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This article fails to address the huge rise in autism diagnoses, all about the same time.

Thimerosol may not be the culprit. But something most certainly is. And the move toward infant vaccination did occur at about that time.

WSJ does not, in this article at least, give a credible accounting of the facts as they are known.

This is a pro-pharmaceuticals hit-piece, more about pharm profits than public health.

"WSJ does not, in this article at least, give a credible accounting of the facts as they are known. This is a pro-pharmaceuticals hit-piece, more about pharm profits than public health."

Hardly. The WSJ isn't trying to give a credible accounting of the facts in an editorial. There's plenty of other accounts elsewhere; this is an editorial. It isn't a pro-pharma hit piece at all. And statistics can be your enemy: the huge rise in diagnoses coincided with the shift away from leaded gasoline too. More accurately, the rise in diagnoses was the result of greater awareness and regular reporting to public health authorities, which indicated a statistical uptick. We have no idea whether there were greater or fewer cases before the 1970s.

I witnessed the hysteria (and I don't use that word lightly) in Britain in 2002 when the medical community and government insisted that the MMR vaccines were safe and the ignorant parents insisted on avoiding any M, M or R vaccines. Within weeks the measels cases got out of control in South London through the day care centers. Is it really worth the quite large risk of getting measels, mumps or rubella and endangering the child's life on a rumor that the medical community (not just big pharma) has shown to be false?

Wired Magazine had a good piece several years ago pointing out that the largest cases of Autism in the United States are centered in two places: the Silicon Valley area and Rochester, New York. The scientists their reporter spoke to suggested that there could very well be a genetic link to mathematic aptitude not vaccination.