The CDC promotes vaccination, and antivaccinationists lose it

If there's one thing that is true of the antivaccine movement, it's that its members are rarely willing to admit that they are, in fact, antivaccine. Sure, there are uncommon exceptions who say it loud that they are antivaccine and proud and through their refreshing honesty and lack of self-delusion cause no end of problems for the more "reasonable" and "moderate" antivaccine activists determined to convince the world that they are "not antivaccine" but "pro-safe vaccine," "pro-vaccine safety," or "vaccine safety activists." The less deluded antivaccine activists are, after all, masters of cognitive dissonance. They know society views being antivaccine as bad and, because they don't view themselves as bad people, convince themselves that they aren't antivaccine. Add to that the need to appear not to be kooks, and they try very, very hard indeed to deny they are antivaccine.

But antivaccine is as antivaccine does, and antivaccine views are not unlike pornography: sometimes hard to define, but I know it when I see it. Boy, did I see it again recently. In the wake of the whole "CDC whistleblower" manufactroversy, the "scandal" that isn't, antivaccinationists seem to be going quite bonkers in the belief that they have finally found evidence to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt their central organizing conspiracy theory, namely that the CDC has been "covering up" incontrovertible evidence that vaccines cause autism.

So pity the poor CDC when it starts up a rather conventional social medial campaign, which it calls #TeamVax:

And:

And:

This rather basic social media campaign did serve a nice ancillary purpose other than promoting vaccination. It prodded the antivaccine movement to do what it does so well: Dive straight into pseudoscience crazy town. For instance, Levi Quackenboss, one of the dumber antivaccinationists whose "work" I've come across, posted one of the silliest antivaccine rants I've ever seen, basically sarcastically thanking the CDC for #TeamVax:

CDC have you done lost your mind? What were the big brains in Atlanta thinking when they decided that the largest public health organization in the nation needed to stoop to meme-speak?

Let’s take a look at the meme that my tax dollars paid for. You’ve got your racially ambiguous doting mother with her tiny baby boy who’s clearly already had one round of vaccines because his bulging forehead circumference is in the 99th percentile. It’s nice to see vaccine-injured babies represented.

CDC #TeamVax

Personally, I don't see any "meme-speak" there. I mean, seriously. Take a look at the photo, which Quackenboss helpfully displays in the post and I helpfully display above. Yes, it's a mother and a baby, with the slogan, "I want my baby to be safe and healthy, that's why," a perfectly fine slogan, concluding with "I'm #TeamVax." This is about as innocuous an ad campaign as I can imagine. In fact, from my perspective as a supporter of vaccine science, the only complaint I can come up with about it is that maybe it's a little too innocuous. As for complaining about the whole "#TeamVax" thing, my first reaction was: WTF? Antivaccinationists have been Tweeting various increasingly ridiculous hashtags for a year now, in particular the #CDCwhistleblower hashtag. Particularly silly was the "#GarbageCan" hashtag "inspired" by the "CDC whistleblower" William W. Thompson's alleged statement quoted by Rep. Bill Posey (R-Florida) that CDC investigators had disposed of a whole lot of original research paperwork and data in a big garbage can. The CDC is only doing what any organization in 2015 should be doing to try to spread its message: leveraging social media. One can argue over how well or poorly it's doing it, but it would be irresponsible of the CDC not to do it, particularly during August, which is National Immunization Awareness Month.

Particularly hilarious is Quackenboss's assertion:

Let me break it down for you. You are the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As far as 95% of America knows, you are infallible. Why do you need an ad campaign if you’re infallible? You don’t. When was the last time you saw a Rolls Royce commercial? Never. They don’t advertise. They don’t have to. They’re infallible.

Actually, Rolls Royce does advertise. Quackenbush just doesn't see the ads. Heck, Rolls Royce even has an active Twitter account followed by nearly 100,000 users. It even runs commercials:

And:

Sorry, Quackenbush, just because you're not aware of Rolls Royce ads doesn't mean Rolls Royce doesn't run them. It might not run them on television (and, in fact, the CDC doesn't often run ads on TV), but it does run print ads and use Twitter. It's advertised for a long time, decades, even. Indeed, one of its classic ads is considered iconic:

Levi Quackenbush really should Google more. Rolls Royce has been advertising its cars for a long time. Levi Quackenbush really should Google more. Rolls Royce has been advertising its cars for a long time.

Seriously, dude, before making a claim like that you really should do a couple of minutes' worth of Googling. So, yes. The CDC does need to advertise. It does need to hit back hard against the antivaccine movement because the antivaccine movement has resulted in pockets of decreased vaccine uptake that have resulted in outbreaks of measles and pertussis. Why? Well, because of people like Quackenbush who gloat because their fear mongering has succeeded in causing vaccine uptake to drop:

But guess what you’ve ended up doing on your little joyride with my tax dollars? You’ve legitimized your opposition, so thank you for that. One doesn’t advertise unless their competitor is a real contender for their job. Do you see NASA responding to flat-Earthers? Do you see #TeamSphere memes on any of their Facebook pages? No, you don’t. Flat-Earthers don’t have NASA quaking in their boots.

We don't see NASA responding to flat earthers because flat earthers don't endanger public health. Antivaccine activists do. Also, real flat earthers are so rare as to be not worth dealing with. Antivaccine activists, unfortunately, are not. Yes, it's a risk responding to them, but it's a risk that has to be taken because a lack of response is no longer acceptable.

Thanks to Quackenbush, though, for showing what I mean about the antivaccine movement.

There's another antivaccine loon who's equally unhappy about the new CDC campaign. We've met her before. It's Megan Heimer over at Living Whole. On one occasion, she inappropriately likened criticism of pseudoscience and quackery to "hate speech"; on another occasion, she argued against neonatal vitamin K injections because they were "synthetic." Basically, there appears to be no woo, antivaccine or otherwise, that she will not embrace. Not surprisingly, she's found another way to attack the CDC ad campaign. Her premise? That it's "pitting parent against parent." Granted, Quackenbush did make a similarly nonsensical argument, but Heimer can't resist taking it right off the cliff into the canyon of stupid.

First, she responds to a CDC questionnaire that tells you what vaccines are recommended for people with chronic diseases:

First, vaccines don’t prevent chronic disease. Nobody with Crohn’s Disease wakes up in the morning and says, “Oh, I have Crohn’s, I should probably get an MMR vaccine.” Secondly, vaccines cause chronic disease. It’s written all over the package inserts, PubMed database, and thousands of peer-reviewed studies. (Don’t bother telling the CDC, they already know.) Third, if you have a chronic disease, you’re more likely to suffer from a vaccine adverse reaction. (Logic would follow that a strong immune system is required to deal with the nasty in the shot and mount a “proper” response.)

The stupid, it burns.

The CDC isn't claiming that vaccines will prevent chronic disease. It's saying that patients with certain chronic diseases are more susceptible to complications from common vaccine-preventable diseases, which is why they should be vaccinated against those diseases. Second, there is no good evidence that vaccines cause chronic disease. I've discussed this more times than I care to remember, including findings that vaccines might actually be protective against asthma. Certainly, even if they aren't, it's a good thing to prevent asthmatics from getting a respiratory infection. They're prone to complications from viral infections. None of that stops Heimer from parroting familiar antivaccine talking points about "injecting neurotoxins, hazardous wastes, aborted baby ingredients, and carcinogens into your tiny children" and labeling anyone who disagrees with her as #TeamStupid. (The projection is truly awesome, is it not?)

We knew that Heimer was antivaccine; so deconstructing her antivaccine tropes is like shooting fish in the proverbial barrel. Instead, let's look at this:

I have to admit, I was left wondering which team the parents of fully vaccinated, vaccine-injured children were on or the parents who vaccinated but believe in choice?

Yes, this is another sad attempt by the CDC to pit parent against parent. Nothing else works. We’re educated and we see through their lacking data, intentional cover-ups, and misleading propaganda, including their latest ploy at “scaring” parents into vaccinating. But it’s like we’re immune to bull$h*t. (Excuse my language but this is an occasion that warrants such a word and I think Jesus would be okay with it.) Education has that effect on people. So they’ve had to stoop to the level of creating animosity between mothers and they’re sending a misleading message that you don’t care about your child’s health if you don’t vaccinate. Nice. How sixth-grade of them.

This is what we in the biz call reading a meaning into an advertisement that isn't there. Do you see any message of divisiveness in the CDC message? I sure don't. It's basically a positive message encouraging parents to vaccinate. There's no snarkiness, as I use from time to time when dealing with antivaccine loons like Heimer. There's no demonization of the vaccine hesitant or antivaccine activists. There's just a simple message: Vaccinate your children. Join #TeamVax. The only way you can object to that message and view it as somehow "pitting parent against parent" is if you are antivaccine and view yourself as being on #TeamAntivax. Otherwise, why would you object, unless you view #TeamVax as the enemy and any perceived attempt to recruit to it as an attempt by the enemy to swell its numbers.

That's because Megan Heimer is antivaccine. To the core.

More like this

"We don’t see NASA responding to flat earthers because flat earthers don’t endanger public health."

Not flat earthers, no, because they're idiots.

NASA has, though, in the past had dedicated pages on its website to debunking the moon landing hoax theorists. I can't find such a page right now but I have found this old one-time story: http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2001/ast23feb_2/

By Yerushalmi (not verified) on 30 Aug 2015 #permalink

In my opinion, the #TeamVax promo picture from the CDC is well done for several reasons:

1) the puncture wound from the vaccine injection is protected with a band-aid. (See child's left thigh); and

2) the pediatrician is properly monitoring for signs of anaphylactic shock by evaluating the child's pupil response and heart rate.

.

By Michael J. Dochniak (not verified) on 30 Aug 2015 #permalink

I'm always fascinated by how anti-vaccine campaigners like Megan Heimer distrust the CDC and seemingly the whole medical establishment and yet have a touching faith in package inserts. Do they not see any contradiction?

I am a bit baffled that you didn't dwell on the "package inserts" argument.

Of all the silly silly arguments anti-vaxers come up with, this one ranks right up there in my view.

Immediately after the list of adverse events reported is this disclaimer "Because these events are reported voluntarily from a population of uncertain size, it is not always possible to reliably estimate their frequencies or to establish a causal relationship to components of Tripedia vaccine".

It is as if the anti-vaxers are incapable of comprehending more than half a sentence at a time.

What is even more mindbogglingly stupid, they claim this as "proof" that vaccines other than DTaP cause autism.

Ever notice how adamant AVers are about how "educated" they are? From Heimer's article:

We’re educated...
...
Education has that effect on people.
...
We got educated.
...
...both of our educated decisions... [refering to her decision not to vaccinate and a friend's delayed schedule]

The lady doth protest too much, methinks

Cate K@2

Do they not see any contradiction?

Nope. Cognitive dissonance at it's finest.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

I can't even hate this. Reasonable people will see this, their stupid arguments, comments about the stock images used, and it will just further cement how crazy these people are in the eyes of the masses.

I agree, Chris P, I think we need to start using package inserts and the VAERS as more ammo to point out their complete lack of reasonsing. They seem to be using it more and more, trying desperately to indicate both are indicative of dangers and how Big Pharma and the CDC lies, yet...both are straight from Big Pharma and the CDC.

By Frequent Lurker (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

I'll admit to being confused. Are there other pictures besides the one Orac linked to? I see a lovely mother with her baby girl, who looks perfectly normal. But Orac references Quackenbush as saying:
Let’s take a look at the meme that my tax dollars paid for. You’ve got your racially ambiguous doting mother with her tiny baby boy who’s clearly already had one round of vaccines because his bulging forehead circumference is in the 99th percentile. It’s nice to see vaccine-injured babies represented.

Is there another picture with a baby boy? Does he look different than this girl?
(I'm at work so can't see many images and unable to google right now).

Oops...Quackenboss. My apologies for mangling the name.

I found Quackenboss' use of "racially ambiguous" remark genuinely weird.

Also, people aren't responsible for the names they're given, but in context "Quackenboss" is positively Dickensian.

By palindrom (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Somewhat off thread. Did anyone else notice the banner at AofA: Vaxed Lives Matter? Anyone else offended?

@ capnkrunch:

Exactly.
How often does a TM say: " After I became educated" or suchlike? Or a commenter remarks that whoever writes this blog should " get educated"? One woo-drenched loon eternally intones, " Do your homework!" Mamacita Jameson habitually narrates how she 'educates' young mothers or parents-to-be. Teresa Conrick ( even today, AoA) has studied the microbiome extensively and now shares the wealth with her students.

Funny, but none of my degrees ever required reading mountains of random rambling from self-preening ego-maniacs anxious to push their solipcism and I read literature and philosophy as well as psychology.

Hilariously, AoA is promoting an Autism Education in Dallas featuring Jenny McCarthy and TMR supports Vaccine Conversation 2.0 in Pittsburgh, both in September.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Is there another picture with a baby boy? Does he look different than this girl?

There is at least one other photo of a younger infant. I am unable to positively identify the sex of that child and neither could Quackenboss. Quackenboss has concluded the child is a boy, because it is wrapped in a blue blanket.

Dawn, I think that he's referring to the small picture shown last above.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Oh, re #CDCwhistleblower and #GarbageCan CAMpaigns-

Ginger Taylor tried to Thunderclap ( that's a new one) by getting 250 tweeting twits together by a particular date but failed, missing by 120.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

@palindrom: You beat me to the Dickens remark. Quackenboss's name is almost as appropriate as Uriah Heep. Or perhaps, in view of the "racially ambiguous" comment you flagged, Jack D. Ripper would be a better analogy. Quackenboss seems to be in favor of maintaining our purity of essence, in more ways than one.

Also, how does he know the age of the infant in that photo? If the kid is young enough, then yes, his cranial circumference might be 99th percentile. But I think the boy is older than he thinks, and a head that big would not be abnormal in a child as old as I think he is.

By Eric Lund (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

@DW and ChrisP: ahhhh. One of the ones blocked by my ever-so-kind employer. I'll have to take a look when I get home.

How did the old joke go: You don't see ads for high-end sports cars on TV because the people who drive them don't watch television?

That said, let's hope this Twitter campaign goes better that #OzsInbox.

By Gray Falcon (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

I dislike the hashtag because it implies a competition. If I am team vax, then that means there is a worthy opponent on team not vax. But there is no worthy opponent. So the whole team concept is a fail in this case.

Team vax is a poorly deliberated meme.

"I’m always fascinated by how anti-vaccine campaigners like Megan Heimer distrust the CDC and seemingly the whole medical establishment and yet have a touching faith in package inserts. Do they not see any contradiction?"

Didja hear about that published study that says published studies are unreliable?

By Dangerous Bacon (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

There are 3 CDC #teamvaccin images I've found.

1. A dark-haired woman with an olive complexion, smiling down at a young hairless, chubby baby wrapped in a slate-blue blanket, cradled in her arms. That's the image that Levi Quackenboss* was referring to with

our racially ambiguous doting mother with her tiny baby boy who’s clearly already had one round of vaccines because his bulging forehead circumference is in the 99th percentile.

2. An African-American woman and a girl toddler in the doctor's office, with a White doctor. The toddler has a bandaid on her thigh.

3. A white woman with long blondish hair, nuzzling a white male toddler in a highchair, who is smiling at the camera.

----
* "Levi Quackenboss is one of many pseudonyms used by a woman in Colorado: Robyn Charron, Skye Tormenta, Jordan Baker, Probono eyecandy, Michael Chad (Stay-At-Home Dad), Doritos Reid, CitizenGACNN, Bobby Dee, Reece Barnett, Johnston Roslyn, Heather Green, None of those are the name she uses to practice law. Yes, she is admitted to the bar in Colorado.

Dangerous Bacon@17

Didja hear about that published study that says published studies are unreliable?

I was thinking the same thing, this the weapon of choice for a clown over at SkepticalRaptor that I saw recently. Another similar one is "Ben Goldacre says Big Pharma blah blah blah." Of course, Ben Goldacre is actually provaccine. Of course he is because he's actually what the AVers like call themselves 'pro-good science'.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Dang, I must just be "country doctor", because I still have to use a tape measure to obtain a child's head circumference.

By Chris Hickie (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

@ Cate K, #2
I’m always fascinated by how anti-vaccine campaigners ... distrust the whole medical establishment and yet have a touching faith in package inserts.
This is something that has puzzled me too, and it applies to many more types of quackery and conspiracy and panic web sites. They have no problem believing scientists on their word when the latter say that something is harmful, e.g. 'formaldehyde is a noxious substance ...'. OK, good to hear that at least they don't feel the need to examine the harmful properties of those substances themselves. But when those exact same scientists continue by specifying which actual concentrations or amounts are harmful, AV'ers somehow immediately shut their ears and refuse to hear let alone believe that crucial bit of extra information. Really weird.

Has anyone ever had a response from an AV'er on the rather obvious truth that 'the dose makes the poison'? I haven't.

"racially ambiguous doting mother" -- wow the US certainly is a foreign country. What does that mean? What are these "races"? What is their relevance (whatever they are)? What does the birth history of this child have to do with vaccination? Do the racially unambiguous not need vaccination to be healthy and it's only the racially ambivalent who do? I'm truly shocked. It's such an unashamedly nasty remark. Such a straightforwardly and unconcernedly racist remark. In the UK we have racism too of course but it's always under the surface and probably unrecognised -- see our Prime Minister's remarks about "swarms" of migrants at Calais. Dear me.

By Miranda Dealler (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Has anyone ever had a response from an AV’er on the rather obvious truth that ‘the dose makes the poison’?

Not antivaxers, but I've heard a few people concerned with "chemicals" in food insist that absolute no dose of whatever they're concerned about is safe or acceptable. Even one atom of mercury is too much, and being unwilling to insist on perfect purity is proof of malicious intent.

By Andreas Johansson (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Actual MD Chris Hickie:

Dang, I must just be “country doctor”, because I still have to use a tape measure to obtain a child’s head circumference.

