St. Paul Saga · 2005-07-28 08:00

Last week, in Censorship, Incivility & Chronic Suspicion, I offered an account of two particularly nasty episodes on the Evidence of Harm discussion list, in which private citizens were targeted for ridicule, harassment and investigation by anti-thimerosal campaigners, in retaliation for expressing their dissenting opinions about the controversy over vaccines and autism. Today I provide an expansion and update on the first episode, the tale of Lisa Randall of St. Paul, Minnesota.

I had originally become familiar with Ms. Randall’s name when her letter to the editor of Salon in response to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.‘s article, Deadly Immunity, was published on the same page as mine. Now, Ms. Randall was fortunate enough to see her letter to the editors of the St. Paul Pioneer Press published in their July 3 edition:

Craig Westover is wrong

In his June 22 column, Craig Westover writes, “The thimerosal connection to autism is first about science.” Actually, it’s about hysteria and money.

Hysteria distilled in the groupthink of autism advocacy groups that insist thimerosal causes autism — contrary to all reputable science — and cast anyone who says otherwise as a member of a global conspiracy to poison children.

Money for shady personal injury lawyers who lick their chops at the prospect of presenting a jury with a disabled child, some sophisticated-sounding pseudoscience, and the ominous fact that certain states have banned thimerosal.

Westover’s attempt to elevate this controversy to something more than a sociopolitical phenomenon crashes like a lead — or should I say mercury? — balloon.

Lisa Randall

Craig Westover promptly prepared a new blog entry, Calm down and explain my hysteria, commenting, “Ms. Randall, should be thanked for providing some balance to my column by sharing a firsthand example of a considerable amount of hysteria and paranoia on the part of one who denies there is any connection” — a surprising response, given the fact that her letter could fairly be called “sharp,” “sassy,” and “well-written,” but hardly “hysterical” or “paranoid.”

That evening, a call to action was sounded:

Date: Sun, 3 Jul 2005 23:38:20 -0500
From: “Tim Ziegeweid”
Subject: CALL LISA RANDALL AT X-XXX-XXX-XXXX TO EXPRESS YOUR OPINIONS TO HER.

Dear EOH Listmates. The following letter to the editor appeared in the 07-03-05 Saint Paul Pioneer Press. It is written by Mrs Lisa Randall who lives at (??deleted??). Her telephone number is (??deleted??) should you wish to call her and express your opinions on her thoughts… If any listmates would like to call Lisa Randall to express their thoughts you may call this bitch at (??deleted??). Or you can write to her at (??deleted??). .... Apparently Lisa Randall is some type of lawyer… I would assume that she is probably working for Big Pharma in some capacity. I called Lisa this morning to get her side of the story but her husband would not put her on the phone for some reason. PLEASE FEEL FREE TO POST THIS ON ANY AND ALL MERCURY-AUTISM LISTS! I HOPE THAT SOMEBODY GETS LISA ON THE PHONE AND FINDS OUT WHAT JUST WHAT SHE KNOWS ABOUT THIMEROSAL AND AUTISM! Tim Ziegeweid.

The list moderator, Lenny Schafer, promptly gave Tim the boot. Investigation of Ms. Randall’s genealogy and presumed ties to Big Pharma continued through the day and night, with No Mercury co-founder Lujene Clark at the lead. On the Fourth of July, after learning that Mr. Ziegeweid had sought to initiate a telephone harassment campaign, Craig Westover urged list members not to call Ms. Randall, but rather to “send an email to Letters to the Editor at the Pioneer Press.” He then went on to “plead (for) a little understanding for Tim. I think a reprimand is sufficient, and I’d urge you to, with a warning, return his group privileges.”

In the meantime, I phoned Lisa to let her know that her personal information had been broadcast by Mr. Ziegeweid on Yahoo. This was not news to her, for in fact, he had called her home seven times on Sunday and once on Monday, to “find out just what she knows about thimerosal and autism.”

