Thomas Frieden, the director of the Center for Disease Control (CDC), has blocked CDC whistleblower, Dr. William Thompson, from testifying on scientific fraud and destruction of evidence by senior CDC officials in critical vaccine safety studies regarding the causative relationship between childhood vaccines and autism.<\/span><\/p>\n The medical malpractice case seeking Dr. Thompson\u2019s testimony is on behalf of 16-year-old Yates Hazlehurst. The lawsuit alleges that Yates is autistic as a result of vaccine injuries.<\/span><\/p>\n Attorneys Bryan Smith and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., of Morgan & Morgan<\/span><\/a><\/strong>, have been seeking to have Dr. Thompson testify in a medical malpractice case to explain how the CDC committed scientific fraud in a series of studies, which found no link between vaccines and autism.<\/span><\/p>\n In denying the request, Dr. Frieden said, \u201cDr. William Thompson\u2019s deposition testimony would not substantially promote the objectives of CDC or HHS [Health and Human Services].\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Dr. Thompson, a 19-year veteran at the CDC and former senior vaccine safety scientist at the agency\u2019s Immunology Safety Office, is the co-author of four key studies that the CDC widely touts to exonerate the MMR vaccine and vaccines containing the mercury-based preservative thimerosal, from being linked to autism. Thompson is currently employed at the CDC\u2019s National Center for HIV\/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention.<\/span><\/p>\n In August 2014, Dr. Thompson revealed that the data underlying CDC\u2019s principle vaccine safety studies demonstrated a causal link between vaccines and autism or autism symptoms, despite CDC\u2019s claims to the contrary. According to Thompson, based upon interpretation of the data, \u201cThere is biologic plausibility right now to say that thimerosal causes autism-like features.\u201d Dr. Thompson invoked federal whistleblower protection in August 2014.<\/span><\/p>\n Dr. William Thompson is listed as author or co-author on the principal studies\u2014Thompson, et al. 2007,<\/a> Price, et al. 2010<\/a>, Destefano, et al. 2004<\/a><\/strong><\/span>\u2014most widely cited to \u201cdebunk\u201d the link between autism and vaccines. Thompson said that his bosses, including the CDC\u2019s Immunization Safety Office Branch Chief Frank Destefano, specifically ordered him and three other CDC scientists to destroy data demonstrating vaccine induced autism in CDC\u2019s seminal 2004 study\u2014Destefano, et al. 2004. The data unexpectedly showed a 250 percent increase in autism among young black males who received the vaccine on time\u2014before their third birthday\u2014compared to those who waited until after their third birthday. The data also showed a significant link between the vaccine and isolated autism (autism in normally developing children with no other medical problems), the kind suffered by Yates Hazlehurst, who is mentioned below. According to Thompson, Destefano called his four co-authors into a room and ordered them to dump the damning datasets into a giant garbage can. The published study omitted those data sets. That study, now cited in 91 subsequent papers on PubMed as proof of vaccine safety, is the principle foundation stone of the theology that vaccines don\u2019t cause autism.<\/span><\/p>\n In a series of taped statements<\/strong><\/span><\/a>, a deposition to Congressman William Posey<\/a><\/strong><\/span> of Florida and in statements issued through his personal attorney<\/a><\/strong><\/span>, Thompson confirmed that the data underlying the seminal 2004 Atlanta study, Destefano, et al. 2004<\/a><\/strong>,<\/u> showed a causal association between MMR and autism for both African-American boys and for children suffering isolated autism. Thompson also asserted that CDC\u2019s leading thimerosal studies, rather than demonstrating thimerosal\u2019s safety, have consistently showed a causal relationship between thimerosal and tics, a family of grave neurological injuries that are a well-established feature of autism.<\/span><\/p>\n The medical malpractice case seeking Dr. Thompson\u2019s testimony is on behalf of 16-year-old Yates Hazlehurst. The lawsuit alleges that Yates is autistic as a result of vaccine injuries, which occurred when the vaccines were improperly administered in 2001. Because of the Vaccine Injury Compensation Act of 1986<\/a><\/strong> (VICA), Hazlehurst v. The Jackson Clinic is the only vaccine injury case that has gone to any U.S. court in 30 years.<\/span><\/p>\n Under the VICA and the 2009 Supreme Court decision Bruesewitz v. Wyeth<\/strong><\/a>,<\/u> almost all vaccine injured children are barred from filing lawsuits in state or federal courts. Instead, their only legal remedy is to seek compensation under VICA in the so called \u201cvaccine court<\/strong><\/span><\/a>,\u201d the popular term which refers to the Office of Special Masters of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, which administers a no-fault system for litigating vaccine injury claims. There is no judge, no jury and the most basic rules of law do not apply.<\/span><\/p>\n