Infections associated with Autism |
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Infections
Electron microscopy of mycoplasma species. |
It is difficult to carry out this type of research. Some of the infections are unclear to have been specific, unclear when they took place, and may simply be associated with changes in immunity.It is most commonly claimed by both patients and doctors that the ASD is indeed associated with multiple minor infections in young children. They notice an increase in the amount of antibiotics that are being used and the number of times that they have to take the child to the doctor for some investigation. However much of this has not been assessed statistically and not published adequately in scientific literature. One of the clearest signs of infection is shown by the work of Nicholson, which does not just show that the infection (chlamydia, mycoplasma and HHV-6) has been more likely than in controls but also that DNA of the agents are remaining in the blood of the autistic patients at a later point. This finding must be explained by any attempt to explain ASD as a single condition as it was significant, and the work was well carried out. The fact that inoculation of the child with specific antigens from the environment, and from infective agents may give rise to antibodies active against neurones is interesting but has not been repeated. The titre of these antibodies or the activity against neurones in vivo has not yet been shown. Certain vaccines are live and some are simply as proteins or dead infective agents. The possibility of them being a cause for ASD symptoms is still under argument. It is important to see the literature on vaccines. |
Non-specific:
This is unclear
to some degree in that some researchers are quite determined that there is an
increase in coughs and colds in younger
ASD children and others disagree.
Torres AR. Is fever suppression involved in the etiology of autism and neurodevelopmental disorders? BMC Pediatr. 2003 Sep 2;3:9. Epub 2003 Sep 2. Review. (Zimmerman. Fever can loosen grip of autism says study: Reuters, 2007) He noticed that fever decreased symptoms of the condition during the time that it was present.
Libbey JE, Sweeten TL, McMahon WM, Fujinami RS. Autistic disorder and viral infections. J Neurovirol. 2005 Feb;11(1):1-10. (Many studies over the years have presented evidence both for and against the association of autism with various viral infections. The best association to date has been made between congenital rubella and autism; however, members of the herpes virus family may also have a role in autism. Review)
Matarazzo EB. Treatment of late onset autism as a consequence of probable autommune processes related to chronic bacterial infection. World J Biol Psychiatry. 2002 Jul;3(3):162-6. (two cases in which the autistic symptoms followed specific infections)
Landrigan
PJ, Witte JJ. Neurologic disorders following live measles-virus
vaccination. JAMA. 1973 Mar 26;223(13):1459-62.
Fallon
J Could one of the most widely prescribed antibiotics
amoxicillin/clavulanate "augmentin" be a risk factor for autism? Med Hypotheses. 2005;64(2):312-5. (Since the introduction of clavulanate/amoxicillin
(now known as co-amoxiclav) in the 1980s there has been the increase in numbers
of cases of autism. In this study 206 children under the age of three years
with autism were screened by means of a detailed case history. A significant
commonality was discerned and that being the level of chronic otitis media.
These children were found to have a mean number 9.96 bouts of otitis media
(with a standard error of the mean of +/-1.83). This represents a sum total for
all 206 children of 2052 bouts of otitis media. These children received a mean
number of 12.04 courses of antibiotics (standard error of the mean of +/-.125).
Unfortunately this was a study without clear controls but it is a hypothesis as
augmentin was brought in during the mid 1980s)
Gurney JG, McPheeters ML, Davis MM. Parental report of health conditions and health care use among children with and without autism: National Survey of Children's Health. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2006 Aug;160(8):825-30. (Children with autism had significantly (P<.001) higher mean physician visits over 12 months for preventive care, nonemergency care, and hospital emergency care, and were far more likely than children without autism to receive physical, occupational, or speech therapy (76.0% vs 6.3%), to need treatment or counselling for an emotional, developmental, or behavioral problem (75.4% vs 7.0%), and, among those taking a prescribed medication, to be using a medication long-term (51.4% vs 14.5%). They found markedly higher reports of concurrent conditions and health care use associated with childhood autism in this study but they did not find a great increase in infections) Free article good: the clearest medical factor that was present was concerning ear infections but not enough questions were asked of the parents to make things more precise).
Castillo
M. Autism and ADHD: common disorders, elusive explanations. Acad
Radiol. 2005 May;12(5):533-4. (no data
on PubMed)
Konstantareas MM, Homatidis S. Ear infections in autistic and normal
children. J Autism Dev Disord. 1987 Dec;17(4):585-94. (Autistic children had a
greater incidence of ear infections than matched normal peers.
Lower-functioning children had an earlier onset of ear infections than their
higher-functioning autistic peers. Ear infections coexisted with low-set ears,
and with a higher autistic symptomatology score.)