See you lack the lawyer's ability to diagnose "vaccine injury" at a glance. It's all that medical training, making you oblivious to the obvious.

your racially ambiguous doting mother

Is it just me, or is that some kind of white-supremacist shout-out?

Package-insert logic:

"They're suppressing the ugly truth about this product by making sure it's conveniently available to everyone!"

The US Dept. of Health and Human Services (HHS) charged the Institute of Medicine (IOM) with providing a thorough review of the current medical and scientific evidence on vaccines and vaccine adverse events.

The IOM has concluded in its report that:

FOOD PROTEIN CONTAMINATED VACCINES CAUSE THE DEVELOPMENT OF FOOD ALLERGIES.

Straight from the horse’s mouth.
https://iom.nationalacademies.org/Reports/2011/Adverse-Effects-of-Vacci…

“Adverse events on our list thought to be due to IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions
Antigens in the vaccines that the committee is charged with reviewing do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction (e.g., hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, gelatin, ovalbumin, casamino acids).
However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

Why is this fact not on the vaccine package inserts?
Why are vaccines still contaminated with food proteins?

So having a kid with a cranial circumference at the 99th percentile is diagnostic of vaccine injury??? My son had a very big head (along with a very big everything else, as I painfully recall.) He's working on his doctorate in music performance. I wish EVERY kid could be so "vaccine-injured." (Now I shall privately lapse into intense profanity.)

Impossible to say that Orac has not paid due attention over the years to the argument by package insert.

Package inserts are great for AV'ers because they are confusing legal documents. I do think it is worth reinforcing how many of the leading activists are lawyers or lapsed lawyers -- the world's happiest profession? -- saying things they know or really ought to know are false and misleading. I do find it hard to sort out the ratio of lying to incompetence.

By James Lind (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

@ann #26

"Package-insert logic:

'They’re suppressing the ugly truth about this product by making sure it’s conveniently available to everyone!' ”

That is the part that makes me wonder about SMI

By James Lind (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Liz Ditz @ 18 -- She took "Quackenboss" as a pseudonym? The mind boggles.

If one didn't know better one would think that all one needs to be admitted to the bar in Colorado is a valid ID showing you're over 21.

Got my TDaP booster last week, with no sequelae at all, but it doesn't seem to have cured my love of stupid jokes.

By palindrom (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

James Lind @29 --

I do find it hard to sort out the ratio of lying to incompetence.

Don't we all? It's a perennial problem when you're battling pseudoscience.

Or, as an eight-grade friend of mine would have quite knowingly and wittily mispronounced it, "p-SUEDE-o science".

By palindrom (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

palindrom #36,

"Got my TDaP booster last week, with no sequelae at all,"

A week is too short to know. The IOM has concluded that TdaP (which contains milk derived casamino acid) can sensitize and cause milk allergy. See #32. That will take a few weeks.

But cocoa for a few weeks may help ...
A diet enriched with cocoa prevents IgE synthesis in a rat allergy model.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22342543

Vinu Arumugham (APV):

You say,

Why are vaccines still contaminated with food proteins?

Honesty check, Vinu.

You say Avantor made their polysorbate 80 from peanut oil, but covered that fact up by omitting the information from their datasheet and subsequently lying about it.

Right?

You say that vaccine makers are producing vaccines containing peanut proteins. Please state which vaccines are being made with peanut proteins in them.

According to you, Avantor makes Polysorbate 80 from sesame oil, but lies about that on their datasheet.

Right?

Don't run away from your words, Vinu. It's time to be honest.

By OccamsLaser (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

My first post after lurking and reading daily for 3+ years... too long.

I just wanted to chime in to James Lind #36. I am an attorney and definitely pro-science & pro-vaccine. While most my of my former law school colleagues are also pro-vaccine, I see too many attorneys that don't understand the difference between a legal debate and a scientific debate. They don't understand that scientific results are not proven wrong, simply by one who argues loudest or best appeals t the passion of the jury, but is proven via well-thought out experiments, in increments to finally prove a hypothesis.

My 2 cents :-) And, mainly just a post on a topic which interests me to finally chime in and say "I'm here" and love this blog.

If one didn’t know better one would think that all one needs to be admitted to the bar in Colorado is a valid ID showing you’re over 21.

We haven't yet established that "Levi Quackenboss" is an incompetent lawyer. (Not that I'd knowingly hire her, based on what I know about her.) What we have established is that she is not knowledgable about medicine, and that we have reason to suspect she's racist. She wouldn't be the only lawyer with those two traits; Orly Taitz (who practiced law in California, a state with a reputation for an especially difficult bar exam) comes to mind.

It takes a certain kind of smarts to be a lawyer, and there is no guarantee that somebody with that kind of smarts will be smart in any other respect.

By Eric Lund (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

For a good example of this "I'm not anti-vaccine but" mindset, the Bob Sears Facebook page is a daily source of illumination. He and a woman named Melissa Floyd have started a group called "The Immunity Education Group" in which they work the numbers and say (among other things) that pockets of low vaccination uptake pose no risk to susceptible children. Floyd has a background in mathematics, and claims her children have been vaccine injured. She spoke before the California senate opposing SB277. Anyway, I encourage anybody with a heart for woo trolling to go over there and make some comments. They do not ban and delete unless foul language and ad hominems are thrown around,

By Mary Russell (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Eric @40 -- I suspect that as a lawyer, Orly Taitz makes a good dentist. It's also possible that as a dentist, she makes a good lawyer, but on that we have less evidence.

APV @38 -- Seeing as how I've managed to reach very-very-late middle age without becoming allergic to anything at all (as far as I know), and how I've had shots galore over that getting-pretty-long lifetime, I'm not too concerned that a TDaP booster is about to make me allergic to milk.

By palindrom (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

@APV: Dishonest as ever...
from what you quoted: “Adverse events on our list thought to be due to IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions
Antigens in the vaccines that the committee is charged with reviewing do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction (e.g., hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, gelatin, ovalbumin, casamino acids).
However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

So, do you want to take the hepatitis B surface antigen out, too? How about the toxoids? They also can lead to sensitization.

Reading for comprehension is vital.

@ann (#31)

Package-insert logic:

“They’re suppressing the ugly truth about this product by making sure it’s conveniently available to everyone!”

I've seen AVers argue that the CDC was hiding the VICP, even after I pointed out that they have web sites all about it, the vaccine information sheets all list info about the VICP, etc.

Re: the package insert argument in general

I know Orac has written about it before, as have Skeptical Raptor and myself. The insert as a whole is not really written for general comprehension, but any gradeschool graduate should have the requisite reading comprehension to understand the statements amounting to: "People have told us about these, but there's no evidence as to whether they're caused by the vaccine or just coincidental."

APV: Here's a little tip for you, gratis. Take a few pennies and balance them very carefully on the tone arm, behind the pivot point. The next time the needle hits the scratch, it might actually stay on the right groove instead of jumping back. It may take some trial and error to find the right number and placement of the coins (some tone arms actually have an adjustable balance weight, like the fine-adjustment weight on a mechanical medical scale).

Thought you could use the advice because, well, nobody likes a broken record.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Did the reference to meme-speak give anyone else an instant mental picture of a sad-eyed kid covered in measles rash with the caption "I can haz vaxene plz?"

njrails@40

...I see too many attorneys that don’t understand the difference between a legal debate and a scientific debate.

Twy

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Heh, totally didn't mean to submit that. Should have said something about it being similar to politicians.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

any gradeschool graduate should have the requisite reading comprehension to understand the statements

Assumes facts not in evidence.

Observationally, the anti-vax crowd acts as if the inserts are saying something about cause and effect. It's possible they are being willfully ignorant (and much worse if they are). But our educational system is not as effective as it should be, and anti-vax types are not the only evidence of this.

By Eric Lund (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

"Do you see NASA responding to flat-Earthers?"

Um...you realize that, in your analogy, Mr. Quakenboss, you're the flat-earther, right? Didn't think that through, didja?

By Dr. Chim Richalds (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Bwahahahaha. I'm kicking myself for not having thought of that myself. :-)

It takes a certain kind of smarts to be a lawyer

You're forgetting about Patti "Never Win" Finn.

^ "Dr." Megan Heimer also has a J.D. from the infamous Thomas M. Cooley Law School, and the jaw-droppingly dense Christina Waldman – alumna of Southern Illinois University's law school, which once tied for last place in the US News rankings before disappearing again – practices in Rochester.

"...you realize that, in your analogy, Mr. Quakenboss, you’re the flat-earther..."

IMHO, no. She's saying her group is nothing like them because her group has something substantial that has the CDC frightened whereas flat-earthers do not.

Seriously, dude,

Orac, are you yanking my chain here because I couldn't get your parroting gnome (troll-lite) to understand the that "dude" tweet was not directed at her? It had nothing to do with guy/girl?

+1000 for use of the phrase "crazy town" though. It's one of my favorites.

By Not a Troll (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

FWIW, the flat -earthers are correct to about 8 inches per mile (or .000126).

By Mephistopheles… (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

@Todd W. #45 and @Eric Lund #50

The concepts are not difficult, but the presentation on the inserts *is* confusing. Most people, I think, hear a scientist say bad things are associated with X and think that means X caused something bad. Adverse events are bad things, so if we see adverse events after vaccination, it is logical to see a causal connection unless you understand the context. Then you have lawyers like RFK jr or Mike Smith saying, e.g., the meningitis vaccine will injure 1% of those vaccinated because the package insert lists an SAE rate of 1%. I think it's asking a lot, especially for vulnerable parents with pressing problems, to sort this out when you have a group of predatory lawyers misinforming them.

I don't see what intelligence has to do with any of this. Smart people are often very good at fooling themselves. Professional misconduct, on the other hand, absolutely fits.

By James Lind (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

NASA has, though, in the past had dedicated pages on its website to debunking the moon landing hoax theorists

There's also the Buzz Aldrin response:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wptn5RE2I-k
Very tempting for the likes of Mike Adams or Gary Null.

"FWIW, the flat -earthers are correct to about 8 inches per mile (or .000126)."

And cows are spherical.

Vinu can’t be honest.Don’t provoke him.We don’t need yet another epic thread where APV just repeats himself for 1000+ posts.

Can it be worse than See Noevo over on the abortion/antivax thread that's rapidly approaching 2,000 comments?

I can recall many a physics problem that started by assuming a spherical, frictionless cow.

By Mephistopheles… (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

"A week is too short to know." Got mine two years ago, is that long enough?

As one of the (several) veterans who read this blog regularly, I can attest that for several years of my youth I was a walking, talking target for any Navy corpsman with a shotgun (along with a quarter million other Marines).

No food allergies. Wonder why?

@Miranda #28 -- there is a strong racist streak in the make-up of some of the more virulent anti-vaxxers in this country, as witness the numberless attempts to blame last winter's measles outbreak on illegal aliens.

That's right,The Disneyland outbreak was caused by Mexican and other children are crossing the border that are not vaccinated.That and "Obama's Medical Genocide". ;) ;)

“Measles had been nearly eradicated until about 15 years ago. When Clinton busted our border with Mexico, the floodgates were opened to infected migrants. Measles, TB, even malaria is returning! This is a form of medical genocide.”

He continued: “These illegal migrants may have a greater resistance to these illnesses owing to the fact they live in the midst of the infecting organisms. Our population is nearly ‘virgin’ to these infectious organisms. The killer flu raging through our population, measles, TB are all the result of this anti-American government.”

The charged-up Savage finished with an ominous historical analogy: “When European seamen arrived in Tahiti and the Marquesas, they brought with them smallpox, which nearly wiped out the entire local population in only 20 years. You see, the ‘natives’ had no resistance to this disease. We are now Obama’s ‘natives.’”

This from one of the supposedly more "educated" right wing nutbars.

By Roger Kulp (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Don'tcha love how Savage dances around the possibility it might have been unvaccinated Amurikin kids,mostly from white and affluent families,that caused measles to come raging back?But what Savage spouts is what a lot of antivax families believe.

By Roger Kulp (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

This is my first post to this blog. I am not a medical person but I am a Environmental Health Specialist. I am the Chairman elect of a regional Public Healthcare Coalition. As an EHS my motto is: Living is hazardous to Your Health.

Reading all this chatter, I think I am in trouble. I was in the first wave of polio vaccinations when I was a kid and have received a lot more vaccinations as I grew older. Just think if it weren't for vaccinations I would have been 6'8" an all American in any sport, president. Oh, the list goes on of what I might have been. As it is I am only 6'1', 225; with a masters and a couple BSs.

I think before anymore damage is done I'll: set under a pyramid, wear copper, drink green slime, wear a tin foil hat and contemplate my navel. If you can think of anything else I need do to protect myself from these ills let me know. Oh, anyone know how to get rid of all those tasty (oh, I mean nasty) pieces of DNA that have taken into my body over the years. I mean plant, mammal, reptile, fish, bird, frog and I don't know what else.

Seriously, I construe what the anti-vaxers are doing to children as a form of child abuse. Are vaccines better than anything we will every have? No, they are best we have currently. I am sure 100 years from now people will look at current vaccines and wonder why we every used them. What the better "vaccines" will be in the future; I have no clue.

Jenny McCarthy has a couple of good points. Whoops that was meant for different forum.

Oh, I forgot about Idaho. I just saw a report that 6.5 % of the children have vaccine waivers. Also, 11.9 % of Idaho's children have not received Varicella vaccinations.

RE #68 don't forget all the cabbage DNA, raw apple DNA,etc. It's a wonder we don't grow roots and make chlorophyll.

By DanielWainfleet (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

This from one of the supposedly more “educated” right wing nutbars.

Education != intelligence. The guy is writing for World Nut Daily, so either he is so idiotic as to believe what he's saying or (worse) he knows better but is writing for an audience of rubes. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt for now, and put him on Team Stupid rather than Team Evil.

Smallpox vaccines didn't exist when Europeans first visited Tahiti and the Marquesas. Today we have measles vaccines, which are supposed to prevent outbreaks. Of course, when people refuse to vaccinate their kids, that increases the probability of somebody (who is at least as likely to be a rich person traveling abroad as to be an immigrant) bringing the disease back from whatever country they were visiting. AFAIK proof of vaccination against measles is not required for travel (yet). Yellow fever vaccinations are required for travel to certain countries (particularly from certain other countries), and the only exceptions are people who have a medically documented contraindication. We don't have yellow fever outbreaks in this country, so far.

By Eric Lund (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

who’s clearly already had one round of vaccines because his bulging forehead circumference is in the 99th percentile.

I was not previously aware that my large head was evidence of 'vaccine damage'. My people just evolved massively thick skulls to protect against other people hitting them with sharp things.

Which is all an excuse to mention the Niels Bohr cranium-circumference story:

The pilot radioed to Bohr that he should put on his oxygen mask as the bomb-bay was not pressurized, but Bohr was not wearing the helmet with the radio headset as it did not fit his head.

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

So this Quackenboss person uses many pseudonyms. Some may recall Groucho as Dr. Hackenbush in "A Day at the Races." His character was originally named Dr. Quackenbush for obvious reasons until it was discovered that there were several Doctors Quackenbush who might take umbrage and feel impelled to sue (Or if they didn't take umbrage, they might take belladonna, and then they'd be in trouble with Bella's mother. And you don't want to find out for whom the Bella tolls.)
What really caught my attention was the name Heather Green, which I heretofore have known as the name of a rather muscular and attractive young woman who seems to enjoy posing in various states of undress (Don't ask why I know this.). I hope this is not the same person.
BTW, Dr. Hackenbush was an expert at pulse diagnosis, delivering the pronouncement, "Either this man's dead or my watch has stopped".

By Old Rockin' Dave (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

MI Dawn #44,

"So, do you want to take the hepatitis B surface antigen out, too? How about the toxoids? They also can lead to sensitization."

Nope. You DON'T have to take any of them out. I have written many times (and provided references) that sensitization to Hep B surface antigens and toxioids are part of the reason why vaccines WORK! The entire list of antigens is perfectly consistent with what I have been saying. And of course, it perfectly consistent with what Dr. Richet taught us over a hundred years ago.

Example:
Long Term Persistence of IgE Anti-Influenza Virus Antibodies in Pediatric and Adult Serum Post Vaccination with Influenza Virus Vaccine
http://www.medsci.org/v08p0239.htm

So, you develop allergy (IgE) to Hep B, influenza viruses and diptheria toxoids just like you do to ovalbumin and milk proteins.

The only difference is the reaction. You don't eat Hep B and influenza by the spoonful. So the reactions are minute. A sneeze or too may be and that's the first line of defense of blowing away the virus.

On the other hand, food protein exposure quantities are huge by comparison to virus exposure. Hence the reactions are proportionally fierce.

I've probably mentioned this before, but the information in the package insert includes just about everything that ever happened to any subject in any trial of the drug.
When I was in charge of writing up findings on one study, I asked the study monitor if there was any kind of adverse event that didn't have to be reported. Even if the patient were to be killed by a meteor strike, it would be a reportable event. I fully expect to unfold an insert one day and read that 1:10,000 users died from an unexpected platypus envenomation.
(Warning: do not handle or have any contact with monotremes while using this medication. Should you be envemonated by a monotreme while using this medication, seek medical attention immediately.)

By Old Rockin' Dave (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

@Rich Bly: I am sure 100 years from now people will look at current vaccines and wonder why we ever used them.

I agree with you that better vvaccines are coming. But I'm gonna be a nitpicker and disagree with your wording here. I'm extremely glad that we no longer have to fight smallpox by inoculating with a hopefully-mild case of the real thing; but I can easily understand why people did so in the 18th century. Indeed I think they were really ingenious to figure out that it worked.

an unexpected platypus envenomation.

I love the worn "envenomation" and shall bear it in mind if I happen to become enalcoholated tonight.

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Just when I am spitting at my monitor because of a tiresome incursion of Ah Pee Vee (like a passel of rutting skunks, only lacking the charm), Old Rockin' Dave comes along to make me laugh out loud. With a side order of herr doktor bimler.

