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Global Warming: We’re Screwed

by Gary Null, PhD. and Richard Gale, edited by Helen Buyniski

There is no longer any question that climate change and global warming are bearing down upon us more aggressively and rapidly than previously believed. It is wishful thinking to cling to fantasies that life will return to normal. Reports on approaching climate change tipping points become direr. It is no longer a question whether climate change is occurring. Instead, we should prepare ourselves for what can be done in our own lives and communities and learn to adapt to the new abnormal that has never been experienced since homo sapiens appeared during the Middle Paleolithic period 200,000 years ago. Since 1972, we have been warned about the impasse we are now reaching. Forty-six years ago, the Club of Rome commissioned a consortium of scientists, legislators, corporate leaders and economists to create the now famous Limits of Growth report. That report predicted a systemic collapse of human civilization due to obscene economic growth and the depletion of essential natural resources. But leaders throughout the developed world flatly denied its conclusions.

It should therefore be evident that believing our world’s leaders will act in unison to lessen climate change’s forward advance is both idealistic and impractical. While there is a 97 percent consensus among scientists globally that planetary warming is human-generated, only 15 percent of Americans, according to a Yale and George Mason University survey, know and understand this fact. The Trump administration and the remainder of the American population continue to embrace the fallacy that the scientific community is divided on the matter. We now have the most anti-rational government in US history, one which categorically refuses to grasp the larger picture and instead chooses to assail the environment to leverage short term gains and profits. Clearly the message is not being communicated, and this leaves millions of citizens in harm’s way as climate change worsens.

We can identify several different attitudes about humanity’s ability to tackle the accelerating challenges of climate change and global warming. The question I pose is whether it is possible or reasonable to hold two seemingly diametrically opposed positions simultaneously. I believe it is.

One view holds that technology will save us – full stop. Such a utopian outlook is ultimately paralyzing because of the massive sums of money required to implement the new world-saving technologies. Some regions can benefit, of course – ultra-wealthy Gulf states like Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, for example, can afford to build the fantastically expensive desalination plants that are required to turn desert expanses into arable land. But at $100 million apiece, these plants are firmly out of reach of 99 percent of the planet’s population. Other nations must therefore set their sights dramatically lower, and here the gap between what is needed and what technology is capable of becomes problematic. Some environmental groups insist we merely need more wind and solar energy, in spite of the high costs of building wind farms, their comparatively paltry energy output, and their numerous downsides – bird deaths, unlivable noise. Hydroelectric dams are a much more economically-sound model for alternative energy, but the existence of a nearby river is obviously a prerequisite. Some groups have even embraced nuclear power, claiming it is non-polluting. They ignore, forget, or disingenuously avoid discussing how enriching uranium creates tons of pollution, how there is no safe disposal process for the spent fuel rods that will remain radioactive for eons, how nuclear power plants are prone to accidents and meltdowns – particularly as catastrophic climate events become more frequent, as Fukushima continues to remind us. For the techno-utopian set, there will always be some brilliant inventor who will sweep in at the critical hour and save us from ourselves. The solutions are always just beyond our fingertips, and we are supposed to merely prepare for the arrival of our techno-saviors by thinking positively about the future. The leaders of this school of thought are the masters of positive platitudes, and nothing – not facts, science, or cold hard reality – will intrude upon their fantasy.

David Korten, writing for Yes! Magazine, asks us to believe that it is within modern civilization’s power to wake up and make the critical changes necessary to either lessen the impact of climate change or reverse its course. Korten is not alone, and I suspect most climate scientists and environmentalists agree with him. Thousands of scientists convene at climate conferences around the world to discuss their conviction that our political leaders and institutions will arrive at a moment of clarity just in time to launch a global Marshall Plan to save our planet and species. After the release of the 2018 International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report arguing that limiting global warming to 1.5 degree C is achievable if drastic action is taken within a dozen years, they imagine there is still plenty of time to act together and thwart the worst consequences. This attitude is especially prevalent in the US, a nation whose unrealistic optimism stems from its historical capacity to be industrious, innovative and brilliant in finding solutions.

Although this overly idealist attitude is not by any means utopian, it lacks a deeper understanding of the psychology of power, wealth, domination, and in particular economics. The environmental crisis is intimately entwined with the economic crisis. “If hope is something expressed through illusion,” notes social activist Chris Hedges, “it is not hope; it is fantasy.” The present strategy rests on the idea that wise people from interdisciplinary fields will collectively unite and work together to slow down, and where possible, reverse deforestation and the acidification of the oceans. We can dramatically reduce industrial agricultural practices and wean ourselves away from our meat-centric food habits. And the technology is already available to rapidly convert to renewable energy sources. Within a reasonable time period–so it is believed–coal, nuclear, oil and natural gas can be phased out and replaced with cleaner geothermal, solar, wind and wave technologies.

This is a noble view. Its optimism offsets the otherwise growing sense of apathy, indifference and fear that climate change instills in billions of people who are experiencing environmental catastrophes at this moment. I fully support those who embrace this optimism such as David Korten, Michael Mann, Bill McKibben, and others. I want to believe that what they believe will come to pass. But there is a serious problem that nobody I am aware of in the popular climate movement or among scientifically-literate legislators have understood. That is, every movement requires an intelligentsia with the capacity to serve as policy makers and opinion leaders to answer the most crucial questions. There cannot be an orchestra without a conductor. It is not the case, as Marx would have us believe, that the masses of average people are capable of agitating and launching a revolution as gargantuan as a much-needed Marshall Plan for the climate. Such a grand strategy to tackle the demands of climate change has been discussed for a decade, and yet the rush to extract and consume more fossil fuels has only increased. Consistently, American presidents including Bush, Obama and now Trump prefer to follow the road to Hades by favoring the illusions of perpetual growth over human survival. In order to mobilize the masses, scientifically-committed and powerful inspirers must step forward to take up multilateral leadership positions. As long as the powers that be value short-term gain over long-term survival, there can be no meaningful change on a societal level.