Gillberg C, Coleman M. Autism and medical disorders: a review of the literature. Dev Med Child Neurol. 1996 Mar;38(3):191-202.
Therapy and epidemiology of autism--clostridial spores as
key elements. Finegold SM. Med Hypotheses.
2008;70(3):508-11.
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Excess antibiotic usage in ASD: few
useful statistics but commonly claimed by clinicians:
Manev R, Manev H. Aminoglycoside antibiotics and autism: a speculative hypothesis. BMC Psychiatry. 2001;1:5. Epub 2001 Oct 10 (poor article) Excess antibiotics has been reported in numerous places but statistics are difficult to find
Adams and Rumdalvik (see under
mercury). Shows an increase in the use
of oral antibiotics in autistic children.
Could one of the most widely prescribed antibiotics
amoxicillin/clavulanate "augmentin" be a risk factor for autism?
Fallon J. Med Hypotheses. 2005;64(2):312-5. A significant commonality was discerned and that
being the level of chronic otitis media. These children were found to have a
mean number 9.96 bouts of otitis media (with a standard error of the mean of
+/-1.83). This represents a sum total for all 206 children of 2052 bouts of
otitis media. These children received a mean number of 12.04 courses of
antibiotics (standard error of the mean of +/-.125). The sum total number of
courses of antibiotics given to all 206 children was 2480. Of those 893 courses
were Augmentin (co-amoxiclav). with 362 of these Augmentin courses administered
under the age of one year. He suggests
carrying out studies in which the drug was banned from one large group of
children.
Croen LA, Najjar DV, Ray GT, Lotspeich L, Bernal P. A comparison of health care utilization and costs of children with and without autism spectrum disorders in a large group-model health plan. Pediatrics. 2006 Oct;118(4):e1203-11. (they show the chance of the use of anti-infective agents as being greater than in controls (p=0.001) but the ratio was not great)
Antibiotic not linked to autism. Casavant MJ. Med Hypotheses. 2006;66(3):678. Epub 2005 Nov 8. (but the reason behind this is not adequately
put forward)
Early medical history of children with autism spectrum
disorders. Niehus R, Lord C. J Dev Behav Pediatr. 2006 Apr;27(2 Suppl):S120-7. They looked back at the medical history of
various children with ASD and found children with ASD were found to have
significantly more ear infections than the typically developing children as
well as to use significantly more antibiotics. Typically developing children
had significantly more illness-related fevers. There was a nonsignificant trend
toward the ASD group having more chronic gastrointestinal problems. There were
no significant differences between the groups for the age of vaccination or for
number of pediatrician visits. Finally, pediatricians noted symptoms of onset
of possible autism, including language delay, for 44 of the 75 children with
ASD and 2 of the 24 typical children.
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Chlamydia pneumonia, mycoplasma, HHV-6 , measles , influenza and other specific organisms
(There is some evidence that Chlamydia pneumonia is associated with multiple sclerosis (MS), as may be autism. Also, autoimmune conditions are involved in MS as is autism. Treatment of MS against C. pneumoniae seems to have an effect in improving the condition.)
Nicolson GL, Gan R, Nicolson NL, Haier J. Evidence for Mycoplasma ssp., Chlamydia pneunomiae, and human herpes virus-6 coinfections in the blood of patients with autistic spectrum disorders. J Neurosci Res. 2007 Apr;85(5):1143-8. (a large subset (28/48 or 58.3%) of ASD patients showed evidence of perhaps multiple Mycoplasma spp infections, using PCR techniques to look for the DNA or the organism, compared with two of 45 (4.7%) age-matched control subjects. The presence of one or more systemic infections may predispose ASD patients to other infections, so they examined the prevalence of C. pneumoniae (4/48 or 8.3% positive, odds ratio = 5.6, P < 0.01, controls 1/48) and human herpes virus-6 (HHV-6, 14/48 or 29.2%, odds ratio = 4.5, P < 0.01, controls 4/48) coinfections in ASD patients.
Brief report: autism and herpes simplex encephalitis.
Ghaziuddin M, Tsai LY, Eilers L, Ghaziuddin N. J Autism Dev Disord. 1992 Mar;22(1):107-13.
Autistic symptoms following herpes encephalitis.Ghaziuddin
M, Al-Khouri I, Ghaziuddin N. Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2002 Jun;11(3):142-6. In this report, we describe an 11-year-old Asian youngster who
developed the symptoms of autism following an episode of herpes encephalitis.