Flat-earthers are rarely a problem only because people are smart enough to avoid putting them in positions where they can hurt people. Wait for the anti-science movement to grow a little, and someday one of them will get a job navigating LNG tankers, with horrific results.

By Dirk Winebarger (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

Semi off-topic:

Do, do, do read Steve Silberman's Neurotribes (link is to the Guardian article, not the book, but you know what to do).

On topic and therefore apropos here:

Why there is no autism epidemic, and why autism has less than nothing to do with vaccines*

----
*except, of course, the rubella vaccine -- some children with Congenital Rubella Syndrome (CRS) could be fit an autism diagnosis.

So this Quackenboss person uses many pseudonyms.

Robyn Ross, just to finish off this loose end.

We’re educated and we see through their lacking data, intentional cover-ups, and misleading propaganda, including their latest ploy at “scaring” parents into vaccinating. But it’s like we’re immune to bull$h*t.

Every time I hear the anti-vax loon play the "I'm educated" card, I throw up in my mouth a little. Or a lot, depending on the anti-vaxer in question.

The truth is that there's a warped sense of reality. They can call public health officials Nazis and it's ok. Rebut their nonsense and you're engaging in hate speech. There is no way you can win.

Package inserts are even better than including every adverse event that occurred after vaccination ever to a person involved in a trial. They also include adverse events reported during post-market monitoring (where the autism occurred in the DTaP insert list).

I am trying to find the vaccine insert where it reports that turning into Wonder Woman is a possible event.

Litz Ditz #78,

"tiresome incursion"

I point out that the IOM has concluded that food protein contaminated vaccines are making our children sick with food allergies. And you think that is a "tiresome incursion". Says plenty about how much you care about our children's health.

Liz Ditz @ 80

What does Silberman say about those with severe or low functioning autism?

By Roger Kulp (not verified) on 31 Aug 2015 #permalink

ChrisP #85,

Here are the solicited adverse events on the influenza (FLuzone) package insert.
Injection-Site Tenderness
Injection-Site Erythema
Injection-Site Swelling
Injection-Site Induration
Injection-Site Ecchymosis
Fever (≥100.4°F)
Vomiting
Crying Abnormal
Drowsiness
Appetite Lost
Irritability

And they are tracked for only 7 days.
Now everyone knows that a vaccine is an immunomodulatory intervention. Everyone knows that a vaccine takes a few weeks to become effective (complete its intended immunomodulatory function).
Therefore, one would expect that (1) solicited adverse events would include immune system disorders. And (2) these events will be tracked for at least a few weeks.

So you are right that package inserts DO NOT INCLUDE RELEVANT adverse events.

They also do not include a warning that food proteins in the vaccines can cause the development of food allergy even though the IOM has concluded that they do.

Vinu can’t be honest.Don’t provoke him.We don’t need yet another epic thread where APV just repeats himself for 1000+ posts.

Can it be worse than See Noevo over on the abortion/antivax thread that’s rapidly approaching 2,000 comments?

More business for the shrinks?

Al

Dear Shay,

As one of the (several) veterans who read this blog regularly, I can attest that for several years of my youth I was a walking, talking target for any Navy corpsman with a shotgun (along with a quarter million other Marines).

I hope by the you don't mean a rifle target?

Al

APV,
You appear to be a classic dilettante. If you really want to do some science you should try your very best to disprove your hypothesis. That's how real scientists operate. Cherry-picking, distorting and ignoring evidence to support a predetermined hypothesis, which is your MO, is textbook pathological science.

I was just reading* about Wilhelm Röntgen, who spent weeks locked away in his laboratory checking and rechecking his results before reporting his discovery of x-rays - that way he could show he had considered every possible objection put to him by other understandably skeptical scientists. That's how a real scientist operates.

* In Sam Kean's 'The Disappearing Spoon' (tales about the elements of the periodic table) - which I highly recommend (thanks to Chris for alerting me to Sam Kean whose books I am now working my way through). Poor Röntgen thought he was going crazy.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

Therefore, one would expect that (1) solicited adverse events would include immune system disorders.

Why? We're all daily exposed to orders of magnitude more antigens than we could ever see as the result of even the most aggressive immunization schedule imaginable. Why would we expect exposure to the limited number we see as the result of vaccination to cause a significant number of immune system disorders when we demonstrably don't onserve this dalily onslaught doing so?

And (2) these events will be tracked for at least a few weeks

You mean, the way post-marketing surveillance does as we speak?

Fusilier is correct. Sorry about the confusion!

@ Liz Ditz:

As we all could guess, Ann Dachel ( AoA) is not particularly pleased with Mr Silberman's book because SHE KNOWS that there weren't ANY autistic people around years ago.

Since she is ( probably) over 70, I assume that she just wasn't aware of institutions and state sponsored schools for children with various disabilities when she was a young adult.
Wasn't she educated and trained as a teacher?

Interestingly, Kim Stagliano continues upon a variant of this theme explaining how her eldest daughter will soon be in a day facility when she becomes 21 and the younger ones are embarked on the same path: Kim is over 50 and seems to be unaware of institutional care in the past. She lives in Connecticut where there are standing state hospitals built a century or more ago. Didn't she read or watch the news?

Like Olmsted, it's in their interest- pushing their brand- to believe that autism is a new thing. Note that Dan ( age, about 60) notes when an older person dies ( today Oliver Sachs) that the "first" autistics 'discovered' by Kanner were younger or the same age.
And he's an investigative reporter. Or so he tells us.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV: "Therefore, one would expect that..."

If only that "one" would also just keep it to themselves.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV @ 32 says that "The IOM has concluded in its report that:
FOOD PROTEIN CONTAMINATED VACCINES CAUSE THE DEVELOPMENT OF FOOD ALLERGIES".
APV @ 86 says that "... I point out that the IOM has concluded that food protein contaminated vaccines are making our children sick with food allergies".
I read several pages of the .pdf file, downloadable at the site AVM linked.
May be it was because I didn't have time to read all of it, but I found nowhere in the .pdf conclusions that could remotely support AVM's claims.
What IOM said is that there have been a handful of cases of immediate serious reactions, IgE mediated, to some vaccines.
Words used by IOM are "...It appears likely to the committee that the risk of anaphylaxis caused by vaccines is exceedingly low in the general population" (page 632).

By perodatrent (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

Roger Kulp: Silberman says a great deal about autistic folk on all places on the spectrum. Read the book; you will learn quite a lot.

NARAD! Last I looked, the woman of many pseudonyms WAS in good standing! Great news.

I found nowhere in the .pdf conclusions that could remotely support AVM’s claims.

Don't feel bad. No one else can find any, either.

APV can find it. Maybe all our vaccine induced allergies has rendered our imaginations dead, and we just lack the capacity to think in the right way.

I didn't like the shot gun - it seemed to hurt more, and I saw one guy flinch and wind up with a small, but very bloody, cut.

As far as shotguns, I like them fine. I have 2 or 3, depending on how you count. The 3rd is a Thompson Center Contender, with a .45 Long Colt barrel, that also shoots .410 shot shells (not legal in California).

Since she is ( probably) over 70, I assume that she just wasn’t aware of institutions and state sponsored schools for children with various disabilities when she was a young adult.
Wasn’t she educated and trained as a teacher?

It's odd how memory works.

Older anti-vax types seem to have very clear memories of a world before the measles vaccine in which the disease was "no big deal", etc.

I was about eight years old when the first measles vaccine was licensed.

I have absolutely no memory of I or my friends having the measles, though I'm sure we all did.

I do however have a clear memory of the "opportunity class" ... for kids who couldn't function in a regular class ... at my (early 1960s) public school.

As I recall, there were anywhere from 8 to 15 students in the opportunity class, some of whom might have been there due to difficulty with one subject, e.g., reading or have what we now call a "learning disability.

Others couldn't function in any regular classroom.

And every regular class had at least one "weird", as we thought of them at the time, "weird" whose social skills were, to say the least, a bit off.

I'd guess that out of the 600 or less kids in my school there were at least 20 who might be diagnosed as autistic today.

And as has been pointed out, these were the kids who were viewed at the time as being able to function in a public school, with those who were "severely retarded" either staying home or, as I realized many years later, placed in institutional "care" ... if you can call it that.

I find it strange that older anti-vaxers ... who often seem to have very clear memories of measles being "no big deal" in their youth ... don't seem to remember the "opportunity class" type kids who were present at the time and have no doubt always been with us.

But I guess those kids don't fit into the anti-vax script.

Yes, it's odd how memory works.

@ #104

Should have read:

"And every regular class had at least one “weird”, as we thought of them at the time, kid whose social skills were, to say the least, a bit off. "

"Opportunity class" sounds so, I dunno, kind? At my junior high school in the '90s we called the equivalent "17b", after the classroom where they had most of their lessons.

(ObAnecdote: Next to 17b was 16, where at one point the maths classes for gifted students was held. Cue a bunch of middle schoolers, incl my younger sister, being shown around the school they'd go to in the next academic year being told by their guide something to the effect of "here's where they keep the pupils who are not so bright" as a bunch of said gifted kids, incl me, stand around outside the two classrooms wating for a lesson to start.)

By Andreas Johansson (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

@ Denice Walter
You may be aware of my story.I was diagnosed with autism the first time as a child in 1971.Diagnosed as a child under the DSM-II.I was not one of those who was able to live a functional life,and be diagnosed as an an adult.Had it not been for my mother,I would have ended up here. as a child.When I was rediagnosed in my 40s,under the DSM-IV,I was still considered too low functioning to care for myself.I have had more developmental and learning disabilities.More medical problems and more regressions than either someone like Anne Daschel,or Kim Stagliano or the very high types in Silberman's book could ever dream of.I was lucky.I was eventually able to get multiple medical diagnoses,including cerebral folate deficiency,and mitochondrial disease.Treating the CFD/autism/seizures/brain stuff was what allowed me to live on my own after my mother died.The mitochondrial disease has been much harder to treat.

I used to post my story over and over at AoA in threads started by Daschel,to try and prove she was wrong.So did a number of parents of other older adults with severe or low functioning autism.We were always ignored by Daschel,and the other hardcore antivax parents at AoA.It took me a while to figure out I was not welcome there.

The way I see it,both antivaxers and neurodiversity types like Silberman,and the members of ASAN,each have their own very political agendas they want to push.Each agenda shows a very one sided picture of autism that they want to present.Someone like myself who believes that autism is not a "difference" to celebrate and accept,but a serious disorder to be treated and cured,and at the same time,a disorder not connected in any way to vaccines,is pretty much an outcast and pariah from both sides,but my beliefs are far more in line with mainstream researchers.

By Roger Kulp (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

When I went through my district had a whole 'nother school for the kids who couldn't handle regular classes. They rode the short bus to school. I figured that meant there were fewer of them than there were of us, but no idea what the actual count would be as we never mingled. One of the kids across the street went on the short bus, but was generally OK in social settings.

We had plenty of the odd kids in the long bus schools, depending on what track you got more or less of any particular weirdness but they didn't cause enough disruption to go to the special building and could pass tests well enough to scrape by.

Now by the time my nieces and nephews came along it was more common to have most of the short bus kids in the normal school but in a separate classroom.

Yeah, I can clearly remember the "retarded kids" room at my elementary school. And several kids in my classes who now would be either diagnosed as autistic or ASD today that back then were just "weird" or "easily angered". But that was the 1960s. We all had too much mercury, I guess...

Strangely, I don't remember is what happened to any of those kids after elementary school except one "weird" kid who lived across the street from me. E. was extremely bright, not very good at social cues, and had other issues (sensory, especially). We went to school all through high school together.

I keep reading TeamAntivax as TeamAnthrax, and I end up distracted and riffing Monty Python dialogue with people around me. I really need to disable wi-fi when I'm trying to work.

By Dan Andrews (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

@Dan Andrews (#110):

I really need to disable wi-fi when I’m trying to work.

Or at least avoid setting alight the grail-shaped beacon.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

@MI Dawn #109

Nah, the 60's was too much lead from the gas fumes and the paint chips.

Mercury was safe as kittens, I remember when they used to let us play with it.

I found nowhere in the .pdf conclusions that could remotely support AVM’s claims.
I bet you didn't see the fnords either.

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

@ DGR:

Yeah, memory is a b!tch but an incredibly fascinating b!tch.

At any rate, AoA writers conveniently forget those 'odd' kids and special education students who attended school with them decades ago. Just like Dan failed to see that hospital for Amish children.

Not all of us do:
my friend became of a teacher for LD, speech inadequacies and assorted other problems. She worked with LDs/ remedial assistance in a city school
( kids were in regular classes but were taken out to see her), EFL/ ESL in a place which had masses of immigrant students and later, in private school for rich kids with emotional/ social problems and a few who were deaf ( she lived in 3 different areas over a decade, mid 1980s on)
She never worked with ID kids but studied educational methods for them as well.

I'm sure we all know people who fit the definition of HFA/ AS from our own education. One of my gentlemen worked with a guy who is over 70 now and attended general classes and university ( never completed his degree) but is almost certainly AS. Another person, a relative, is 50 and extremely likely to have AS- he even has a STEM degree.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

@ Roger:

I remember your story.

I think that although some ND advocates may be politically active it doesn't mean that the movement isn't based on evidence.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

Nah, the 60’s was too much lead from the gas fumes and the paint chips.

Mercury was safe as kittens, I remember when they used to let us play with it.

And don't forget asbestos from the pipe insulation in older homes.

Was fun to play with when there was no Plasticine available.

Or, was I the only early 60s kid doing this?

Might explain a lot.

I'm just waiting for measles to get to my area. So many of my friends don't vax their kids. I don't get why they would want their kids to be so ill. I think my areas sits at 60-65%

On a side note, my kids are vaccinated and we ALL came down with whooping cough this past spring. With research it becomes clear that the vaccine does not always protect against the illness rather it weakens the effects of the illness and wears off with time. My husband had a full blown whooping/gagging/puking case, I was pretty bad, my 13 year old is still coughing 4 mos later and my youngest two (9-11) just coughed for 2-3 weeks. Our house was not a happy place for 8 weeks.

I worry about the information provided about pertussis that if you get the vaccine you will be protected.

One is not always protected even with the vaccine and you CAN pass it on - to unvax'd babies (and unvax'd friends!) In addition, doctors don't realize what you have (especially if there is no whoop) so you aren't treated with antibiotics and are very infectious. Our doctor saw our family 4 times in two weeks - and we rarely go to the doctor. My husband described TWICE a whooping/gagging fit and the diagnosis was missed. Even when we SELF diagnosed and went in for confirmation, antibiotics were given to my husband and I but not for our kids. Early on I mistakenly thought they didn't have it as they had had their vaccines and the doctor didn't think to prescribe to my kids even though she knew they were sick too.

We passed it on to A LOT of people. A LOT OF PEOPLE. It was not a fun experience.

By Louisa McClellan (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #92,

The IOM conclusion that food protein contaminated vaccines cause the development of food allergies, ends the discussion.

The US Dept. of Health and Human Services (HHS) charged the Institute of Medicine (IOM) with providing a thorough review of the current medical and scientific evidence on vaccines and vaccine adverse events.

The IOM concluded:
“Antigens in the vaccines that the committee is charged with reviewing do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction (e.g., hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, gelatin, ovalbumin, casamino acids).
However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

The result is consistent with what I have been describing all along and in line with Nobel Laureate Richet's findings.

The game is over.

perodatrent #98,

Pl. see:
Document Pg. 65 (pdf pg. 94 ) and Pg.277 (pdf pg. 306).

@APV:

The game is over.

Yay! Does that mean you'll take your ball and go, now?

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 01 Sep 2015 #permalink

JGC #93,

"Why? "

Because, vaccines do not just include bacterial and viral antigens. They include adjuvants, food proteins and other excipients.

"You mean, the way post-marketing surveillance does as we speak?"

No. Post marketing surveillance is for UNSOLICITED adverse events. I am talking about tracking SOLICITED adverse events for at least a few weeks.

Roger Kulp #107,

"autism ... a disorder not connected in any way to vaccines"

Not so fast.

https://iom.nationalacademies.org/Reports/2011/Adverse-Effects-of-Vacci…

Pg 546.

The IOM says:

"Causality Conclusion
Conclusion 10.6: The evidence is inadequate to accept or reject a causal relationship between diphtheria toxoid–, tetanus toxoid–, or acellular pertussis–containing vaccine and autism."

No conclusion can be drawn EITHER WAY, yet.

Milk proteins in vaccines causing synthesis of IgE antibodies to milk proteins is settled in the IOM report (casamino acid).

Milk proteins in vaccines causing synthesis of FR antibodies I think is just a matter of looking. If someone studies it, they will find it. So the mechanism to link at least some forms of autism to food protein contaminated vaccines, definitely exists.

In fact, the IOM only listed some antigens as examples. That is NOT an exhaustive list. Perhaps the body of evidence they looked at already has evidence of FR antibody synthesis due to milk contaminated vaccines ...

The Fist of Goodness -- all that's missing for APV is a cape and fancy logo.

Our junior high had us grouped in rosters based on likely academic achievement (I guess). Rosters 1 & 2 were the high achievers, 3-6 next level and so forth. Roster 19 was the 'different' kids. We never saw them in classes or lunch or any other school setting. I am near 60 so that was a while ago.

@Kerbozian, I LOVED Kean's 'Disappearing Spoon'. I will now march my fingers over to the electronic book store and see what else there may be:)

Louisa Mclellan: Get some new friends, stat. Anti-vaxxers are all horrible people, and I don't know why you'd want your kids near them.

Personally, I think the CDC is all wrong. What they need to do is empower doctors to give 'perks' to their patients, and ration the vaccines in areas with high anti-vax sentiment. Example: Parent goes to doctor, doctor checks records and says "your kid's about due for the DTAP, would you like me to special order it?"
Anti-vaxxers object to vaccines because they are cheap and available to everyone. If there is a perception of scarcity, or if hesitant parents have to pay a little more, the vaccines will rise in 'perceived' value. Low-income parents, on the other hand will be more likely to vaccinate if it's made easier and if they get stuff in exchange.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV,

Milk proteins in vaccines causing synthesis of IgE antibodies to milk proteins is settled in the IOM report (casamino acid).

