[2010 Nov] J.B. Handley: Hungry Lie 2.0? “Autism is Genetic” By J.B. Handley

[2010 May] Frontline’s Producer Feeds the “Hungry Lie” By J.B. Handley

DR. MAX WIZNITZER: (expert witness for the government against the families who file in the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program)-"Well, we know that in about 10 percent to 15 percent of the cases, we can identify a genetic causation, ..."
    OK. Gotta stop right here as Mark Blaxill did a wonderful piece on that "10%-15%" that Dr. W is bringing up... http://www.ageofautism.com/2008/03/the-fragile-b-1.html#more"
1. There is no valid foundation for the claim that 10% of autism cases can be explained by genetic causes. The claim appears to be just another case of a faulty “chain of collective reasoning” and, despite being “generally accepted”, it is specifically wrong.
2. Even when there was documented evidence of a positive diagnostic yield, the evidence was overstated. The overall genetics yield in all of these studies came to less than 7%, and well under 6% if you exclude the single study that claimed to have explained 30% of cases.
3. When you take out known rare forms of autism like Rett and Fragile X syndromes, the reported yields collapsed even further. Nearly half of the foundation of success in generating a diagnostic yield rested on these two exceedingly rare diagnoses."  [2009 April] Olmsted on Autism: 1 in 10,000 Amish

Professor Sir Michael Rutter along with a troupe of psychiatrists now or formerly associated with The Maudsley Hospital and The Institute of Psychiatry at Kings have been working hard at telling the public autism is solely genetic and denying there is a world autism pandemic.  .....Genetics cannot account for the large rise we are seeing in autism since the mid 1980s.  So instead what we see are efforts by Rutter and the King's Institute of Psychiatry other autism denialists to claim there is no real rise in the prevalence of autism.  This claim is unscientific and runs counter to the facts documented in the formal literature.
    The Institute of Psychiatry has or is home to more than its fair share of doctors (psychiatrists mostly) who publish papers claiming autism is genetic and denying there is an autism epidemic (the correct word is pandemic - epidemics have far fewer victims).  These doctors include Rutter, Eric Fombonne, (now expert witness in the US in the thiomersal/autism litigation when he had previously published nothing about it), Simon Baron Cohen.  It is also home to controversial "Gulf War Syndrome" psychiatrist Simon Wessely, director of the Centre for Military Health Research at King's College London and who had been claiming ME/CFS is not a physical condition but a mental one contrary to the definition used around the world...... Rutter was also an expert witness in Malmo, Sweden in an MMR autism case where the key question was whether autism was solely genetic and not environmental.  Rutter's expert evidence was that it was genetic.  Professor Sir Michael Rutter & The Drug Industry Connections

        As expected by science, extensive searching for a genetic cause of autism has not turned up a significant find that would explain the recent increased rate in autism.  The latest genetic find, at best, might explain 0.5% of autism causation.  Most agree that a genetic predisposition is likely (like those that lead to low glutathione levels), but that a toxic exposure is absolutely needed.  Consider also, that this increased toxic exposure would have had to occur in all 50 states at about the same time as all states have reported similar increases in autism rates.  Only something like the government recommended vaccine program fits this need for a time dependent, uniform exposure of a toxin throughout all the states. Dr. Boyd Haley RESPONSE TO 2008 R. SCHECHTER AND J. GRETHER PUBLCIATION

There is no valid foundation for the claim that 10% of autism cases can be explained by genetic causes. The claim appears to be just another case of a faulty “chain of collective reasoning” and, despite being “generally accepted”, it is specifically wrong.  Even when there was documented evidence of a positive diagnostic yield, the evidence was overstated. The overall genetics yield in all of these studies came to less than 7%, and well under 6% if you exclude the single study that claimed to have explained 30% of cases. When you take out known rare forms of autism like Rett and Fragile X syndromes, the reported yields collapsed even further. Nearly half of the foundation of success in generating a diagnostic yield rested on these two exceedingly rare diagnoses. THE FRAGILE BASIS OF GENETIC AUTISM CLAIMS REVEALED BY AN OSOTEN* By Mark Blaxill