On the other hand, there is another growing faction of people whose awareness has expanded beyond the desire for self-gratification and acquisition of power and wealth. Their attitude is pragmatic yet cautiously optimistic. They are not policy makers and their efforts never make headline news. This is the new civilized, literate segment of humanity who are going off the grid and moving to sustainable regions. Their conscience is aligned with the changing times and planetary needs. They realize that the over-use of land to feed Americans’ hunger for a meat-based diet is contributing dramatically to climate change, and they understand that going vegan cuts their carbon footprint in half. Princeton University calculated that the animal-based American diet accounts for 85% of all agricultural greenhouse gas emissions and wastes about 90% of arable land that could otherwise feed an increasing population more efficiently and nutritionally with plant-based foods. Unfortunately, multiple industries and the entire banking sector benefit from economic growth within the livestock industry. The new climate literati’s efforts will not affect the time limits before climate tipping points chaotically cascade. For that to commence, a worldwide effort is necessary and there is a very slim chance that will ever happen.

The third attitude is best exemplified by scientists willing to speak out about worst case scenarios such as Paul Beckwith, Kevin Hester, Guy McPherson, Natalia Shakhova, and the anonymous climate scientists blogging under the pseudonym Sam Carana at Arctic News. These are the messengers of despair with only flickers of hope. There are already too many greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to make any discernable corrections. Humanity has waited far too long and it is past the time when nations are capable of mustering the necessary resources and collective will to do anything truly constructive. However, scientists such as McPherson are not advocating complete apathy nor suggesting that we retreat into a stupor of do-nothingness. Nor is this small contingent of Cassandras saying we will experience an apocalyptic end to the world. Rather, they encourage us to understand that half the climate tipping points have already tipped, and it is prudent to prepare now for the new world we are entering. Their message was much too harsh when it was first introduced for most of the population to swallow, and as a result they mostly disappeared off the radar, their positions not renewed, their books unpublished. They tell us truths we are unprepared to act on: that we have to stop blindly spending, that growth for growth’s sake is unsustainable and ultimately self-destructive. How is a society to digest such messages when its entire economy is based on the accumulation of stuff? But these are the pragmatists, and their message is very simple: educate yourselves, change your habits, network with like-minded people and communities, and realize not everyone will have a place in the lifeboat.

Finally, there is the attitude of the climate change deniers who will discover the lifeboats have been filled when their personal Katrina moment arrives. Professional climate change deniers, almost none of whom are climatologists or experts in anything related to atmospheric sciences or the environment, have generated about 200 arguments on why we should not be worried about global warming. Almost none of these opinionated views are based upon peer-reviewed scientific publications, and the few that are contradict themselves and are amateurishly thought out. One of the stupidest relies on a theory called Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity to debunk a relationship between CO2 release and temperature increases on the earth’s surface. Grammar school physics can deconstruct the theory because the theory completely ignores that when water gets warmer, it evaporates, thus increasing the greenhouse effect! And the enormous illiteracy among large segments of the American population is indulged by its media echo chamber, the chorus of Fox, Infowars, Breitbart, the Trump-o-sphere, and the evangelical Christian networks telling them there’s nothing to all this climate nonsense – just keep performing the rituals and parroting the dogma and all those floods, fires, storms, and droughts will stay confined to the television where they belong. No one wants to believe their home will be burned, flooded, desiccated, or otherwise destroyed – and these types simply choose not to. They ignore the weekly reports of new climate disasters hundreds or even dozens of miles away, reasoning that if it’s not happening to them, it’s not their problem. Among these are found the evangelical Christians who believe God will save them at the last moment, whether via an emergency Rapturing or a last-minute stilling of the roiling tides of an angry planet. They stand side by side with the Schadenfreude addicts, so blinded by the joy they feel in seeing others’ misfortune that they cannot see that misfortune is also their own. America is a nation of individualists who deep down might find hard to stomach the notion that with regard to the environment, the human race stands or falls together. But we must get over our aversion to collective thinking quickly unless we wish to sacrifice ourselves for a principle we don’t fully understand.
Aside from Americans being poorly educated about climate change, the entire dominant edifice of corporations, government and the media is determined to keep everyone pacified and in denial. And this is largely due to an embedded elite that rule over the institutions responsible for alerting citizens and preparing the nation for an uncertain future. The entire mainstream media has acted criminally by keeping Americans ignorant about climate change and the science supporting human’s responsibility for global warming’s escalation. Media Matters reported that during the 2018 heat waves, three major networks–ABC, CBS and NBC–only made reference to climate change in one of 127 segments. For FOX, hurricanes devastating the Florida panhandle and the Carolinas or California’s 1.6 million acres ravaged by wildfires in 2018 are nothing more than acts of God. The reason for our media’s denial is obvious. It is the same leaders of industry and government who optimists are placing their faith in who are silencing the media from speaking out about climate truths.
To tackle climate change, an economic overhaul of the entire financial establishment is critical. For corporations to cooperate and retool for the new future, they will need to receive subsidies from taxpayers through the government. They will also likely need to defer and reduce their profit shares. Yet the neoliberal capitalist system is never altruistic. It is intrinsically mercenary. Investors hold stock or equity because these consistently assure high profitable returns. Shareholder equity is the number one financial fiduciary responsibility to those who invest in corporate interests.

