FDA's Move Against "Chelation" Cure for Autism Is Long Overdue
The FDA's move to shut own quacks who use "chelation" to treat autism will be seen by many -- including Jenny McCarthy -- as another example of the federal government's conspiracy against alternative medicine.
In fact, the FDA has moved too slowly on this issue, allowing quacks to inflict their abusive practices on children for two years after it became clear that there's no evidence that chelation has any medical benefit. Chelation is the practice of adminstering an agent that removes toxic heavy metals, such as mercury, from the body. The FDA said:
These companies marketing unapproved OTC chelation products commonly target patients with serious and incurable diseases who may have limited treatment options. Two common conditions that these products claim to treat are autism spectrum disorders and heart (cardiovascular) conditions, ...
FDA is concerned that patients will delay seeking proven, sometimes essential medical care, when relying on unproven OTC chelation products to treat serious conditions such as heart and blood vessel disease. FDA is also concerned that chelation can result in serious side effects such as dehydration, kidney failure, and death.Here's one of the companies that the FDA targeted, ClayBathsforKids.com, which sells a product called Kids Chelat, "used by doctors and healthcare practitioners worldwide":
These products are safe, inexpensive, highly effective, easy to use, and they do not require visits to a health care practitioner's office.The words "do not require visits to a health care practitioner's office" ought to make parents run in the other direction. There is no medical supervision. Chelation is often highly dangerous, even fatal. Here's one child who died from it. Here's another. And here's another. Yet Yahoo!'s health groups message boards are filled with hundreds of parents searching for chelation cures for autism.
The National Institute of Mental Health attempted to study chelation in 2008, but the test was shut down after officials saw evidence that chelation causes long-term cognitive damage in animals. The Mayo Clinic has been against it since that time, as has the American Heart Association. And peer-reviewed evidence for the effectiveness of chelation is poorly supported.
Despite all this, McCarthy -- the actress, comedian and former Playboy model -- has advocated chelation for children with autism even though she has not actually done it to her own son. Perhaps she read some of the horror stories on Yahoo from parents who chelated their kids. Here's one:
My son is 6 and I have to hold him down for the IVs â€" we've done 10. Today he got poked 3 times and has purple hands from blowing veins. As I'm lying on him, both of us sweating with 2 nurses trying to do the IV, I'm thinking is is worth it?No, it's not.
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