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Autism’s Theoretical Causes: Mercury Amalgam Fillings and Anti-D Injections: An Editorial

 
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Autism related image Photo: Getty Images

In my previous article I discussed mercury and vaccines as possible causes of autism. Now, I will look at elements that babies are exposed to in the womb that may predispose them to getting autism.

Mercury Amalgam Fillings

Mothers who have mercury fillings, which contain 50 percent mercury, when pregnant, or who have them before pregnancy, may have an increased risk of having a child with autism. Although mercury fillings have been used for more than 150 years, the safety of such a practice was not studied until recently.

A review published in 2009 found that:

"Mercury from maternal amalgam fillings leads to a significant increase of mercury concentration in the tissues and the hair of fetuses and newborn children. Furthermore, placental, fetal, and infant mercury body burden correlates with the numbers of amalgam fillings of the mothers. Finally, mercury levels in amniotic fluid and breast milk correlate significantly with the number of maternal dental amalgam fillings." (1)

So pregnant women who have mercury fillings could end up leaching mercury into their amniotic fluid and passing it through the placenta to give their babies' bodies burdensome amounts of mercury before they are even born.(6)

If the mother has the fillings removed during pregnancy, this can make the situation worse and cause more mercury to be released.
When she begins to breast feed, her baby gets additional mercury from the milk. A study in sheep found that after ewes were given new amalgam fillings and they nursed foster lambs, the lambs received some of this mercury.

"Neonatal uptake of mercury (Hg) from milk was examined in a pregnant sheep model, where radioactive mercury (Hg203)/silver tooth fillings (amalgam) were newly placed. A crossover experimental design was used in which lactating ewes nursed foster lambs. Results from the animal studies showed that during pregnancy, a primary fetal site of amalgam Hg concentration is the liver and after delivery, the neonatal lamb kidney receives additional amalgam Hg from mother's milk. It was concluded that Hg originating from maternal amalgam tooth fillings transfers across the placenta to the fetus, across the mammary gland into milk ingested by the newborn, and ultimately into neonatal body tissues." (2)

Anti-D injections

Anti-D injections are given to rhesus (Rh) negative mothers during pregnancy to reduce the risk of fetal Rh (positive blood mixing with theirs and causing an immune system reaction). This is called rhesus disease or feto-maternal haemorrhage.


This can occur during childbirth but mainly occurs if the mother has had an invasive medical procedure such as amniocentesis or chorionic villus sampling. Feto-maternal haemorrhage can cause the baby to become anemic and need an in utero blood transfusion, which carries a 2 percent risk of fetal death. (3,4)


However, some brands of anti-D injection used to contain mercury and it has been implicated as a possible cause of autism.
 A 2008 study by the Institute of Chronic Illnesses found that Rh-negative mothers were much more likely to have children with neurological disorders, compared with Rh-positive mothers.

Thimerosal was removed from the U.S. anti-D injections in 2002 and researchers discovered that the children born in 2002 or later had the same risk of neurological disorder as those in the Rh-positive group, but those before 2002 had a higher risk, suggesting that the anti-D injection was the causative factor.

"There were significant and comparable increases in maternal Rh-negativity among children with NDs (Clinic: A=24.2 percent), autism spectrum disorders (Clinic: A=28.3 percent, B=25.3 percent), and attention-deficit-disorder/attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder (Clinic: A=26.3 percent) observed at both clinics in comparison to both control groups (Clinic: A=12.1%, B=13.9 Percent) employed. Children with NDs born after 2001 had a maternal Rh-negativity frequency (13.6 percent) similar to controls." (5)

Removing the mercury from anti-D injections seemed to be a positive step in reducing the number of children with autism and ASDs.

