5 ms·

CDC to study vaccines and autism despite research showing no connection

50 points by rntn 2y ago

klipt 2y ago
Like how the USSR studied Lysenkoism? "Cook up some data to prove our hypothesis or you're fired"
- spacephysics 2y ago
  Theres evidence of that happening today at medical companies. [0][1] The way to do this while retaining trust is to gather data, release the methodology and data transparently, then have other labs reproduce the studies and see if they get the same results. RFK and others have touted they will be aggressively transparent. In my opinion, lets let them do it and see if their words match their actions. If it ends up being a connection, we should be able to reproduce with independent labs. If not, then proceed as normal. Given the historical mistrust with pharmaceutical industries, investing resources in a study such as this is low on the “wasteful spending” list. Worst case, its a scandal and we need to reevaluate how we handle vaccine testing. Best case it builds trust back in institutions. Classic scientific method has been tainted by corporate interest. [0] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02299-w https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02299-w [1] https://journals.library.columbia.edu/index.php/bioethics/article/view/8940 https://journals.library.columbia.edu/index.php/bioethics/ar...
  - fzeroracer 2y ago
    Why? Why do we need to waste money on something that's already been researched and confirmed to death? And why would you trust someone to be aggressively transparent when the first thing they do when entering office is outright lie? This isn't a 'big pharma doesn't want YOU to know the truth' problem. There have been multiple and independent studies done into this topic across the globe. The people perpetuating the line of vaccines causing autism are the dumbest motherfuckers on the planet with zero credentials and zero actual evidence backing it up.
  - pbronez 2y ago
    Yeah. If people are worried enough about something that they vote this hard about it, go ahead and do some more tests. Be super transparent. The real fight will be the communications about the results. Bend over backwards to explain everything extremely clearly. If RFK Jr oversees a milestone study that dramatically shows there is no vaccine/austism connection then maybe, just maybe, we can stop talking about it. Then again, flat earthers seem to lose faith in their experiments as soon as the results disagree with their preferred outcome…
    - klipt 2y ago
      I'd be more worried the results are something like "1% chance of saving your life and 0.001% chance of exacerbating autism symptoms" and RFK focuses entirely on the latter as an excuse to ban vaccines. We know vaccines can have negative side effects, but a reasonable person weighs those against the (larger) benefits. I don't think the current regime is very reasonable though.
  - watwut 2y ago
    > RFK and others have touted they will be aggressively transparent. In my opinion, lets let them do it and see if their words match their actions. They gave literal orders to stop reporting for CDC, so no, their actions do not match those words.
ujkhsjkdhf234 2y ago
I'm curious how this will turn out because this administration is so comfortable lying, if we get data that says there is a connection between vaccines and autism, will the assumption be that the data was manipulated and if so that completely evaporates the US trust on the world stage in science. I don't see how that's good for anyone, even Elon.
epistasis 2y ago
It is frightening how extremely politicized and wasteful all the science management has become in a shockingly short amount of time. The US is setting their entire science infrastructure on fire, leaving a massive opening for Europe, the UK, and especially China to take over. And the US does not consider any of those countries allies. It's baffling to imagine why this is happening unless those in control are actually actively working on foreign orders to weaken the US and its future.
- ujkhsjkdhf234 2y ago
  > It's baffling to imagine why this is happening unless those in control are actually actively working on foreign orders to weaken the US and its future. This is exactly what is happening. I feel like people have to be deliberating ignoring all the evidence that Elon and Trump are foreign assets at this point. It has been obvious for years and only more obvious with time.
  - jfengel 2y ago
    As insane as all of this is, I still have a hard time believing that they're foreign assets. They are doing what Trump was elected to do. The voters aren't Russian assets. Certainly the Russians have been doing their best to dis-inform the voters, but that doesn't need to come from the top. And they are largely doing it by parroting the standard Republican talking points for the last four decades. The Russians are, at most, exacerbating what they already wanted to believe. If anything, that's worse. They're not assets. They're doing this because they're genuine believers.
    - epistasis 2y ago
      But where do those voters get their beliefs? Who controls their information space, and who is injecting ideas? This is classic Russian strategy all over the world, and they are experts at the psychology and how to control parts of the population through division of that population. This might in fact be the only innovation that Russia can claim since the fall of the USSR: complete mastery of the technology of propaganda for controlling populations.
jfengel 2y ago
It is unclear whether the health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, who has long promoted anti-vaccine views, is involved in the planned CDC study or how it would be carried out. Uh-huh. How would this work? If they're going to do a literature review or meta-study, the conclusions are foregone. If they're going to do new studies, it will take years to get anything conclusive. Longer than the current political administration.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  This is the President who redirected a hurricane with a Sharpie. We shouldn't assume they're above just making shit up.
- throw16180339 2y ago
  They'll just make something up that supports the desired conclusions.
