I just don’t think the courts are the place to determine causality when scientists are very badly divided on this issue.
The trick in studying this is the difficulty in finding a population of never-vaccinated children. Certainly it’s not possible to do a double-blind study because you can’t placebo people who are expecting to be vaccinated.
But there’s some interesting findings out of the Amish:
http://www.upi.com/ConsumerHealthDaily/view.php?StoryID=20060728-111605-3532r
“In our anecdotal and unscientific reporting, the rate of autism seemed strikingly lower in never-vaccinated children, although those findings cannot be considered conclusive or convincing. For that, a scientific study would be needed, as proposed in the new legislation.”
Mind you, there a sample biases of gene pool, diet and other environmental factors at play here, but it’s interesting.
It’s just hard to trust the “science” because the so called scientists doing the research are usually bankrolled by the folks who could lose a bundle of money if a link is found between the vaccine or thimerosol and autism