The IOM report says no such thing. It says that milk proteins (among others) can cause IgE-mediated sensitization, it doesn't say milk proteins in vaccines cause IgE-mediated sensitization. I'm sure that proteins in vaccines do occasionally cause IgE-mediated sensitization, just as foods do. Removing all possibly allergenic proteins from vaccines seems to me to be as futile as removing all food proteins from food for fear of them inducing IgE-mediated sensitization.

You also continue to conflate the presence of IgE antibodies with IgE-mediated sensitization and you seem to have forgotten that in a previous thread I showed you that the doses of antigens used by Richet were far greater than those present in vaccines. Remember you compared unpurified egg white in vaccines to a purified protein fraction of egg white used by Richet?

Milk proteins in vaccines causing synthesis of FR antibodies I think is just a matter of looking. If someone studies it, they will find it. So the mechanism to link at least some forms of autism to food protein contaminated vaccines, definitely exists.

You think it exists therefore it definitely exists, and that this definitely cause autism despite anyone demonstrating this? That is practically the definition of pathological science.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

AVM #119
I had read page 65 of IOM report.What they say is:
"Antigens in the vaccines ... do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction … However, (they) do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis".

The only possible meaning of these words is that in the first exposure some rare people are sensitized, and in a second exposure some even rarer people have a reaction. Which is what happens for every reaction mediated by specific IgE antibodies.

I had not read IOM's words about varicella vaccine. They are
(page 277) "The patients developed symptoms of (allergic reactions) … shortly after vaccination".
Nowhere IOM says that sensitization with a dose of vaccine causes a clinical manifestation when the person eats a particular antigen contained both in the vaccine and in the food.

By perodatrent (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

In other anti-vax news..

( AoA) Kim confounds mercury contaminating a river with mercury ( which may or may not be in vaccines) and then invites her partisans to read articles in NatGeo and later contaminate the comment sections.

Even worse... ( but not particularly anti-vax)
Old Mikey unloads stilted, ham fisted parody about people who aren't 'prepping' ( and misses obvious opportunity for parody in that term itself) by running through his pet peeves and *betes noires* as predictably and in as pedestrian fashion as possible.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent #128,

"The only possible meaning of these words is that in the first exposure some rare people are sensitized,"

Yes, by the food protein in the vaccine. Food allergy prevalence is say 6% (varies by source). Kids get say 20 shots by the time they are diagnosed. That means about 1 in 320 shots causes sensitization. Seems rare but can explain the current food allergy epidemic.

"and in a second exposure some even rarer people have a reaction."

Yes, the second exposure can be ANY exposure, eating that food item or another injection.

"subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis"
is clinical manifestation.

Did you miss the part about 'orders of magnitude more"? Adjuvants promote immune response resulting from minimal antigen ex[posure. Nothing and no one, on the other hand, acts to minimize the antigen exposure received from the environment itself.

Excipients, by definition, are pharmacologically inert.

And to date you've been able to offer no evidence that food proteins in vaccine formulations are a problem, unless one had already been sensitized against that particular food protein prior to receiving th vaccine. (hell, you haven't even been able to demonstrate that food proteins you insist are in some formulations actually are in those formulations)

Post marketing surveillance is for UNSOLICITED adverse events. I am talking about tracking SOLICITED adverse events for at least a few weeks.

Please define 'solicited' versus 'unsolicited' as you're using the terms here, and explain why you beleive post-marketing surveillance--which tracks ALL adverse events--would capture only the latter and not the former.

APV,

Yes, by the food protein in the vaccine. Food allergy prevalence is say 6% (varies by source). Kids get say 20 shots by the time they are diagnosed. That means about 1 in 320 shots causes sensitization. Seems rare but can explain the current food allergy epidemic.

Do you have any evidence that is incompatible with the current hypothesis that in the vast majority of cases exposure to food in susceptible individuals causes food allergies? That's what you need to get people's attention about this and so far you haven't provided it.

I'm not even convinced that IgE-mediated sensitization induced by injection can lead to food allergy. Are there any documented cases of this happening? Type 2 allergies (inhaled -> ingested allergens) occur, but I don't know about injected -> ingested.

As just one example, the evidence about different allergies in different countries that has been pointed out to you is good evidence that it is food that causes food allergies, for example sesame allergies are more common in Israel and peanut allergies are more common in the UK, presumably because of the relative frequencies of consumption in those countries. This fact has reduced you to claims that vaccines in the UK contain peanut oil whereas in Israel they contain sesame oil, neither of which are true, and which is yet another marker for pathological science.

Even this (admittedly flawed) Dutch study found no significant difference in food allergy between vaccinated and unvaccinated children.

I suggest you try to find countries that use different vaccines containing different food proteins, and see whether food allergies in those countries parallel those proteins. That might be a first step towards supporting your hypothesis. So far "the game" hasn't even begun.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen, perodatrent, and anyone still bothering to engage APV,

Allow me to save you some time.

Krebiozen@133

Do you have any evidence that is incompatible with the current hypothesis that in the vast majority of cases exposure to food in susceptible individuals causes food allergies? That’s what you need to get people’s attention about this and so far you haven’t provided it.

APV: Oral exposure has a protective effect.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4416404/

minions: That's for exposure to one allergen in one specific population, not generally as you claim.

APV: that's only one study in a long line of evidence.

minions: prove it.

*silence*

minions: also, that's not what the IOM said. If they meant sensitization was caused by vaccines they would've said that, not just exposure.

APV: they do that to include people on antacids who develop sensitization to oral exposure.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2999748/

minions: once again you're putting words in the IOM's mouth. If that's what they meant, that's what they would have said.

Rinse and repeat.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

It appears that APV has been active at TMR's post about peanut allergy.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

@APV,

From "the greatest WordPress.com site in all the land!"

Any intramuscular vaccine/injection needle will tear off muscle tissue and deposit it along with the vaccine contents. One muscle protein is tropomyosin. Tropomyosin is found in the brain and intestines also. A person can develop sensitization to this tropomyosin protein, resulting in the immune system attacking the body’s tissues that contain tropomyosin. In other words, an autoimmune disorder results. When the immune system attacks the intestines, the result is ulcerative colitis. Likewise, autoimmune brain disorders are also possible.

Do you actually believe it when you say "directly into the bloodstream" or are you a lying sack of something?

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

@Denice #129

My boredom disinhibition (caused most recently by transferring files on floppy disks to an external drive) facilitates my posting of some odd things at times but even I found the Mike Adams advice for non-preppers to be one of the weirdest things I have ever read.

The only good thing I can say about it is that it didn't involve him selling anything.

By Not a Troll (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

It appears that APV has been active at TMR’s post about peanut allergy.

In the words of Gomer Pyle -- Surprise, surprise, surprise.

APV is the peanut gallery.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Kim confounds mercury contaminating a river with mercury ( which may or may not be in vaccines) and then invites her partisans to read articles in NatGeo and later contaminate the comment sections.

So is Kim more purposefully deceitful than stupid or is she more stupid than purposefully deceitful?

Guess it really doesn't matter.

A few of the AoA crackpots took her up on her suggestion to comment on the NatGeo page, snigger, snigger.

The latest "childhood" disease to make the news is chickenpox. Two players for the Kansas City Royals are expected to be out _a few weeks_ after coming down with the disease:

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/chicken-pox-infection-affect-kansas-city-r…

What I didn't see in the article is if other players on the team are getting vaccinated against chickenpox. Maybe they'll "tough it out" like those NHL nimrods who opted out of shots after their teammates came down with mumps this past season.

By Dangerous Bacon (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Let me see if I have this straight -

Vaccines that have food proteins in them are the cause the current epidemic in food allergies, because the body responds to the foreign protein in the bloodstream. But just getting the protein in your bloodstream isn't enough, as our early ancestors who spent almost every waking hour searching for and preparing food (which was a contact sport back in the day) didn't have food allergies. The vaccines are designed to also provoke an allergic response, so just a cut while butchering a wild beast with stone tools (not known for their ergonomic grips) isn't a problem.

My friend, the cow rancher (the one who always corrects me when I call them cows), who is getting allergy shots (very much designed to provoke an allergic response) for a grass allergy isn't in danger of having his allergies become worse, and in fact they will probably lessen. This is because our bodies somehow know not to make us more allergic when we have pollen proteins in our blood. Pollen allergies are different.

Now I'm being told that the needle used in the injection will tear muscle tissue and cause autoimmune disorders.

Now it seems to me, given the number of people receiving allergy shots, and the number of tissue tearing shots they receive, that there should be a very high correlation between those getting allergy shots and those with autoimmune disorders. That signal should be clear and unmistakable. I suspect that would have made the news if it was true.

I expect APV will have some reason allergy shots don't cause autoimmune disorders.

All I can say in response is that if 'mental gymnastics' becomes an Olympic sport, APV is sure to medal, and be the odds on favorite to take the gold.

Johnny@143

Now I’m being told that the needle used in the injection will tear muscle tissue ...

and deposit it into... muscle.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Johnny & capnkrunch:

Reminds me of one of George Carlin's "news" bits, where it was revealed that saliva causes stomach cancer, but only if swallowed in small amounts over a long period of time.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

When was 7 years old I was hit by a car and spent 10 days in the hospital (1961) for a basal skull fracture. I remember receiving at least 10 injections a day (probably not that many really). So I must have had a lot of muscle protein sent to my blood stream.

The only allergy I developed was one to needles.

Louisa McClellan@117: I hope your family is on the mend! Whooping cough is a particularly hard one because even having the disease doesn't confer life-long immunity (humans just don't make a long-lasting response to pertussis). The new, safer vaccine for pertussis doesn't generate very long immune memory either (compared to the older vaccine).

I think it's likely that pertussis will be put on an every-10-year booster cycle, like tetanus.

(Politicalguineapig says lots of not-very-nice things, please don't think we all agree with her.)

By JustaTech (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Justatech: I WAS being nice and trying to offer advice. Unfortunately, I was also on my way and didn't think to temper my reaction. It's not Mrs. Mclellan's fault her neighbors are idiots, but that doesn't mean she needs to encourage them.

Mrs. Mclellan: I'm sorry for misspeaking and I'm glad everyone's recovered. Hopefully you can eventually meet sensible people offline.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

@ Not a Troll:

HOWEVER Mike IS selling something, as he does each and every moment of every day**:

first of all, he's selling himself: he wants to incite loyalty in his followers - he CARES about them- when the authorities and institutions decidedly DO NOT- isn't he wonderful?
then, when he has their trust, he instructs people in how to save themselves WITH his help. Because he is so brilliant and so purely humanitarian.
Mike sells a range of products that can insure customers' survival-
there are supplements and superfoods as well as STOREABLE organic foods, flashlights, water filtration systems, hydroponic 'farms', heirloom seeds, herbal medicine cabinets etc etc.
AND books and videos. Take a look at his store.

Mike also makes money from adverts such as survivalists' supply stores and economic Armageddon forecasters

** same goes for the other idiot @ PRN.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

On my way *out.* I hate breaking in computers.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

DGR@140

So is Kim more purposefully deceitful than stupid or is she more stupid than purposefully deceitful?

The age-old question regarding any quack or crank. It's a sliding scale from Andrew Wakefield to AoA commenter. A quick and dirty estimate is to ask how much momey is in it for them. Based on this, I would guess Kim is closer to the Wakefield end of the spectrum.

But, like you said, it doesn't particularly matter. It makes for a moderately interesting exercise and that's about it.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

@ capnkrunch:

I rather doubt that she makes any decent sums of money from her anti-vax activities including her writing career- such as it is. I think that she's a true believer who is TRYING to become a thought leader or suchlike.

Hilariously, she often notes that she really understands science because she studied it in secondary school.

By Denice Walter (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Based on that standard, I'm an ornithologist. Though we actually did handle live birds.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #133,

"Do you have any evidence that is incompatible with the current hypothesis that in the vast majority of cases exposure to food in susceptible individuals causes food allergies?"

That is YOUR current hypothesis which I showed is wrong.
Please explain this result:
Randomized Trial of Peanut Consumption in Infants at Risk for Peanut Allergy
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1414850

How did the group AVOIDING peanuts have a higher peanut allergy development rate than the group EATING peanuts?

Where did the peanut exposure occur in the group AVOIDING peanuts?

Hahaha! Did I call that or what (see me@134/APV@154)? Man I'm brilliant.

By capnkrunch (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Re: 117 126 147 148

Seriously people I have a thicker skin than that!

I homeschool, so you see, I have to keep my trap shut as there seems to be an unusual amount of homeschooler-antivaxers. I have one friend with whom I wage a passive aggresive war on - I post Vandana Shiva critiques, gmo stuff and Vaccination 'propaganda' in the comments on every BS story she posts. My links often directly address her stories via here and sciencebasedmedicine. We never speak of our passive aggressive battle but I see today she has been VERY busy with the vaccination injury and guardisil posts......

The problem with the whole pertussis illness is that we were vax'd and 5/5 of us got it.
They weren't vaxed and 3/6 of them got it.
So you see, why vaccinate?

By Louisa McClellan (not verified) on 02 Sep 2015 #permalink

Rich Bly #146,

"So I must have had a lot of muscle protein sent to my blood stream.

The only allergy I developed was one to needles."

Autism rate is 1 in 68 children. A child receives about 30 shots today. So about 1 in 2000 shots could produce autism due to tropomyosin (muscle protein) injection.

http://www.sardogs.com/health_purdue_vaccination_study.htm

capnkrunch #134,

"APV: Oral exposure has a protective effect.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4416404/

minions: That’s for exposure to one allergen in one specific population, not generally as you claim."

Wrong again. Oral tolerance is old news (more than a hundred years) and you are forgiven for forgetting ...

Wells HG. Studies on the chemistry of anaphylaxis (III) Experiments with isolated proteins, especially those of the hen’s egg. J Infect Dis. 1911;9:24.
Wells HG, Osborne TB. The biological reactions of the vegetable proteins. I. Anaphylaxis. J Infect Dis. 1911;8:66–124.
“The phenomenon of oral tolerance was first described by Wells and Osborne in 1911. They used guinea pigs to show that inclusion of egg white, purified egg allergens, or oats in the diet rendered the animals hyporesponsive to sensitization and anaphylaxis to those proteins. ”

Berin MC, Mayer L. Can we produce true tolerance in patients with food allergy? J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2013;131(1):14–22. doi: 10.1016/j.jaci.2012.10.058.

At least you are paying good attention to my posts ...

Krebiozen, #127,

"The IOM report says no such thing. It says that milk proteins (among others) can cause IgE-mediated sensitization, it doesn’t say milk proteins in vaccines cause IgE-mediated sensitization."

Are you kidding?! This IOM report is about vaccine adverse events. They ARE talking about VACCINE ANTIGENS causing sensitization. Why are hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, in the list along with gelatin, ovalbumin, and casamino acids?

Nice try though. Perhaps you should hire a lawyer to look for more loopholes in the report?

Krebiozen #127,

"doses of antigens used by Richet were far greater than those present in vaccines."

You are absolutely right that dosage is key. Now please post the studies that have determined the SAFE DOSAGE for all food proteins currently present in vaccines.

APV,

Please explain this result:
Randomized Trial of Peanut Consumption in Infants at Risk for Peanut Allergy
How did the group AVOIDING peanuts have a higher peanut allergy development rate than the group EATING peanuts?
Where did the peanut exposure occur in the group AVOIDING peanuts?

From skin exposure through the many skin care products that contain peanut oil, obviously, as suggested in the discussion at the end:

In this study, very early sensitization was observed in infants with no history of peanut consumption. As we have proposed in our dual allergen hypothesis, early environmental exposure (through the skin) to peanut may account for early sensitization, whereas early oral exposure may lead to immune tolerance. The LEAP study showed that early oral introduction of peanuts could prevent allergy in high-risk, sensitized infants and in nonsensitized infants.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 03 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #127,

"The IOM report says no such thing. It says that milk proteins (among others) can cause IgE-mediated sensitization, it doesn’t say milk proteins in vaccines cause IgE-mediated sensitization."

The IOM report said NOTHING about milk. They mention sensitization to casamino acid. I pointed out that casamino acid is derived from milk. Casamino acid is a microbial growth media. So the IOM report is talking about sensitization to (milk proteins) casamino acid contained in vaccines.

In your hurry to jump to the wrong conclusion, you are missing the details ...

Krebiozen #161,
"From skin exposure through the many skin care products that contain peanut oil, obviously, as suggested in the discussion at the end:"

Peanut allergy: Effect of environmental peanut exposure in children with filaggrin loss-of-function mutations
http://www.jacionline.org/article/S0091-6749(14)01183-X/abstract

Are you claiming that children suddenly developed filaggrin loss-of-function mutation? Are you claiming that every child allergic to peanut has this mutation?

Has the "current hypothesis" moved from GI mucosa sensitization to skin sensitization?

And according to your new hypothesis, there should be NO peanut allergy in the United States. From your article:
"The good news for U.S. parents is that the peanut-based baby and nursing products identified in this study aren't sold in the United States, notes Anne Muoz-Furlong, founder of the nonprofit Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network, a national educational group with 25,000 members. Indeed, she says, "we did a study looking generally at creams for nursing mothers [and for babies with diaper rash] in the United States, and none of them contained peanut oil.""

Oops?

APV (#163):

“we did a study looking generally at creams for nursing mothers [and for babies with diaper rash] in the United States, and none of them contained peanut oil."

But did they contain polysorbate 80 made from peanuts?

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 03 Sep 2015 #permalink

Is this an experiment in how many threads one lying little sh1tweasel can stink up with obsessive stupidity at once?