And here is the dilemma of adhering to irrationally idealistic attitudes. The majority of private industries that fuel economic growth depend upon and are powered by the very same fossil fuel addiction that drives climate change. We are therefore forced to demand that all of the largest polluters change their entire paradigm of business-as-usual and invest in long-term sustainability immediately, because none of them can transition their financial agendas overnight. Fossil fuels have been the engine driving manufacturing and the quality of life that is taken for granted in developed nations. To change the paradigm in order to save the planet, and our species, means separating ourselves from this pernicious neoliberal ethos. Survival must be prioritized above the growth and profit that feed the insatiable oligarchy. Not just for the few, but across all industries. Populations in the developed world will need to lower their purchasing to that of a third world banana republic in order to minimize their carbon footprints. More taxes will be required to reforest, not just for their own nations but for poorer regions such as Brazil’s Amazon, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea that are being leveled and cannibalized by the US and other first world countries. And the ongoing development of gated communities for the elite, with private golf courses, sucking up enormous amounts of water from aquifers must cease. The idea that an oligarchy can live in a private desert oasis is no longer feasible.

The facts are crystal clear. The past several years have taught us that perpetual drought and more frequent wildfires in the Pacific coastal and southwestern states are here to stay. Southern states have been battered by category 4 and higher hurricanes. All of the science points to more extreme weather events and conditions as the planet’s surface warms. It is very likely that another Category 5 superstorm during the next year or two will result in the largest human migration in modern American history. Following hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Michael, homeowners are realizing their insurance is not covering what they believed they were paying for. A year after Harvey, thousands of Texas residents still do not have their lives back in order. And both the federal and state governments need to be honest about where Americans should and should not live. The hard truth is that certain regions of the country simply cannot be protected from climate-related environmental disasters. Massive funding will be necessary either for population relocation or extensive climate-proofing infrastructure, or both.

Unfortunately, none of this happening. My greatest disappointment has been observing the US regress into the most self-absorbed, narcissistic and selfish citizenry in its history. There are always exceptions, but they seem to be progressively becoming a minority. Poll after poll indicates that concerns about climate change pale in comparison to the desires for economic growth and national security from imaginary terrorists. After almost fifty years of counseling people about their health conditions, even after heart attacks and strokes, and providing the best advice based upon hard scientific evidence, I watch patients continue to resist making fundamental changes even when their lives depend upon it. So even as sea levels rise and superstorms worsen, people will continue to rebuild along coastal regions while believing they are entitled to a pleasant climate and a normal life. Deep down, they understand the laws of cause and effect – that there are consequences to unchecked growth, that one cannot get something for nothing. But most people secretly believe they are the exception to the rule.

The US Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates there are approximately 61 million Americans in the professional class, which includes engineers, higher management, architects, physicians, computer and IT specialists, psychologists, diverse scientists and researchers, academics, clergy, etc. And according to some wealth analysts, this includes close to 11 million millionaires as of 2017. Over 90% of millionaires are married with families. Taking into account family size, this means there is a social class of approximately 181 million people, including 33 million living with ridiculous wealth. This latter group considers themselves among the privileged elite. To understand the economic obstacles thwarting any viable climate change initiative, we can ask a simple question. Who amongst this privileged elite will agree to downsize their lifestyle to help reverse human greenhouse emissions and preserve the environment? The US has never before been so polarized into two economic classes competing with each other. The professional careerists who are highly educated, work hard and carry enormous debt exist in sharp contrast to the remainder of the nation that struggles to make ends meet, living from paycheck to paycheck.

Having participated in or organized many dozens of demonstrations over the years, I have noticed that it is the average working people who go into the streets and protest. Rarely do you see many from the professional class and certainly none from the rank and file of the wealthy elite. Yet with the future set for more artificial intelligence technologies, higher education work visas, automation and off-shoring, once economically secure families are now starting to sink into the ranks of the new poor. Both classes are fully capable of agreeing that the environment is a defining problem, if not the defining problem of our time, but there is at most a nominal overlap between those capable of making a change and those in whom making a change will have an impact on their surroundings.

This realization came home to me recently after a conversation with a prominent Wall Street financial planner. For over three decades, he has counseled hundreds of clients in the multi-million dollar class. He said that in recent years he has witnessed something he has never encountered before. Rather than seeking investment advice, his clients are asking for assistance to sell off assets: antiques, designer clothing and jewelry, paintings, art, etc. Why? Because although many elite earn millions annually, they are spending millions-plus. They need cash. These same wealthy individuals are speculating at unprecedented levels, at margins of nearly 100 percent, convinced they can beat the system. They watched too-big-to-fail banks bounce back stronger than ever after the 2008 crash that should have killed them. They’ve seen hedge funds and equity partnerships create piles of money out of nothing, enriching their owners beyond their wildest dreams. This hyperconsumptive model has become the new American dream, the province of an emerging professional elite that lives off of debt in order to maintain a lifestyle that is no longer within their means to sustain. They live artificial lives solely to preserve artificial appearances. Private sector debt is astronomical. If the US debt clock is accurate, Americans’ total personal debt is now over $19 trillion, including $15 trillion in mortgage debt, $1.5 trillion in student loans, and $1 trillion in credit card debt.

If the US were a solvent nation without or with very little debt, with substantial currency holdings, a national effort to mitigate the worst consequences of climate change might be paid for. Yet the government can barely pay for the interest on its insane debt, and Trump’s perverted tax cut promises the country will be dead in the water when global warming cascades into catastrophes we can now barely imagine. So where will the tens of trillions be found to prepare the American public for the dismal future ahead?