Autistic syndrome with onset at age 31 years: herpes
encephalitis as a possible model for childhood autism. Gillberg IC. Dev Med Child Neurol. 1991 Oct;33(10):920-4
Onset at age 14 of a typical autistic syndrome. A case
report of a girl with herpes simplex encephalitis.Gillberg C. J Autism Dev Disord. 1986 Sep;16(3):369-75.
Herpes simplex virus (HSV) antibodies in child
psychiatric patients and normal children. Sylvester Jørgensen O,
Vejlsgaard Goldschmidt V, Faber Vestergaard B. Acta Psychiatr Scand. 1982 Jul;66(1):42-9
(no differences were found between them and controls, including autistic
children)
Acquired reversible autistic syndrome in acute
encephalopathic illness in children. DeLong GR,
Nicolson GL, Nicolson GL, Gan R, Haier J. 2005b. Chronic Mycoplasmal infections in Gulf War Veterans' children and autism patients. Med Veritas 2:383-387.
Sweeten TL, Posey DL, McDougle CJ.
Brief report: autistic disorder in three children with cytomegalovirus
infection. J. Autistism Dev Disord. 2004;34:583-6.
Yamashita Y,
Fujimoto C, Nakajima E, Isagai T, Matsuishi T. 2003. Possible association
between congenital cytomegalovirus infection and autistic disorder. J Autism Dev Disord 33:355-459.
Libbey JE, Sweeten TL, McMahon WM, Fujinami RS. Autistic disorder and viral infections. J Neurovirol. 2005 Feb;11(1):1-10. (Many studies over the years have presented evidence both for and against the association of autism with various viral infections. The best association to date has been made between congenital rubella and autism; however, members of the herpes virus family may also have a role in autism. Review)
Molloy CA, Morrow AL, Meinzen-Derr J, Dawson G, Bernier R, Dunn M, Hyman SL, McMahon WM, Goudie-Nice J, Hepburn S, Minshew N, Rogers S, Sigman M, Spence MA, Tager-Flusberg H, Volkmar FR, Lord C. Familial autoimmune thyroid disease as a risk factor for regression in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: a CPEA Study. J Autism Dev Disord. 2006 Apr;36(3):317-24.
Jirapinyo P, Thakerngpol K, Chaichanwatanakul K. Cytopathic effects of measles virus on the human intestinal mucosa. J Pediatr Gastroenterol Nutr. 1990 May;10(4):550-4. (simply showing that measles will grow in the mucosa in vitro)
Jirapinyo P. Presence of measles virus in human intestinal mucosa. J Pediatr Gastroenterol Nutr. 1991 Apr;12(3):404. (this was simply to show that if you looked in gut wall of humans you could find the virus. This was in cases of measles, and not in inflammatory bowel disease or necessarily after vaccines)
See Singh-VK
research showing elevated measles antibodies, abnormal measles antibodies and
an association of them with herpes virus-6 and autoantibodies. See measles vaccine
Montgomery
SM, Morris
DL, Pounder
RE, Wakefield
AJ
Paramyxovirus
infections in childhood and subsequent inflammatory bowel disease. Gastroenterology.
1999 Apr;116(4):796-803. (note the comments in a later article) (Mumps infection before age 2 years was a risk for ulcerative
colitis (odds ratio, 25.12; 95% confidence interval, 6. 35-99.36). Measles and
mumps infections in the same year of life were significantly associated with
ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease, with odds ratios of 7.47 (2.42-23.06)
and 4.27 (1.24-14.46), but not with IDDM. These relationships are independent
of each other as well as sex, social class at birth, household crowding in
childhood, and family history of IBD. Note that measles is a paramyxovirus)
Abnormal expression of myelination genes and alterations in white matter fractional anisotropy following prenatal viral influenza infection at E16 in mice.Fatemi SH, Folsom TD, Reutiman TJ, Abu-Odeh D, Mori S, Huang H, Oishi K. Schizophr Res. 2009 Jul;112(1-3):46-53.
Prenatal viral infection has been associated with the development of
schizophrenia and autism. Our laboratory has previously shown that viral
infection causes deleterious effects on brain structure and function in mouse
offspring following late first trimester (E9) and late second trimester (E18)
administration of influenza virus. We hypothesized that middle second trimester
infection (E16) in mice may lead to a different pattern of brain gene
expression and structural defects in the developing offspring. We propose that maternal infection in mouse
impacts myelination genes. By using
their mouse model they tried to show that various genes were expressed
differently if the mother was infected at specific points.