It has been suggested that this not a real increase but is due to increased awareness and/or new classifications. If that is so then there must have been the same number of cases prior to the observed increase as there have been since. All efforts to identify these earlier cases in both the USA and the UK have failed. There are only two possible reasons for the absence of earlier cases. They could all have been spontaneously cured in the intermediate period (which would strongly suggest that they were not autism cases) or they could all have died. Both of these possibilities seem remotely unlikely. The conclusion has to be that the increase is real.
     There are only two possibilities to account for this increase. The cause could be due to an inherent or "internal" patient factor or it could be an "external" factor. For all practical purposes the only inherent cause would be genetic, either congenital from a parent or a gene mutation in the child. Whichever may be the case it would necessitate the coincidental occurrence, in about the year 1990, of precisely the same genetic mutation in thousands of individuals in both the USA and the UK. As far as I am aware this has never happened in the billions of years of evolution so this would be a first of monumental proportions.
     The observed increase in autism in such a short period of time (15-20 years) therefore has to be real and to have external causality. [Nov 2006 Letter] Peter Fletcher

"At this point, it is believed that about 10% of cases of autism can be accounted for genetically."--B.J. Freeman, Ph.D. Professor of Medical Psychology, Dept. of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences' UCLA School of Medicine.

"They claim that autism naturally occurs at about 18 months, when the MMR is routinely given, so the association is merely coincidental and not causal.  But the onset of autism at 18 months is a recent  development.  Autism starting at 18 months rose very sharply in the mid-1980s, when the MMR vaccine came into wide use.  A coincidence?  Hardly!"--Dr Rimland

The blind men can’t answer these questions: if autism is a genetic illness, why is the incidence increasing so dramatically? If autism is a behavior disorder, why do the children have chronic bowel problems? Why do they have ear infections, frequent viral infections, and eczema? Why do they have nutritional deficiencies? And why do most autistic children seem to develop normally and then start to regress? These are questions that can’t be answered by their theories. AUTISM: THE EVOLUTION OF A DISEASE by Bryan Jepson, MD

Several of the participants tried to imply that autism was a genetic disorder and therefore could have nothing to do with vaccines. Dr. Weil put that to rest with this comment, "We don't see that kind of genetic change in 30 years." In other words, how can we suddenly see a 300% increase in a genetically related disorder over such a short period? It is also known that there are two forms of autism, one that is apparent at birth and one that develops later in childhood. The former has not changed in incidence since statistics have been kept; the other is epidemic. THE TRUTH BEHIND THE VACCINE COVER-UP By Russell Blaylock, M.D.

This conference, held on June 7-8, 2000 at Simpsonwood Retreat Center, Norcross, Georgia, assembled 51 scientists and physicians of which five represented vaccine manufacturers. These included Smith Kline Beecham, Merck, Wyeth, North American Vaccine and Aventis Pasteur

As a pediatrician, who has been in practice for over two decades, I find it more than a little insulting as well as disturbing to have someone say that these children were always there. ..... For years the vaccine division at the CDC and others have said the reason for the dramatic increase in autism is due to "better diagnosing" and "greater awareness." They have encouraged those like Paul Shattuck to manufacture uncertainty. .... There are no studies that have found the previously undiagnosed or misdiagnosed autistic individuals among older Americans. They simply aren't there.  We need to address the real reason for the alarming autism rate. No more secrets or truth-spinning. This is not a faux epidemiological epidemic, nor an infectious epidemic, nor a genetic epidemic (as there are no genetic epidemics). That leaves an epidemic linked to some sort of exposure. [Schafer Autism Report--Pediatrics article May 2006] The Obfuscation of The Iatrogenic Autism Epidemic

"Dr. Michael Goldberg, a California pediatrician and researcher, explained how it was impossible to have an epidemic based solely on genetics. That's the standard excuse the CDC and the NIH have been using to explain how autism has grown from 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 300 in just 22 years."--Tim O'Shea, DC

The rationalization chief
There has been a fair amount of study which I think has clearly shown that the disease is at least – or at least has a genetic basis.......So that sort of takes out the environmental influenza and just looks at genetics I think and has – and there has been study after study that has shown that there's at the very least a genetic. [March 2006] Paul Offit Briefs Media On Vaccine Safety Concerns

Breggin