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Vermonters Take on Children’s Health Defense National Conference in Austin, Texas
Vermont Daily Chronicle reported:
Over the weekend I attended the Children Health Defense national conference, The Moment of Truth, in Austin, Texas. Let me just start by thanking everyone who supported the trip financially and has supported OGA’s mission from the start. This was a very successful event for us and was well worth your support. This was an incredible event that featured speakers on extremely important topics including vaccine safety, autism, medical freedom, the surveillance control grid, an increasingly cashless society, and transhumanism.
Speakers included Sen. Rand Paul, Russell Brand, Dr. Peter McCullough, Del Bigtree, Bret Weinstein, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, Dr. Joe Ladapo, and so many more. Overall the energy was very high. I personally was very inspired by many of the moms and families I met with children who had autism. I learned a lot about autism over this weekend. We have barely scratched the surface on understanding what autism really is, how it is caused, how it can be prevented, and managed.
My biggest takeaway was that people with autism are genuinely no different than any of us and that they are fully aware and capable of understanding things but their speech and motor skills have been severely damaged by vaccines and other poor medical practices. A lot of the symptoms of anger and rage that we see from autistic children and adults comes from the frustration of understanding what is happening but not having the ability to express themselves.
One event in particular stuck out to me was their panel of Spellers. “Our panel of Spellers, courageous non-speaking individuals with autism, brought the room to both tears and laughter,” writes Children Health Defense on their X page. “Through the power of spelling, they shared their struggles, dreams, and hopes, reminding us what’s possible when we listen deeply and take every mind seriously.”
Cheaper Medicines, Free Beach Trips: U.S. Health Plans Tap Prescriptions That Feds Say Are Illegal
Every step is a struggle for Bruce Zimmerman, whose health has been deteriorating since he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis eight years ago. In 2019, Zimmerman said, his then-employer offered him an opportunity that sounded irresistible: He and his wife, Becky, could take all-expense-paid trips to the Cayman Islands and the Bahamas to retrieve the medication he needed, Avonex, a drug made by Biogen that currently retails in the U.S. for $2,159 per weekly dose. Through Florida-based PriceMDs, which paid for the couple’s travel, Zimmerman’s Avonex would be free of charge.
PriceMDs is part of a growing class of businesses called alternative funding programs, or AFPs, which promise to connect patients with more-affordable options for accessing specialty medications that often come at very high costs. AFPs contract with employer-sponsored health plans to offer coverage on specialty drugs.
While PriceMDs has taken the business model to another level, flying patients such as Zimmerman to other countries to bring back their drugs themselves, AFPs more typically obtain the medications overseas for significantly less than what they cost in the U.S. and get them shipped directly to patients. The savings can at times be so large that AFPs, at least in the case of PriceMDs, can send patients on Caribbean trips and still make money.
CCHR Warns Disinformation Undermines Psychiatric Drug Death Toxicology Reporting
The Citizens Commission on Human Rights International (CCHR), a 50-year mental-health industry watchdog, is urging legislators to ensure that policy decisions are grounded in evidence — not in misinformation from vested interests. The appeal follows testimony before the Wyoming Joint Labor, Health & Social Services Committee, which recently considered but postponed sponsorship of the proposed Wyoming Death Data Collection and Toxicology Transparency Act.
The bill — similar to a recent Tennessee law — would require coroners to test for and report the presence of psychiatric drugs in suicides and violent deaths — using only anonymous, aggregate data. This information would provide lawmakers with transparent, population-level evidence that can improve public safety.
Jan Eastgate, president of CCHR International, said there was “a shocking amount of disinformation presented to lawmakers in the hearing by state officials and psychiatric representatives opposing this important public-awareness bill.” She added, “Such resistance reflects a broader national pattern of efforts by psychiatric-pharmaceutical interests to suppress information about the risks associated with these drugs.”
Dads’ Valproate Use May Raise Red Flags for Kids’ Neurodevelopment
Children whose dads took valproate up to three months before conception were more likely to have neurodevelopmental disorders, data from Denmark, Norway, and Sweden showed. Compared with children whose fathers took lamotrigine or levetiracetam, kids with fathers exposed to valproate had a higher risk of a neurodevelopmental disorder diagnosis up to age 12 years, reported Sandrine Colas, MPH, Ph.D., of Sanofi in Gentilly, France, and co-authors.
Congenital malformation risk did not differ between exposure groups, the researchers wrote in JAMA Network Open. Data for lamotrigine and levetiracetam were pooled in both analyses.
“Our cohort study using sources with paternal linkage, is the first, to our knowledge, to observe an increased neurodevelopmental disorder risk in offspring of valproate-exposed fathers compared with offspring of lamotrigine or levetiracetam-exposed fathers,” Colas and colleagues wrote.
Conflicting Advice on Covid Shots Likely to Ding Already Low Vaccine Rates, Experts Warn
More than three-quarters of American adults didn’t get a covid shot last season, a figure that health care experts warn could rise this year amid new U.S. government recommendations.
The COVID-19 vaccine was initially popular. About 75% of Americans had received at least one dose of the first versions of the vaccine by early 2022, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data shows.
But only about 23% of American adults got a COVID-19 shot during the 2024-25 virus season, well below the 47% of American adults who got a flu shot. The vaccination rates for flu, measles, and tetanus are also going down.
Where Vaccine Support Stands
A new survey from Republican pollster Alex Lundry — on behalf of centrist nonprofit Centerline Liberties — found that 70% of people said they keep their children up to date on vaccines. In comparison, 7% said their children had skipped some vaccines, and 22% said they don’t keep their children up to date at all. The poll was shared exclusively with Pulse.
Most respondents were supportive of vaccination across the board, including Republicans. But more than a third of GOP respondents expressed some skepticism.
Of Republicans, 58% agreed with the statement that “vaccines are one of the most important tools for preventing disease and protecting public health. Their benefits outweigh any potential risks.”
But 42% of GOP respondents said they agreed with the statement, “Vaccines carry risks and uncertainties that make me question their safety and effectiveness. People should be cautious about relying on them for health protection.” Lundry found that 70% of respondents were comfortable with some government vaccine requirements and recommendations, while 30% said it should be left exclusively to parents and individuals with no government involvement.
Here’s Why Fewer People Are Vaccinating Their Pets
When Sylvalyn Hammond started practicing veterinary medicine in 2018, she rarely encountered pet owners who wanted to skip their dogs’ vaccines. The first time it happened, “I almost thought they were joking,” she recalls. “I was so shocked that I think I might have laughed.”
Now, just a few years later, Hammond deals with anti-vaccine sentiment at least a few times a week at her office in Charleston, S.C. “We’re seeing vaccine hesitancy in pet parents rising exponentially,” she says. “I’m much more prepared for these conversations now, because I understand that I usually have one chance to win these pet parents back and place credible data and information in front of them.”
Experts say that growing misinformation and concerns about vaccines for pets — happening in tandem with plummeting childhood vaccination rates and efforts to end vaccine mandates — represent a serious public-health issue that has ramifications for humans as well as their four-legged family members.