Ms. Randall wrote to Mr. Schafer, requesting that the posts containing personal information about her and her family be deleted, but he did not respond. Ultimately, Yahoo’s abuse department stepped in and took care of the job for him. She also contacted the editors of the St. Paul Pioneer Press to let them know what had happened, and was assured that they “never publish letters generated by this kind of online campaign.”

Nonetheless, two weeks later, the St. Paul Pioneer Press generously and inexplicably provided the very instigator of such a campaign 174 words’ worth of space on the July 20 Letters page:

Glutathione causes problems

Because my daughter suffers from thimerosal-induced autism, I was offended by Lisa Randall’s July 3 letter, “Craig Westover is wrong.” She stated that the thimerosal-autism connection is “about hysteria and money.” She also said the thimerosal-autism connection was based on “money for shady personal injury lawyers who lick their chops at the prospect of presenting a jury with a disabled child, some sophisticated sounding pseudoscience and the ominous fact that certain states have banned thimerosal.” Thimerosal-induced autism has nothing to do with desperate parents or shady trial lawyers and has everything to do with a mercury detoxifier called glutathione. Dr. Jill James of the University of Arkansas found that autistic children have a severe deficiency in glutathione, the body’s most important detoxifier of mercury. Children who suffer from a glutathione deficiency cannot detoxify mercury from their bodies.

My daughter received all of her required vaccinations. In her first six months she received 112.5 micrograms of mercury. With each shot her mercury exposure exceeded the EPA-recommended safety guidelines 40- to 50-fold. Sheryl has thimerosal-induced autism.

TIMOTHY ZIEGEWEID
Eau Claire, Wis

Ms. Randall promptly submitted a reply:

Timothy Ziegeweid would like us to believe that his daughter’s autism was brought on by thimerosal in her childhood vaccines. He cites a single small study for the proposition that autistics lack the antioxidant glutathione and concludes – with no information about his daughter’s glutathione level – that she must have a deficiency which led to her inability to process mercury and thence to autism. In fact, even if the results of this study can be replicated, they would not imply that glutathione deficiency causes autism any more than they would imply the exact reverse; the only finding of the study is that the two tend to co-exist.

Standing against the theory of thimerosal-induced autism, meanwhile, are five large, rigorously peer-reviewed epidemiological studies using multiple statistical techniques on diverse populations and concluding unanimously that there is no evidence to link thimerosal-containing vaccines with autism. There is also increasing uncertainty about the common belief that autism has become dramatically more prevalent in recent years.

My letter doubting a role for thimerosal in autism, which prompted Mr. Ziegeweid’s response, appeared in the Pioneer Press more than two weeks ago. Maybe he didn’t have time to reply sooner than he did because he was too busy trying to organize a stalking campaign. He posted my letter, along with my name, address, and phone number, to an 800-member anti-vaccine online message board with an exhortation to “call this bitch.” Other members of the group responded by searching public records for personal information about me and my family, and speculating about my motivations for debunking the alleged vaccine-autism connection.

I am happy to clear up the speculation. I am a stay-at-home mom who is concerned that the thimerosal scare may convince parents not to immunize their children. I’ve learned that we need community immunity to protect children who are too young or too sick to safely receive vaccines, and that it doesn’t take a very large share of the population going unimmunized to break down the protection that these children need. In fact, about 1% of children who receive a vaccine do not develop antibodies to the disease it aims to prevent, so even fully vaccinated children like mine are endangered by anti-vaccine campaigns. That’s why I want to see parents getting reliable information on the safety of vaccines.

