THE MERCURY CALCULATOR

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NATIONAL VACCINE INFORMATION CENTER ANNOUNCES
"THE MERCURY CALCULATOR"

Do you have a child who you suspect is vaccine injured because of exposure to the mercury preservative Thimerosal in vaccines? Are you taking your child in for routine vaccinations and want to know how much mercury he or she will be injected with? Are you thinking about getting a vaccine yourself and wonder about the mercury content? Now you can check it out with The Mercury Calculator on the National Vaccine Information Center's award winning website, www.NVIC.org

NVIC's Mercury Calculator is quick and easy to use. Vaccines in use today as well as those sold in the past, listed by vaccine type and manufacturer's name. Users just enter a weight and click on the vaccines which were/are to be give. The total mercury load is automatically calculated to reveal how many times it is over the allowable Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) "safe" limits for mercury exposure.

For example, in 1980, a 10 pound two month old infant given the CDC and AAP recommended whole cell DPT could have gotten 55 times the EPA limit for daily mercury exposure, while a 25 pound two year old given DPT could have been subjected to 22 times the EPA limit for daily mercury exposure.

In 1995, a 10 pound two month old infant who got the CDC and AAP recommended DPT and HIB vaccines could have been 110 times over the EPA limit and an 18 pound six month old given the recommended DPT, HIB, and Hep B vaccines could have been 76 times over the EPA limit, depending upon the manufacturers of the vaccines.

Ten years later, in 2005, a 10 pound two month old baby who receives the recommended DTaP, HIB, IPV, and pneumococcal vaccines may or may not be at all over the EPA limit for single mercury exposure, depending upon the manufacturers, while an 18 pound six month old who got these vaccines as well as a dose of flu vaccine, could be 31 times over the EPA limit.

An 125 pound teenager or adult who gets a recommended flu and meningococcal vaccination, could be 4-8 times over the EPA limit for a single mercury exposure, depending upon the manufacturers. A teen or adult who got a mercury-containing flu vaccine would have to weigh 551 pounds to be under the EPA limit for a single mercury exposure.

Mercury is a known neuro-toxin that has been proven to cause brain damage in the developing fetus as well as to children and adults exposed to it. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has developed guidelines for limiting mercury exposures to humans from many different sources, including air and water pollution; contaminated foods, such as tuna; as well as in products sold over-the-counter, such as contact lens solution. In 1999, the EPA and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) directed the vaccine manufacturers to remove mercury from childhood vaccines.

Since 1999, vaccine manufacturers have been reducing the amount of mercury preservatives in killed bacterial vaccines (live virus vaccines such as MMR and chicken pox do not contain thimerosal) and some now only contain trace amounts, depending upon the vaccine manufacturer, type of vaccine and whether the vaccine is being packaged in multi-dose or single-dose vials. Single-dose vials of killed bacterial vaccines usually only contain trace amounts of mercury.

The mercury-based preservative, Thimerosal, has been used in killed bacterial vaccines since the 1930's without adequate testing for toxicity. In the past two decades, as the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) have added many more vaccines containing Thimerosal to the routine vaccination schedule for all children and states have mandated these vaccines, children have been exposed to much higher levels of mercury through vaccination. During this same time period, childhood developmental disabilities have dramatically increased to the point where today the CDC estimates 1 in 6 American children is developmentally delayed with a diagnosis of autism, learning disabilities, attention problems or other learning or behavioral problems. The CDC estimates that 1 in 166 American children has been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. Clinical and scientific evidence is now emerging which is linking mercury-containing vaccines to the regressive type of autism in some children.

The National Vaccine Information Center is a non-profit, educational organization founded by parents of vaccine injured children in 1982. NVIC is dedicated to the prevention of vaccine injuries and deaths through public education and defending the right of all citizens to make informed, voluntary vaccination decisions. Accessing The Mercury Calculator at NVIC's website, www.NVIC.org, will also provide users with the opportunity to report a vaccine reaction to NVIC's Vaccine Reaction Registry and receive assistance about how to report a vaccine reaction to the federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

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