But away from the spotlight, Trump has put his name and money behind an autism advocacy group that firmly rejects any such link. Twenty-five years ago, 35 years ago, you look at the statistics, not even close. “It has gotten totally out of control”. However, the ex-surgeon then promoted spacing out kids’ vaccine schedules more.
Advertisement
Trump’s claim that autism rates have increased in the preceding decades has no basis in fact.
As a result of these concerns, some pediatricians have promoted alternatives to the traditional vaccine schedule that either omits certain vaccines or stretches out the schedule.
Between the two debates, CNN will also bring all of the candidates onstage for a “class picture” – the first time the 16 Republicans will all appear together. Vaccines don’t cause autism.
“That’s why we saw the measles outbreak in Disneyland this year” he said – because parents chose to delay vaccinating their children.
He went on to assert that a child of one of his employees got a vaccination “and a week later got a tremendous fever, got very, very sick, now is autistic”.
Technically, Carson’s answer was in line with the overwhelming scientific consensus that vaccines don’t cause autism. But you know, the fact of the matter is, we have extremely well documented evidence that there is no autism associated with vaccinations.
Spreading the vaccines out over a long period of time for fear a child may be getting too high a cumulative dose of antigens only leaves children more exposed and vulnerable to disease. The statement that the Republican presidential frontrunner spilled during the GOP debate stirred several unfavorable reactions towards him. He can read about it if he wants to. “Autism is not caused by vaccines – and Autistic Americans deserve better than a political rhetoric that suggests that we would be better off dead than disabled”.
In the 1930s, some vaccine-makers used a preservative called Thimerosal, which contained a very low concentration of a mercury compound. Alison Singer, president and co-founder of the Autism Science Foundation, said candidates should not politicize issues of public health.
Paul’s views line up more closely with his libertarian philosophy, which frowns on a major role for government in this as well as other matters. Similarly, Dr. Rand Paul briefly denied the autism link but the then proceeded to stress that he supports parents’ “freedom” to vaccinate their children as they see fit.
“I’m also a little concerned about how they’re bunched up”.
“There is no connection between vaccines and autism and I’ll just pause there for a second because I don’t want anybody to think there are strings attached to that statement”, Gupta told Wolf Blitzer after watching the clip from the debate.
But while Carson and Paul affirmed the safety of vaccines, they also said there should be flexibility in the strict vaccination schedule that’s been crafted by the medical profession.
In February, Paul said he’d heard of “many tragic cases of walking, talking normal children who wound up with profound mental disorders after vaccines”.
They didn’t distinguish themselves among their medical colleagues.
Advertisement
In the end, it seemed that not even Trump went far enough in his comments to please advocates of parents opting their children out of vaccines entirely. “As president you would be in charge of the Centers for Disease Control and the National Institutes of Health, both say you are wrong”.
