Heavy metals may be implicated in autism
* 27 May 2006
URINE samples from hundreds of French children have yielded evidence for a link between autism and exposure to heavy metals. If validated, the findings might mean some cases of autism could be treated with drugs that purge the body of heavy metals.
Samples from children with autism contained abnormally high levels of a family of proteins called porphyrins, which are precursors in the production of haem, the oxygen-carrying component in haemoglobin. Heavy metals block haem production, causing porphyrins to accumulate in urine. Concentrations of one molecule, coproporphyrin, were 2.6 times as high in urine from children with autism as in controls.
Autism is thought to have a number of unknown genetic and environmental causes. Richard Lathe of Pieta Research in Edinburgh, UK, says he has found one of these factors. "It's highly likely that heavy metals are responsible for childhood autistic disorder in a majority of cases," he claims. The study will appear in Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology.
Lathe says these porphyrin metabolites bind to receptors in the brain and have been linked with epilepsy and autism.
The researchers restored porphyrin concentrations to normal in 12 children by treating them with "chelation" drugs that mop up heavy metals and are then excreted. It is not yet known whether the children's symptoms have eased, but Lathe cites anecdotal reports suggesting the drugs might do some good.
From issue 2553 of New Scientist magazine, 27 May 2006, page 21
Autism, Brain, and Environment
In Autism, Brain, and Environment (2006, ISBN 1-84310-438-5), Lathe proposes that autism is largely a disorder of the limbic brain, balancing evidence that environmental factors may trigger autism with a recognition of genetic vulnerability. In his book, he analyzes biomedical evidence pertaining to the genetics, endocrinology, immunology, toxicology, virology, and neuroscience essential for understanding the causes of autistic spectrum disorders (ASDs). Lathe contends that the autism epidemic and rise in ASDs has resulted from increased exposures to environmental toxics, combined with predisposition to genetic vulnerability. While nothing in his book contradicts research implicating genetic vulnerability as an underlying cause of ASDs, Lathe instead uses evidence showing autism is more prevalent in urban than rural areas to bolster his contention that pollution is a likely culprit as well. Lathe argues that most children on the autistic spectrum have additional physiological problems, and that these, rather than being separate from the psychiatric aspects of ASDs, can produce and worsen the condition. “I aim to show how genetics and environmental factors might come together,” he says. Lathe's book also describes a cycle of disease that begins with exposure to certain brain damaging toxins, in particular affecting the limbic system, which in turn can lead to autistic symptoms and collateral physical ailments, such as autistic enterocolitis, leading to further brain damage. With sixty percent of families with a child on the autistic spectrum using casein and/or gluten-free diets, Lathe believes that parents are correct in thinking that biomedical intervention can help their children, and that some of these interventions may effectively address environmental causes of ASDs.
http:// en.wikip edia .org/wiki/Ri chard_Lathe
This shows that he may be biased, as he is selling a book on the subject.
And also:
Pieta Research was founded in 2002 by Richard Lathe
ht tp:/ /ww w.pieta-resea rch.or g/1Pie ta.htm
People respect the scientific debate in New Scientist so this could mean serious problems for autistic children who may end up suffering chelation as a result.
:mad:
People respect the scientific debate in New Scientist so this could mean serious problems for autistic children who may end up suffering chelation as a result.
:mad:
Like giving a lunatic a machine gun...
It is not yet known whether the children's symptoms have eased, but Lathe cites anecdotal reports suggesting the drugs might do some good.
anecdotal reports kind of like these?
http://www.crystalinks.com/hollowearth.html
So now we have Porphyria, rather than Autism...I wish they'd make up their minds...
*sighs*
Alison
I am so very disappointed with the science magazine "New Scientist" for publishing this nonsense in the first place. I really thought it was more reputable and scientific than that. Should someone fire the magazine a letter about this article? Amy?
I was fascinated to read that levels of "porphyrins" are "abnormal" in some autistics. One of my all-time heroes is the professor who's name was made famous by the Cochrane Collaboration. He is a hero to many people in the medical profession, due to his revolutionary ideas which he put into practice. I have always greatly admired Archie Cochrane's sceptical and logical way of thinking, and his willingness to question established authorities and ideas. I feel that he had the same attitudes and way of thinking that I have, so I have wondered if he was in any way linked to the autistic spectrum. Prof Cochrane was disabled by a neurological condition that ran in his family (his sister was also affected). He never married, but was happy enough to live the single life. He was once psychoanalysed, but he eventually came to think of this as a load of rot. I recall that the condition he had was porphyria. Isn't this so so interesting?
I don't think there is any evidence that porphyria is caused by environmental exposure.
King George the Third of Britain is now widely believed by doctors who have read of his condition to have had Porphyria. I wonder how someone living back then was exposed to toxic levels of mercury? Hatters at the time had an occupational danger of mood swings and eccentric behaviour due to using mercury in the manufacture of hats, but he didn't make hats, I believe.
Alison
In those days, and up until the late 1800s at least, mercury, antimony and to a lesser degree, arsenic, were used very widely in everyday medicine, for instance, a mixture of finely divided metallic mercury and chalk, used to be given to children who were teething, and mercurous chloride (calomel) was given for all sorts of things, so its not at all improbable that he was treated with mercury in one or more forms.
Medicine those days, wasn't quite as safe as it is now....