Those who have built and profited most from the economic structure of the neoliberal regime are those who have brought upon us the climate crisis we face today. The elites’ habits of consumption have desensitized them to harsh natural realities. Al Gore is an excellent example, a man who has sculpted his image as one of the planet’s leading climate crusaders. Gore’s Generation Investment Management, a London-based investment firm co-founded by a former chief of Goldman Sachs’ asset management, David Blood, has made a killing on the speculation of putting a tax price upon carbon emissions. However little of this has anything to do with actually getting rid of fossil fuel greenhouse gas emissions. Gore is not an environmentalist. He is simply the exemplar of climate change capitalism as he flies around the world in a private jet giving speeches for hundreds of thousands of dollars and racking up monthly electricity bills of up to $22,000. According to the National Center for Public Policy Research, our renewable energy champion’s own solar power installation only accounts for under 6% of his monthly energy consumption, which is 21 times that of the average American family.
And the average American family uses an appalling share of the world’s resources. Americans consume 26 percent of the world’s energy with only 4 percent of its population. The professional class has grown exponentially, and its members now occupy most of the power positions in the country. Their lifestyle is one of excessive consumption, and this consumption is integral to their self-concept – how will they show everyone they’ve “made it” in life if they aren’t surrounded by all the nicest stuff? To stop consuming is unthinkable. Who in this group of 181 million people will volunteer to lower their standard of living in order to set a good example for their peers, for their country, for the world? These people do not make sacrifices – they are not even willing to vote for a third-party candidate, to throw their support behind a Ralph Nader or a Rocky Anderson in order to register their dissatisfaction with a hopelessly corrupt duopoly. If these – our policymakers and opinion leaders – are not willing to change, we cannot be surprised that we find ourselves with:
The largest epidemic in overweight and obesity among children and toddlers
The largest medical bill in world history, comprising a full 17 percent of GDP
More people engaged in more speculative investment than before the 2008 crash, with derivatives, hedge funds, and equity partnerships thriving and bankers bringing home bigger paychecks than ever
Corporations kept on life support while families are foreclosed upon, 21 to 28 million homeless
Private prisons bringing back the once-unthinkable concept of debtor’s prison, for the swelling underclass caught in a series of financial traps

This leaves us with a bleak impression for the future. Perhaps this is the most we can expect, looking to the elite to side with humanity in order to prevent a global climate catastrophe. If so, we are in dire straits. Gore and his ilk should never be counted upon as inspiring examples to lead an effective climate Marshall Plan. When we look at the potential leaders who could advance such a plan, all we find is greedy Wall Street and Silicon Valley firms ready to make money off the next new green technology. Obama may have started an organic garden on the White House property, but he still signed the DARK Act to protect Monsanto and the chemical-agricultural industry’s profits from states passing legislature to label genetically modified foods. Such is the utter hypocrisy of our national policy makers. And it is futile to pray for an epiphany to awaken the corporate elite and our legislators from their insatiable need to acquire more stuff. Can we expect the commanders of finance and industry to give up their Wagyu Kobe or vintage cote de boeuf steaks, ostrich feathered handbags and massive consumption? It would be like trying to get a meth or crack addict to give up a drug dependency voluntarily. Good luck with that effort. If our leaders who profit from the military industrial complex are incapable of shedding a tear for dying mothers and children in Yemen and Palestine, how can we expect them to sacrifice their interests to protect poorer Americans from future cataclysmic climate events? For the elite, deaths associated with wildfires, superstorms, tornados and flash floods are the new collateral damage, an unfortunate necessity to keep the fossil fuel machine rolling.

In the meantime we are spiraling downward with the clock ticking. Whether it is a dozen years to fundamentally turn our energy consumption around as the conservative IPCC report allows, or the more thorough independent analyses giving us seven years or less, the time is rapidly approaching when nothing can be done. Party affiliation–Democratic, Republican, Libertarian or Green–will make absolutely no difference. Global warming doesn’t align with political ideologies. Nor do superstorms, floods, droughts and wildfires give a rat’s buttocks for human hubris or our illusions about any divinely ordained exceptionalism. The framing of climate change trends in the future depends entirely upon human beings and our consumption and psychological behaviors. We either harness our knowledge and resources or we don’t.

So where are the wise humans in higher positions of authority and policy-making to grasp the reins of a national climate change initiative? They are out shopping and supporting the very industries contributing to the Sixth Extinction and a hotter planet. To remain optimistic that they will do the right thing is foolishness. Consider that two major cities directly in the pathway for more devastating climate events — Miami and Houston — are also the two fastest booming regions for urban growth and entry of new residents. Yet nobody is warning new urban migrants about the future dangers they will face. The alternative would be to live a sustainable life in rural America instead of depending upon government to spend exorbitant dollars to fund energy-intensive cities in order to accommodate further urbanization. If no efforts to mobilize and shift the economy have been made since the warnings of the Limits of Growth report nearly five decades ago, we mustn’t waste time waiting for the corporate and political elite to have a change of heart. More than ever, as the IPCC report shows, we are capable of agreeing that the environment is the single most important problem facing us as a species. We understand, in no uncertain terms, that we must change. But we won’t.
In 2016, almost 11 percent of the world’s population, approximately 815 million people, suffered from chronic malnourishment. Tens of millions more are food-insecure. Last year almost 12 percent of Americans, 40 million people, were food-insecure, meaning they were unable to daily have sufficient food to sustain an active, healthy life for all family members. For a nation that prides itself as the wealthiest and most progressive in the world, this is unconscionable. But is also a clear sign that things will get far worse as national and personal debts continue to climb and extreme climate catastrophes increase. You’d be hard-pressed to find 15 countries living a sustainable existence, even those whose leaders admit in public that the environment is the most pressing problem of our time. Everyone wants to see the change, but no one wants to be it. Until a group of people with the intelligence and resources to lead a far-reaching shift in human consciousness steps up to the plate and gives voice to the existential quandary we all face, we remain paralyzed by the enormity of the problem and our own powerlessness as cogs in the neoliberal machine. This is the perfect recipe for disaster.