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 03 Sep 2015 #permalink

Christ on a bike, it's nice to know APV is still banging on about the same stupid shit.

I miss you guys! Hi everyone!

welcome back, poster with the name this damned tablet keeps auto-correcting (to 'Dolphins,' no less). Nice trip?

Don't read #162 with your mouth full of coffee. Particularly the last line.

herr doktor bimler says(#165),

Is this an experiment in how many threads one lying little sh1tweasel can stink up with obsessive stupidity at once?

MJD says,

Did you do the Spock mind-meld with lilady before she passed?

Your writing just like her's

By Michael J. Dochniak (not verified) on 03 Sep 2015 #permalink

Richard Smith #164,

"But did they contain polysorbate 80 made from peanuts?"

Certainly possible.

However, people have used vegetable oil on their skin for centuries without developing allergies.

Here's another interesting question.
Skin prick allergy tests involve pricking the skin and introducing an allergen.
If merely applying peanut oil/protein to the skin can cause one to develop peanut allergy, why is a peanut extract skin prick test considered safe?

http://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/allergy-tests/basics/what-yo…
"After cleaning the test site with alcohol, the nurse draws small marks on your skin and applies a drop of allergen extract next to each mark. He or she then uses a lancet to prick the extracts into the skin's surface. A new lancet is used for each allergen."

APV #170 asks:
"Skin prick allergy tests involve pricking the skin and introducing an allergen. If merely applying peanut oil/protein to the skin can cause one to develop peanut allergy, why is a peanut extract skin prick test considered safe?".
Because "safety" of prick skin tests has the same meaning that every other medical procedure should have: that is, a recommended procedure is such that its benefits outweighs the risks for people who consider using it.
Same as for vaccines.

By perodatrent (P… (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV,

Are you claiming that children suddenly developed filaggrin loss-of-function mutation? Are you claiming that every child allergic to peanut has this mutation?

How do you get from "Early-life environmental peanut exposure is associated with an increased risk of peanut sensitization and allergy in children who carry an FLG mutation", to, "every child allergic to peanut has this mutation"? Why would anyone even think that?

Has the “current hypothesis” moved from GI mucosa sensitization to skin sensitization?

The current hypothesis is that both routes can lead to sensitization, depending on dose and other factors we don't yet understand clearly.

And according to your new hypothesis, there should be NO peanut allergy in the United States. From your article: [snip]

Children in the US still ingest peanuts, as far as I know, and you missed the next bit of the quote:

However, many other cosmetics, body lotions, hydrating creams, and soaps do contain peanut oils, nut oils, and soy oils, Lack points out. "Although not directly prescribed for use on infant skin," he notes, "it's not uncommon for mothers to apply these products on their babies–because these preparations are marketed as benign and good for the skin."

Why would you have missed that out?

Oops?

Oops indeed. Yet again you are caught out in a bit of dishonest cherry-picking.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

shay, his/her facile leaps are breathtaking.

We had a great trip, London (the better half had work to do there and one of my sisters and her family live there) to Paris to Kinshasa. Delphinette was reasonably well-behaved, considering. My Nana (the lady who helped raise us in the DRC) is dying of cancer and I wanted Mr. Delphine and Delphinette to meet her before she leaves us. That aside, it was great to be back.

perodatrent (Pietro Alfonsi, physician) #171,

"Because “safety” of prick skin tests has the same meaning that every other medical procedure should have: that is, a recommended procedure is such that its benefits outweighs the risks for people who consider using it."

Please post safety studies of skin prick test w.r.t to allergic sensitization.

APV (#174): Granted, there is evidence of an irritating prick having very few benefits.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #172,

"The current hypothesis is that both routes can lead to sensitization, depending on dose and other factors we don’t yet understand clearly."

The only studies we have seen thus far show ingestion produces tolerance, not allergy. Skin sensitization occurs in people with an FLG mutation.

Why don't you post the studies showing GI/skin sensitization in the rest of the population?

You are unscientifically sticking to a hand-waving hypothesis with " depending on dose and other factors we don’t yet understand clearly" and have no data to back it up.

And worse, you IGNORE, the REPEATEDLY PROVEN route of injection/vaccine sensitization that has been known for over a hundred years and confirmed again by the nation's top scientific experts at the IOM.

"Children in the US still ingest peanuts"
Which PROTECTS against allergy.

Dr. Lack said:
"This suggests, he says, that "low-dose exposures through a route other than the gastrointestinal tract may actually switch on an allergy." "

But you CONVENIENTLY IGNORE injections/vaccines which are a "low-dose exposures through a route other than the gastrointestinal tract ".

And Dr. Lack says:
"Intuitively, he says, "that makes sense, because we're not meant to become allergic to things that we eat." From an evolutionary point of view, he says, exposure to foreign proteins through the gut should "lead to tolerance"–the dampening of an allergic response–"which indeed it does in the majority of individuals."

Perhaps this should be labeled the pseudoscienceblog.com ...

#175

We can all go home now, excellent work.

APV (#176):

Perhaps this should be labeled the pseudoscienceblog.com

Only if your posts achieve critical mass.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

As we all could guess, Ann Dachel ( AoA) is not particularly pleased with Mr Silberman’s book because SHE KNOWS that there weren’t ANY autistic people around years ago.

I've noticed recently that the Dachelbot seems to have picked up something of a shine for Hillel Handler. This is not a well thought out appeal to "authority."

Richard Smith @139

That is golden!

By Roger Kulp (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

“Skin prick allergy tests involve pricking the skin and introducing an allergen. If merely applying peanut oil/protein to the skin can cause one to develop peanut allergy, why is a peanut extract skin prick test considered safe?”.

There is risk. This is why suitably trained and prepared medical personnel must be on site whenever this test is performed, and for subsequent allergy shots. In my experience this is strictly enforced. Not only is the risk well managed (as perodatrent said), the benefit of the tests and treatment outweighs the risk.

LM:I homeschool, so you see, I have to keep my trap shut as there seems to be an unusual amount of homeschooler-antivaxers.

Well, considering that among homeschoolers it's nearly 50-50 fundamentalists and hippy-dippies, I'm not surprised that most of them are anti-vax. Moving the kids to charters might help if you're looking for a rational peer group.
There's like maybe 5 sensible people per state who homeschool, probably a lower percentage than that.

As for the pertussis vaccine, you can lay that at the door of the anti-vaxxers. We used to have a d-t-p that was far more effective at combating the p. Then whining happened, and the end result is that we have a far less effective vaccine against pertussis. At least the diptheria and tetanus bits still work.

By Politicalguineapig (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV,

The only studies we have seen thus far show ingestion produces tolerance, not allergy. Skin sensitization occurs in people with an FLG mutation.
Why don’t you post the studies showing GI/skin sensitization in the rest of the population?

Look at the study you posted, at Table II specifically, that shows 90% of children with peanut allergy had wild-type FLG i.e. no FLG mutation.

You are unscientifically sticking to a hand-waving hypothesis with ” depending on dose and other factors we don’t yet understand clearly” and have no data to back it up.

I'm not an immunologist, but the data I have looked at is consistent with the current mainstream hypotheses. You are the one challenging this so the burden of evidence is on you, and so far you have failed miserably to provide anything even vaguely convincing.

And worse, you IGNORE, the REPEATEDLY PROVEN route of injection/vaccine sensitization that has been known for over a hundred years and confirmed again by the nation’s top scientific experts at the IOM.

You still claim a single slightly ambiguous statement in that IOM report supports your claims? Pathetic.

“Children in the US still ingest peanuts”
Which PROTECTS against allergy.

In the right dose, perhaps, but they are also exposed to topical peanuts, despite your deceitful attempt to pretend they are not.

Dr. Lack said:
“This suggests, he says, that “low-dose exposures through a route other than the gastrointestinal tract may actually switch on an allergy.” ”

Precisely, "may" or may not, "switch on an allergy".

But you CONVENIENTLY IGNORE injections/vaccines which are a “low-dose exposures through a route other than the gastrointestinal tract “.

No one is ignoring it, it's just there is no evidence to suggest there is a problem. You never commented on that study I posted that found fully unvaccinated children have just as many food allergies as vaccinated children. I know it was a phone survey, but as it was done by an antivaccine organization that is highly motivated to make vaccines look as bad as possible, I found it interesting.

And Dr. Lack says:
“Intuitively, he says, “that makes sense, because we’re not meant to become allergic to things that we eat.” From an evolutionary point of view, he says, exposure to foreign proteins through the gut should “lead to tolerance”–the dampening of an allergic response–”which indeed it does in the majority of individuals.”

What part of, "in the majority of individuals", are you having trouble grasping?

Perhaps this should be labeled the pseudoscienceblog.com …

I think you mean pathological science, which is clearly your MO.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

Did you do the Spock mind-meld with lilady before she passed?

Flattery! It will get you everywhere.

By herr doktor bimler (not verified) on 04 Sep 2015 #permalink

rs #183,

"This is why suitably trained and prepared medical personnel must be on site whenever this test is performed,"

You misunderstood. I am NOT talking about an immediate allergic reaction to the skin prick test. I am talking about SENSITIZATION caused by the skin prick test. Suitably trained and prepared medical personnel on site is irrelevant.

Krebiozen #185,

"You still claim a single slightly ambiguous statement in that IOM report supports your claims? "

So, according to you, what the does the IOM statement mean?

perodatrent (Pietro Alfonsi, physician)

Dr. Alfonsi, could you please provide your interpretation of the IOM statement?

Krebiozen,

Another detail that was missed. Disrupted skin barrier exposure causes sensitization (per Dr. Lack), not healthy skin exposure to allergen.

http://consumer.healthday.com/respiratory-and-allergy-information-2/foo…
"Study senior author Gideon Lack, also of King's College London, added, "This is further evidence for the dual-allergen-exposure theory, which suggests food allergies develop through exposure to allergens via the skin, likely through a disrupted skin barrier, whilst consumption of these food proteins early in life builds up tolerance in the body.""

Vaccines/injections are VERY EFFICIENT methods of delivering allergens by disrupting the skin barrier. Definitely more efficient than house dust allergens settling on the disrupted skin barrier. But let's set that aside for a moment.

1. Allergen exposure to disrupted skin barrier causes sensitization.
Skin prick allergy tests cause allergen exposure to disrupted skin and therefore can cause sensitization. So this widely used allergy test that even Dr.Lack's team uses extensively in the study below, should have been banned.
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1414850#t=article

OR

2. Skin prick allergen tests do NOT cause sensitization.
Allergen exposure to disrupted skin barrier is safe.

You have to choose 1 OR 2. You cannot have your cake and eat it too ...

APV #189
Could you please specify which IOM statement you refer to?
The file is really extensive, and contains a lot of statements (that is, IOM's interpretations of the clinical studies).
As for some late posts of yours, I think Gideon Lack's may be right when saying that "... food allergies develop through exposure to allergens via the skin, likely through a disrupted skin barrier".
But this has nothing to do with your view about some components of childhood vaccines having "caused" sensitization towards food epitopes.
Everyone that has studied immunology knows that the cells responsible for processing foreign antigens are not in the muscles (where vaccines are injected), but in the skin.

By perodatrent (not verified) on 05 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent #191
sorry, there are times of the day when my brain isn't fully connected to keyboard.
My last phrase should be deleted. I was conflating desired immunological response mediated by IgG with unwanted reactions mediated by IgE.

By perodatrent (not verified) on 05 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV,

“You still claim a single slightly ambiguous statement in that IOM report supports your claims?”
So, according to you, what the does the IOM statement mean?

OK, I'll explain it piece by piece.

“Adverse events on our list thought to be due to IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions

This is a heading to let us know the subject being discussed is IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions to vaccines i.e. anaphylaxis. I don't see "subsequent development of food allergy" on the list of adverse events the IoM discusses in this paper.

Antigens in the vaccines that the committee is charged with reviewing do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction (e.g., hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, gelatin, ovalbumin, casamino acids).

However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

Antigens in the vaccine do not typically cause anaphylaxis, but sometimes they do.

Nothing in this paragraph lead me to think the IoM meant that vaccines are a significant cause of sensitization. Since the discussion in subsequent chapters is entirely about anaphylaxis, apart from some mention of the Japanese gelatin incident (a manufacturing error), I think my interpretation is correct.

1. Allergen exposure to disrupted skin barrier causes sensitization.
Skin prick allergy tests cause allergen exposure to disrupted skin and therefore can cause sensitization. So this widely used allergy test that even Dr.Lack’s team uses extensively in the study below, should have been banned.
OR
2. Skin prick allergen tests do NOT cause sensitization.
Allergen exposure to disrupted skin barrier is safe.
You have to choose 1 OR 2. You cannot have your cake and eat it too …

Once again your logic is faulty because you are ignoring dose. The dose used in allergy tests has been carefully chosen to be safe (this paper as just one example). Maybe the dual allergen theory is correct, we don't know for sure yet. Either way it doesn't support your hypothesis; if allergy-testing caused sensitization I, and everyone who has had skin prick tests, would be allergic to everything. I'm not, in fact I have lost my positive response to some antigens, despite having multiple vaccines over the years.

I'll ask you once again, do you have any evidence that is inconsistent with the mainstream view that the vast majority of food allergies are caused by ingested food or by skin exposure?

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 05 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent #191,

"Could you please specify which IOM statement you refer to?"

This one on Document Pg. 65 (pdf pg. 94 )

“Adverse events on our list thought to be due to IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions
Antigens in the vaccines that the committee is charged with reviewing do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction (e.g., hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, gelatin, ovalbumin, casamino acids).
However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

Krebiozen #193,

"The dose used in allergy tests has been carefully chosen to be safe (this paper as just one example)"

Your reference shows the dose has been carefully chosen to produce a safe REACTION. In other words, reduce the chance of anaphylaxis. There is NOTHING about safety considerations to avoid sensitization. And sensitization safety/risk is what we are talking about.

So please provide a relevant reference.

Krebiozen #193,

"I’ll ask you once again, do you have any evidence that is inconsistent with the mainstream view that the vast majority of food allergies are caused by ingested food or by skin exposure?"

First, that is NOT the mainstream view.

The mainstream view is "WE DON'T KNOW" what causes food allergy.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db10.htm
"The mechanisms by which a person develops an allergy to specific foods are largely unknown. "

Food allergy: an enigmatic epidemic.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23648309

Second, I have provided a solid body of evidence that injected food proteins cause food allergy.
I agree that allergen exposure to disrupted skin can in theory, also cause sensitization and therefore skin prick allergy tests are dangerous.

If you argue that skin prick allergy tests are not an efficient sensitization mechanism, then the same applies to household dust settling on disrupted skin barrier.

It is also interesting that Dr. Lack's team did NOT control for skin allergen exposure in this study:
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1414850

Krebiozen #193,

IOM:
"Antigens in the vaccines that the committee is charged with reviewing do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction (e.g., hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, gelatin, ovalbumin, casamino acids).

However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

First, they are making it very clear that they are talking about viral proteins (Hep B surface antigen), bacterial proteins (toxoids) and food proteins (gelatin, ovalbumin, milk proteins) present in vaccines. Casamino acid is derived from milk and known to be contaminated with milk proteins.

"the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization"
As clear as they can be in stating that these proteins do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in a vaccine recipient.

"and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”
And this makes it clear that the sensitization is SUFFICIENTLY strong to result in subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis upon exposure to those proteins. In other words, clinical allergy.

So, not just subsequent food allergy, but also allergy to the viral and bacterial proteins in the vaccine as I have written numerous times.

Long Term Persistence of IgE Anti-Influenza Virus Antibodies in Pediatric and Adult Serum Post Vaccination with Influenza Virus Vaccine
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3065793/

Influenza Specific Serum IgE is Present in Non-Allergic
Subjects
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-3083.2005.01710.x/pdf

This article and some of its references below:
Extensive Swelling After Booster Doses of Acellular Pertussis–Tetanus–Diphtheria Vaccines
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/105/1/e12.long#ref-21

Nagel J, Svec D, Waters T, Fireman P (1977) IgE synthesis in man. I. Development of specific IgE antibodies after immunization with tetanus-diphtheria (Td) toxoids.J Immunol 118:334–341.

Mark A, Björkstén B, Granström M (1995) Immunoglobulin E responses to diphtheria and tetanus toxoids after booster with aluminum-adsorbed and fluid DT-vaccines. Vaccine 13:669–673.

Hedenskog S, Björkstén B, Blennow M, Granström G, Granström M (1989)Immunoglobulin E response to pertussis toxin in whooping cough and after immunization with a whole-cell and an acellular pertussis vaccine. Int Arch Allergy Appl Immunol 89:156–161.

"May," "can in theory," and "could" =/= solid body of evidence.

shay #197,

I used "can in theory," for skin exposure sensitization. NOT for sensitization by vaccine/injection.

The IOM statement has no "May" or "could".

"However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens DO occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis."

My emphasis of "do".

Krebiozen #193,

"Either way it doesn’t support your hypothesis; if allergy-testing caused sensitization I, and everyone who has had skin prick tests, would be allergic to everything. I’m not, in fact I have lost my positive response to some antigens, despite having multiple vaccines over the years."

Using that logic, EVERYONE has had disrupted skin barrier that has been exposed to allergen laden household dust. So EVERYONE should be allergic to everything. Conclusion: No one develops allergy to household allergen exposure through disrupted skin barrier?

Vine Arumugham (APV):

You said Avantor used peanuts to make its Polysorbate 80 and concealed that fact by keeping it off their datasheet. According to you, they are lying about that now.

Also according to you, Avantor is currently making their Polysorbate 80 from sesame oil, and they are concealing that fact by not listing that ingredient on their datasheet.

You have also said that vaccine makers are currently producing a vaccine with peanut oil-based Polysorbate 80, and that the resulting vaccine has peanut proteins in it, but you refuse to say which vaccine it is. This is very strange, considering your professed concern with the food allergy "epidemic" that you claim is caused by this vaccine and others like it.

Why do you act as though you don't care about children getting terribly sick?