Sources:

1. A prospective study of prenatal mercury exposure from maternal dental amalgams and autism severity, Acta Neurobiologiae Experimentalis. Acta Neurobiol Exp 2009, 69: 1–9.
Abstract: http://www.iaomt.org/news/files/files302/Amalgam_Autism_Geier_2009.pdf

2. Vimy MJ et al., Mercury from maternal "silver" tooth fillings in sheep and human breast milk. Biol Trace Elem Res.1997 Feb;56(2):143-52. Abstract:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9164660

3. Birth Defects, Rh Disease, March of Dimes. Web. 9 September 2011. http://www.marchofdimes.com/birthdefects_rh.html

4. A156 Pregnancy (rhesus negative women) - routine anti-D (review): guidance, National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. Web. 9 September 2011.
http://guidance.nice.org.uk/TA156/Guidance/doc/English

5. Neurodevelopmental disorders, maternal Rh-negativity, and Rho(D) immune globulins: a multi-center assessment, Neuroendocrinology Letters. 2008 Apr;29(2):272-80. Abstract:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18404135

6. Lugliè PF et al. Mercury determination in human amniotic fluid. Minerva Stomatol. 2000 Apr;49(4):155-61.
Abstract:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11040541

Joanna is a freelance health writer for The Mother magazine and Suite 101 with a column on infertility, http://infertility.suite101.com/. She is author of the book Breast Milk: A Natural Immunization, and co-author of an educational resource on disabled parenting.

She is a mother of five who practised drug-free home birth, delayed cord clamping, full term breast feeding, co-sleeping, home schooling and flexi schooling and is an advocate of raising children on organic food.

Reviewed September 21, 2011
by Michele Blacksberg RN
Edited by Malu Banuelos

Add a Comment34 Comments

(reply to AutismNewsBeat)

Do you mean in medicine? I think that homeopathy is safe as it's one of the few types of medicine that pregnant women and babies can have (whereas pharmaceutical medications have side-effects and herbal medicines and essential oils can also have side-effects and aren't suitable for everyone).

I think other general medications like ibuprofen are what I call 'generally safe' in that most people can take them without adverse effect but they can have the side-effect of giving you gastritis and in rare instances can cause meningitis.

What I do is look for the healing method that is least invasive with the least known side-effects (whether that be general medicine or alternative therapy) and only opt for the one with more risk if there are no other options. For instance, if I need an X-ray then I will have the X-ray but will have a bath with baking soda or clay in it to help extract the radiation afterwards.

I will take a glucosamine supplement for arthritis (which worked after one week of taking), but if I run out of that or my pain is worse that week I will take a pretty strong painkiller and also take vitamins so that my body is better able to withstand drug side-effects.

So I realise that nothing in medicine is absolutely safe but with a known harmful metal and YEARS of experience of what it can do, doctors should be choosing the least harmful option and not just saying 'Oh, I'm sure this will be alright.'

First do no harm, remember? That's what they promised.

September 27, 2011 - 4:57am
(reply to Joanna Karpasea-Jones)

Homeopathic remedies are water. Drink too much, and you can get very sick, even die. Fortunately, one can drink a safe amount of water.

One can also ingest a safe amount of mercury, which is a good thing since the element is unavoidable. It has been in the air, plants and water since the earth cooled.

My point is that before you throw around the word "safe" we need to agree on its meaning. Since nothing, medicinal or otherwise, is 100% safe, we need to assess risk against the supposed benefit. The riskiest thing that most people do is driving a car, but we accept the risk because of the perceived benefit of fast, easy mobility. The risk of thimerosal, which has been absent from scheduled pediatric vaccines for ten years, is minute compared to the benefit of vaccination.

How does baking soda extract radiation? Do you also bath in clay after sitting in front of your computer, or riding in an airplane?

September 27, 2011 - 6:15am
(reply to AutismNewsBeat)

This re baking soda:

www.jem.org/cgi/content/abstract/25/5/693

While some things may be okay and even beneficial in small quantities (like red wine for instance), mercury is one of the things that isn't. It just isn't, in any amount.

Check this out:

In addition to the multidose vaccines containing thimerosal discussed above, some companies offer a 0.5 mg/L single dose, pre-filled syringe vaccine. Some of these products are labeled “preservative- or thimerosal-free”. Preservative-free products may contain trace amounts (less than or equal to 1 microgram/0.5 mL dose) because thimerosal was used during the manufacturing process. The term preservative- or thimerosal-free can be utilized if the manufacturer further purified the product, leaving only trace amounts (less than or equal to 1 microgram/0.5 mL) per dose. Even at this level, calculations indicate mercury would exceed the TCLP standard; therefore these vaccines, if deemed unusable, should be managed as hazardous waste as well.'

http://www.iaomt.org/news/files/files372/Thimerosal%20-%20South%20Dakota%20Waste%20Mgmt%20Guidelines.pdf

So the supposedly thimerosal free vaccines have trace amounts high enough to be deemed 'hazardous waste', yet they're okay to be injected into a baby? This stuff is okay to put into a filling?

