So if you are a parent you know all about the controversy over childhood vaccines. If you aren't you may not really know or care at this point in your life, but like I said before: knowledge is power.
The big debate over vaccines in general (especially ones for children) are the harmful side-effects that may or may not occur and of course their overall effectiveness. One of the most controversial aspects regarding vaccines is the preservative called thimerosal. It is used in vaccines that are mass-produced in large doses (in vials that can be used for several different patients), or vaccines that contain several different viruses (such as measles, mumps and rubella: MMR).
Thimerosal itself is can be harmful when inhaled, injested or when the skin is exposed. Evidently it is not harmful when it is injected into the body. Not really sure why. The body breaks thimerosal down into two parts: ethylmercury and thiosalicylate. Hopefully you all recognize the "mercury" in the ethylmercury and thus the controversy. Now generally mercury exposure comes from methylmercury, an organic, more readily absorbed form of mercury. It crosses the blood-brain and placental barriers. High levels can lead to neurological damage, organ damage, autoimmune diseases and all kinds of other things.
Tests have been done and have shown that ethylmercury is eliminated through waste more readily and so is not dispersed throughout the body doing the kind of damage methylmercury does. However, high doses of even ethylmercury over a period of time would have the same effects as methylmercury.
When the FDA, CDC and all those other acronymic organizations realized the possible harmful effects of ethylmercury they began to eliminate it from all childhood vaccines. Now I am not sure if that means that no childhood vaccines have thimerosal or that they just give you the option now. You at least have the option. However, thimerosal has not been eliminated from adult vaccines such as influenza--probably one of the most commonly administered vaccines.
The government has done numerous studies and says at the very best that there is no conclusive proof that thimerosal is harmful to children and that the benefits of vaccines far outweigh any possible unproven harmful effects. I'm not sure as a parent that I would be willing to take that risk, but ok. There have been numerous studies done on the other side of the coin showing that there are very suspicious correlations between rising numbers in children with autism and the increase in the number of vaccines recommended to children under the age of 2.
The government has said that the recommended limit of mercury exposure for children is not being exceeded by the accumulated amount of mercury in childhood vaccines. To me this means that for most children the vaccines will not be a problem. Their little bodies will be able to eliminate the harmful substance from their bodies quickly and their will be no negative effects. However there have been studies showing that some infants due to either a genetic or development factor are unable to eliminate the mercury from their bodies. This is obviously a problem. How do you know if your child has this developmental issue? Is there some test your pediatrician can do? Probably not.
The statistics linking autism and mercury poisoning are fairly astounding. As of yet there is no proof. I won't pretend there is. And as with all things I am sure there is more than one cause for some of these developmental issues that are running rampant in our children. But how easy is it to just ask your child's doctor for a mercury-free vaccine and save yourself the worry?
It's hard to know who to believe. This is the battle I was talking about last time. I usually think that the government and big business are not the most reliable sources for truth. They tend to have agendas that are very important to them and have a long history of withholding information to the detriment of the public whenever it suits them. But whether thimerosal is harmful or not, whether it causes autism or not we do know that mercury is not good for you, infant or adult. Generally I think that the more bad stuff we can keep out of our bodies and the more good things we can put in them, the better. This might just be another good opportunity to put that into practice.
And now you know.
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