By OccamsLaser (not verified) on 05 Sep 2015 #permalink

First, they are making it very clear that they are talking about viral proteins (Hep B surface antigen)....

Funny, Twinrix is a three-dose series. Shall we return to the positively dreamy Charles Richet? Vinu "Medical Student" Arumugham/APV/Vinucube has trotted this one out over and over.

Oh, wait, that's not even necessary. Take it away, Vinu:

Over a hundred years ago, Charles Richet discovered that injecting proteins into mammals will cause them to develop an allergy.

Basically, Charles Richet demonstrated a 100 years ago that any proteins injected into mammals will cause sensitization. Any subsequent exposure to the protein will result in anaphylaxis - a term he coined.

"The phenomenon of anaphylaxis was becoming of general application. Instead of applying only to toxins and toxalbumins, it held good for all proteins, whether toxic at the first injection or not.

"Two years later Rosenau and Anderson, two American physiologists, demonstrated in a noteworthy piece of work that the phenomenon of anaphylaxis occurs after every injection of serum, even when the injection is minute, for example of 0.00001 ml which is an infinitely small amount but nevertheless sufficient to anaphylactize an animal. They quoted examples of anaphylaxis from all organic liquids: milk, serum, egg, muscle extract."

Ad nauseam.

I'm not going to bother fishing around for back when he was claiming that exposure to influenza, measles, etc., after vaccination would result in anaphylaxis as well.

Narad #202,

"Twinrix is a three-dose series"

And DTaP is a five dose series. That is exactly what I covered in #197 with this reference:

Extensive Swelling After Booster Doses of Acellular Pertussis–Tetanus–Diphtheria Vaccines
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/105/1/e12.long#ref-21

"Entire thigh swelling was an unsolicited reaction reported in 20 (2%) of the 1015 children who received 4 consecutive doses of the same DTaP vaccine."

"We believe this to be the first study to indicate a possible relationship between high Dtxd content and swelling of the entire limb after booster doses of DTaP administered intramuscularly in toddlers. Because of the lack of association of Dtxd content with lesser degrees of swelling, any extrapolations or conclusions from these data should be made with caution. However, if confirmed, the results suggest that decreasing the quantity of Dtxd in certain high diphtheria content DTaP vaccines used for booster doses might lessen the rate of entire limb swelling after fourth or fifth doses of some DTaP vaccines. The quantity of Dtxd in vaccines used to boost immunity in adults was specifically reduced to avoid the severe local reactions experienced by individuals with preexisting immunity, and these lowered doses of Dtxd were found adequate to elicit an anamnestic response in primed adults.25 The resurgence of diphtheria in Eastern Europe reminds us that it is essential that adequate immunogencity be maintained, however. Other possible approaches to reducing local reactions include using more highly purified Dtxd or using an adjuvant that does not stimulate an immunoglobulin E antibody response. Preliminary studies of reduction of the quantities of several antigens in a combined Dtxd–Ttxd 3-component acellular pertussis vaccine suggest that this approach may successfully reduce local reactogenicity, while maintaining immunogenicity.26,,27Eventually, when new data become available on duration of protection after DTaP immunization, additional reductions in reactions may be possible through refinements in schedule."

That is EXACTLY why the IOM covered it. It is a well known adverse event in multi-dose vaccines.

"he was claiming that exposure to influenza, measles, etc., after vaccination would result in anaphylaxis as well."

No, not natural exposure to influenza, measles, etc. but reactions/anaphylaxis to subsequent VACCINES for influenza or measles etc. Again, exactly what the IOM is covering with that statement.

OccamsLaser #201,

Pl. point to my original posts. That way people can see EXACTLY what I claimed and what embellishments YOU have added.

Your retreat from your earlier literal fetishism for Richet is noted, Vinu. As I said, I have no particular interest in panning the sediment from your copious discharges, so I'll leave it to anybody who still has interest in playing with the remains of the Black Knight.

Why do you suppose you didn't gain any traction at TMR? Or MDC? Who needs whom at this point? How are the WP stats looking?

APV,

Your reference shows the dose has been carefully chosen to produce a safe REACTION. In other words, reduce the chance of anaphylaxis. There is NOTHING about safety considerations to avoid sensitization. And sensitization safety/risk is what we are talking about.
So please provide a relevant reference.

I said it was one example. I'm not going to scour the entire immunological literature for you. How about you show me some evidence that injected antigens can lead to food allergy, because I'm having trouble finding any.

“I’ll ask you once again, do you have any evidence that is inconsistent with the mainstream view that the vast majority of food allergies are caused by ingested food or by skin exposure?”
First, that is NOT the mainstream view.
The mainstream view is “WE DON’T KNOW” what causes food allergy.
“The mechanisms by which a person develops an allergy to specific foods are largely unknown. ”

Yet again you display a curious lack of logic. It's true, we don't know the precise mechanisms of how ingestion or skin exposure causes allergy, but we have a pretty good idea.

Food allergy: an enigmatic epidemic.

Did you read that article? It is about different factors that lead to either tolerance of hypersensitivity on ingestion or skin exposure to antigens. I see nothing in it that supports your hypothesis

Second, I have provided a solid body of evidence that injected food proteins cause food allergy.

No you haven't, not remotely.

I agree that allergen exposure to disrupted skin can in theory, also cause sensitization and therefore skin prick allergy tests are dangerous.

Citation needed for any cases of sensitization caused by skin prick testing - a single case history?

If you argue that skin prick allergy tests are not an efficient sensitization mechanism, then the same applies to household dust settling on disrupted skin barrier.

There are other factors involved, not least dose, as that helpful article explains.

As clear as they can be in stating that these proteins do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in a vaccine recipient.

I merely note your desperation in seizing upon a single ambiguous statement as apparently the only thing that even vaguely appears to support your hypothesis in a 900 page document.

Long Term Persistence of IgE Anti-Influenza Virus Antibodies in Pediatric and Adult Serum Post Vaccination with Influenza Virus Vaccine

As I have pointed out many times before, we don't know if these people had IgE antibodies to wild influenza or the vaccine, and in any case their IgE was not in the range you would expect in those with allergies. You still conflate a normal IgE with that indicating sensitization; even non-atopic people have some IgE in their blood.

Influenza Specific Serum IgE is Present in Non-Allergic Subjects

It looks as if IgE is involved in a normal immune reaction to viruses. This doesn't mean everyone has an allergic reaction to vaccine antigens, or that allergy is how vaccines work (as you have previously claimed). If that were true vaccines wouldn't work in non-atopic individuals, would they?

Extensive Swelling After Booster Doses of Acellular Pertussis–Tetanus–Diphtheria Vaccines

An adverse reaction to vaccine toxoids is relevant to food allergies how?

Using that logic, EVERYONE has had disrupted skin barrier that has been exposed to allergen laden household dust. So EVERYONE should be allergic to everything. Conclusion: No one develops allergy to household allergen exposure through disrupted skin barrier?

It was you, as Narad kindly reminded us, that claimed "any proteins injected into mammals will cause sensitization", though you seem to retreat from that when it suits you. Anyway, the difference is we have plenty of evidence for sensitization through skin sensitization and none, to my knowledge, that skin prick allergy testing has ever induced IgE hypersensitivity.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 06 Sep 2015 #permalink

I have been reading "The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin" and was struck by this passage:
"In 1736 I lost one of my sons, a fine boy of four years old, by the smallpox, taken in the common way. I long regretted bitterly, and still regret, that I had not given it to him by inoculation. This I mention for the stake of parents who omit that operation, on the supposition that they should never forgive themselves if a child died under it ; my example showing that the regret may be the same either way, and that, therefore, the safer should be chosen."

By Old Rockin' Dave (not verified) on 06 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #206,

"Citation needed for any cases of sensitization caused by skin prick testing – a single case history?"

Nonsense. You FIRST prove the safety of a test BEFORE approving/using it.

Krebiozen #206,

"There are other factors involved, not least dose, "

You keep talking about dose whenever it suits you. I lost count of the number of times I have asked you to show the safe dose for all the food proteins in vaccines. Hyporcrisy?
Where has the safe dose been determined for sensitization risk of a skin prick test?

That should be "sake", not "stake". I didn't proof my source for the copy and paste.
Whichever, Ben Franklin is widely regarded as one of the wisest and smartest Americans ever. Even an antivaxer would have a hard time discrediting old Ben.

By Old Rockin' Dave (not verified) on 06 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV # 194
I thought my post at # 128 explained well enough my belief about your argument. I paste it here:
" Nowhere IOM says that sensitization with a dose of vaccine causes a clinical manifestation when the person eats a particular antigen contained both in the vaccine and in the food".
IOM's opinion is based on a handful of case reports of reactions after a dose of some vaccine.
But I start thinking capnkrunch (#134) has got it right, when suggesting that our arguments change words, but not meanings
("... minions: once again you’re putting words in the IOM’s mouth. If that’s what they meant, that’s what they would have said.
Rinse and repeat").

By perodatrent (not verified) on 06 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #206,

"I merely note your desperation in seizing upon a single ambiguous statement as apparently the only thing that even vaguely appears to support your hypothesis in a 900 page document."
The importance of a statement does not depend on how many pages it spans.

"This doesn’t mean everyone has an allergic reaction to vaccine antigens, or that allergy is how vaccines work (as you have previously claimed)."

Allergy is PART of how vaccines work. It is like the first line of defense. You develop a minute allergic reaction (may be a sneeze or two, tears, that flush away the virus).

"An adverse reaction to vaccine toxoids is relevant to food allergies how?"
Demonstrates that repeated injection of proteins (toxoids) causes sensitization. The adverse event occurs on the 4th, 5th shots of the series. Same mechanism of sensitization applies to the food proteins in those vaccines.

"If that were true vaccines wouldn’t work in non-atopic individuals, would they?"

Wrong again.
Influenza Specific Serum IgE is Present in Non-Allergic
Subjects
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-3083.2005.01710.x/pdf

Allergy is PART of how vaccines work. It is like the first line of defense. You develop a minute allergic reaction (may be a sneeze or two, tears, that flush away the virus).

Now you're just being ridiculous. Why am I not surprised?

perodatrent #211,

Sorry, I seem to have missed your comment in #128.

you wrote:
"The only possible meaning of these words is that in the first exposure some rare people are sensitized, and in a second exposure some even rarer people have a reaction. Which is what happens for every reaction mediated by specific IgE antibodies."

So you DO agree that vaccines DO cause sensitization to viral, bacterial and FOOD antigens present in them. Then we are in agreement. Thank you.

Once sensitized, on rare occasions these people will develop a reaction to a vaccine. But they will much more commonly have a reaction when exposed to those food items.

Sometimes making the idiocy obvious is sufficient. I believe my work here is done.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 06 Sep 2015 #permalink

One last thing. APV , how do you account for the fully unvaccinated children (at least 44 - it's hard to extrapolate) with food allergies in this Dutch survey? You didn't respond before.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 06 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #216,

"One last thing. APV , how do you account for the fully unvaccinated children (at least 44 – it’s hard to extrapolate) with food allergies in this Dutch survey? You didn’t respond before."

I cannot find the word "ALLERGY" AT ALL in that document. Did you include the right reference?

TBruce #213,

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK8423/
"IgE antibodies and immediate hypersensitivity
Recent information suggests that viruses that bind to IgE antibodies may trigger immediate hypersensitivity responses through the release of vasoactive mediators (see Ch. 1). These observations may explain many of the apparent allergic manifestations, such as wheezing and urticaria, that accompany some viral infections."

Krebiozen #206,

"“any proteins injected into mammals will cause sensitization”, though you seem to retreat from that when it suits you."

With sufficient dose of allergen, that statement is true. 100% of influenza vaccine recipients developed anti-influenza IgE.

perodatrent #211,

” Nowhere IOM says that sensitization with a dose of vaccine causes a clinical manifestation when the person eats a particular antigen contained both in the vaccine and in the food”.

People who are allergic to egg for example, can get vaccines containing small doses of ovalbumin without developing a reaction. But the reverse is NOT TRUE. People who react to egg in a vaccine CANNOT safely consume egg.

The IOM statement definitely covers the case of sensitization followed by reaction to these antigens in vaccines.
So the situation you describe is automatically covered.

In other words, once sensitization occurs, a reaction can result from ANY route of exposure and there is no need to enumerate each route of exposure.

These observations may explain many of the apparent allergic manifestations, such as wheezing and urticaria, that accompany some viral infections.”

Nope, you're still being ridiculous.

APV #214
APV says:
"So you DO agree that vaccines DO cause sensitization to viral, bacterial and FOOD antigens present in them. Then we are in agreement. Thank you.
Once sensitized, on rare occasions these people will develop a reaction to a vaccine. But they will much more commonly have a reaction when exposed to those food items".

Both affirmations are quite inaccurate.
1) What I say is that vaccines -as every High Molecular Weight substance- CAN cause sensitization in some individuals. Every immunologist can subscribe to such a proposition.
2) Nor I nor IOM say that sensitized people WILL more commonly have a (anaphylactic) reaction when eating a food containing an antigen they have been sensitized to with a vaccine.

By perodatrent (not verified) on 07 Sep 2015 #permalink

@Humpty Dumpty:

Nonsense. You FIRST prove the safety of a test BEFORE approving/using it.

What constitutes proof of safety in your mind, Humpty Dumpty?I'm guessing it'll involve trying to prove a negative.

By Julian Frost (not verified) on 07 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent #214,

"2) Nor I nor IOM say that sensitized people WILL more commonly have a (anaphylactic) reaction when eating a food containing an antigen they have been sensitized to with a vaccine."
The IOM has stated that vaccines NOT ONLY cause sensitization, they also cause subsequent hypersensitivity reactions including anaphylaxis.
As I wrote before, if a person is sensitized enough to react to a vaccine, they are sensitized enough to react to food.

No, the IOM says what perodatrent quoted. It does not say what you have re/mis-interpreted it to say by conveniently (and stupidly -- if you're going to lie, must you make it so easy for the average reader to disprove you?) leaving out the qualifying statements.

With our resident Archbishop Chaput fan-boi out of the picture it looks as though he left APV to do all the heavy lifting in the dishonesty front.

shay #225,
perodatrent wrote in #128,
"The only possible meaning of these words is that in the first exposure some rare people are sensitized, and in a second exposure some even rarer people have a reaction."

Which is exactly what I am saying. There is no "re/mis-interpreted" except perhaps in your imagination.

It is a well known fact that egg allergic people can get vaccines that contain smaller doses of egg (<1mcg ovalbumin) without a reaction. That is proof that in a person sensitized to an allergen, eating the allergen produces a reaction much more commonly than vaccine exposure to that allergen.

perodatrent (Dr. Alfonsi) and shay,

Consider the following:

A patient comes to Dr. Alfonsi's office for a flu shot. The patient reports no history of allergy. The patient receives the flu shot and suffers a reaction.
Dr. Alfonsi knows that the brand of flu vaccine he carries contains gelatin and egg. I expect that Dr. Alfonsi would refer the patient to an allergist to check if the patient is allergic to egg or gelatin. Further, I expect Dr. Alfonsi to advise the patient to AVOID EGG and GELATIN FOODS until the allergist's diagnosis.

Dr.Alfonsi, please let us know if you agree.

Julian Frost #223,

No, you don't need to prove a negative. You need a trial to obtain the risk statistics. How can people claim "benefits outweigh risks" without quantifying the risk?

Vinu Arumugham (APV):

You say,

OccamsLaser #201,

Pl. point to my original posts. That way people can see EXACTLY what I claimed and what embellishments YOU have added.

There's no need, Vinu.

Everyone will see that you are not actually disagreeing with any of the positions I explained that you hold.

Of course, if that's wrong, you could simply correct it.

Which of the positions that I attributed to you do you not actually hold?

Be specific. Failure to do so will confirm that all my characterizations are, in fact, correct, and that you are retracting your non-specific objection.

Thanks in advance.

By OccamsLaser (not verified) on 07 Sep 2015 #permalink

OccamsLaser #229,

"Of course, if that’s wrong, you could simply correct it."

No, I am not going to waste my time correcting it OVER and OVER AGAIN.

@ Krebiozen
That survey is from a Dutch organisation, that is just as anti-vaccine as all other organisations that state they are just pro save vaccins.

APV #227
I would advise to have tests made only for a systemic reaction.
Ditto for food avoidance,
I would not need an allergologist's opinion to decide the tests to be made (RAST c74 and f1, plus some more to have a look on aspecific reactivity, two weeks after systemic reaction). Only if specific IgE blood concentrations were high enough (above 2 kU/L) I would send my patient to an allergologist.
On the other side, I would suggest to this particular patient to avoid further doses of that particular vaccine, even before knowing the results of the tests.

By perodatrent (not verified) on 08 Sep 2015 #permalink

"No, I am not going to waste my time correcting it OVER and OVER AGAIN."

You prefer to waste your time making the same erroneous statements over and over again, then.

Vinu Arumugham (APV):

You now say,

OccamsLaser #229,

“Of course, if that’s wrong, you could simply correct it.”

No, I am not going to waste my time correcting it OVER and OVER AGAIN.

As I suspected.

You don't dispute any of the characterizations of your positions that I posted. Not a single one.

As for "correcting it OVER and OVER AGAIN," let's make sure the facts are presented to readers here: You have never once "corrected" even a single one of my characterizations of your positions. We all take note of your failure to provide a reference to any such purported "correction." They don't exist. Telling.

So, you don't disagree with any of what I wrote. Here it is again; despite having ample opportunity, you have made no specific objections whatsoever to any of it:

You said Avantor used peanuts to make its Polysorbate 80 and concealed that fact by keeping it off their datasheet. According to you, they are lying about that now.

Also according to you, Avantor is currently making their Polysorbate 80 from sesame oil, and they are concealing that fact by not listing that ingredient on their datasheet.

