[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 52 (Thursday, April 3, 2008)]
[House]
[Pages H1996-H1997]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       NEED FOR SAFE VACCINATIONS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BURTON of Indiana. Mr. Speaker, one of the things that's made the 
United States and the world healthier than at any period of the world 
has been vaccinations. Vaccinations have stopped so many dreaded 
diseases from killing hundreds of thousands, millions of people, it's 
not even funny.
  But while vaccines have saved so many lives, there have also been 
some shortcomings in vaccines. When I was chairman of the Government 
Reform and Oversight Committee, I held hearings on autism; and we have 
gone from 1 in 10,000 children who are autistic to 1 in 150. We have an 
absolute epidemic of autism in this country, and hundreds of thousands 
of families have been affected and they have nowhere to turn.
  Because of that, we passed in the 1980s what was called the Vaccine 
Injury Compensation Fund, and it was supposed to take care of families 
and people who were injured by vaccines and had nowhere to turn. Well, 
that was supposed to be a nonconfrontational system. But unfortunately, 
there has been nobody, up until recently, who has been paid out of the 
vaccine compensation fund. And one of the reasons is because Health and 
Human Services and the Food and Drug Administration have said that the 
mercury in vaccines, 50 percent of it is a preservative called 
thimerosal. The mercury in vaccines did not cause autism, and there 
have been a lot of studies that have come out saying the mercury in the 
vaccines was not a root cause of the autism crisis that we have in this 
country.
  In fact, in 2004, there was a report that said categorically that the 
thimerosal, the mercury in the vaccines, was not a cause of autism. And 
yet, just recently, in the Journal of Child Neurology, an article 
published by Drs. DeSoto and Hiltlan, both doctors, reexamined that 
study and they said it was in error and that there was no doubt that 
the mercury in the vaccinations was a contributing factor to the 
epidemic of autism that we have in this country.
  As a result of that and other information, some of the test cases 
that have been raised and are in progress right now have come before 
the special master. And just recently, a young

[[Page H1997]]

lady who was damaged by vaccinations, a young lady from Georgia, Hannah 
Poling, her case went before the special master, and the Justice 
Department had five attorneys who said that this young lady was not 
damaged in part by the mercury in the vaccinations. This young lady got 
five vaccinations in one day, most of which contained thimerosal, which 
is 50 percent ethyl-mercury. Shortly thereafter, she became autistic.
  The same thing happened to my grandson. He got nine shots in one day, 
and within a short time, he became autistic. I won't go into all of the 
details of what happens when you become autistic, but it is certainly a 
tremendous change in the lives of not only the child but the entire 
family.
  But anyhow, this case went before the special master along with two 
others. And just recently, a decision was made in that case by the 
special master; and in spite of the evidence that was presented by the 
Health and Human Services, the FDA, and the Justice Department, the 
special master awarded damages to this family and said that this girl 
was damaged by the vaccination. And the case was brought because this 
young lady took several shots, five in one day, that had mercury in 
them. So this is the first case that shows, in my opinion, that the 
mercury in vaccines is a contributing factor to the epidemic of autism 
that we have in this country.
  The reason I come before the floor tonight to talk about this is it's 
time that we got mercury out of all vaccinations. We've been able to 
get it out of most of the children's vaccinations, but it's still in 
some. I think it is in three or four now. It needs to be out of all 
children's vaccinations.
  We have had an increase in the cases of Alzheimer's in this country, 
and that's because in part, in my opinion, because mercury is in almost 
all of the adult vaccinations. When you get a flu shot or almost any 
kind of a shot, you're getting ethyl-mercury injected into your body. 
Now if we eat fish, they tell us to be careful because there's mercury 
in the fish and it may cause neurological damage. Yet, we are injecting 
it into ourselves and into our children through vaccinations.
  It's high time that the Food and Drug Administration, Health and 
Human Services, and the pharmaceutical industry decides we want 
vaccinations because they give us a better quality of life and makes us 
live longer and prevents us from getting diseases, but we have to get 
mercury out of all vaccinations out of anything that goes into the 
human body; and until we do that, the problems with autism and other 
neurological diseases will continue to rise.
  So I would like to say to my colleagues, I hope you will pay 
attention to this special order tonight. We have to get mercury out of 
all vaccinations. We can do it with single-shot vials that will not 
require that preservative; and once we do that, I think we will have a 
much better quality of life, and people will be able to get 
vaccinations without worrying about becoming autistic.

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