New Vaccines Still Cause Autism and Our Government Knows

Richard Gale and Gary Null
Progressive Radio Network, November 5, 2018
Today in the US and a growing number of other countries, the official policy is that any scientific study, regardless of its methodology, quality, author credentials, and peer-reviewed process, is summarily dismissed as incomplete, irrelevant or unsupported if it finds a connection between any vaccine or combination of vaccines and autism. Even when the CDC’s own immunologist, Dr. William Thompson, whistle-blows and provides thousands of pages of scientific data and research proving a vaccine-autism connection, the matter is rapidly swept under the rug. In the case of Dr. Thompson’s release of confidential documents to a Congressional subcommittee, the CDC intentionally concealed their evidence that African American boys under 36 months had a higher risk of autism after receiving the MMR vaccine.  The documents also proved the CDC has known for a long time that neurological tics, indicating brain disturbances, were associated with thimerosal-containing vaccines, such as the influenza vaccine.

We have also known for over fifteen years, thanks to a Freedom of Information Act filing, that CDC officials, scientists on the CDC’s vaccine advisory panel, the WHO and private pharmaceutical executives met secretly for two days at the Simpsonwood retreat center near Atlanta to deliberate on the Verstraeten research’s findings proving thimerosal’s role in the rise of autism. The meeting was held for the specific purpose of strategizing on how to prevent the findings from reaching the public – and how to spin and manipulate the data to disprove a vaccine-autism connection.

Private medical consultant Barry Rumack, MD, was hired by the FDA to review the mercury levels in children with an eye toward childhood vaccines. According to his findings, “There was no point in time from birth to approximately 16-18 months of age that infants were below the EPA guidelines for allowable mercury exposure…. In fact, according to the models, blood and body burden levels of mercury peaked at six months of age at a shocking high level of 120 ng/L. To put this in perspective, the CDC classifies mercury poisoning as blood levels of mercury greater than 10 ng/L.”  Dr. Rumack notes that the FDA chose to hide this finding from the public and higher health officials.[1]

Unfortunately, the vaccine-autism debate has been limited to only two issues: the MMR vaccine, following the controversies over Dr. Andrew Wakefield’s findings in the 1990s, and the toxicology of thimerosal. Concerns over thimersosal are waning because it has been removed from all vaccines except for the influenza shot, and even the flu vaccine cannot account for the rising autism rate. Since 2001, autism has steadily continued to rise. In 2000, it was 1 in 250 children. Today it is 1 in 36. The CDC argues that this proves thimerosal is not the culprit. It ignores a 2012 Australian study published in the journal Toxicological and Environmental Chemistry that there is a direct maternal transfer of ethylmercury from pregnant mothers to the embryo/fetus.[7] It remains American federal health policy for pregnant women to receive the flu shot, which may contain 25 micrograms of mercury.

For the current 2018-2019 flu season, approximately 80% of flu vaccines will be mercury-free. One would therefore expect autism rates to noticeably decrease; however, the opposite has been the case. So what else is contributing to the escalating autism epidemic? Might it be other vaccine ingredients that are being medically ignored as potential causal agents? Or might it be any or all of the three Hepatitis B, two Hepatitis A, two Rotavirus, five DpT, four Haemophilus influenzae, four pneumococcus, three polio, two MMR, two Varicella and the annual flu vaccinations children receive during the first five years of their lives?

The science clearly indicates that the autism epidemic is not and never has been solely caused by the influenza vaccine, which continues to use a high mercury level, and the MMR vaccine. Although the MMR vaccine continues to be a leading culprit in autism cases, the entire childhood vaccination regimen needs to undergo deep scrutiny. Studies point to the role of other vaccines as well.  Doctors at Stony Brook University’s Medical Center determined that male infants vaccinated with the Hepatitis B vaccine prior to 1999 have a three-fold higher autism rate than their non-vaccinated peers. The risk was greater among non-white boys.[6]

One damning case of government-industry knowledge about a vaccine-autism connection is a leaked December 16, 2011 document from GlaxoSmithKline, one of the world’s largest vaccine manufacturers. The text admits the corporation has been aware of the autism risk associated with its Infanrix vaccine, which combines diphtheria, tetanus, acellular pertussis, hepatitis B, inactivated polio and haemophilus influenza viruses. The report details adverse effects associated with autism, including encephalitis, developmental delays, altered states of consciousness, speech delays and other adverse reactions.[2]

While these revelations might be considered criminal cover-ups that directly threaten public health, they have had little effect on changing national policy over vaccine safety. Rather, the official denial of any possible association between vaccines and autism has hardened into an absolute dogma. And to date, there is not a single gold standard publication to refute with any certainty a vaccine-autism connection. Indeed, research from around the world proving a relationship increases, but almost none of it is coming from within American medical institutions.

