Though government authorities have insisted that no solid evidence of a connection between thimerosal and autism exists, they do not deny that vaccines can cause harm. In addition, there is mounting evidence that vaccines may be associated with other disorders. The responsibility falls to parents to decide which is worse, the risk of the illness, or the risk of the vaccine. To complicate things further, this decision must be made in the absence of complete information.
In 1997, Andrew Wakefield, a British doctor, published an article in which he theorized that the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine (which has never contained thimerosal, but has been implicated in autism) might cause a digestive problem which allows toxic substances to pass from the gut into the bloodstream. This theory was based on the autistic symptoms and intestinal symptoms he sometimes noticed after the MMR vaccine. Perhaps some combination of weakened bodily defenses and exposure to toxins and chemicals allows some susceptible individuals to develop disease.
Despite a united public government front, undisclosed CDC studies have uncovered possible connections between vaccines and autistic disease, including the fact that autistic-like symptoms may be increased by exposure to thimerosal during a child’s first six months. Another confidential study (later released to a parent group) showed that the majority of vaccinated children have mercury levels that exceed the EPA limits at one and three months of age. In 1999, the FDA stated that thimerosal exposure might lead to excessive mercury levels in a child’s first six months, but insisted that no child was receiving toxic doses.
Other independent studies have shown that rats, when exposed to a similar amount of thimerosal compared to their body weight as American infants in the 1990s, exhibited disturbing autistic behaviors. In addition, a link has been observed between vaccinations and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). It also appears that Rh-negative mothers, who are most likely to have a mercury-laced injection during pregnancies, may be more likely to have autistic children.
There is even a theory that the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) which causes AIDS might have originated from contaminated vaccines. Polio vaccines have been made from monkey cells which may have been contaminated with the Simian Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV). Perhaps this animal virus mutated into HIV when humans were injected with an animal pathogen that their bodies were incapable of handling. This theory is unproven, but frightening nonetheless.