tolerant.

Ironically, another post that's currently sitting on the HNews frontpage has some fun ads from the 60s encouraging women to slam sugar before lunch so they don't eat as much. I'm sure this advice was being peddled alongside physicians who not only smoked in their patient rooms, but encouraged smoking for it's weight loss side-effect.

Separating the human from science is unfathomably difficult. Humans are cruel, selfish and misguided about many things. Assuming because something was published in JAMA or NEJM by someone who spent 6 years in a PhD program at an accredited university, that it's the gospel truth should be discouraged. People should ask questions and think for themselves. And as a result, some people will make horrible decisions and some may even die directly from those decisions or from the long term consequences. But then again, there were probably plenty of doctors in the 60s who had a gut feeling about the safety of smoking and ended up dying of some horrible and preventable cancer. But what the hell, they had a medical degree, so they probably knew better than everyone else.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replication_crisis

Edited to add missing link

⬐ wavepruner

One big issue that gets lost in the discussion is how many of these treatments are reasonably safe for perfectly healthy people, and it's the people with risk factors who need to be concerned. That's why informed consent and choice are so important.

Maybe Vioxx was fine for most, and the decrease in digestive symptoms made it the ideal medication for many. Maybe doctors could have withheld prescriptions for people at risk of heart attack. Maybe a big warning could have been placed on every bottle so patients could decide for themselves. But instead it blew up into a drama-fest because one side has to be 100% correct and the other crazy or fraudsters.

If this either/or dynamic was addressed we could come close to having our cake and eating it too.

But instead everyone is shoe horned into limited studies, and those less-than-healthy people on the fringes are demonized and ostracized as luddites destroying human civilization. Except every once in a while when big pharma gets the blame for pushing safety risks too far.