Unfortunately, the American media has also accepted the federal health officials’ denial as absolute. Never do we hear the media questioning the veracity and scientific legitimacy of the vaccine doctrine. In fact, the media goes even further, embracing the principles of fake news to attack scientists, physicians and parents who provide evidence to the contrary. The media falsely frames the debate as a war between science versus parents. The argument is, what can parents possibly know about vaccine science? They aren’t medical professionals. Therefore, we present for readers to review and reflect upon the proof of an unequivocal relationship between vaccination and autistic disorders.

Unlike the US, the UK and Australia, the majority of the governmental health ministries in the modern industrialized world do not take an official national stance on the vaccine-autism controversy and other serious vaccine-related injuries. Only nineteen countries, including the US, have no-fault policies regarding the pharmaceutical industry for vaccine injury compensation programs. This is partially due to the American and British health agencies being heavily compromised by private vaccine business interests. The revolving doors and conflict of interests between these federal agencies and the pharmaceutical industry have been well documented. In the US, members of the CDC’s vaccine advisory community are deep in the pockets of pharmaceutical firms.
The vaccine market is one of the most toxic cash cow scams in operation. In 2016, Market Watch reported that the technological advisory firm Technavio released its Global Human Vaccines Market 2016-2020 analysis estimating that the vaccine market would reach $61 billion by 2020. At the start of 2016, it was worth $24 billion. The enormous projection increase is due to global initiatives to push vaccination compliance upon other nations and over 270 new vaccines, for both old and new indications, in development. The report also predicted that American pharmaceutical companies, notably Merck, Pfizer and Abbott, have the most to gain. The industry also benefits from the $10 billion pledged by Bill and Melinda Gates to increase vaccination rates and compliance worldwide.[a] Another culpable ingredient now used in most childhood vaccinations, and also associated with adverse neurological effects, is the adjuvant aluminum. Because the viruses in vaccines have been weakened or killed, they are unable to trigger a sufficient immune response in the body. Therefore, an adjuvant is used to hyperstimulate the immune system to start producing antibodies. Without an adjuvant, vaccines would largely be ineffective. The critical question raised by Generation Rescue co-founder and author of How to End the Autism Epidemic Jonathan “JB” Handley is, “Could an ingredient in vaccines whose purpose is to hyperstimulate the immune system trigger immune activation in the brain at critical points during brain development?”[b]

Since 2000, as thimerosal was being phased out, children’s aluminum adjuvant burden has increased, with more vaccines being added to the CDC’s vaccination schedule.[8] Aluminum compounds — either as aluminum hydroxide or aluminum phosphate — are the most used adjuvants found in vaccines, including the hepatitis A and B vaccines, DTP, Hib, Pneumococcus, and the HPV vaccine or Gardasil. Each is given to children, the HPV now starting at 10 years. Handley notes that in the mid-1980s, a fully vaccinated child would have received 1,250 mcg of aluminum before turning 18 years of age. Today, that same fully vaccinated child would be injected with over 4,900 mcg, a four-fold increase.[b] A child’s actual aluminum exposure is likely much greater because aluminum sulfate is used in the purification of municipal water. Drinking water may contain levels up to 1,000 mcg/L. An early 1996 study published in the American Academy acknowledged aluminum toxicity and adverse effects in premature infants receiving intravenous fluid therapy.[c]

A common argument against vaccine opponents, who blame aluminum for a variety of health conditions, including autism, is that the metal is the third most prevalent element on earth.  What they fail to acknowledge is our gastric-intestinal system is rather impervious to aluminum absorption.  About 2% of orally consumed aluminum from the environment is actually absorbed and much of this is later expelled from the body by other means.  However, injectable and intravenous aluminum compounds directly entering the bloodstream are a completely different matter. This is why the use of aluminum adjuvants in vaccines carries a high neurodegenerative and autism risk.  Aluminum neurotoxicity in preterm infants after intravenous feeding, which then contained alum, was observed back in 1997 and reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.[11] Thirty-nine percent of infants receiving aluminum-containing solutions developed learning problems upon entering schools compared to those receiving aluminum-free solutions.

Similar to thimerosal, aluminum is a heavy metal that contributes to oxidative stress leading to neuroinflammation and microgliosis, an intense adverse reaction of the central nervous system microglia that leads to a pathogenic results characteristic in some ASD conditions.[9] The National Library of Medicine lists over 2,000 references about aluminum’s toxicity to human biochemistry.  Aluminum’s dangers, often found as alum or aluminum hydroxide in vaccines and food preparations, have been known since 1912, when the first director of the FDA, Dr. Harvey Wiley, later resigned in disgust over its commercial use in food canning; he was also among the first government officials to ever warn about tobacco’s cancer risks back in 1927.[10] The medical profession cannot argue against aluminum’s ill effects on children.