jisnsm 2y ago
[flagged]
- epistasis 2y ago
  We should cut wasteful spending! No not like that let's study the same thing that has been already studied to death until we get the answer we want!
  - kittikitti 2y ago
    There's not enough consensus and science communicators haven't been successful with convincing the American public about vaccines. This research will also be some of the most impactful science the CDC produces. If we bring all the deniers and skeptics to agree on a way to test it (e.g. double blind study), and then the results don't match their opinions, then continued denials makes their case unreasonable.
    - watwut 2y ago
      Frankly, issue is not with science communicators not being successfully. Vaccines were accepted... until conservatives started to lie lie lie and lie again. This is not about lacking research. This is about lying for profit.
    - snailmailstare 2y ago
      Right, if it is unreasonable a bunch of climate change denying creationists who think Canada is responsible for the US' drug problems will feel totally ashamed. Maybe they will even go to area 51 to ask for safe passage away from their shame in this galaxy.
    - comte7092 2y ago
      Rhetoric, not science, convinces people, at least at the level of the general public. It is nieve to think that an negative result will have any impact on the discourse here whatsoever.
- fzeroracer 2y ago
Freedom2 2y ago
> despite research showing no connection ... so far. What's the harm in pivoting research goals? A curious mind (like many have here on HN) will pursue all avenues, even those some may consider controversial and contradictory to our current beliefs. I, for one, am supportive of being curious like this, and I can only hope that it spurs curious discussion among the world, as per the HackerNews guidelines.
- sanktanglia 2y ago
  There is a huge difference between being curious and attempting to reverse engineer a connection which they are clearly doing now. Rfk already believes the lie that vaccines cause austism they just want studies they can put their thumb in to go "see the science isn't settled"
- dekhn 2y ago
  The harm is that if we spend more money following up a purported link between vaccines and autism, it will be taken away from people doing more useful research. We have limited time and funding, so we maintain a portfolio of research investments that are based on what we currently see as reasonable. "Curious" is not what the folks who want to research the link between vaccines and autism are. Weaponized is a better term.
awnird 2y ago
Grimly funny that America's race into facism includes its own version of Jüdische Physik
vfclists 2y ago
Whether there is a connection between vaccines and autism depends on whose research you believe. Did the Guardian present any research showing there is no evidence showing a connection between vaccines and autism, or are they insisting that it is so because they say so?
- trust_bt_verify 2y ago
  They seem to have only included credible research.
- dekhn 2y ago
  The Guardian is saying what they are saying because they trust the (previously) reliable health establishment's general consensus. Let's ignore any single article from the Guardian and instead talk about the larger public health question: "Do vaccines have side effects that are great enough to prevent their use"? It's a classic risk benefit problem with additional societal complexity (most vaccines work much better at high rates of vaccination) and a fair amount of subtlety to the outcomes (people who are vaccinated can still get sick, the vaccine itself can have short-term side-effects). Of course, there are many different vaccines and each needs to be treated more or less independently of any other in terms of risks. The technology used to create, store, and deliver the vaccine matters tremendously. We have had terrible outcomes with vaccines before, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutter_Laboratories#Cutter_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutter_Laboratories#Cutter_inc... was an example where an error cause a bunch of people to die after they were vaccinated for polio. But throughout my whole life, people, regardless of their political orientation, always thought the polio vaccine was a great thing. One exception: I worked with a guy whose parents didn't get him vaccinated for polio, and he was in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Anyway, back to the scientific story. As we know, you can't "prove a negative" (can't prove there is no vaccine/autism causative relationship), but scientifically speaking, nobody has been able to come up with a reliable experiment demonstrating that it does ("proving a positive"). This is not for lack of trying; the problem is inherently challenging, because running trials like this skirts ethical issues. What we do know is the original paper by Wakefield that purported the vaccine/autism relationship was fraudulent- contained false information - and more importantly, similar studies that were not fraudulent (to the best of our knowledge) did not replicate the results. And all of that led to a number of trials where a great deal of evidence of Wakefield's actions (which include close to half a million pounds in payments from a vaccine manufacturer) was presented and Wakefield was found guilty. Not sure where you're really going with your question other than to muddy some fairly clear waters. Nobody has shown replicable evidence that there is a causative relationship between vaccines and autism.
hndamien 2y ago
Is science supposed to use the scientific method to investigate anything? No sacred cows?
- nxobject 2y ago
  If science cost zero dollars and zero cents, sure. When it's public dollars you can see why every researcher needs strong preliminary evidence to justify dropping hundreds of NIH dollars on research. Waste, fraud, and abuse, no? Anyway, if you want a sacred cow to kill, a good one would be "we don't have enough evidence to draw conclusions about the risks and benefits of vaccines".
Eddy_Viscosity2 2y ago
Can't wait till Trump gives a flat earther a cabinet position and soon after a couple billion will do to studies showing the earth is flat.

