Pre-natal maternal immune disorder at root of autism by 1kiki

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Pre-natal maternal immune disorder at root of autism

POSTED BY: 1KIKI
UPDATED: Sunday, September 16, 2012 03:33
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Saturday, September 15, 2012 4:36 PM

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.

August 25, 2012

An Immune Disorder at the Root of Autism

By MOISES VELASQUEZ-MANOFF

... here’s the short of it: At least a subset of autism — perhaps one-third, and very likely more — looks like a type of inflammatory disease. And it begins in the womb.
It starts with what scientists call immune dysregulation.

Ideally, your immune system should operate like an enlightened action hero, meting out inflammation precisely, accurately and with deadly force when necessary, but then quickly returning to a Zen-like calm. Doing so requires an optimal balance of pro- and anti-inflammatory muscle.

In autistic individuals, the immune system fails at this balancing act. Inflammatory signals dominate. Anti-inflammatory ones are inadequate. A state of chronic activation prevails. And the more skewed toward inflammation, the more acute the autistic symptoms.

Nowhere are the consequences of this dysregulation more evident than in the autistic brain. Spidery cells that help maintain neurons — called astroglia and microglia — are enlarged from chronic activation. Pro-inflammatory signaling molecules abound. Genes involved in inflammation are switched on.

The lesson here isn’t necessarily that viruses and bacteria directly damage the fetus. Rather, the mother’s attempt to repel invaders — her inflammatory response — seems at fault.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/opinion/sunday/immune-disorders-and-
autism.html?pagewanted=all

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Saturday, September 15, 2012 7:06 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Interesting. I knew that autism began before birth because of the study on blood samples which showed skewed profiles of vasoactive intestinal peptide (VIP) and seven other neurodevelopment peptides AT BIRTH (long before vaccinations were ever administered).

In related fashion, my DD's seizures and other neurological disorders remitted with steroids... not anticonvulsants.

And finally, schizophrenia has been linked to Rh incompatibility... now, presumably a thing of the past due to injections of Rhogam. But schizophrenia has ALSO been linked to severe neonatal jaundice, most likely due to ABO incompatibility.

Not only is the immune system supposed to know friend from foe unerringly, but the maternal immune system is supposed to be even smarter... NOT reject or attack the fetus (foreign protein though it be) ... but still repel all other invaders. No wonder it screws up and gets confused.

Some of the things I used to wonder about as possible causes of autism had to due with decreased consumption of fish with its anti-inflammatory fats. The other thing is that widespread immigration now brings more blood types in contact with each other, so maybe with a more foreign fetal blood type the maternal immune system is more activated. A third possibility is lack of sunshine, which tends to pop white blood cells off of the latent circulation right under the skin, sending them back for recycling and reprocessing before they have a chance to age and dysregulate. Also, the plethora of modern chemicals was always a possibility.

And finally, as the article points out, many of us live in a sanitized world. And wherever sanitation goes, asthma and autoimmune disorders and autism seem to follow. With no REAL enemies like parasites and infections to fight off, perhaps the immune system becomes bored and misdirected. I have heard of a person who specifically infected himself with some sort of intestinal parasite (I forget which one specifically) to cure his life-threatening allergies, and it worked.

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Sunday, September 16, 2012 3:33 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I looked up that intestinal parasite, it is hookworm

Gut instinct: the miracle of the parasitic hookworm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/may/23/parasitic-hookworm-
jasper-lawrence-tim-adams

Kinda icky....

Not, not "kinda" icky, TRULY icky. But there it is. Maybe some of our autoimmune disorders would be cured by a case of hookworm.

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