Dr. James Lyons’Weiler at the Institute for Pure and Applied Knowledge has noted that aluminum levels found in vaccines are based on increasing immune efficacy and completely ignore the body weight safety of a child, especially infants and toddlers. But even more negligently, the safety codes for aluminum vaccine doses rely on dietary studies in mice and rats, not human children! Lyons-Weiler notes, “On Day 1 of life, infants receive 17 times more aluminum than would be allowed if doses were adjusted per body weight.”[d] The author is referring to the Hepatitis B vaccine given immediately after birth.
Infancy and the neonatal states are the most vulnerable periods of human development, a time when individuals are most susceptible to transfer and uptake of toxic metals such as aluminum and mercury — if a pregnant mother received a thimerosal-laced flu shot — into the brain tissue. Newborns also vary in size, organ development, genetic disposition, and mother’s environment in utero. Fetal elimination of toxins is also vastly different that the later stages of development in life. Research investigating the elimination of ethylmercury or aluminum in an adult has little relevance to that of a fetus. Nevertheless, vaccines adhere to a one-size-fits-all model for their formulation, and much of the argument for vaccine ingredient safety is solely based upon published studies on adults, not fetuses and infants. Worse, JB Handley’s investigations realized that “aluminum was grandfathered into pediatric vaccines without safety testing.”[b] In other words, injecting aluminum into the bloodstreams of small children has NEVER best tested. This is supported by Drs. Christopher Shaw and Lucjia Tomljenovic at the University of British Columbia’s Neural Dynamics group, who has been investigating aluminum toxicity diligently in their laboratory. In their paper “Mechanisms of Aluminum Adjuvant Toxicity and Autoimmunity,” the authors state, “It is somewhat surprising to find that in spite of over 80 years of use, the safety of AL adjuvants continues to rest on assumptions rather than scientific evidence. For example, nothing is known about the toxicology and pharmacokinetics of AL adjuvants in infants and children.”[f] Shaw and Tomljenovic have conducted extensive research over the years to determine the neurotoxicological effects of vaccine aluminum and its correlation with the rise of autism spectrum disorders. There is already a strong correlation between children in countries with the highest autism rates and aluminum levels from vaccine exposure. As stated above, the FDA established its measurement for aluminum allowance based upon the amount necessary to trigger the vaccine’s antigenicity rather than concerns about toxicity or safety. In an earlier 2009 study published in the Journal of Neuromolecular Medicine, Dr. Shaw and his team demonstrated that the extreme toxicity of aluminum adjuvant contributed to motor neuron death associated with Gulf War illness.[12] It was the first study to test aluminum in vaccines within a biological setting.[e]

Some of the research to discover aluminum-adjuvanted vaccines’ toxic levels and their adverse effects has found the following:
⦁ Aluminum inflicts strong neurotoxicity on primary neurons.[14] ⦁ Aluminum-laced vaccines increase the aluminum levels in murine brain tissue leading to neurotoxicity.[15] ⦁ Aluminum hydroxide, the most common form of adjuvant used in vaccines, deposits mostly in the kidney, liver and brain.[16] ⦁ Long term exposure to vaccine-derived aluminum hydroxide (which is today an ingredient in almost all vaccines) results in macrophagic myofascitis lesions.[17]

In 2002, researchers at Utah State University conducted a serological study of elevated measles antibodies and myelin basic protein (MBP) autoantibodies from 125 autistic children and 92 children in a normal control group. MBP has been identified as playing a significant role in the onset of autism. Ninety percent of the MMR antibody-positive autistic children were also positive for MBP autoantibodies. The researchers concluded that “an inappropriate antibody response to MMR, specifically the measles component thereof, might be related to the pathogenesis of autism.”[18] It is well known that in addition to metals such as mercury and aluminum, viral infections also cause oxidative stress that decreases methylation capacity, as is common in autism.[19]

The work of Dr. Roman Gherardi at the University of Paris has also recently come to light, showing that when an aluminum adjuvant is injected in a mouse, it will find its way to the brain a year later. The significance of this discovery would confirm that many cases of autism progress gradually, and symptoms do not necessarily appear immediate upon or several days after vaccination. Gherardi and his colleagues also discovered in a later 2015 study that aluminum adjuvant remains in the tissues far longer than originally assumed. The principle argument offered by the pro-vaccine community and health officials is that aluminum is quickly eliminated from the body. However, the Paris University study raises a serious concern over aluminum’s biopersistence, which Gherardi calls a “Trojan horse mechanism.” The adjuvant can lodge and accumulate in brain tissue for years, decades or perhaps a lifetime.[g] This should also further raise a question whether vaccines are now also contributing to the epidemic in dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease that has also been associated with brain neuroinflammation caused by the buildup of aluminum plaque. Back in the US, Dr. Carlos Pardo-Villamizar at Johns Hopkins University published his paper “Neuroglial Activation and Neuroinflammation in the Brain Patterns of Patients with Autism.” His conclusions: autistic brains are permanently inflamed. This was the first independent study to actually look at the brains of people with autism.[h]

Finally, this brings us to the critical research and findings of Prof. Christopher Exley at Keele University in the UK and their investigation into the brain tissue of autistic patients to measure aluminum levels. Exley’s finding, reproduced by JB Handley, is shocking. He reports,

“While the aluminum content of each of the five brains (of people with autism) was shockingly high, it was the location of the aluminum in the brain tissue which served as the standout observation…. The new evidence strongly suggests that aluminum is entering the brain in ASD via pro-inflammatory cells which have become loaded up with aluminum in the blood and/or lymph, much as has been demonstrated for monocytes at injection sites for vaccines including aluminum adjuvants.”

Why is this so critical? Because Exley has identified a biomolecular pathway directly leading to vaccine-caused brain inflammation. It is the monocytes or macrophages at the injection sites, the point where a child has been vaccinated, that have become the carriers of aluminum to the brain.[i]

Unlike the US and UK, in most nations independent and scientific integrity rules, and compensation for vaccine adverse events is the norm. In 2014, French authorities ruled there was a direct relationship between the Hepatitis B vaccine and a sudden rise in multiple sclerosis.[3] In 2012, after a long investigative trial, an Italian court ruled that the MMR vaccine caused brain injury leading to autism in the case of Valentino Bocca.[4] This ruling was intentionally blacked out by the American media. The Japanese government halted the MMR in 1993 due to rising autism rates. As of mid-2017, the US vaccine injury compensation court has paid out approximately $3.7 billion to families of vaccine-victimized children. The actual number of awarded cases nevertheless is very small compared to the large number of claims filed and subsequently denied. Many more compensations have been awarded to cases of vaccine-induced encephalitis or brain inflammation, a common event associated with regressive autism. Therefore, within the legal record, contrary to the adamant denials of the CDC and pro-vaxxers such as Paul Offit, vaccines do cause autism.
Let’s be clear. The health of Americans is declining dramatically. Annually, the statistics worsen. According to the World Health Organization, the US ranks 39th in the overall health of its population. And a large proportion of this poor ranking is made up of the failing health of American children, with autism and neuro-developmental disorders rising.

