Autism and Alzheimer’s have much in common. Both are neurological disorders that result in cognitive impairment and loss of language abilities. And both have seen a dramatic rise in the past decade, particularly in the US and other industrialized countries. In fact while the incidents of heart disease and cancer have declined in seniors neurological diseases have increased in women by over 600 % in the last 20 years. In the late 80’s the incidence of autism in the United States was only one in 10,000! By 2001 it had risen to 42.5 per 10,000. Today some experts believe the incidence of all the Autism Spectrum Disorders could be as high as one in 10 children. In fact California’s has seen a sevenfold increase in autism in the past 20 years.
What Is Going On?
Many medical officials argued that the rise was due to changes in diagnoses or migration patterns rather than a real rise in the disorder. But a new study that recently appeared in the prestigious science journal Scientific American.
concluded that those factors cannot explain most of the increase in autism. More than 3,000 new cases of autism were reported in California in 2006, compared with 205 in 1990, and this and related research suggests this is most likely due to environmental exposures. This new study advocates a nationwide shift in autism research to focus on factors such as pesticides, viruses and chemicals in household products.
Researchers analyzed 17 years of state data that tracks developmental disabilities. Migration to the state had no effect, and changes in how and when doctors diagnose the disorder can explain less than half of the increase.
It is possible that a pregnant woman’s exposure to chemical pollutants, particularly metals and pesticides, could be altering a developing baby’s brain structure, triggering autism. Many parent groups also believe that childhood vaccines could be responsible.
Throughout the U.S., the numbers of autistic children have increased dramatically over the past 15 years. More than 3,000 new cases of autism were reported in California in 2006, compared with 205 in 1990.
Many medical officials argued that the rise was due to changes in diagnoses or migration patterns rather than a real rise in the disorder. But the new study analyzing 17 years of data concludes that those factors explain only a small fraction of the increase in autism.
Possible Culprits
So what do the best researchers and practitioners in the field find is contributing to this dramatic increase?
Conventional medicine likes to point the finger at genetics, but science shows that only 1 percent of autism cases are likely due to a genetic mutation. Despite this, funding for studying the genetic causes of autism is 10 to 20 times higher than funding for environmental causes, according to Irva Hertz-Picciotto, an epidemiology professor at University of California, Davis who led the above study.
It’s time “modern” medicine caught up with the times on this issue, as the picture is becoming much clearer as to the real underlying causes of autism.
On Monday 2 November the world’s largest free online Summit on Autism begins to clarify for parents and practitioners what this new picture is revealing in terms of causes and effective treatments. Click here or copy this link into your browser to attend: http://autismsummitonline.com/?wpam_id=117
At this summit you will learn from top experts, therapists, and parents who have employed a variety of evidence based treatments to achieve success and effect fantastic improvements with autism spectrum disorders.
One of the parents is the daughter of doctor friend of mine who has successfully effected major improvements in both of her children with Autism. One now has nearly no symptoms at all anymore, and her younger brother has made major strides in language, social interaction, empathy, etc.
When you sign up you will immediately receive a video interview with Dr. Klinghardt, MD, one of the current international leaders in this field with clinics in the US, Germany and England. Dr. Klinghardt has effected major improvements in hundreds of children with his Nobel prize winning interventions. Once you receive the link to his presentation I would skip down 25 minutes into the interview to hear his story of reversing symptoms in a young boy while on vacation in Italy. The boy could not talk and in just 3 days after his third intervention he had a vocabulary of over 50 words. He then goes on to talk about some of the most common causes and best practices.
A Glimpse…
It is possible that a pregnant woman’s exposure to chemical pollutants, including toxic metals like mercury or aluminum, pesticides, fire retardants and Lyme’s disease, could be damaging a genetically vulnerable developing baby’s immune system and brain structure, triggering autism.
Many parent groups also believe that childhood vaccines could be responsible. Noting, like my friend’s daughter, that symptoms first appeared within days if not hours of an immunization series. Dr. Klinghardt believes that was likely the case prior to 1999 when they stopped using mercury in immunizations, but some immunizations still use aluminum, a known neurotoxin, to activate the serum.
However, rather than being the primary cause, according to Klinghardt this is simply the last straw to break an already compromised immune system.
You can watch his and more than 20 other expert interviews for free by simply clicking or copying this link, http://autismsummitonline.com/?wpam_id=117
but one topic that’s discussed is the commonality among most people with autism that their pathways of detoxification have become overwhelmed by both man-made and microbial toxins.
The toxins that are at the top of this list are:
- Mercury and other metals, such as aluminum.A major route of exposure here has been from vaccines, but also from mercury fillings, eating contaminated seafood, and living downwind from coal-powered energy plants. (A few years ago our local newspaper reported fish in a local reservoir, downwind from a power plant, were found to have toxic levels of mercury.)
- 2. Viruses and microbes, such as mold.Children with autism not only have overwhelmed detoxification pathways and often heavy metal toxicity, but, according to Dr. Kllinghardt, they also have a silent, daily toxin production in their body caused by toxic microbes.
- Electromagnetic Fields (EMF). These come not only from cell phones and cordless phones, but also from electrical outlets and WI-FI. Dr. Klinghardt considers EMF “synergistically causal,” partly because it potentiates the production of toxic endotoxins, and may disrupt signally mechanisms in the brain.
- Nutritional Deficits A fourth major contributor that has recently been discovered is also one of the easiest to remedy: Low levels of key nutrients in the body and gut like vitamins A & D, melatonin, B-9 & 12, various strains of probiotics SAMe and glutathione which aid in detoxification and DNA protection.There is a link between rampant vitamin D and melatonin deficiency in pregnant women and the proportionate jump in autism, which has recently been highlighted by Dr. John Cannell.
So one of THE MOST IMPORTANT and easiest changes that may The vitamin D receptor appears in a wide variety of brain tissue early in the fetal development, and activated vitamin D receptors increase nerve growth in your brain.
Some believe this may be the single largest contributing factor to autism and that it is a deficiency of sun exposure to the pregnant mom, resulting in a lack of both vitamin D and melatonin, and subsequent deficits in the fetus, that puts the child at a massively increased risk of developing autism.
So one of THE MOST IMPORTANT and easiest changes that may significantly reduce autism is to make certain ALL pregnant women have their vitamin D levels normalized to 50-60 ng/ml.
Many other timely suggestions and resources will be provided at this free Summit. http://autismsummitonline.com/?wpam_id=117
If you are interested I this or have friends who may be, I hope you can make some time to listen to some of these interviews. If you can’t don’t worry, as I know the whole series will be made available for around $60. But for the next few days you can’t beat free. And I think you will find this fascinating. As with Alzheimer’s. there is much more that families and individuals can do to protect themselves and even turn things around, than most have been led to believe.
Dave Larsen, MFHD
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