From the Washington Post and ACHAMP:

“We’ve seen just a skyrocketing autism rate. Some people are suspicious that it’s connected to the vaccines. This person included. The science right now is inconclusive, but we have to research it.” - Barack Obama, Pennsylvania Rally, April 21, 2008.

“It’s indisputable that (autism) is on the rise among children, the question is what’s causing it. And we go back and forth and there’s strong evidence that indicates it’s got to do with a preservative in vaccines.” - John McCain, Texas town hall meeting, February 29, 2008.

“Yes. We don’t know what, if any, kind of link there is between vaccines and autism - but we should find out. The lack of research on treatments, interventions, and services for children and adults with autism is a major impediment to the development of delivery of quality care.” - Hillary Clinton, ACHAMP Questionairre

What in the world is everyone thinking? Are they not fully briefed on the issues, or do they simply not care? How many studies do our presidential candidates need to ignore to keep perpetuating such myths? Is this peer-reviewed study from the journal Pediatrics, this study from the Institute of Medicine, these findings from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or numerous other studies that all demonstrate that there is no link between thimerosal and autism not enough?

This isn’t simply shameless pandering to a lobbying group, it has wider implications that perpetuate falsehoods that needlessly endangers the health of infants everywhere. Fostering the false belief of a link between mercury and autism only leads loving parents to reject their trust in the efficacy of vaccines, which may lead to the decision not to inoculate their children with vaccines like MMR, or even worse, most new vaccines altogether. Rather than entrust in the scientific community with peer reviewed research and studies, parents with autistic children may turn to “alternative” therapies that have no method of verification to “cure” their children of the purported cause (mercury) of their illness. Emotional wounds are kept unhealed with trial lawyers taking advantage of the public sentiment to sue the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VCIP).

It is understandable vaccine preservatives be studied to see if there is a relationship to particular illnesses. But these studies in relationship to autism have been done, numerous times, with conclusive findings. With the continuance of this false discussion, however, we are only doing a disservice to the trust of sound research that is the only well thought out manner in which we have to verify our problems. We are placing the role of hearsay and pseudoscience above science, and even worse, we are wasting valuable resources in information campaigns and redundant studies that could otherwise be used to actually fund research to better understand autism.

It’s also understandable that parents of children with autism want to discover the underlying causes of their children’s disorder. But Hillary Clinton, John McCain, and Barack Obama have no business and no evidence to keep perpetuating disinformation, especially given their roles of public office.