50 points by rntn 2y ago

klipt 2y ago

Like how the USSR studied Lysenkoism? "Cook up some data to prove our hypothesis or you're fired"

spacephysics 2y ago
Theres evidence of that happening today at medical companies. [0][1] The way to do this while retaining trust is to gather data, release the methodology and data transparently, then have other labs reproduce the studies and see if they get the same results. RFK and others have touted they will be aggressively transparent. In my opinion, lets let them do it and see if their words match their actions. If it ends up being a connection, we should be able to reproduce with independent labs. If not, then proceed as normal. Given the historical mistrust with pharmaceutical industries, investing resources in a study such as this is low on the “wasteful spending” list. Worst case, its a scandal and we need to reevaluate how we handle vaccine testing. Best case it builds trust back in institutions. Classic scientific method has been tainted by corporate interest. [0] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02299-w https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02299-w [1] https://journals.library.columbia.edu/index.php/bioethics/article/view/8940 https://journals.library.columbia.edu/index.php/bioethics/ar...
- fzeroracer 2y ago
  Why? Why do we need to waste money on something that's already been researched and confirmed to death? And why would you trust someone to be aggressively transparent when the first thing they do when entering office is outright lie? This isn't a 'big pharma doesn't want YOU to know the truth' problem. There have been multiple and independent studies done into this topic across the globe. The people perpetuating the line of vaccines causing autism are the dumbest motherfuckers on the planet with zero credentials and zero actual evidence backing it up.
- pbronez 2y ago
  Yeah. If people are worried enough about something that they vote this hard about it, go ahead and do some more tests. Be super transparent. The real fight will be the communications about the results. Bend over backwards to explain everything extremely clearly. If RFK Jr oversees a milestone study that dramatically shows there is no vaccine/austism connection then maybe, just maybe, we can stop talking about it. Then again, flat earthers seem to lose faith in their experiments as soon as the results disagree with their preferred outcome…
  - klipt 2y ago
    I'd be more worried the results are something like "1% chance of saving your life and 0.001% chance of exacerbating autism symptoms" and RFK focuses entirely on the latter as an excuse to ban vaccines. We know vaccines can have negative side effects, but a reasonable person weighs those against the (larger) benefits. I don't think the current regime is very reasonable though.
- watwut 2y ago
  > RFK and others have touted they will be aggressively transparent. In my opinion, lets let them do it and see if their words match their actions. They gave literal orders to stop reporting for CDC, so no, their actions do not match those words.

ujkhsjkdhf234 2y ago

I'm curious how this will turn out because this administration is so comfortable lying, if we get data that says there is a connection between vaccines and autism, will the assumption be that the data was manipulated and if so that completely evaporates the US trust on the world stage in science. I don't see how that's good for anyone, even Elon.

epistasis 2y ago

It is frightening how extremely politicized and wasteful all the science management has become in a shockingly short amount of time. The US is setting their entire science infrastructure on fire, leaving a massive opening for Europe, the UK, and especially China to take over. And the US does not consider any of those countries allies. It's baffling to imagine why this is happening unless those in control are actually actively working on foreign orders to weaken the US and its future.

ujkhsjkdhf234 2y ago
> It's baffling to imagine why this is happening unless those in control are actually actively working on foreign orders to weaken the US and its future. This is exactly what is happening. I feel like people have to be deliberating ignoring all the evidence that Elon and Trump are foreign assets at this point. It has been obvious for years and only more obvious with time.
- jfengel 2y ago
  As insane as all of this is, I still have a hard time believing that they're foreign assets. They are doing what Trump was elected to do. The voters aren't Russian assets. Certainly the Russians have been doing their best to dis-inform the voters, but that doesn't need to come from the top. And they are largely doing it by parroting the standard Republican talking points for the last four decades. The Russians are, at most, exacerbating what they already wanted to believe. If anything, that's worse. They're not assets. They're doing this because they're genuine believers.
  - epistasis 2y ago
    But where do those voters get their beliefs? Who controls their information space, and who is injecting ideas? This is classic Russian strategy all over the world, and they are experts at the psychology and how to control parts of the population through division of that population. This might in fact be the only innovation that Russia can claim since the fall of the USSR: complete mastery of the technology of propaganda for controlling populations.

jfengel 2y ago

It is unclear whether the health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, who has long promoted anti-vaccine views, is involved in the planned CDC study or how it would be carried out. Uh-huh. How would this work? If they're going to do a literature review or meta-study, the conclusions are foregone. If they're going to do new studies, it will take years to get anything conclusive. Longer than the current political administration.

llamaimperative 2y ago
This is the President who redirected a hurricane with a Sharpie. We shouldn't assume they're above just making shit up.
throw16180339 2y ago
They'll just make something up that supports the desired conclusions.