The public must demand a national debate between those who advocate for mandatory vaccination and those who challenge it. More than ever before, it is imperative to have this dialogue, as privately controlled interests infiltrate the halls of state legislators to lobby for state-wide mandates. It is highly predictable that autism rates will escalate as more vaccines come to market and states mandate the CDC’s vaccination schedule. The public needs to be educated about the science and ultimately decide for themselves. In a real democracy, an informed patient should have the freedom of choice in making his or her own health decisions. Today, there is no honest debate, no informed consent, no real science, no transparency of vaccine research, and no accurate statistics. Instead, we have federal health agencies, such as the CDC, on its own website, making false claims, advocating fake news. The powers of federal and state governments are being used to mandate the enforcement of vaccination in a totalitarian manner upon its citizens. This is not democracy, this is medical tyranny.

NOTES

[1] http://cdc.news/2017-02-02-americas-taxpayer-funded-bureaucracies-lie-about-vaccine-safety.html
[2] https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B-jYsdHZuRhCVXZUbFFlUzdfNGM/edit?pli=1
[3] https://healthimpactnews.com/2014/new-study-hepatitis-b-vaccination-in-france-sparked-a-wave-of-new-cases-of-ms/
[4] https://www.undergroundhealth.com/courts-quietly-confirm-mmr-vaccine-causes-autism/
[5] Sharpe MA, Livingston AD, Baskin DS. Thimerosal-derived ethylmercury is a mitochondrial toxin in human astrocytes: possible role of Fenton chemistry in the oxidation and breakage of mtDNA. Jounral of Toxicology vol. 2012, (2012)
[6] J Toxicol Environ Health A. 2010;73(24):1665-77. doi: 10.1080/15287394.2010.519317.
[7] Gallagher CM, Goodman MS. Hepatitis B vaccination of male neonates and autism diagnosis, NHIS 1997-2002. Toxicological and Environmental Chemistry. Volume 94, Issue 8, 2012
[8] Brown IA, Austin DW. Maternal transfer of mercury to the developing embryo/fetus: is there a safe level?
[9] Seneff S, Davidson RM, Liu JJ. Empirical Data Confirm Autism Symptoms Related to Aluminum and Acetaminophen Exposure. September 24, 2012
[10] http://www.fda.gov/aboutfda/whatwedo/history/centennialoffda/harveyw.wiley/default.html
[11] Bishop NJ, Morley R, Day JP, Lucas A. Aluminum neurotoxicity in preterm infants receiving intravenous-feeding solutions. New England Journal Medicine. May 29, 1997 336(22):1557-61
[12] Shaw C. Aluminum adjuvant linked to gulf war illness induces motor neuron death in mice. Neuromolecular Medicine, 2007
[13] Seneff S, Davidson RM, Liu JJ. Empirical Data Confirm Autism Symptoms Related to Aluminum and Acetaminophen Exposure. September 24, 2012
[14] Kawahara M et al. Effects of aluminum on the neurotoxicity of primary cultured neurons and on the aggregation of betamyloid protein. Brain Res. Bull. 2001, 55, 211-217
[15] Redhead K et al. Aluminum adjuvanted vaccines transiently increase aluminum levels in murine brain tissue. Pharacol. Toxico. 1992, 70, 278-280
[16] Sahin G et al. Determination of aluminum levels in the kidney, liver and brain of mice treated with aluminum hydroxide. Biol. Trace. Elem Res. 1994. 1194 Apr-May;41 (1-2): 129-35
[17] Gherardi M et al. Macrophagaic myofastitis lesions assess long-term. Brain. 2001. Vol. 124, No. 9, 1821-1831
[18] Singh VK, Lin SX, Newell E, Nelson C. Abnormal measles-mumps-rubella antibodies and CNS autoimmunity in children with autrism. J. Biomed Science. 2002 Jul-Aug;9(4):359-64.
⦁ [19]James J, Culter P, Melnyk S, Jernigan S, Janak L, Gaylor DW. Metabolic biomarkers of increased oxidative stress and impaired methylation capacity in children with autism. Am J Clin Nutr December 2004 vol. 80 no. 6 1611-1617
[20] http://www.jpands.org/vol9no2/bradstreet.pdf

[a] Big Pharma and Big Profits: The Multibillion Dollar Vaccine Market By Timothy Alexander Guzman Silent Crow News 26 January 2016 https://www.globalresearch.ca/big-pharma-and-big-profits-the-multibillion-dollar-vaccine-market/5503945
[b] Handley, JB. How to End the Autism Epidemic.
[c] Aluminum Toxicity in Infants and Children Pediatrics March 1996, VOLUME 97 / ISSUE 3 114(4):1126 http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/97/3/413
[d] James Lyons-Weiler and Robert Ricketson Reconsideration of the immunotherapeutic pediatric safe dose levels of aluminum Journal of Trace Elements in Medicine and Biology Volume 48, July 2018, Pages 67-73 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0946672X17300950#!