Thimerosal is not absent from pediatric vaccines, it's just been reduced. It's used in manufacturer and pretty much impossible to make vaccines without it and amounts of 3mcg or less are in many vaccines listed as thimerosal free. It's also in the Hep B vaccine (some brands) and flu vaccines in the full amount. They added it in, in 2004 after they said they were removing it for safety reasons. In the UK they also introduced an under 5's H1N1 vaccine program that later got scrapped, that contained the full amount of thimerosal (that was 2009) and they recommend thimerosal containing flu vaccines for pregnant women. Go figure.

Here's the CDC Pink Book that shows thimerosal in small amounts in thimerosal free vaccines:

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/B/excipient-table-2.pdf

And check out this Merck document that says 'inhalation, swallowing or absorption through the skin IN VERY SMALL AMOUNTS CAN CAUSE CONSIDERABLE DAMAGE TO HEALTH AND MAY EVEN BE LETHAL.'

http://www.vce.org/mercury/thimerosal-usp.pdf

As for the computer, yes, I agree it's bad. If I work too much (on the computer), I get headaches. I try to have breaks from it and my children are severely restricted from using computers. I only allow a certain amount of usage per week. I won't let them have mobile phones and interestingly if I use my mobile phone it triggers my auditary processing disorder. I can text on it but not put it to my ear to talk. The landline phone does not do this. I eat only organic food and will only give organic to my kids. I use only natural cleaners for the home (baking soda is good for cleaning too) and I travel on public transportation (less pollutive to the world and probably slightly safer, you hear about car accidents all the time but not so much about bus crashes) and if they try to mandate these full body radiation scanner things at airports I will be refusing.

I think electromagnetic pollution is a major issue and probably some of that may be causing autism too and I want to write something on that too.

September 27, 2011 - 8:19am
(reply to Joanna Karpasea-Jones)

Joanna
you are an anti vaccine zealot who believes in homeopathy, electromagnetic pollution and defend a doctor, Mark Geier who injects children with Lupron, a powerful drug that interferes with their hormonal balance and has dangerous side effects. This drug is expensive and he has to pretend his victims have precocious puberty to fool the insurance companies into picking up the bill. But that is OK because he is a brave maverick doctor standing up to the drug companies that are only motivated by profit.

You peddle this nonsense on a site devoted to women's health, unaware of the controversy surrounding this drug among those for whom it is legitimately prescribed. You have written elsewhere about Endometriosis. Lupron is a treatment for this that has had a mixed reception amongst women. See http://www.endometriosis-survivor.com/?page_id=10

I do not know if the controversy around Lupron has any more basis than the controversy around vaccines. But there is a very vocal patient led movement against it which should give pause to anybody supporting its off label use in children in doses that exceed all clinical recommendations.

Geier's Lupron protocol is at best malpractice. At worst it is child abuse. It has cost him his medical licence in a number of states in the USA. You support his chemical castration of children while promoting alternative, non-invasive therapies because you share the same anti vaccine rhetoric. What a disgrace.

September 27, 2011 - 3:50pm
(reply to mike.stanton3)

I don't know anything about the treatment or him personally, I'm only writing about some studies he and others authored. The article comments on those studies, not on Lupron.

I won't respond to your comments due to you calling me names. If you want to have a respectful debate then please do, but I won't respond to name calling.

September 29, 2011 - 5:35am
(reply to Joanna Karpasea-Jones)

Joanna you claim to know nothing about Geier's treatment protocol yet you can write, "At least Geier is trying to help recover autistic children." So you are endorsing the behaviour of a man about whom you know nothing.

