Wednesday, June 22, 2005 | ||
Bad Links? | Tyrone councilwomans vaccine story moves up bestseller listsBy JOHN THOMPSON Lyn Redwood knew something was wrong with her son, Will, shortly after his first birthday in 1995. It was like Invasion of the Body Snatchers. He couldnt talk and it was just like he was a shell of a person, she said. Redwood, who serves on the Tyrone Town Council, immediately took Will to several specialists and eventually learned that he suffered from autism. But it was not until five years later that she found a possible cause for her sons learning disorder. Redwood had started hearing about the levels of thimerosal contained in childhood vaccines. Thimerosal is a chemical preservative that contains nearly 50 percent mercury, a liquid so-called heavy metal. In 1999, the federal government issued a statement saying that some children could have been exposed to mercury levels above the federal standards in their vaccines. As a member of Fayette Countys Board of Health, Redwood checked with the county to see if the county had used vaccines made with thimerosal. She learned that the countys supply did not contain the preservative, but then remembered something that chilled her to the bone. Wills vaccines had come from a company that did not supply the countys vaccines, she said. Redwood added up the mercury levels in the vaccines and discovered that Wills mercury levels exceeded the federal standards by 125 times when he was 2 months old. With her hypothesis formed, Redwood wanted to find out for sure if her son suffered from mercury poisoning. She called several labs, but learned that detection of heavy metals was only available for recent exposure. Since Will was now 5, Redwood thought her trail had grown cold. But then, she realized something. I remembered that I had saved a lock of his baby hair and sent it off to the lab for testing, she said. For the next few days, Redwood waited nervously for the results to come back from the lab. Finally, Redwood received a fax at her home that indicated Wills level of mercury exposure at 20 months old was 48 parts per million. The EPA standards indicate anything over one part per million is dangerous and 5 parts per million is mercury poisoning. Redwood finally had her answer. Over the last five years, Redwood has become a tireless crusader in trying to get the government and pharmaceutical companies to live up to their responsibilities. Her complete story is recounted in Evidence of Harm, which is zooming up the charts at Amazon.com. The book was co-written by David Kirby, who has been a regular contributor of science and health articles to the New York Times for eight years. Redwood tried to write her story for years, but constantly received rejection letters. Kirby heard her story and asked her if she would want to help him co-author her story. Redwood agreed, and now a movie company, Participant Productions, has bought her story after the success of the book. The movie company was founded by Jeff Skoll, who was the first president of eBay. Redwood is excited and hopeful that her story could come to the big screen. This companys motto is changing the world one story at a time and Ive talked to several people already who are interested in the project, she said. During her years of research and community activism, Redwood discovered that autism now affects 1 in 166 children, compared to 1 in 10,000 in 1987. The increase, she believes, is tied to the increase in the number of vaccinations required for children to go to daycare and school that started in the 1990s. Most of the vaccinations, she said, contained thimerosal. When I was growing up, you really didnt hear about autism or ADD. Weve poisoned a whole generation of children, she said. Redwood also discovered that the first case of autism wasnt documented until the 1940s, shortly after thimerosal was introduced into vaccines. But years ago, vaccines were only available to well-off parents, so the outbreak didnt become apparent until the 1980s and 1990s when the number of vaccinations dramatically increased. If the link could be proven, many parents who blamed themselves for their childrens illness could have possible recourse against the pharmaceutical companies. But that all changed in 2002. There was a rider attached to the Homeland Security Act that would dismiss legal liability against Eli Lilly and other companies that had thimerosal in their vaccines, she said. The bill passed, and the only recourse left was through the Vaccine Court. Redwood said the court awards damages, but the money is funded by taxpayers and not the corporations that created the products. Another hitch was that there was a three-year statute of limitations, so Redwood and thousands of others were out of luck. But Redwood was not deterred. Over the last five years, Redwood helped co-found SafeMinds, which is a nonprofit organization to investigate and raise awareness of the possible dangers in mercury exposure. Redwood is appearing on the Montel Williams show this week, and will also be featured on Oprah. Last week, Robert Kennedy Jr. threw his support behind the cause, and Redwood spends her time trying to educate as many people about the problem. Five years ago, Redwood couldnt talk about her frustration with the issue without bursting into tears. Today, shes put her nursing career on hold to try and get the word out on the deficiencies she sees in what she views as the governments and drug companies slow action in dealing with the situation. Today, Will is enrolled at the Bedford School in Fairburn and is able to have conversation and do many of the same things other children do. But Redwoods memories of his childhood are vivid. She remembers when the whole family was at the ball-fields in Tyrone. We had established a 10-ft area that we told Will he could not leave. I decided to see how far he would wander off before he would stop. He got about 50 feet away and I couldnt take it anymore and went running after him, she said. Redwood hopes that her advocacy will help parents struggling with their childrens autism and blaming themselves, instead of holding responsible the agencies that are possibly accountable for the illness. |
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