| Dan Olmsted |
Article Index for Dan |
Website Links For Dan |
Information AboutDan Olmsted |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT DAN OLMSTED | |
| american journalists | |
| autism | |
| investigative journalists | |
| living people | |
|
Olmsted's columns on Health and Medicine appear regularly in the '' Washington Times '' and are syndicated nationally from UPI's Washington D.C. bureau. THE ''AGE OF AUTISM'' In January, 2005 , Olmsted began writing about his investigative findings concerning the possiblility that an Autism Epidemic has arisen throughout the United States and elsewhere. By April, 2005, Olmsted had begun searching for children who had not been exposed to Mercury in vaccines, the kind of population that scientists typically use as a 'control' in experiments. Because of the unlikelihood of finding a large enough group of unvaccinated children to compare with those who have been vaccinated, Olmsted learned, government medical officials have not yet conducted an Epidemiological study with such a control group — despite the urging of many parents and some medical professionals who suspect a link between autism and vaccines. While the federal government has worked to prevent scientists from studying the Adverse Effects of vaccines, recommending research dollars should be spent elsewhere, journalists like Olmsted and others have stepped in to study the link to autism. {Link without Title} Olmsted looked for such a group that might establish Demonstrative Evidence of whether a link exists, and caught wind of scattered reports that autism was virtually unheard of among the Amish , prompting him to begin investigating what has come to be known as the 'Amish Anomaly '. The Amish rarely vaccinate children, and Olmsted found a family doctor in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania , who had treated thousands of Amish patients. The doctor indicated he had never seen an Amish person with autism. Based on the national rate of autism, Olmsted determined there should be 130 Amish children with autistic syndrome around Lancaster County. After an exhaustive search, he found four. One had been exposed to high levels of mercury from a power plant and the others had been vaccinated. Olmsted then traveled to Amish communities in Ohio and Indiana , with similar results. In the Amish community around Middlefield, Ohio , the autism rate was one in 15,000, according to the medical director at a clinic for special needs children there. In contrast, the Centers For Disease Control (CDC) has estimated the nationwide prevalence rate at one in 166. Olmsted later discovered another large unvaccinated group, thousands of children cared for by Homefirst Health Services in and around Chicago , Illinois ; according to Homefirst doctors, none of these children has autism. "We have about 30,000 or 35,000 children that we've taken care of over the years, and I don't think we have a single case of autism in children delivered by us who never received vaccines," said Homefirst's medical director, Dr. Mayer Eisenstein . Congressional action Citing Olmsted's Age of Autism reports, on March 30, in April, after gleaning further input from her constitutents and researchers. Maloney made the announcement at a National Press Club press conference in Washington, D.C. , along with Olmsted and David Kirby , whose book '' Evidence Of Harm '' has drawn much attention to the possible mercury-autism link. If successful, Maloney's bill would mandate that research be conducted by the federal government that would compare the incidence of autism in the general population with its incidence in a control group, drawn from populations which remain unvaccinated for religious or personal beliefs. Criticism In a critical assessment by the '' Columbia Journalism Review '' of the Thimerosal Controversy , Olmsted's reporting on unvaccinated populations has been characterized as "misguided" by anonymous reporters (Schulman 2005). Specifically, the anonymous sources were critical of Olmsted's attempts to spur scientists to conduct investigations into the apparent link between vaccines and autism. Nevertheless, legislation triggered by the ''Age of Autism'' series is pending in the US Congress. REFERENCE
SEE ALSO EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|