I called you an anti vaccine zealot because you are. Here is an anti vaccine blog you wrote. http://www.whale.to/vaccine/jones.html Here is the anti vaccine website you set up. http://www.vaccineriskawareness.com/

If we are to have a respectful debate it works both ways. You have dismissed every study or piece of evidence which I have presented, which contradicts your opinion, on the grounds that the authors are either politically motivated or in it for for the money. You respond to scientific arguments by traducing the scientists and doctors who carry out the studies rather than responding to the content of their papers.

You are writing a series of articles on "theoretical causes of autism." "Theoretical" implies biological plausibility and a modicum of research evidence to support your view. That used to be the case for vaccines ten years ago. It never made it as a theory because scientists looked and could not find any evidence. There is not even a plausible biological pathway for ultrasound and autism. Your article amounts to this:

"Radiation at sufficient intensity can damage tissues in the human body and cause neurological damage. Ultrasound is a form of radiation. We need more studies to investigate the possibility that the radiation in ultra sound scans might be causing autism."

I know what the FDA paper said about possible unknown risks. But that was in the context of commercial operators, possibly without proper training and using devices which had not had sufficient safety checks, using ultra sound at much higher levels of intensity and for much longer periods of time than is normal in clinical use. The same paper said that clinically indicated scans were carried out at much lower levels of intensity and for much shorter periods of time . The research evidence says they are safe. The only significant neurological effect that has emerged so far is handedness and that is a weak association that is challenged by some researchers.

So why are you writing about something that has a track record of safety, a good research basis and a proven benefit in the management of pregnancy?

September 29, 2011 - 2:17pm

Well, how do you explain the fact that the FDA has re-classified mercury fillings as more dangerous than before?

'On July 28, 2009, FDA issued a final rule that: (1) reclassified mercury from a class I (least risk) device to class II (more risk) device; (2) classified dental amalgam as a class II device; and (3) designated a special controls guidance document for dental amalgam.

The developing neurological systems in fetuses and young children may be more sensitive to the neurotoxic effects of mercury vapor. Very limited to no clinical information is available regarding long-term health outcomes in pregnant women and their developing fetuses, and children under the age of six, including infants who are breastfed.'

They say that very limited to NO clinical information is available in this group. The majority of safety tests are in people older than 6 years.

http://www.fda.gov/MedicalDevices/ProductsandMedicalProcedures/DentalProducts/DentalAmalgam/ucm171120.htm#ifu

This is even later, from 2009.
I put those studies in and not the other because that's what I have read, not because I was cherry picking. If I had been cherry picking I would have included the FDA source I just showed you as I think that's a gem!

September 25, 2011 - 7:29am
(reply to Joanna Karpasea-Jones)

I hold no brief for the FDA but I expect that they are operating on the precautionary principle. I do not know why you think it is "a gem." The lack of evidence for the effects of amalgam in children under six is probably because very few children under six have dental amalgams. Dentists do not usually drill and fill baby teeth. But for those that do and for babies who are breast fed, the FDA document does conclude with this "gem."

"Taking into account factors such as the number and size of teeth and respiratory volumes and rates, FDA estimates that the estimated daily dose of mercury in children under age six with dental amalgams is lower than the estimated daily adult dose. The exposures to children would therefore be lower than the protective levels of exposure identified by ATSDR and EPA.
In addition, the estimated concentration of mercury in breast milk attributable to dental amalgam is an order of magnitude below the EPA protective reference dose for oral exposure to inorganic mercury. FDA has concluded that the existing data support a finding that infants are not at risk for adverse health effects from the breast milk of women exposed to mercury vapors from dental amalgam."

September 25, 2011 - 3:33pm
(reply to mike.stanton3)

But the point is, they just don't have enough evidence so they don't know. You can't say something is safe when you haven't done the research to prove it. How can they say it is safe for pregnant women to have amalgam fillings when they admitted they have no data on long term outcomes?? They don't have the science to back up their recommendations.

September 26, 2011 - 2:12am
(reply to Joanna Karpasea-Jones)

Joanna, how do you define "safe"? Can you name something that you consider safe?

September 26, 2011 - 4:34am
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We value and respect our HERWriters' experiences, but everyone is different. Many of our writers are speaking from personal experience, and what's worked for them may not work for you. Their articles are not a substitute for medical advice, although we hope you can gain knowledge from their insight.

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