Activation of the maternal immune system alters
cerebellar development in the offspring. Shi L, Smith SE, Malkova N,
Tse D, Su Y, Patterson PH. Brain Behav. Immun. 2009 Jan;23(1):116-23. They were using the histopathology of the
brain (change in numbers of Purkinje cells etc) to assess whether influenza
vaccine given to the pregnant maternal mouse would create the effect. They found that indeed it did.
Dopamine and serotonin levels following prenatal viral
infection in mouse--implications for psychiatric disorders such as
schizophrenia and autism. Winter C, Reutiman TJ, Folsom TD, Sohr R,
Wolf RJ, Juckel G, Fatemi SH. Eur Neuropsychopharmacol. 2008 Oct;18(10):712-6. Again
they used the influenza vaccine.
The role of cerebellar genes in pathology of autism and
schizophrenia. Fatemi SH, Reutiman TJ, Folsom TD, Sidwell RW. Cerebellum. 2008;7(3):279-94.
They make it clear that their model of autism in the mouse using the
influenza vaccine was great and they were proud of it. They justified it through the biochemistry
and the histopathology seen in the brain.
Prenatal viral infection in mouse causes differential
expression of genes in brains of mouse progeny: a potential animal model for
schizophrenia and autism. Fatemi SH, Pearce DA, Brooks AI, Sidwell
RW. Synapse. 2005 Aug;57(2):91-9. These results show for the first time that prenatal human
influenza viral infection on day 9 of pregnancy leads to alterations in a
subset of genes in brains of exposed offspring, potentially leading to
permanent changes in brain structure and function.
Maternal influenza infection causes marked behavioral and
pharmacological changes in the offspring. Shi L, Fatemi SH, Sidwell
RW, Patterson PH. J
Neurosci. 2003 Jan
1;23(1):297-302
No association between prenatal exposure to influenza and
autism. Dassa D, Takei N, Sham PC,
For indications of measles
in infection see measles vaccine site and CSF.
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Antibodies to neurone specific antigens
as a result of exposure to infection
Vojdani
A, Campbell AW, Anyanwu E, Kashanian A, Bock K, Vojdani E. Antibodies to
neuron-specific antigens in children with autism: possible cross-reaction with
encephalitogenic proteins from milk, Chlamydia pneumoniae and Streptococcus
group A. J Neuroimmunol. 2002 Aug;129(1-2):168-77.
Erratum in: J Neuroimmunol 2002 Sep;130(1-2):248. (autoantibodies against nine
different neuron-specific antigens and three cross-reactive peptides in the
sera of autistic subjects and healthy controls by means of enzyme-linked
immunosorbent assay (ELISA) testing. The antigens were myelin basic protein
(MBP), myelin-associated glycoprotein (MAG), ganglioside (GM1), sulfatide
(SULF), chondroitin sulfate (CONSO4), myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein
(MOG), alpha,beta-crystallin (alpha,beta-CRYS), neurofilament proteins (NAFP),
tubulin and three cross-reactive peptides, Chlamydia pneumoniae (CPP),
streptococcal M protein (STM6P) and milk butyrophilin (BTN). Autistic children
showed the highest levels of IgG, IgM and IgA antibodies against all neurologic
antigens as well as the three cross-reactive peptides. These antibodies are
specific because immune absorption demonstrated that only neuron-specific
antigens or their cross-reactive epitopes could significantly reduce antibody
levels. These antibodies may have been synthesized as a result of an alteration
in the blood-brain barrier. This barrier promotes access of preexisting T-cells
and central nervous system antigens to immunocompetent cells, which may start a
vicious cycle. These results suggest a mechanism by which bacterial infections
and milk antigens may modulate autoimmune
responses in autism.)
Anti-Measles/Rubella/Mumbs
antibodies derived from MMR that are found to be active against neuronal
tissue, also an indication of the anti-HHV6.
See the data under vaccines.
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Infection/immunisazation episodes and autism (see discussions etc under ‘vaccines’)
Takahashi
H, Arai S, Tanaka-Taya K, Okabe N. 2001. Autism and infection/immunization
episodes in
Rudolf
Wank. Schizophrenia and other mental disorders require
long-term adoptive immunotherapy. Med Hypotheses. 2002 Aug ;59
(2):154-8 They justify this through a
patient with bipolar disease, schizophrenia and autism responded to
immunotherapy.
Warren RP, Singh VK, Averett RE, Odell JD, Maciulis A, Burger RA, Daniels WW, Warren WL. Immunogenetic studies in autism and related disorders. Mol Chem Neuropathol. 1996 May-Aug;28(1-3):77-81. (a genetic report on C4B allele)
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