How to Take Part in Planning for the Future of Autism Research
There will be a meeting of the Strategic Plan Workgroup of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) under the Combating Autism Act of 2006 (P.L. 109-416) taking place on July 8th, 2008 from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. EST. The meeting will review and comment on the draft IACC Strategic Plan for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) Research. The meeting will be an online conference call with web-based presentation. Audio of this workgroup meeting will be accessible to the public via a teleconference phone link, and web-based access to information will be displayed at the meeting via computer/projector. To access the meeting, please visit the following web address: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/250792981Will you attend, listen in, or send email? What will you say to the IACC?The call-in phone number is: (888) 455-2920. The pass-code necessary to access the meeting is 3857872. The contact person for this meeting is:
Azik Schwechter, Ph.D.
National Institute of Mental Health, NIH
6001 Executive Boulevard, Room 8203a, MSC 9657 Rockville, MD 20852
(301) 443-7613
schwechtera@mail.nih.govA meeting of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee [under the Combating Autism Act of 2006 (P.L. 109-416)] will take place on Tuesday, July 15, 2008 from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on the campus of the National Institutes of Health at the Natcher Conference Center, Rooms E1 and E2, 45 Center Drive, Bethesda, MD. The meeting will be open to the public, with attendance limited to space available. The registration website can be found at this website.
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For the most part, such open door meetings hold little or no value. They are held to placate concerned people, but not much is actually done after the concerned people give their input.
This is why autism organizations worldwide are banding together. Autism organizations have done what most parents have not: Gotten the facts on autism from the researchers themselves. It is with this knowledge, backed up by published proof, that enables them to argue their cases and points so well.
Meanwhile, parents continue to serenely live in blissful ignorance as they subject their kids to hyperbaric oxygen chambers, gluten free diets which result in protein malnutrition, and chelation therapy which resulted in death in at least one case. Articles show measles outbreaks on the increase thanks to parents who still believe that thimerosal causes autism. (In fact, thimerosal has been removed from all but flu vaccines in the US for years, yet the number of new autism cases is on the INCREASE.)
En-masse and collectively, autism organizations can circumvent people who choose to live in ignorance, and frustrate the efforts of those who engage in unethical behaviors against autistics, and they can advocate for autistics themselves, who are often gagged by their parents.
Stated plainly: Parents often believe they know more about autism than the autistics themselves do, but in fact the opposite is true.
This was why it was autistics, not parents, who were able to organize a successful effort against “The Ransom Note Campaign” while parents, for the most part enthusiastically backed the Ransom Notes campaign.
Similar actions in the future will be taking place against other organizations and campaigns, I am sure.
Just think if Mr. Thomas D. Taylor was in charge there would be a cure for Autism already. Thimerosal has been the main culprit in identifying the cause of Autism primarily due to the fact that all to many parents have seen there children becoming lost soon after they have received their shots. Most parents still think it’s because of vaccinations [ Thimerosal or not!] I think it has to do with either a heredtary Autism weakness that is brought out or, that some children do not have the tolerance for these vaccine cocktails or having these shots to soon after birth.
Personally, I have a problem with the name of the “Combating Autism Act”. It sounds so violent. Instead of trying to “fight” Autism, why can we learn how to live with it? Instead of trying to conform people who are on the Autism scale to “act normal”, why can’t we adapt to meet their needs and comforts? More people should read the books by William Stillman, an adult diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome.