Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention quietly attempted to change their messaging around vaccines and autism, despite research overwhelmingly showing that there is no connection. But what do medical experts and autistic advocates have to say? Coincidentally, last week, BTPM invited experts to discuss this exact topic. This week on the Disabilities Beat, we share part of that conversation.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript created by a contractor and may be updated over time to be more accurate.
Emyle Watkins: Hi, I'm Emyle Watkins, and this is the Disabilities Beat. Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention quietly attempted to change their messaging around vaccines and autism, despite research overwhelmingly showing that there is no connection. But what do medical experts and autistic advocates have to say? Coincidentally, last week, BTPM invited experts to discuss this exact topic.
Dr. Mark Hicar: These are dangerous. I mean, I've unfortunately seen a child die from measles.
Emyle Watkins: That's Dr. Mark Hicar, talking about the infections many vaccines prevent or reduce the severity of. Hicar is an expert on vaccines and vaccine hesitancy.
Dr. Mark Hicar: It's rare that children die from measles, but still, 1 in 4 children with measles end up in the hospital. And 1 in 10 get pneumonia from measles, and that could be very severe, long hospital stays, and is greater risk. So, these are not benign infections when they happen, necessarily.
Emyle Watkins: As Dr. Hicar points out, we do know skipping vaccinations can lead to bad outcomes for kids.
Dr. Mark Hicar: Well, most kids aren't going to end up in the hospital. But the kids who end up in the hospital with flu, kids who end up in the hospital with COVID, almost none of them are vaccinated. So, that's the correlation, is that the kids who are in the hospital basically skip their vaccines.
Emyle Watkins: But still, many parents are hesitant because of the misinformation that has been presented about vaccines. We have the entire conversation with Hicar and other experts on our website, which explains the since-retracted and disproven study that led to the modern wave of disinformation around vaccines and autism. I wanted to share a few excerpts from that conversation, in particular where Dr. Hicar explained another cause of vaccine hesitancy is misinformation about preservatives in vaccines.
Dr. Mark Hicar: Yeah, I was going to get into that on some of the reasons why people are still hesitant about vaccines. And thimerosal sounds scary. We haven't had it in any of the children's vaccines, basically, for over 25 years now. And it really has shown no change on the incidence of autism, basically taking that out of any of the vaccines and even when they take it out in Europe.
And really, ethylmercury, there's a whole issue that you get into where people are afraid of chemicals, basically. But when you say, "And then toxicity levels also come into that," like, "What is a toxin? What is a poison?" And so, we can all take too much dihydrogen monoxide and end up dying. Dihydrogen monoxide is water. You drink it every day, but it sounds much scarier when I say dihydrogen monoxide. And you can overdose on water. You have to drink a lot of water. We do not recommend it, obviously. But you can actually overdose on water. And so, knowing that cyanide is a poison that everyone recognizes as a poison. However, your cells make cyanide. Every cell in your body is making cyanide, at a very low level. It's necessary for certain processes. But this is basically, there's a toxicity level when something's in something. And just because something sounds like a chemical name doesn't mean it's a bad thing.
Emyle Watkins: Like acetaminophen?
Dr. Mark Hicar: Like acetaminophen. Yeah.
Emyle Watkins: And later in the conversation, David Herring from the Western New York Neurodiversity Network shared that many autistic people don't want to cure or to change who they are. Herring identifies as neurodivergent and is raising a neurodivergent child.
David Herring: I think autism is beautiful. If there was a cure for autism, I wouldn't want it. I want autistic minds in the world that I live in. It's not the end of the world. I think at one point, someone made a reference to say a young parent who's maybe already had an autistic child and then is worrying about the next one having it. I'm more interested in us finding cures for ableism than I am a cure for autism. I get it. Especially if you're a young parent, you don't feel equipped to navigate a lot of the information. On some level, I get why people are drawn to ideas that are not backed by science, because there is kind of of and in itself some community in that. I would argue it's not the most productive means of having community. But when you're feeling a lot of uncertainty, when you're feeling overwhelmed, I can see how it comes to that.
Emyle Watkins: If you've had questions about vaccines, Tylenol and/or autism, you can check the rest of this conversation out on our website at btpm.org.
David Herring: Find productive community. Pause when you see information. And find ways to celebrate the beautiful autistic child you have.
Emyle Watkins: You can listen to the Disabilities Beat segment on demand, view a transcript and plain-language description for every episode on our website at btpm.org. I'm Emyle Watkins. Thanks for listening.
