Robert Maynard is absolutely correct when he says that something else is involved in the marked increase in the incidence of asthma.
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Unfortunately, the published evidence implicates vaccination as a major factor and as Campbell Murdoch, the first professor of general practice at Otago University in New Zealand, wrote in the NZ Physician (1995) 'It is a very brave or foolish medical person who dares to question the wisdom of this wonderful scientific advance for to do this is to challenge one of the sacred cows of modern medicine espoused uncritically by the medical establishment. Any doctor who dares to suggest that there could be a downside to this wonderful miracle is pilloried by the medical establishment and subjected to threat and ridicule.'
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He concluded with, 'The important issue here is that our relationship with patients should result in a net benefit to the patient, or at least not cause them any harm.'
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A paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association (1994) reported that 11 per cent of children vaccinated against pertussis developed asthma compared to only 2 per cent of unvaccinated controls. Another in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics (2000) reported that the incidence of asthma doubled in vaccinated children compared to controls. However, there is just a possibility that it could be the mercurial preservative that skewed their immune systems from the TH1 to TH2 and thus a generalised heightened allergic response, and if so, we could see a drop following the removal of thimerosal from the majority of childhood vaccines.
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This will then also be seen in a reduction in the incidence of autistic spectrum disorders and diabetes, both of which have reached epidemic proportions commensurate with the increase in multiple vaccines 20 years ago after the manufacturers had been given indemnity from legal repercussions by the US Congress. A very early indication of this possibility has surfaced from California where for the first time in 30 years, the incidence of autism (in three year-olds) has shown a drop with the inclusion this year of the 1999-2000 birth cohort who were not given thimerosal-containing vaccines.
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Many cases of asthma could thus be iatrogenic.
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Michael Godfrey, New Zealand
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