The ABCs of Biotech for Christians - Second in a series - A is for Autism
Autism often is referred to as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) since it manifests in various ways, from few disabilities to many. Wikipedia defines autism as “a developmental disorder characterized by troubles with social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior. Parents usually notice signs in the first two or three years of their child’s life.”
What would cause this change in the young child’s health? What caused the fogging of the child’s natural abilities?
An article on the National Center for Biotechnology Information subsite of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) website names immunoexcitotoxity as a major cause of autism, and indicts fluoride and aluminum as two agents that may play a role in the tragedy. An abstract of the article on PubMed led me to the full article. PubMed is the U.S. National Library of Medicine of the NIH.
Since medical research articles are necessarily complex, it may be best for this blog post to simply reference the article and encourage anyone seeking more information to delve into it. You could start by breaking apart that long word:
- immuno-
- representing immune, immunity, or immunology
- excito-
- very active
- toxicity-
- poisonous
- excitotoxicity-
- a destruction of nerve cells by excessive stimulation by neurotransmitters such as glutamate and similar substances
A neurotransmitter is a chemical that is made by nerve cells and used to communicate with other cells, including other nerve cells and muscle cells.
Glutamate is a pivotal transmitter in the brain, the crucial link in circuits involved in memory, learning and perception. Too much glutamate leads to seizures and the death of brain cells. Excessive glutamate release is also one of the main reasons that people have brain damage after strokes. (ref)
If you want to find out why glutamate could cause a fogging of the brain, try eating food that has a lot of MSG. You very well may feel dizzy and find it hard to think straight. MSG or monosodium glutamate is a flavor enhancer that you can read much more about on the internet.
Putting all the pieces together that the article presents may be too difficult for the average layperson. Getting the gist of it, that fluoride in a water supply, and aluminum (A13) in vaccines must be addressed, may be the best we can do.
This paragraph sums up the research findings— Be brave and read it!
Chronic activation of the brain's immune system increases extracellular glutamate levels sufficiently to trigger the excitotoxic cascade, which in conjunction with inflammatory cytokines and prostaglandins, magnifies the damaging effects of both. This mechanism explains most of the features of the ASD, including the behavioral difficulties, language problems, repetitive behaviors, intellectual delay, and episodic dyscontrol of anger. In addition, these mechanisms explain the pathological findings as well, including the changes in the cerebellum, abnormalities in connectivity and the widespread activation of microglia and astrocytes. It also explains why ASD has not disappeared despite the removal of mercury from most childhood vaccines, since excessive immune activation is the initiating and sustaining event in ASD. Evidence is presented that the abundance of fluoride added to the water worldwide and the widespread availability of aluminum particularly to infants and young children through aluminum containing vaccinations, singly or together as aluminofluoride can be potent factors in producing the condition of immunoexcitotoxicity that leads to the pathological changes seen in ASD. The vaccination program should be evaluated to reduce the excessive stimulation of immature immune system and to replace Al3+-adjuvants.
Inventing vaccines that comprise aluminum as an adjuvant (something added in) for whatever reasons, is clearly biotech and so is adding fluoride to water. Fluoride's ability to damage the brain is one of the most active areas of fluoride research today. Over 300 studies have found that fluoride is a neurotoxin (a chemical that can damage the brain). (ref)
Since these things are done, can biotech find ways to reverse their effects? It is heartening to think about biotech healing biotech hurts.
As Christians we can pray for good research studies to affect medical practice, and for autistic children and their families.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 1 in 59 children in the U.S. has ASD, and it is four times more common among boys. ASD prevalence increased from 6.7 percent per 1,000 children in 2000 to 16.8 percent in 2014.
To find more information on autism and research currently being done, visit ClinicalTrials.gov, and search for autism. Just typing that in the “Condition or disease” text-box will produce a number of suggested studies that you can pursue. You can also search by city, state and country to find out if there is a clinical study near you.
