Mercury and autism -
Cinical data on biomedical treatment
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Mercury and autism, plus other clinical data on biomedical autism treatment
This is Part II of an article on clinical data on biomedical autism treatment from our clinic in Singapore, was presented by Dr Ang Poon Liat and John Yeo at the First Singapore Conference on Integrative Medicine, held on October 20 to 22, 2006.
To read Part I of this article, click here.
Also, click here to view a video on how mercury causes brain neuron degeneration. The video is produced by the Department of Physiology and Biophysics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Calgary.
Part II looks at the 20 best and 20 worst cases of autistic kids who received biomedical treatment at our clinic in Singapore during 2005 and 2006.
It also examines the possible link between mercury and autism, as well as whether other autism therapies, such as ABA, speech therapy, occupational therapy, etc could have had an effect on the effectiveness of biomedical autism treatment.
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For some years already, there has been much discussion among medical professionals as well as parents of autistic kids about a possible link between heavy metal toxicity and autism, particulary between mercury and autism.
In 2001, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the US National Academy of Sciences determined that there was a plausible link between mercury from thimerosal contained in childhood vaccines and the
recent dramatic increase in neurodevelopment disorders, such as autism.
In a 2003 study, Dr Jeff Bradstreet et al found that children with autism excreted 5 times as much mercury as the controls. His study used a 3-day, 9 dose, 10 mg/kg-dose DMSA treatment – which removes mercury from the boxdy – in roughly 200 children with autism and 19 controls.
Major sources of mercury include childhood vaccines, fish (particulary large, ocean fish), dental amalgams and pollution from coal-generated electric power stations.
Clinical data on mercury and autism
Of the 80 children who received biomedical autism treatment at our clinic, Singapore, 34 had their hair analysed for mercury.
The data revealed that 29 kids, or 85 percent, had elevated levels of mercury (more than 0.4µg / g).
In addition, it was found that a reduction in mercury levels correlated with improvements in ATEC scores. In other words, the condition of autistic children improved when mercury was reduced.
To learn more about ATEC scores, click here.
Data on mercury and autism was available for only
- 8 kids in the 20 best-functioning group
- 6 kids in the 20 worst-functioning group.
In the best functioning group, 6 out of 8 kids (75 percent) had more than 20 percent – in fact, more than 50 percent – reduction in mercury levels. Of the remaining two, one had a 5 percent reduction in mercury while the other had a small, 2 percent increase.
In the worst-functioning group, only 2 out of 6 kids had more than 20 percent reduction mercury. And two saw their mercury levels rise by several hundred percent!
These results are summarised in the table below:
| BEST-FUNCTIONING GROUP | ||
| PATIENT # | Change in mercury level | ATEC score |
| 1 | down 59 percent | 4 |
| 2 | up 2 percent | 7 |
| 3 | down 93 percent | 17 |
| 4 | down 46 percent | 18 |
| 5 | down 54 percent | 21 |
| 6 | down 70 percent | 26 |
| 7 | down 5 percent | 28 |
| 8 | down 58 percent | 30 |
| WORST-FUNCTIONING GROUP | ||
| PATIENT # | Change in mercury level | ATEC score |
| 1 | up 9 percent | 89 |
| 2 | down 84 percent | 86 |
| 3 | down 51 percent | 76 |
| 4 | down 14 percent | 73 |
| 5 | up 224 percent | 63 |
| 6 | up 700 percent | 61 |
The data suggests a strong link between the level of mercury and autism. While mercury is not the only factor, it appears to be a MAJOR factor.
Influence of other autism therapies
Besides a possible link between mercury and autism, clinical data from our clinic also provided some indication of the influence of other autism therapies as well as early intervention.
| USE OF OTHER THERAPIES | ||
| TYPES OF THERAPY | 20 best-functioning kids | 20 worst-functioning kids |
| ABA | 2 | 7 |
| SPEECH THERAPY | 8 | 7 |
| OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY | 11 | 9 |
| EARLY INTERVENTION | 7 | 5 |
| NO OTHER THERAPIES | 1 | 2 |
The pattern of attendance at other therapies appears SIMILAR for the 20 best functioning kids versus 20 worst functioning kids. All therapies thus probably contributed to improvements.
Besides ABA, however, there has been no evidence that other standard therapies are able to achieve the same levels of improvements such as those achieved through biomedical autism treatment, presented in Part I of this report (click here to read).
ABA is a very intensive form of therapy that requires the autistic child to spend at least 20 hours per week – and up to 40 hours or more – in 1-to-1 sessions with the therapist. Such therapy involves heavy commitment of time as well as money.
Interestingly. ABA did not feature strongly in the 20 best-functioning kids at our clinic, Singapore. Only 2 of the 20 best-functioning kids had ABA, compared with 7 of the 20 worst-functioning kids.