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Looks like difference of vitamin D levels were not significant in the 2010 study between mothers of Somali origin with or without a child with autism. http://o

by code51 9y ago

Looks like difference of vitamin D levels were not significant in the 2010 study between mothers of Somali origin with or without a child with autism. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1651-2227.2010.01755.x/full http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1651-2227.2010.... Do you have another source for the statement in the first paragraph?

trhway 9y ago
>between mothers of Somali origin with or without a child with autism "increasing chances" and "necessarily leading to" are 2 different things. Consider for example smoking and cancer - among people who smoke the same amount of tobacco some will get cancer, some will not. That doesn't falsify the fact that smoking increases the chances of the cancer. You link is actually enough here. From your link : "Results: Between 12 and 17 mothers from the different groups accepted to participate, both groups of mothers of Somali origin had significantly lower values of 25-hydroxyvitamin D compared with Swedish mothers. " So, i'm not sure what of the 2 well established facts you are arguing against : 1. Somalis in Sweden have very low D 2. Somali children born in Sweden have much higher autism rate. Of course correlation isn't necessarily causation, yet the correlation (both - between populations as well as inside the Somali mothers population) is clearly stated in your link (have you read it yourself?) : "Conclusion: Our findings of low vitamin D levels in Somali women entail considerable consequences in a public health perspective. The observed tendency, i.e. the lowest values in mothers of Somali origin with a child with autism was in the predicted direction, supporting the need for further research of vitamin D levels in larger samples of Somali mothers of children with and without autism."
- code51 9y ago
  I wasn't trying to argue against. Just trying to understand better. 1. Yes, Somalis in Sweden have very low D. That is quite obvious [from Table 1] after winter. 2. Yes, Somali children born in Sweden have higher rate (according to this study: 17 in 2437 [0.7%] for Somali background, 484 in 250565 [0.19%] for non-Somali): http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8749.2008.03036.x/full http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8749.2008.... However we should also consider the effect of other compounding factors about parents coming from Somali. Here: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10803-017-3232-z https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10803-017-3232-z "Results lend support to previous studies that found higher rates of ASD intellectual disability in children of immigrants from low human resource index countries compared to other groups." coming from Somali also means coming from a low human resource index country. all kinds of air/water pollutants and chemicals/pesticides might be at play -together with- vitamin D deficiency. Vitamin D effect itself is hard to isolate from just this. Further studies need additional data about these other factors (air pollution, exposed chemicals etc)
  - code51 9y ago
    I'm starting to think a study focusing on Swedish mothers with really low D (similar to Somali mothers) with Swedish mothers with high D would solve all the mystery here.
  - trhway 9y ago
    >"Results lend support to previous studies that found higher rates of ASD intellectual disability in children of immigrants from low human resource index countries compared to other groups." >coming from Somali also means coming from a low human resource index country. all kinds of air/water pollutants and chemicals/pesticides might be at play -together with- vitamin D deficiency. >Vitamin D effect itself is hard to isolate from just this. If anything, your link confirms vitamin D theory even more :) What is the most common trait for all these low human resource index countries? They are closer to equator, i.e darker skin of the population. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Dev... It is very well established epidemiological fact that darker skin immigrants have noticeably lower vitamin D in higher altitudes (i.e where the higher developed countries are that they immigrate into).
    - code51 9y ago
      If by "theory" you mean "darker skin in higher altitudes -> low vitamin D", I don't have anything against that. If by "theory" you mean "low vitamin D -> autism", you're reading science wrong (by only using correlation when reasoning about it). You have to control for other factors in Somali population. That's how you do proper research. In its current form, as the researchers themselves point out, this says that a future study is needed. Let me repeat: you might be entirely right but "this correlation supports the theory better" is not scientific evidence. It's just a hint to direct research. As I said, if they find Swedish mothers with really low vitamin D and compare with Swedish mothers with high vitamin D, that would say a lot more.

by code51 9y ago

trhway 9y ago

>between mothers of Somali origin with or without a child with autism "increasing chances" and "necessarily leading to" are 2 different things. Consider for example smoking and cancer - among people who smoke the same amount of tobacco some will get cancer, some will not. That doesn't falsify the fact that smoking increases the chances of the cancer. You link is actually enough here. From your link : "Results: Between 12 and 17 mothers from the different groups accepted to participate, both groups of mothers of Somali origin had significantly lower values of 25-hydroxyvitamin D compared with Swedish mothers. " So, i'm not sure what of the 2 well established facts you are arguing against : 1. Somalis in Sweden have very low D 2. Somali children born in Sweden have much higher autism rate. Of course correlation isn't necessarily causation, yet the correlation (both - between populations as well as inside the Somali mothers population) is clearly stated in your link (have you read it yourself?) : "Conclusion: Our findings of low vitamin D levels in Somali women entail considerable consequences in a public health perspective. The observed tendency, i.e. the lowest values in mothers of Somali origin with a child with autism was in the predicted direction, supporting the need for further research of vitamin D levels in larger samples of Somali mothers of children with and without autism."

code51 9y ago
I wasn't trying to argue against. Just trying to understand better. 1. Yes, Somalis in Sweden have very low D. That is quite obvious [from Table 1] after winter. 2. Yes, Somali children born in Sweden have higher rate (according to this study: 17 in 2437 [0.7%] for Somali background, 484 in 250565 [0.19%] for non-Somali): http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8749.2008.03036.x/full http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8749.2008.... However we should also consider the effect of other compounding factors about parents coming from Somali. Here: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10803-017-3232-z https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10803-017-3232-z "Results lend support to previous studies that found higher rates of ASD intellectual disability in children of immigrants from low human resource index countries compared to other groups." coming from Somali also means coming from a low human resource index country. all kinds of air/water pollutants and chemicals/pesticides might be at play -together with- vitamin D deficiency. Vitamin D effect itself is hard to isolate from just this. Further studies need additional data about these other factors (air pollution, exposed chemicals etc)
- code51 9y ago
  I'm starting to think a study focusing on Swedish mothers with really low D (similar to Somali mothers) with Swedish mothers with high D would solve all the mystery here.
- trhway 9y ago
  >"Results lend support to previous studies that found higher rates of ASD intellectual disability in children of immigrants from low human resource index countries compared to other groups." >coming from Somali also means coming from a low human resource index country. all kinds of air/water pollutants and chemicals/pesticides might be at play -together with- vitamin D deficiency. >Vitamin D effect itself is hard to isolate from just this. If anything, your link confirms vitamin D theory even more :) What is the most common trait for all these low human resource index countries? They are closer to equator, i.e darker skin of the population. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Dev... It is very well established epidemiological fact that darker skin immigrants have noticeably lower vitamin D in higher altitudes (i.e where the higher developed countries are that they immigrate into).
  - code51 9y ago
    If by "theory" you mean "darker skin in higher altitudes -> low vitamin D", I don't have anything against that. If by "theory" you mean "low vitamin D -> autism", you're reading science wrong (by only using correlation when reasoning about it). You have to control for other factors in Somali population. That's how you do proper research. In its current form, as the researchers themselves point out, this says that a future study is needed. Let me repeat: you might be entirely right but "this correlation supports the theory better" is not scientific evidence. It's just a hint to direct research. As I said, if they find Swedish mothers with really low vitamin D and compare with Swedish mothers with high vitamin D, that would say a lot more.