A couple of weeks ago I published a blog about the work of Andrew Wakefield. Although some viewers answered kindly with information meant to rebuke me, the visceral response from others has been quite violent. Besides serious physical threats, there are abusive remarks and other nonsensical comments. Some of the readers have gone over previous blogs now finding new evidence for my “deranged” way of thinking. One comment, for example, came from a reader who appropriately named himself “Smarter than You”. His comment was as follows: “Wow, this is how you draw your conclusion that mercury is not involved in Autism? Looks like you did about 5 minutes of google research here pal. Very shortly you are going to wake up and realize that you shouldn’t talk about something when you don’t even have the most basic understanding of either Autism or Mercury. I can’t wait to finally educate people like you”. Actually, I am a Board Certified Neurologist who did training in Neuropathology at Johns Hopkins. I served as a Medical Examiner in both Washington, DC and Maryland. I recently came back from being one of the opening plenary speakers at the annual American Association of Neuropathologists. I think that my education has extended over 5 minutes of internet search. However, you can judge the criticized blog by yourselves.
I believe that parents, such as Bernie Rimland, have promoted our modern understanding of autism. Indeed, I have learned more about the clinical aspects of autism by reading autobiographical accounts than by reading medical textbooks. It is therefore unsurprising that throughout the years when diverging opinions regarding autism have erupted between physicians and parents, it is the latter’s point of view that has carried the day. It stands to reason that nowadays when a controversy arises I try to understand both sides of the argument before making an informed decision. In the present blog, I will risk wasting everybody’s time in discussing a subject that has been repeatedly broached in the literature and offer my own take on the role that mercury may (or may not) have on the genesis of autism from the perspective of a neurologist and neuropathologist. I won’t cover the MMR controversy because I have not…
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