You have also said that vaccine makers are currently producing a vaccine with peanut oil-based Polysorbate 80, and that the resulting vaccine has peanut proteins in it, but you refuse to say which vaccine it is. This is very strange, considering your professed concern with the food allergy “epidemic” that you claim is caused by this vaccine and others like it.

Again, I ask: Why do you act as though you don’t care about children getting terribly sick?

You could clear this up right now by simple naming the vaccine or vaccines that contain peanut proteins, but apparently you want children to continue to receive these vaccines unknowingly. Perhaps you hope that if lots of kids get sick, it will draw attention to your cause? Please explain your intentional withholding of this information.

You have not made any specific objection to these characterizations of your position. The conclusion is clear: you indeed hold all these beliefs. I mean, they're all based on your own words, as you clearly know.

Thanks for reaffirming your stance on these points.

By OccamsLaser (not verified) on 08 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent #232,

"I would advise to have tests made only for a systemic reaction.
Ditto for food avoidance,"

The IOM statement said antigens in vaccines can sensitize and subsequently result in hypersensitivity reaction including anaphylaxis. So systemic reactions to the example flu vaccine are of course possible.
You agree that you would advise food avoidance in that case.

Say, the patient was sensitized to gelatin by MMR he received a month before his flu shot with you. Now you have asked him to avoid gelatin foods. Obviously, it is because MMR induced gelatin allergy, resulted in a systemic reaction to the flu shot and can cause a reaction to gelatin-containing foods. That is basically my point. Vaccines can induce clinical food allergy.

Renate,

That survey is from a Dutch organisation, that is just as anti-vaccine as all other organisations that state they are just pro save vaccins.

I know, and it's a self-reported survey, but I still think it's interesting that they report almost as much food intolerance and allergic reactions as the vaccinated. To be fair they don't specifically report food allergies, but I would expect those with unvaccinated children to minimize their children's illnesses and, if APV were correct, to have significantly less food intolerance or allergy or both.

As for APV's claims about skin prick testing, this was first used in the 1860s (Blackley), then in the 1920s and 1930s (Lewis and Grant) with the current technique developed in the 70s (Pepys). I would have thought some immunologists would have noticed if the test they were using was causing allergies, since skin prick testing is often carried out multiple times - I have been tested at least 3 times just investigating a sinus problem. There is a large literature about this that I'm sure APV could investigate to see how the safety of this test was established, if he were really interested.

I was thinking about APV's fixation, and it occurred to me that he is trying, rather desperately, to find a simple explanation for food allergy. It's an understandable urge, but there are no simple explanations in immunology (or cell or genetics), since the whole shebbang is mind-bogglingly complex. I'm reminded of H. l. Mencken who said, "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.".

BTW I still can't find an unequivocal case of a patient developing a food allergy after injected proteins. I thought the Japanese gelatin incident might qualify, but apparently these patients did not develop allergy to ingested gelatin - I have seen speculation that this is because the gelatin in the vaccine "may be of porcine origin whereas gelatin ingested in food may be of bovine origin" - which is odd since pork is the most popular meat in Japan.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 08 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV (#235): Say, the patient sprouted wings due to the MMR he received last month. Or, say the patient turned bright purple due to the DTaP he received three months, two weeks, four days and three hours ago? Or, say the patient temporarily turned into a newt due to the flu vaccine he received just the other day?**

Oh! Say the unvaccinated patient had measles eight years ago, and suddenly came down with subacute sclerosing panencephalitis? Say the patient is only five months old, and asphyxiating due to an acute case of pertussis? Say the unvaccinated patient has measles, and has now developed encephalitis? Say the unvaccinated patient has chickenpox, and develops a Group A streptococcal infection? Say the unvaccinated patient has rubella, and she is two months pregnant?

But yeah, the very remotest, slimmest glimmer of a chance that some vaccine, somewhere, might possibly, in the rarest of circumstances, if the planets are just-so aligned, create an immunological response that might, given a very generous definition, be considered a sort of allergic reaction is clearly enough of a reason to pull all of them until they are absolutely guaranteed 100% safe. Unless, of course, someone could tell us which vaccines have these terrible allergens. Anyone? Beuller...? Beuller...?

** Of course, he got better.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 08 Sep 2015 #permalink

Richard Smith -

Unless, of course, someone could tell us which vaccines have these terrible allergens. Anyone? Beuller…? Beuller…?

Vinu Arumugham (APV) has known for quite some time of a vaccine (or vaccines) that have peanut proteins in them; he believes these vaccines are causing peanut allergies, which can lead to death, but he will not reveal which vaccine(s) are so formulated. Perhaps he considers that the children he believes are being victimized are martyrs?

By OccamsLaser (not verified) on 08 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #236,

"BTW I still can’t find an unequivocal case of a patient developing a food allergy after injected proteins. I thought the Japanese gelatin incident might qualify, but apparently these patients did not develop allergy to ingested gelatin – I have seen speculation that this is because the gelatin in the vaccine “may be of porcine origin whereas gelatin ingested in food may be of bovine origin” – which is odd since pork is the most popular meat in Japan."

Food allergy to gelatin in children with systemic immediate-type reactions, including anaphylaxis, to vaccines.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8977505

"Twenty-four of the 26 children with allergic reactions to vaccines had anti-gelatin IgE ranging from 1.2 to 250 Ua/ml. Seven had allergic reactions on ingestion of gelatin-containing foods. Of these, two had reactions before vaccination, and five had reactions after vaccination. All the control children without allergic reactions to vaccines had no anti-gelatin IgE."

Two had reaction to food BEFORE vaccination and FIVE had reaction to food AFTER vaccination. Mere coincidence of course. What else can it be?

Krebiozen,

Let's see if using some numbers can help.
We know that people who are allergic to egg (in food) usually do not react to egg in the influenza vaccine.

Say people reacting only to food have 50 IU/ml of anti-ovalbumin IgE.
People who react to the influenza vaccine have say, 100 IU/ml of anti-ovalbumin IgE.

The IOM statement says, vaccines can sensitize and vaccines can cause subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis. If subsequent reactions to ovalbumin-containing vaccines are known to occur (per IOM), then sensitization to ovalbumin by vaccines cause >100 IU/ml (from our example) of anti-ovalbumin IgE.

If vaccines can cause 100 IU/ml of IgE in some people then it stands to reason that a lot of people definitely were sensitized at the 50 IU/ml IgE level. In other words, with sensitization caused by a vaccine, a lot more people will develop the level of sensitization required to react to food than the number of people who will develop the level of sensitization required to react to a subsequent vaccine.

So since vaccine sensitization do cause reactions to occur upon subsequent vaccinations (per IOM), they do definitely cause clinical food allergy.

So since vaccine sensitization do cause reactions to occur upon subsequent vaccinations (per IOM), they do definitely cause clinical food allergy.
.

Your evidence that vaccines definitely cause food allergies would be what, APV? So far all you've offered is a repeated argument taking no form other than "Well, it could happen--couldn't it?"

The IOM statement says, vaccines can sensitize

That is not what was said, Humpty Dumpty. The IOM said they might, not that they did. You are once again twisting.

If vaccines can cause 100 IU/ml of IgE in some people then it stands to reason that a lot of people definitely were sensitized at the 50 IU/ml IgE level

It stands to reason? That's your argument? Once upon a time, it stood to reason that the further south you went, the hotter things would get and eventually oceans would start to boil. It also stood to reason that the Sun went around the Earth. "It stands to reason" is a flawed argument even on its face.

So since vaccine sensitization do cause reactions to occur upon subsequent vaccinations

You have failed to demonstrate that this is the case.

By Julian Frost (not verified) on 09 Sep 2015 #permalink

I still think I have a better claim to being Marlene Dietrich.

With regards to APV, I'm inclined more towards Greta Garbo.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 09 Sep 2015 #permalink

Julian Frost #242,

"The IOM said they might, not that they did."

Dead wrong. Again. Show us the "might" here:

IOM statement:
“Adverse events on our list thought to be due to IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions
Antigens in the vaccines that the committee is charged with reviewing do not typically elicit an immediate hypersensitivity reaction (e.g., hepatitis B surface antigen, toxoids, gelatin, ovalbumin, casamino acids).
However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

DO occasionally induce. No uncertainties. Vaccines do induce sensitization AND subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis. Period.

Julian Frost, JGC,

The IOM statement is unambiguous that vaccine do cause sensitization and subsequent vaccines result in hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.

Fact: Most allergic people who react to food, DO NOT react to vaccines. Only the MOST SEVERELY allergic react to vaccines because vaccines contain trace amounts of allergen usually 1000x less than in food.
http://www.medpagetoday.com/MeetingCoverage/AAAAI/25520

The IOM statement makes it clear that vaccine sensitization DOES create allergy severe enough to result in hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis to subsequent vaccines.

If you react to food allergen in a vaccine, you are guaranteed to react on eating that food. That is why as Dr. Alphonsi confirmed, he will advise avoidance of food containing that allergen after a vaccine reaction.

Proof, that vaccines cause development of clinical food allergy.

Krebiozen #236,

"It’s an understandable urge, but there are no simple explanations in immunology (or cell or genetics), since the whole shebbang is mind-bogglingly complex."

The flip side of the "simple is wrong" logic. You are of course right that the immune system is mind-boggling in its complexity.
Do you think it is possible to prevent an influenza infection by the simple act of injecting 15 mcg of HA proteins? Seems like a ridiculously simple idea that the mind-bogglingly complex immune system can be corralled into providing protection against influenza by this simple act.
By your logic there is no chance that flu vaccines (or any vaccine for that matter) can ever work. They are too simple.

Yes, the mind boggling mechanism of how 15 mcg of HA protein injection turns into protection against influenza, obviously has not been understood.

The IOM listed bacterial, viral and food proteins in the same list for good reason. The immune system handles them ALL the same way.

When you get a flu shot, you may also be provided with protection against the "egg virus" whether you like it or not.

Naturally, you are exposed to femtograms of virus surface HA proteins when someone sneezes on you. The resulting allergic reaction is imperceptible.

Unfortunately, when you eat eggs, you eat way more than a few femtograms. The immune system reacts exactly as it was programmed to do. It vigorously protects you against the massive "egg virus" exposure. How can you complain about the overreaction? You asked for it.

Vinu Arumugham (APV):

You say,

Richard Smith, #237,
“Unless, of course, someone could tell us which vaccines have these terrible allergens. ”
You don’t seem to be paying enough attention …
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/B/excipi…

Why are you concealing the information you have about the vaccine that has peanut proteins in it?

It is noted for the record that you have not denied holding any of the positions I attributed to you.

By OccamsLaser (not verified) on 10 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV (#248):

You don’t seem to be paying enough attention…

No mention there of peanuts, sesame seeds, nuts, shrimp, prawns, shellfish, or seafood that you've claimed are in vaccines*. Sure, there are things in the list that are allergens but, duh!, that's why they're in the list - because some people are allergic to them, and others are just sensitive to them. Also, why offer up a document from the CDC if they're in on the whole cover-up?

Honestly, I'm surprised you haven't gone into anaphylactic shock just by being here, given your clear allergy to facts.

* Yeah, yeah, they list polysorbate 80, but that's because it is polysorbate 80, not because of its putative source.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 10 Sep 2015 #permalink

The IOM statement makes it clear that vaccine sensitization DOES create allergy severe enough to result in hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis to subsequent vaccines

You've yet to produce a clear statement by the IOM (or anyone else, for that matter) that vaccines create food allergies at all, APV. Can I expect you will do so anytime this year?

If you react to food allergen in a vaccine, you are guaranteed to react on eating that food.

So if you're already so allergic to something that you react to the minute amounts which may be present in a vaccine, we will expect that you'll also react when you receive a far, far greater exposure to that something as a consequence of eating a food that contains. Wow! Who'd have thought?

APV # 247
I think APV's logic isn't right.
He says "... If you react to food allergen in a vaccine, you are guaranteed to react on eating that food. That is why as Dr. Alphonsi confirmed, he will advise avoidance of food containing that allergen after a vaccine reaction.
Proof, that vaccines cause development of clinical food allergy".

It seems to be the a case of the "affirmation of consequent" fallacy.
No one is guaranteed to react to a food after having a reaction to a vaccine! The only case where it would be "guaranteed" is when the patient was allergic to the food antigen before having vaccine (possibly) containing the same antigen.
The reason I would advise him against eating that particular food is only prudential, and my advice would be confirmed only if his level of specific IgE after reaction were quite high.
And, as everyone here repeats: IOM does not say what AVM wants us to believe, namely that vaccines causes allergy to food.
This is not to say that it is impossible. Only that it is not in their cards.
AVM's hypothesis is fascinating, but it would take much more work to be recognized as a workable theory.

By perodatrent (not verified) on 10 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent #254,

'The only case where it would be “guaranteed” is when the patient was allergic to the food antigen before having vaccine (possibly) containing the same antigen."

That is exactly what I am describing. Please consider the following sequence:

1. Patient gets MMR vaccine containing gelatin. Patient is sensitized to gelatin in MMR (no symptoms at this time of course).
2. Patient receives flu shot containing gelatin in your clinic.
Suffers allergic reaction.

The above sequence DOES occur per IOM and you have accepted that.
My point is that only patients with SEVERE ALLERGY will react to vaccines because of the trace quantities of allergen in the vaccines. So the patient in this case who has reacted to gelatin in the flu shot will definitely react to gelatin in foods.

Proof that gelatin (or any food antigen) in vaccines DO cause the development of food allergy.

JGC #252, #253,

Here's the IOM statement.
It makes it absolutely CLEAR that vaccines DO cause sensitization and subsequent vaccines can cause hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.
Dr. Alphonsi (perodatrent) has accepted that.

"However, as will be discussed in subsequent chapters, the above-mentioned antigens do occasionally induce IgE-mediated sensitization in some individuals and subsequent hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis.”

Nothing about allergy to EATING food, yet.

Now, YOUR statement #253 is perfect. That is exactly what I have been trying to point out.

Per IOM vaccine sensitization followed by vaccine reaction DOES occur.
Per YOUR statement, anyone who reacts to vaccines will OBVIOUSLY react to food containing the same allergen. Thank you for helping make that point crystal clear.

That's the proof that vaccines DO cause the development of food allergy.

perodatrent (Dr. Alfonsi) wrote in #128, commenting on the IOM statement:

"The only possible meaning of these words is that in the first exposure some rare people are sensitized, and in a second exposure some even rarer people have a reaction. "

In other words, vaccines do sensitize, subsequent vaccines do cause reactions.

JGC wrote in #253:

"So if you’re already so allergic to something that you react to the minute amounts which may be present in a vaccine, we will expect that you’ll also react when you receive a far, far greater exposure to that something as a consequence of eating a food that contains."

In other words, if you react to food allergens in a vaccine , you will react to those foods.

Conclusion by combining the two statements above: vaccines do sensitize, causing you to react to foods.

It is understandable that nobody wants to agree with what an outsider/pariah like me, has to say.
Now you can agree with Dr. Alfonsi, JGC and come to the same conclusion as me, "WITHOUT AGREEING WITH APV".

Dr. Alfonsi, sorry for misspelling your name.

Dr. Alfonsi #254,

"This is not to say that it is impossible. Only that it is not in their cards.
AVM’s hypothesis is fascinating, but it would take much more work to be recognized as a workable theory."

I have discussed this matter with Dr. Polly Matzinger of the NIH/NIAID.
Dr. Matzinger helped develop the danger model of the immune system.
Dr. Matzinger agrees with me that vaccines cause food allergy.
She pointed out that it is standard practice to inject mice with allergen and alum to induce food allergy for research.

Example: Injection of pertussis toxin and alum (both adjuvants) along with ovalbumin to cause egg allergy in rats.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22342543
Exactly the same as injecting humans with DTaP (which of course contains pertussis toxin and aluminum salts, both act as Th2 biased adjuvants) and ovalbumin being replaced with milk as the allergen, in casamino acid.

You can see Dr. Matzinger's full response here:
https://list.nih.gov/cgi-bin/wa.exe?A2=ind1305&L=immuni-l&F=&S=&P=37286

I have numerous references over the years of vaccines causing food allergies and obviously the IOM has looked at a far bigger collection in coming to their conclusion:

Nobel Laureate Charles Richet discovered over a hundred years ago that injecting proteins into mammals can cause them to develop an allergy to that protein.

In 2002, the doctors from the CDC and FDA warned that gelatin-containing vaccines can cause gelatin allergy based on similar findings in Japan.

“Nonetheless, our cases with anti-gelatin IgE required some previous exposure to gelatin to become sensitized, and this may have come through ingestion of gelatin-containing food or injection of gelatin-containing vaccines.”

They wrote: “Efforts should continue to identify less allergenic
substitutes for gelatin currently used by vaccine manufacturers.”.

Authors:
Vitali Pool, MD, CDC, M. Miles Braun, MD, MPH, FDA, John M. Kelso, MD,Naval Medical Center, Gina Mootrey, DO, MPH, CDC, Robert T. Chen, MD,MA, CDC, John W. Yunginger, MD, Robert M. Jacobson, MD, Mayo
Clinic,Paul M. Gargiullo, PhD, CD.
Prevalence of Anti-Gelatin IgE Antibodies in People With Anaphylaxis
After Measles-Mumps-Rubella Vaccine in the United States
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/110/6/e71.long

It has been observed even in 1940 that vaccines cause sensitization/induce allergy. Second dose of the same vaccine resulted in an allergic reaction.

ALLERGY INDUCED BY IMMUNIZATION WITH TETANUS TOXOID
ROBERT A. COOKE, M.D.; STANLEY HAMPTON, M.D.; WILLIAM B. SHERMAN, M.D.; ARTHUR STULL, Ph.D.
JAMA. 1940;114(19):1854-1858. doi:10.1001/jama.1940.02810190016005.
http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1160278

1952:
Paper 1.
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM195204032461403
They show 5 of 319 developed dermal sensitivity to egg white due to the egg proteins present in vaccines.

