Kirby also needs to go away

Ok, here's the story. Olbermann does his "worst person in the world" stick. 

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It's Wakefield! For forging data. And deservedly so. 

But noooo, that's so not fair, since according to David Kirby, (a man with a huge financial interest in maintaining vaccine paranoia) Brian Deer, the reporter who broke the Times story, was the original complainant in the medical review of Wakefield and this fact was not disclosed in the article.  

Which prompted Olbermann to name Deer the next day:

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Well, aside from the fact that I wouldn't be bothered by a reporter calling the police on a criminal and then later reporting more about the bad deeds of the criminal, it turns out that the accusation was flat out not true.  Deer didn't make the complaint. As is easily shown with the power of a bit of Google-fu. Sheeesh. 

And Kirby wrote Evidence of Harm, one of the reasons vaccine paranoia jumped to the US.  I didn't see Kirby post this conflict of interest over at Huffpo. I just saw links to his book. 

Oh, and in case you're not tired of Kirby and Olbermann smackdown, here's some more. 

Measles Over Autism

“Most parents I know will take measles over autism,” said J. B. Handley, co-founder of Generation Rescue, a parent-led organization that contends that autism is a treatable condition caused by vaccines.

- From a NYT article showing a rise in Measles cases, including at least two deaths.

Um, no. Not me. Even assuming for a moment that the MMR vaccine causes autism. It doesn't. There's no credible evidence at all that it does, and the rate of diagnosis has increased even as the rate of vaccination has decreased. But even assuming it were a possibility - I'd rather have a live child with a disability than a dead child I could have saved.

Just like some of the so called "treatments" out there. I'd rather have a live child with a disability than a dead child with a cure.

Vaccines Don't Cause Autism, ABC!

So I watched the premier of a new show I thought might be good and end up being all pissed off instead. The show, Eli Stone, showed a jury awarding a huge cash payment to the mother of an autistic child over "mercurium" in a flu vaccine. They had a disclaimer at the end, but damage was already don.

Please, people. We don't need anymore damn "vaccines cause autism" scares. It's simply not true. The mercury used as a preservative leaves the body too quickly to do the heavy metal damage you'd see from eating fish or being exposed to environmental toxins. And most vaccines have phased it out due to bad press, anyway.

There are enough people scared of vaccines as it is. I'd rather have my kids avoid exposure to pertussis, TYVM. I've had it. It wasn't a harmless and comically loud cough. It was a struggle to breath with the occasional vomit. Yay.

And then when we get past the stupid vaccines and autism faux link, we find a kid who apparently neatly stacks thousands of toy blocks. His mom must own stock in the wooden toy block factory. Oh, and he never melts down and knocks them over. He just stacks the blocks. I know that if my son likes blocks? I'll buy him thousands of them instead of letting him play with 30-40.

It was just weird.

And the show? Was trying to be funny and really failing.

Eli Stone? You suck.