Autism and mercury in fish
Mercury in fish
For some years already, there has been much discussion among medical professionals, as well as parents of autistic kids, about a possible link between heavy metal toxicity and autism, particulary between mercury and autism.
Click here to view a video on how mercury causes brain neuron degeneration. The video is produced by the Department of Physiology and Biophysics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Calgary.
In recent years, mercury in fish has become a major concern. Most families dealing with the biomedical aspects of autism are probably aware that large predator fishes like salmon, cod, tuna, sharks etc contain high levels of mercury.
Up to mid-2006, THE AUTISM CLINIC @ Thomson3 had been advising families to avoid consuming large fishes. Small fishes were ok, or so we thought.
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Most kids on our biomedical treatment for autism programme do undergo hair elements analysis regularly.
Subsequently, when we compared the levels of hair mercury of these kids who do not eat fish at all. versus the ones who continued to eat small fishes, the former group had significantly lower levels of mercury in their hair.
This suggest that mercury in fish is still a problem when small fish is consumed.
Based on this clinical observation, we now advise all children with autism, as well as pregnant mothers, to avoid fish consumption all together.
As for shell fish and other sea food, we do not have any data as yet but we think they are best avoided as well.
Mercury in fish oils
We continue to recommend fish oil supplements for their Omega 3 fatty acids, which are highly beneficial for children with autism. In fact, most people will benefit from taking Omega 3 supplements, as the modern diet is badly lacking in Omega 3.
However, we emphasise that such supplements should be of the highest quality, produced under stringent conditions to remove even the slighest traces of mercury in fish oils.
Previously, we ever had parents who gave their autistic children cheap, commercially produced fish oil supplements and the hair analysis of these children showed elevated levels of mercury.
Please call THE AUTISM CLINIC @ Thomson3 at 62536257 for more information.
Clinical data on mercury and autism
In October 2006, we compiled and presented clinical data of 80 children who received biomedical autism treatment at THE AUTISM CLINIC, Singapore.
In this group, 34 had their hair analysed for mercury. The data revealed that 29 kids, or 85 percent, had elevated levels of mercury (more than 0.4µg / g).
In addition, it was found that a reduction in mercury levels correlated with improvements in ATEC scores. In other words, the condition of autistic children improved when mercury was reduced.
To learn more about ATEC scores, click here.
In the best functioning group, 6 out of 8 kids (75 percent) had more than 20 percent – in fact, more than 50 percent – reduction in mercury levels. Of the remaining two, one had a 5 percent reduction in mercury while the other had a small, 2 percent increase.
In the worst-functioning group, only 2 out of 6 kids had more than 20 percent reduction mercury. And two saw their mercury levels rise by several hundred percent!
The data suggests a strong link between the level of mercury and autism. While mercury is not the only factor, it appears to be a MAJOR factor.
Although fish is aa healthy food, it is unfortunate that because of ocean pollution, high levels of mercury in fish has become a serious problem, especially for children with autism.