Paper 2.
Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection may protect against allergy in a tuberculosis endemic area.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16393268

The children in Paper 1, were all under treatment for tuberculosis.
So the authors seem to have unknowingly selected a population with some protection against allergy.

So even in a population with some protection against allergy, sensitivity was detectable in 1.6% of the patients, in 1952.

1987, 36 out of 100 patients developed anti-ovalbumin IgE after the flu shot:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2249232/pdf/epidinfect00008…

Kuno-Sakai H, Kimura M. Removal of gelatin from live vaccines and DTaP-an ultimate solution for vaccine-related gelatin allergy.Biologicals 2003;31:245-9.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14624794

Study showing DTaP vaccine causing milk allergy:
“In addition, they induced Th2-type cytokines to the co-administrated antigen tetanus toxoïd, as well as to the food antigen beta-lactoglobulin.”
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264410X06007742

It seems obvious that APV needs some apprenticeship in use of auxiliary verbs. As someone noted, the fact that some people become sensitized after a vaccine is best expressed using the verb "may" instead than the verb "do" as APV prefers -even using it in CAPITALS.
It seems even more obvious that APV cannot accept the fact that nowhere in IOM's cards anyone can find a reference that justifies his pretence that eating a food antigen after a vaccine containing the same antigen DOES (his capitals) cause a clinical allergy.
And it very unkind from APV to quote only selected words from my (and others') posts to try to justify what he says.
Since a few weeks I am retired. Up to then I was working as a clinical pathologist in a hospital. I had responsibility of the Lab's area where allergy testing was made, and I worked in close contact with our allergologists.
This is to say that I know something about allergy. No one of us could have accepted APV's hypothesis about vaccines being "the cause" of allergy.

By perodatrent (not verified) on 11 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV, the IOM statement mentions IgE sensitization, not the development of a food allergy. (Haven't others already explained this to you?

Further, none of my statements support the notion that exposure to food proteins present in vaccines causes food allergies: I only note that if you already possess a food allergy significant enough to react when exposed to trace amounts of food proteins that might be found in a vaccine we can expect you'll also react to those antigens present at higher concentrations in the food itself.

APV:

There's a serious drought happening, very little rain. I go camping in the woods one evening and, even though I try my best to be careful, my small campfire temporarily gets out of control (but I am eventually able to extinguish it with the help of a passing park ranger). Two weeks later a storm hits the same area, with lots of lightning, and several direct strikes cause a large forest fire that burns for several days before fire crews are finally able to subdue it.

So, if the incident with the campfire hadn't occurred, would the lightning not have caused the later fires? Or were both incidences symptomatic of an pre-existing, underlying cause (the draught)?

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 11 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent, JGC, #258, #259,

Pick an allergen from the IOM list, say ovalbumin.
1. Per IOM, ovalbumin containing vaccines DO sensitize some people. This is undisputed.
2. Per IOM, people in (1) are sensitized severely enough that they can suffer hypersensitivity reactions, including anaphylaxis upon subsequent vaccination with ovalbumin-containing vaccines. This is undisputed.
3. Per JGC #253, since people in (2) are sensitized enough to react to the minute quantity of ovalbumin in the vaccine, they will definitely react to eating the far larger quantity of ovalbumin in eggs and egg containing foods. This too is undisputed.

The only conclusion one can draw is ovalbumin-containing vaccines cause the development of ovalbumin allergy.
I don't know how anyone can come to any other conclusion.

I don't know how anyone can come to any other conclusion.

People who actually read with comprehension and have noticed that your three statements don't naturally follow can.

shay #262,

May be you can explain why "they don't naturally follow"?

JGC #260,

"APV, the IOM statement mentions IgE sensitization, not the development of a food allergy. "

The IOM statement NOT ONLY mentions IgE sensitization, it also mentions hypersensitivity reactions including anaphylaxis.

Food allergy (that we are discussing) IS IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions including anaphylaxis.

"Further, none of my statements support the notion that exposure to food proteins present in vaccines causes food allergies: "

You did not have to say anything about vaccines causing food allergy. Your statement in #253, along with the IOM statement, logically leads to only one conclusion: vaccines cause food allergy.

APV (#264):

Your statement in #253, along with the IOM statement, logically leads to only one conclusion

And the whole of your statements logically leads to only one conclusion: You are a single-minded dolt operating at a heretofore unseen level of Dunning-Kruger.

By Richard Smith (not verified) on 11 Sep 2015 #permalink

perodatrent #259,

"may" vs. "do"

The IOM used the word "do" in the statement we are discussing.
The word "may" has been misinterpreted as speculation.
I emphasized the word "do" to make sure people understand that the IOM statement has no uncertainty, is based on evidence and is not speculation.

"It seems even more obvious that APV cannot accept the fact that nowhere in IOM’s cards anyone can find a reference that justifies his pretence that eating a food antigen after a vaccine containing the same antigen DOES (his capitals) cause a clinical allergy."

As I have explained many times, the IOM stated that vaccine sensitization causes reactions/anaphylaxis to subsequent vaccines. This automatically means you will react to food as JGC explains in #253. As you obviously know, vaccines have minute amounts of allergen. While foods have huge amounts of allergen. So, the IOM does not have to mention food reactions specifically as this huge difference in allergen content is obviously very well known in the medical community.
The best example is that most people who are allergic to egg can tolerate the egg-containing flu vaccine.

"And it very unkind from APV to quote only selected words from my (and others’) posts to try to justify what he says."

I have exactly quoted you and pointed to your post number.

"No one of us could have accepted APV’s hypothesis about vaccines being “the cause” of allergy."

Understandable as you were unaware of the IOM statement until now. Now, I would request you to please reconsider. To be accurate, it is NOT MY hypothesis. It is a proven fact from the days of Nobel Laureate Charles Richet, a hundred years ago.
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1913/richet-l…

The IOM statement is the just the latest and most authoritative confirmation of the concept, especially as related to vaccines.

APV came stomping in here -- it seems like years ago -- proclaiming that according to Nobel Laureate Charles Richet, a hundred years ago, any injection of any protein causes sensitization and later anaphylaxis.

Numerous commenters pointed out that the rough-and-tumble world of our human and pre-human ancestors offered innumerable opportunities for proteins to be accidentally injected, and if any such injection of any protein invariably caused sensitization and later anaphylaxis, the species would have long since gone extinct.

APV then modified its claim: our bodies have evolved to tolerate injection of other sorts of proteins, such as pollen, but not food proteins because food proteins are specially tagged for the body's benefit*.

Numerous comments pointing out ways in which food proteins could be injected naturally (eating with scratched-up hands, injuries while butchering or preparing food) produced nonsensical responses along the lines of, how do we know that cooks don't commonly keel over from anaphylaxis? This situation persisted until the comment was made that babies routinely teethe, and teething babies will inevitably get food particles into their blood and gum tissues, thereby, according to APV causing sensitization and later anaphylaxis. Oops.

APV then changed its position again: injection directly into the bloodstream (as other antivaxxers like to characterize vaccination) does not under any circumstances produce sensitization; only injection into the muscles. Oh, and the tissues of the mouth, even though they include muscles and skin and mucus membranes, are designed so that they, and only they in all the body, cannot produce sensitization.

In fact, APV has contended all along, sensitization can never be produced by consuming food unless the digestive system is impaired by PPIs and the like. Thus essentially every childhood food allergy must come from vaccines, including allergies to fish, beef, pork, shellfish, strawberries, peanuts, and so on. If vaccine data sheets do not show fish, beef, pork, shellfish, strawberries, peanuts, and so on as ingredients, that just means that the vaccine manufacturers are lying.

I believe this is an accurate history of the evolution of APV's claims.

* okay, I added the special tagging bit.

LW, pretty much.

By Julian Frost (not verified) on 12 Sep 2015 #permalink

It's interesting to see Richet's discussion of "alimentary anaphylaxis" as he called it, which was sensitization via ingested antigen and subsequent anaphylaxis when the antigen was injected. Richet appears to have failed to make animals react to ingested proteins with anaphylaxis after sensitizing with injected antigens, only vice versa (i.e. sensitizing through ingestion and subsequent anaphylaxis through either ingestion or injection). He mentions the theoretical possibility of "(3) P preparatory, A releasing" where P = parenteral and A = alimentary, but doesn't describe any successful experiments that demonstrate this happening, though he must surely have tried this.

Doesn't that argue against APV's hypothesis?

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 12 Sep 2015 #permalink

It’s interesting to see Richet’s discussion of “alimentary anaphylaxis” as he called it, which was sensitization via ingested antigen and subsequent anaphylaxis when the antigen was injected.

Richet seems to have neglected to mention concurrent ingestion of antigen and PPIs. We know, because APV has told us so, that ingestion of antigens always produces tolerance rather than sensitization, unless interfered with by PPIs.

Richet also seems to have neglected to mention that the word "injection" as he consistently uses it, excludes injection into the bloodstream because, as APV assures us, his experiments would have failed if the antigens were injected into the bloodstream.

LW,

Richet also seems to have neglected to mention that the word “injection” as he consistently uses it, excludes injection into the bloodstream because, as APV assures us, his experiments would have failed if the antigens were injected into the bloodstream.

Richet stated:

To date, all experiments mentioned above have been carried out by parenteral injections, that is to say that the substance introduced into the blood was introduced by other means than the digestion, and namely by means of subcutaneous, intravenous, intraspinal and peritoneal injections.

So that includes intravenous but not intramuscular injections. Oops.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 12 Sep 2015 #permalink

@Krebiozen, it's almost like APV is making up new claims unsupported by Richet or anything else.

Krebiozen #273,

You wrote in #127:
"you seem to have forgotten that in a previous thread I showed you that the doses of antigens used by Richet were far greater than those present in vaccines. "

Dose matters as you have rightly pointed out. But more importantly you have failed completely in providing us ANY evidence from studies establishing safe levels for allergens in vaccines.
And as you should know, intramuscular injections only make the sensitization problem worse. Vaccines are administered intramuscular because you get the best immune response.
And we use IgE biased adjuvants today.

LW #271,

"Richet seems to have neglected to mention concurrent ingestion of antigen and PPIs. We know, because APV has told us so, that ingestion of antigens always produces tolerance rather than sensitization, unless interfered with by PPIs."

Wrong again. Oral tolerance is old news (more than a hundred years) and known during Richet's time.

Wells HG. Studies on the chemistry of anaphylaxis (III) Experiments with isolated proteins, especially those of the hen’s egg. J Infect Dis. 1911;9:24.
Wells HG, Osborne TB. The biological reactions of the vegetable proteins. I. Anaphylaxis. J Infect Dis. 1911;8:66–124.
“The phenomenon of oral tolerance was first described by Wells and Osborne in 1911. They used guinea pigs to show that inclusion of egg white, purified egg allergens, or oats in the diet rendered the animals hyporesponsive to sensitization and anaphylaxis to those proteins. ”

Berin MC, Mayer L. Can we produce true tolerance in patients with food allergy? J Allergy Clin Immunol. 2013;131(1):14–22. doi: 10.1016/j.jaci.2012.10.058.

If you had arranged a supply of PPI to them, they would have studied it too ...

Krebiozen #270, LW,

"alimentary anaphylaxis"

As Richet explains, if you can defeat/alter the protein digestion process, you can sensitize to ingested proteins. Just like PPI.

perodatrent, JGC,

Let's say the Pentagon has a document that says a nuclear bomb can destroy a city.
I say thousands of people will be killed.

Some posters here object saying the Pentagon document says nothing about people being killed.

The argument that IOM does not mention food allergy is exactly like that. It is obvious to anyone familiar with vaccines and allergy (especially the medical community) that if you react to a food allergen in a vaccine, you will react to eating that food. The IOM has no reason to state the obvious.

LW #268,

Some of what you have stated is accurate and I stand by it. But there are also many embellishments.

Further, you have created many problems for Krebiozen's skin sensitization hypothesis. See, you don't need to cut your skin and expose it to meat. Apparently you merely have to handle meat with your bare skin to cause sensitization per Krebiozen.

APV,

Dose matters as you have rightly pointed out. But more importantly you have failed completely in providing us ANY evidence from studies establishing safe levels for allergens in vaccines.

You dug up the historical evidence on sensitivity, so don't complain when I find some that contradicts your hypothesis. Wells found that guinea pigs did not react to the the amount of egg protein present in vaccines. Let's see exactly what Wells wrote in the paper they refer to:

Egg-white was diluted with an equal volume of water, beaten, and filtered. To a sample of this filtrate ten volumes of alcohol were added, the precipitated protein dried and weighed, and the solution was found to contain 6.3% protein. The minimum sensitising dose of this solution was found to be (for 300-gram guinea pigs) about 0.0001 c.c (or 0.0000063 gm.). Doses smaller than this produced no sensitization whatever, while fatal results were only obtained when 0.001 to 0.0005 c.c. were used for sensitizing.

That's a minimum of 6.3 micrograms of purified egg protein (not just egg white) required to sensitize a 300 gram guinea pig (5 times more to produce fatal sensitivity). If we extrapolate to humans, we would require 1,470 micrograms of egg protein to sensitize an average 70 kg human. The lowest normal weight of a six month old baby (youngest age at which influenza vaccine is recommended) is 6.7 kg, requiring 140 micrograms of egg protein to sensitize her/him, 700 micrograms to induce fatal sensitivity.

What's the maximum amount of egg protein found in influenza vaccines? This study found a maximum of 1.4 micrograms per ml. in Fluzone (much less in other vaccines), which amounts to a dose of 0.7 micrograms in a six-month-old child. That's 250 times less than the minimum weight-corrected dose required to produce sensitization in a guinea pig, a more than adequate safety margin, in my opinion. Even if you don't accept a weight-corrected dose, Wells' results suggest there is still insufficient egg protein in an influenza vaccine to sensitize a guinea pig, much less a human.

Do you have some evidence that 0.7 µg egg white protein can sensitize a human to ingested egg?

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 12 Sep 2015 #permalink

The "they" I referred to above was Anderson and Rosenau in another paper I discussed with APV in another thread.

By Krebiozen (not verified) on 12 Sep 2015 #permalink

Further, you have created many problems for Krebiozen’s skin sensitization hypothesis. See, you don’t need to cut your skin and expose it to meat. Apparently you merely have to handle meat with your bare skin to cause sensitization per Krebiozen.

An excellent example of APV's ... uh ... reasoning. Krebiozen states that some individuals may develop an allergy due to skin exposure, therefore APV concludes that Krebiozen claims that ALL individuals WILL develop allergies due to skin exposure. APV gleefully points out that this is obviously not true therefore I "have created many problems for Krebiozen’s skin sensitization hypothesis".

No. SOME individuals have reactions to various environmental stimuli, and if EVERY individual had those reactions the species would go extinct. If Krebiozen had claimed that any skin exposure to any food protein, even in nanogram quantities, caused sensitization, in the same way that APV pranced in here claiming than any injection of any protein, even in nanogram quantities, caused sensitization, we'd all be criticizing Krebiozen too.

But Krebiozen knows the difference between "occasional individuals" and "every single individual", unlike APV.

LW,

"claims that ALL individuals WILL develop allergies due to skin exposure."

You are putting words into my mouth. Show me where I state that.

LW #282,
"But Krebiozen knows the difference between “occasional individuals” and “every single individual”, unlike APV."

Again putting words into my mouth. I have posted many times that food allergy prevalence is 6-8%, never claimed it was 100%.

Vinu Arumugham (APV):

Why are you covering up the name of the vaccine that has peanut protein in it? You say it's causing children to develop peanut allergy. Is that what you want?

By OccamsLaser (not verified) on 12 Sep 2015 #permalink

APV #283, 284
I think what LW notes ("all individuals" versus "occasional individuals") has the same meaning of the use of "do" and "may" that i pointed before.
Reasoning in a probabilistic way, using the word "do" implies that all individuals would become sensitized (and then would react), while using "may" implies that a only some (very rare) individuals would follow that course.
Perhaps APV cannot reason probabilistically?

By perodatrent (not verified) on 12 Sep 2015 #permalink

Krebiozen #280,

First, your analysis results are obviously incorrect because the IOM has already concluded that the quantity of allergen present in vaccines is not only sufficient to sensitize humans, but they are even capable of producing anaphylaxis.

In fact, it looks like EVERY vaccine they reviewed has a "convincingly supports" or "favors acceptance" conclusion for anaphylaxis as an adverse event.
https://iom.nationalacademies.org/~/media/Files/Report%20Files/2011/Adv…

So your calculation needs some work. My suggestions: perhaps the guinea pigs were not administered the allergen intramuscularly as you previously pointed out about Richet's research. Thus needing a higher dose for sensitization. You have to adjust for the fact that humans get up to five shots in one sitting and some of them contain MULTIPLE Th2/IgE biased adjuvants such as pertussis/diptheria toxins and aluminum salts. The guinea pigs did not.

Further, our children today have predisposition to allergy due to factors such as hygiene and higher c-section birth rates causing sub-optimal gut microbiome thus predisposition to allergy. I suspect these did not apply to the guinea pigs either.

Once you factor those in, I suspect your calculation results will be consistent with the IOM's conclusion that current allergen content in vaccines do cause the development of food allergy.

perodatrent #286,

"Perhaps APV cannot reason probabilistically?"

As I wrote before, using "may" allows people to abuse it and claim you are speculating. As I also wrote before, food allergy occurs in 6-8% of population. Obviously that is probabilistic. I have NEVER claimed that EVERYONE receiving a vaccine will be sensitized.

IOM makes it clear by using "do occasionally".

Krebiozen #280,

Another very basic allergy concept. Elicitation doses are 5x or more than sensitizing doses. IOM has concluded that EVERY vaccine they reviewed causes anaphylaxis (elicitation). Proof, that ALL of them have MORE THAN ENOUGH allergen content to sensitize humans.

We don't even have to worry about cross-species scaling (with guinea pig examples). The IOM results are completely based on human studies.

Except, of course, that's not what they concluded or stated so no, no proof.

shay #290,

They did not conclude what or state what?