Lisa Randall

I cannot help but wonder why the editors of the St. Paul Pioneer Press would publish Mr. Ziegeweid’s letter when they knew that he had published Ms. Randall’s personal information on Yahoo, urged his colleagues to call her and to sound the alarm far and wide, and had phoned her home numerous times over the July 4 weekend. I also cannot help but wonder why they have not published Ms. Randall’s reply. Their columnist, Mr. Westover, seemed to take quite personally Ms. Randall’s comments about the anti-thimerosal campaign, going so far as to state that she was “hysterical” and “paranoid.” In a June 2 post to his blog remarking on my letter to David Kirby, Mr. Westover lamented that I had “gone astray by focusing on militant comments, as unfortunate as they are,” and made the inaccurate suggestion that I disapproved of journalists discussing the thimerosal issue. It seems that many of Mr. Westover’s listmates are far more “militant” than he would prefer to admit. Or perhaps he is well aware of their militancy, but feels that parental tsuris gives them license to engage in abusive behavior. In his post requesting that Mr. Ziegeweid’s list membership privileges be reinstated after he violated both Ms. Randall’s privacy and Yahoo’s terms of service, Mr. Westover stated,

“I know that people are at all different levels of rage and reason on this issue. Getting a piece of hate email pales in comparison to what many parents have gone or are going through with their children.”

Considering that Mr. Ziegeweid had already revealed that he had crossed over the line from impulse to action by phoning Ms. Randall at home, I cannot help but wonder whether Mr. Westover feels that “getting a piece of hate mail” — or in this case, eight angry phone calls made to one’s home by an outraged stranger — should not only be considered par for the course for journalists who publish articles on controversial topics, but also for private citizens who express their opinions in the paper for which he writes — just as long as that hate mail comes from people for whom he already feels some sympathy.

Comments


  1. I’ve read the glutathione study cited. It doesn’t even mention autism. In fact, it only looks at cultured cells. It looks at thimerosal effects on cultured glioblastoma and neuroblastoma cells. It also looks at mercury concentrations in the 0-20 micromolar range, which is one thousand times higher than the highest mercury concentrations measured in infants receiving vaccines in the study by Pichichero et al published in The Lancet in 2002. In that study, blood levels measured were in the 8-18 nanomolar range. — Orac    2005-07-28 08:50    #

  2. Ooops. Wrong study. I was talking about a different study by S. J. James that was cell culture only, mainly because it was cited on my blog by a commenter yesterday.

    I’ll have to look at the slightly earlier study to which Ziegeweid refers. — Orac    2005-07-28 08:57    #

  3. In the James et al study in question (Metabolic biomarkers of increased oxidative stress and impaired methylation capacity in children with autism. Am J Clin Nutr. 2004 Dec;80(6):1611-7.), they studied the plasma levels of a variety of substances and concluded that the 20 children with autism (compared to 33 “typical” controls) had a lower level of, among other things, glutathione. They also instituted an “intervention trial” which normalized the levels of those substances – but, significantly, no mention is made of it normalizing the autistic behaviors.

    What James et al have shown – if their data is reproducible – is that children with autism have reduced levels of the substances mentioned. They study did not directly measure either anti-oxidant capacity OR methylation ability, although they concluded that both were deficient in the autistic children.

    As happens so often in this sort of study, the conclusions can be reversed without being contradicted by the data – autism could be caused by low methylation and anti-oxidant levels or it could CAUSE low methylation and anti-oxidant levels. Another hypothesis that was not tested is that the autistic children had low levels of the measured substances but had normal methylation and anti-oxidant capacities because they were utilizing alternate metabolic pathways not tested.

    Jim Laidler — Jim Laidler    2005-07-28 11:17    #

  4. Disturbing, truly disturbing.

    I don’t understand how anyone could feel that such an action (posting someones personal contact details on the internet) is in any way acceptable.

    That list grows ever more vicious. — Kev    2005-07-28 11:50    #

  5. Thank you, Kathleen.

    Autism Diva — Autism Diva    2005-07-28 15:22    #

  6. I hope your readers take time to follow the links to my posts and columns, but for those that don’t, a few clarifications.