jisnsm 2y ago

[flagged]

epistasis 2y ago
We should cut wasteful spending! No not like that let's study the same thing that has been already studied to death until we get the answer we want!
- kittikitti 2y ago
  There's not enough consensus and science communicators haven't been successful with convincing the American public about vaccines. This research will also be some of the most impactful science the CDC produces. If we bring all the deniers and skeptics to agree on a way to test it (e.g. double blind study), and then the results don't match their opinions, then continued denials makes their case unreasonable.
  - watwut 2y ago
    Frankly, issue is not with science communicators not being successfully. Vaccines were accepted... until conservatives started to lie lie lie and lie again. This is not about lacking research. This is about lying for profit.
  - snailmailstare 2y ago
    Right, if it is unreasonable a bunch of climate change denying creationists who think Canada is responsible for the US' drug problems will feel totally ashamed. Maybe they will even go to area 51 to ask for safe passage away from their shame in this galaxy.
  - comte7092 2y ago
    Rhetoric, not science, convinces people, at least at the level of the general public. It is nieve to think that an negative result will have any impact on the discourse here whatsoever.
fzeroracer 2y ago

Freedom2 2y ago

> despite research showing no connection ... so far. What's the harm in pivoting research goals? A curious mind (like many have here on HN) will pursue all avenues, even those some may consider controversial and contradictory to our current beliefs. I, for one, am supportive of being curious like this, and I can only hope that it spurs curious discussion among the world, as per the HackerNews guidelines.

sanktanglia 2y ago
There is a huge difference between being curious and attempting to reverse engineer a connection which they are clearly doing now. Rfk already believes the lie that vaccines cause austism they just want studies they can put their thumb in to go "see the science isn't settled"
dekhn 2y ago
The harm is that if we spend more money following up a purported link between vaccines and autism, it will be taken away from people doing more useful research. We have limited time and funding, so we maintain a portfolio of research investments that are based on what we currently see as reasonable. "Curious" is not what the folks who want to research the link between vaccines and autism are. Weaponized is a better term.

awnird 2y ago

Grimly funny that America's race into facism includes its own version of Jüdische Physik

vfclists 2y ago

Whether there is a connection between vaccines and autism depends on whose research you believe. Did the Guardian present any research showing there is no evidence showing a connection between vaccines and autism, or are they insisting that it is so because they say so?

trust_bt_verify 2y ago
They seem to have only included credible research.
dekhn 2y ago
The Guardian is saying what they are saying because they trust the (previously) reliable health establishment's general consensus. Let's ignore any single article from the Guardian and instead talk about the larger public health question: "Do vaccines have side effects that are great enough to prevent their use"? It's a classic risk benefit problem with additional societal complexity (most vaccines work much better at high rates of vaccination) and a fair amount of subtlety to the outcomes (people who are vaccinated can still get sick, the vaccine itself can have short-term side-effects). Of course, there are many different vaccines and each needs to be treated more or less independently of any other in terms of risks. The technology used to create, store, and deliver the vaccine matters tremendously. We have had terrible outcomes with vaccines before, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutter_Laboratories#Cutter_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutter_Laboratories#Cutter_inc... was an example where an error cause a bunch of people to die after they were vaccinated for polio. But throughout my whole life, people, regardless of their political orientation, always thought the polio vaccine was a great thing. One exception: I worked with a guy whose parents didn't get him vaccinated for polio, and he was in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Anyway, back to the scientific story. As we know, you can't "prove a negative" (can't prove there is no vaccine/autism causative relationship), but scientifically speaking, nobody has been able to come up with a reliable experiment demonstrating that it does ("proving a positive"). This is not for lack of trying; the problem is inherently challenging, because running trials like this skirts ethical issues. What we do know is the original paper by Wakefield that purported the vaccine/autism relationship was fraudulent- contained false information - and more importantly, similar studies that were not fraudulent (to the best of our knowledge) did not replicate the results. And all of that led to a number of trials where a great deal of evidence of Wakefield's actions (which include close to half a million pounds in payments from a vaccine manufacturer) was presented and Wakefield was found guilty. Not sure where you're really going with your question other than to muddy some fairly clear waters. Nobody has shown replicable evidence that there is a causative relationship between vaccines and autism.

hndamien 2y ago

Is science supposed to use the scientific method to investigate anything? No sacred cows?

nxobject 2y ago
If science cost zero dollars and zero cents, sure. When it's public dollars you can see why every researcher needs strong preliminary evidence to justify dropping hundreds of NIH dollars on research. Waste, fraud, and abuse, no? Anyway, if you want a sacred cow to kill, a good one would be "we don't have enough evidence to draw conclusions about the risks and benefits of vaccines".

Eddy_Viscosity2 2y ago

Can't wait till Trump gives a flat earther a cabinet position and soon after a couple billion will do to studies showing the earth is flat.