What are the potential environmental triggers?

Dr. Derrick MacFabe

Departments of Psychology (Neuroscience) & Psychiatry (Division of Developmental Disabilities), Director and Principal Investigator of the Kilee-Patchell-Evans Autism Research Group, University of Western Ontario, London, Canada.


Dr. Tore Midtvedt

Professor Emeritus at Medical Department of Medical Microbial Ecology, Cell and Molecular Biology at Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden.

Dr. Martha Herbert

Dr. Martha Herbert is an Assistant Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School, and a Pediatric Neurologist at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

Dr. Sidney Finegold

Dr. Finegold is a world-renowned authority on the biology and taxonomy of anaerobic bacteria and has contributed significantly to the knowledge of these disease-producing organisms. An award-winning researcher with a career spanning 60 years, Finegold’s reputation is global in scale.


Join the discussion :

11 thoughts on “What are the potential environmental triggers?

  1. It is of critical importance to take a look at phyto-toxic soy facts that are FDA acknowledged to cause a host of physiological, reproductive, and neurological adverse effects to exposed fetus, infants, and children. http://toxic2babies.blogspot.com

    Ask the FDA why they continue to protect a billion dollar soybean (estrogenic hormone disruptors) industry, and NOT protecting fetal, infant, and child health? Why doesn’t a trusting U.S. public have equal knowledge of soybean-poisoning as recognized by the FDA? http://foodhealthroulette.blogspot.com

  2. Here is an autism-cause: Concerning toxic environmental factors such as pesticides and pollution on adverse brain effects that are caused by these poisonous hormone disruptors, yet there is NO one talking about the “natural” estrogenic hormone disruptors loaded in soybeans. National Institute of Mind Health Dr. Insel confirms autism connection to hormone disruptors, yet he too continues to simply disregard the high levels of hormone disruptors found in soybeans. In the USA, the FDA increasingly allows the overwhelming marketing of soy foods, fillers, and soy infant formulas. During pregnancy, maternal consumption of soy phyto-toxins contaminates her fetus, and then her infant while breast feeding. Soy infant formulas and soy loaded infant foods continue to contaminate the fragile body and brain systems especially of the developing child! It is no coincidence that the U.S. has a higher rate of behavioral disorders including autism than anywhere in the world, as soy IS a cause, as confirmed by countless published studies. Soy industry in the U.S. is very profitable, and very powerful, with evidence as to why the FDA remains deliberately silenced of their own repeat studies proving adverse fetal, infant, and child physiological, reproductive, and neurological effects caused by the many “natural” soybean toxins, particularly soy’s actively toxic estrogenic hormone disruptors.
    http://causeautism.blogspot.com,
    http://nihtoxictruth.blogspot.com

  3. I rented the Autism Enigma film because just this week I was researching digestion issues and stumbled upon the work of Dr. Haas, who develped a specific “Carbohydrate Diet” which he used to treat an overgrowth and imbalance of intestinal microbial flora. Not sure if you are aware of Dr. Haas’s work Here are links to two websites with information.

    http://www.breakingtheviciouscycle.info/home/
    http://scdlifestyle.com/about-the-scd-diet/

  4. Saw an interesting follow up to some of Dr. Herbert’s comments on agricultural overuse of antibiotics. The FDA is starting to restrict certain antibiotics in livestock. Note that more antibiotics are used in agriculture than in humans, possibly contributing to drug-resistant infections as well as other problems (as mentioned in the film).

    Article can be found here – http://nyti.ms/yhomPV

  5. I am a mother of a nine year old nonverbal and not potty-trained autistic boy. He was a normal baby with emerging speech that went away after the MMR (we don’t know if this caused it, but it was three months before we watched him go down hill). Over the years we have done chelation, hundreds of supplements (which have helped some), the GFCF diet (marginally helpful for us), HBOT (don’t know if it helped), tried SCD diet (he wouldn’t do it), B12 injections, was scoped twice (biopsied as well) and more. Of course endless feces and urines tests, Whatever he eats he is unbelievably hyper. Currently, we have done three rotations of Flagyl. The first round worked so well we cried at how calm he was. Since then the Flagyl helps, but not like the first time. This past year was the worst ever – beating his head, biting his hand and extreme tantrums. The Flagyl has helped with this, but still can get upset and very difficult to redirect him. If I could sign him up for an intestinal transplant I would – NO DOUBT – all of this starts in the gut. It is in an endless cycle. God bless anyone who is helping discover ways to help these voiceless children. Stacie Matson

    • Hi Stacie,
      I am the mother of a 3 year old son with autism. I sympathize with your situation, since like you, we are trying everything.
      I noticed your comment about your son getting hyper after eating. Our son was exactly the same until we discovered that he had an inability to process foods that are high in phenols and salicylates (e.g. all fruits except pears, some veggies, all seeds and nuts). Once we removed the offending foods, we saw a very dramatic improvement in his behaviour and sleep. We have not yet been able to re-introduce high phenol foods, but are working through the Biomed approach as well as using sub-lingual phenol drops in the hopes that it will help him. There are also products called “Phenol Assist” and “No Phenol” that can be administered with food. They did not help our son, but have helped many others.
      Removing these foods has not been easy, but the results have been profound.
      All the best.
      Sarah

Leave a Reply to Gail Elbek Cancel reply