    First—Lisa Randall’s letter refers to a column I wrote that specifically took issue with the tone and the misrepresentation of data in Kennedy’s Salon and Rolling Stone article. The purpose of the column was expressing my opposition to conspiracy theory over science. I do disagree with Randall’s position on this issue, on the science and on the way the government is handling the issue, but, as my column stated and she omitted from her letter, I don’t approve of Kennedy-like tactics or the tactics she describes in the letter—which I stated in the column.

    Second—My reference to “hate mail” was premised on the hate mail and phone calls I received in response to my Kennedy column. Although I support the parents position, which I made clear in my column, I received a number of pretty vile responses for having the audacity to criticize Kennedy’s piece. I also received supporting email and some that agreed Kennedy’s piece was “over the top,” but felt that the parents had been put down so long, his approach was necessary to draw attention to the issue. Those responses prompted my hate mail comments in relation to my personal experience.

    Third—When I found people were emailing Randall’s home, I immediately posted my disapproval on my site and posted to the list, which I seldom do, again expressing my disapproval. My comment about email to the letters to the editor specifically was an alternative for those upset by Randall’s letter—it was not a call to action, nor was it phrased as the call to action you imply. People have a right to appropriately object to Randall’s comments just as she had to object to mine. As a letter writer myself before having a regular column, I’ve received some of the most vicious racist mail for a column I wrote favorable to a play raising the issue of lingering racism. It’s wrong, but hate mail comes with the territory.

    Fourth—I chose to characterize her letter as “hysterical” and “paranoid.” Her references to “shady personal injury lawyers who lick their chops at the prospect of presenting a jury with a disabled child” and lumping all parents into “distilled groupthink” strikes me as being as over the top as Kennedy’s remarks. To classify the parents as “anti-vaccine” is either ill-informed, intentionally misleading or hysterical reaction. Most of the parents that are prominent in the Minnesota movement specifically state they want safe vaccines, not the abolishment of all vaccines. Many simply want an adjustment to the vaccine schedule. You may choose to characterize her response as you will.

    Fifth—I did make a request on behalf of Tim to be reinstated on the list. I met Tim as a result of my research on this topic. Several times he has sent me material that I have told him I disagree with and I’ve sent him a number of emails critical of conspiracy theory pieces he’s circulating and the posting of Randall’s personal information. Nonetheless, I also know a little of his family background, his personal situation, his daughter’s, and knowing that prompted my request, which is a far as it went. I don’t know whether or not he has been reinstated. I hope he has, and I hope he’s behaving himself.

    Sixth—As you yourself have noted, I have and continue to look at both sides of this issue. I am not completely convinced that the parents are right on this issue, a disclaimer in every column I’ve written on the subject. What I am sure of is that the evidence of harm is sufficient that it warrants more research and attention than government agencies have or are giving it. While government falls back on five epidemiological studies, independent researchers concerned about vaccine safety are pushing the envelop of hard science, looking at how mercury affects the nervous system of young children, how the toxicity of mercury is enhanced or retarded in certain combinations, how mercury is absorbed by the blood, new genetic research. Any one of the hard science studies done in the last five years, with different results, could have conclusively disproved any link between thimerosal and autistic symptoms. None has. That doesn’t make the hypothesis correct, but it makes the case stronger. It shows a courage on the part of researchers betting their hypothesis on every study.

    Whatever the ultimate resolution of the thimerosal issue, it is clear that the government agencies involved have not adequately responded to safety concerns. If they had, the parents movement would be losing steam or dying rather than gaining momentum. It is also clear that their safety methodology failed—there is no excuse for injecting the amounts of mercury into children that we do, not realizing it until 1999, not really knowing the impact. If there is no harm, it’s blind luck (which is why the government must rely on retrospective epidemiology to make its case—there is no primary data showing thimerosal in the quantities injected is safe).

    Again, I hope your readers will explore the links, which I appreciate you making, to the source documents and draw their own conclusions of intent and fairness. Thanks. — Craig Westover    2005-07-28 18:03    #

  7. I don’t know Mr Westover or his columns, so i will confine my remarks to his penultimate paragraph.

    Issue 1.
    “government agencies involved have not adequately responded to safety concerns”

    So, the IOM gatherings 1 & 2 to review all the data didn’t happen?

    I was under the impression that the IOM was reserved for the big questions and serious issues, since they stand above both the FDA and CDC on this type of issue. The US government seemed concerned enough to invoke an IOM gathering not once, but twice. In the light of that would Mr Westover care to define an adequate response?

    Issue 2

    “there is no excuse for injecting the amounts of mercury into children that we do,”

    Well, if they were injecting mercury, there would be cause for complaint but they aren’t injecting mercury are they? Thimerosal contains ethyl mercury. Isn’t this analagous to objecting to the common addition of the sodium salt of chlorine (a highly toxic gas) to processed food?

    Issue 3

    “there is no primary data showing thimerosal in the quantities injected is safe”

    Salts of elements have their own toxicity levels and don’t they use the known toxicity of methyl mercury even though they believe it to be more toxic than the ethyl mercury compound?

    Mind you I don’t agree with the US vaccine schedule, which looks screwy to me and no doubt is a side issue in this debate and a major distraction. — Alyric    2005-07-28 22:46    #

  8. Does Craig Westover have a clue as to how safe mercury is at low doses? Humans have been exposed to mercury forever, they have the ability to deal with it or we wouldn’t be here. People don’t understand how common mercury exposure is. As it is said, “mercury is ubiquitous”. If tiny exposures to mercury caused autism the rate of autism would be steady, since it’s always been there.

    Remember mercurochrome and merthiolate? Remember how many kids used to play with the mercury from broken thermometers?

    The fear that has been promoted over tiny levels of mercury is hysteria. Whoever, made the decision to cut back on the mercury levels did so within a big fat safety margin. Sure they should have cut it back, but there is still the big fat safety margin.

    There is no evidence that mercury from thimerosal at the dosages in vaccines has done any damage at all to brains, and there is no evidence that it has caused autism.

    If it was damaging brains it would be causing much more than an “autism epidemic” there ought to be all kinds of “neurological epidemics” with the matching “skyrocketing increases”. There ought to be an epidemic of kidney damage if this stuff is so toxic.

    The Hornig mouse study showed nothing about autism at all.

    The James study about glutathione proves nothing about autism and thimerosal, and it hasn’t been replicated.

    The baby haircut studies are a joke. The monkeys at Washington State U. didn’t behave autistically, they didn’t record anythign about the monkey’s behavior being different at all, which it seems likely they would have, even though the monkeys had a little mercury in their brains from thimerosal exposure.

    But Mr. Westover thinks that these studies show reason for more research into this.

    Mr. Westover either hasn’t read the studies being discussed or doesn’t understand them.

    He may be trying to be fair, but he is far over the line from “fair”. He’s been lied to and believes the garbage put out by David Kirby who is merely a paid mouthpiece for SAFEMINDS, and the rest. He said some time back he wasn’t going to speak on this issue any further without being paid for doing so.

    The “science” they point to is garbage, the stupidity of it right there if you go look. And Mr Westover needs to look at it carefully and rethink his position.

    He is helping to keep quacks and charlatans in business and families are losing big money to these guys. Children could benefiting from proven therapies or a pony or a new backyard swing, instead of being put in saunas and having $150 a bottle, foul smelling, hand lotion, touted as a “chelation therapy” rubbed on them.

    He is, knowingly or not, promoting the idea that there are no adult autistics because he says there has been an “autism epidemic” that only “works” against a backdrop of no older autistics. — Autism Diva    2005-07-29 00:27    #

  9. So, Mr. Westover. “Over the top” to talk about shady personal injury lawyers? Read this selection and tell me you do not hear the slurpy sound of chops being licked.

    Waters & Kraus, Attorneys at Law: “at the forefront of mercury litigation, representing injured victims and families whose lives have been adversely affected by mercury.”

    Thimerosal & Autism Sympsoms Resource: “If you have a loved one that has suffered the serious effects of thimerosal-containing vaccines we provide sound legal counsel. We encourage you to contact us….”

    Thimerosal InfoCenter: “Learn about your legal rights from a Thimerosal Lawyer!”

    Thimerosal Lawyers FYI: “Find a Thimerosal Lawyer in Any State:...”

    Jeff Z. Sell, Esq.: “Conditions that may be associated with vaccines include Autism….If you believe that you or a loved one has been
    injured as a result of a vaccination, we may be able to help.”

    Law Offices of Shawn Khorrami: “handle and prosecute to the fullest extent of the law, claims against manufacturers and distributors of dangerous childhood vaccines that contained the preservative Thimerosal.”

    Ghai & Associates, P.C.: “If [you] have a question as to whether your child may have been exposed to the ethyl mercury contained in the please call this office today at….”

    Defective Drugs: “For more information on Thimerosal, please contact us to speak with a lawyer.”

    Williams Love O’Leary Craine & Powers P.C.: “To learn more about the legal rights of you or your loved one concerning vaccine injuries, please call our lawyers….”

    Now, for your next protest: “Over the top” to talk about anti-vaccine groupthink? Maybe you have a different interpretation of these comments from the discussion group in question:

    “the holocaust against humanity known as vaccinations” (message 13276)

    “I have no comfort level vaccinating” (message 13547)

    “The article read ‘Not only did we meet our goal of 85% of all children vaccinated but we beat our goal!’ and he thinks this is a good thing? Stupid. Just stupid.” (message 13661)

    “I really cannot for the life of me perceive one reason for anyone to be pro-vaccine” (message 13757)

    “I will never give my kids any vaccine again, mercury or not. They just aren’t safe” (message 10962)

    “I will just refuse to PRETEND that I not anti-vaccine if asked” (message 11318)

    “We’re against the ongoing propaganda campaign they wage to keep the vaccination program in place” (message 11289)

    (Shall I go on? This is just a recent handful.)

    “I have and continue to look at both sides of this issue.” Ahem. In much the same way, I suppose, as does Evidence of Harm, the book – with sneering glances at the real science, followed by bucketloads of voodoo.

    Let me just note here that the 2004 IOM committee considered the entire oeuvre of Westover’s “independent researchers concerned about vaccine safety” – and found it “noncontributory,” which I believe is a technical term for “sucky.” — Lisa Randall    2005-07-30 00:18    #

  10. I’ve posted a response to Mr. Westover’s comment at:
    http://neurodiversity.com/weblog/article/18/ — Kathleen Seidel    2005-07-30 07:10    #

  11. Thank you Lisa for gathering those citations on the source of the giant slurping sound coming from the ambulance chasers we aren’t supposed to know about and their greedy interests we aren’t supposed to think about. — Concerned parent of an autistic child    2005-07-30 18:35    #

  12. I think that the labels of “paranoid and hysterical” could be more accurately applied to the mercury alarmists than Ms Randall.

    A recent interaction with one of them bore this fact out to me: I pointed out that my son is autistic despite never having had a single vaccination in his life. I am also autistic, and he acts about the same as I did. My family is full of socially inept sorts who have difficulty with social interactions; I think it’s genetic.

    Her response was that it HAD to be mercury or other heavy metal poisoning of some kind. The grocery store food isn’t safe, the water is laden with chemicals, maybe my water pipes were poisonous, or aluminum pots, foil, or soda cans, etc etc. My situation was such that I actually hadn’t been very exposed to any of those things…She eventually concluded and insisted that it had to be the fillings in my teeth! — Rebekah Leaf    2005-07-30 22:19    #

  13. “The list moderator, Lenny Schafer, promptly gave Tim the boot.”

    And if Lenny can give one of “his own” the boot, that must have been a serious thing!

    This Tim chap sounds nasty.

    — David N. Andrews BA-status, PgCertSpEd (pending)    2006-04-13 12:36    #