Doctor Gregory A. Poland is an American physician and vaccinologist. He is the Mary Lowell Leary professor of medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, as well as the director of the Mayo Clinic's Vaccine Research Group. He is also the editor-in-chief of the medical journal Vaccine. Poland received his BA in biology from Illinois Wesleyan University In 1977 where he was a member of Sigma Pi fraternity. He received his MD from the Southern Illinois University School of Medicine in 1981. Poland also received an MA in theology from Westminster Theological Seminary. Doctor Poland is known for researching the immunogenetics of responses to certain vaccines, including smallpox vaccines. He has also written about the negative impacts of the false claim that the MMR vaccine might cause autism, and is an outspoken advocate of mandatory influenza vaccination. After developing tinnitus after his COVID vaccination he has called for better safety studies.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is a podcast from WOR Here's Larry Minting with
more of the wr Saturday Morning Show.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Over the years, there's been a dramatic rise in autism cases.
But doctor Gregory Poland, leader in vaccines and infectious diseases
and president of the Atria Research Institute in New York, says,
actually that's a good thing, doctor Poland, thanks for being
here again.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Good to be with you. Larry.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Let's talk about what seems to be the big health
story today about an alarming rise in the autism rates.
What's causing this.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Well, let me let me first shock you by saying
this is very good news. Shocking. Yeah. And the reason
that I say that is this reflects a dramatically increased
awareness of the disease, screening and diagnosis of the disease,
(00:59):
and the fact that the diagnosis keeps expanding in criteria.
It's sort of like saying, well, nobody knew anything about
attention deficit disorder, you know, thirty years ago, and now
it seems like, you know, everybody has some form of it. Well, indeed,
because the criteria keep expanding. So you know when people
(01:21):
say alarming on this is a crisis, well, in the
sense that we're defining the full extent of the number
of people who have it, and we certainly would like
to find a cause for it. What we can say
after thirty years and over twenty studies in multiple countries
(01:43):
across multiple decades, is the one thing that does not
cause it is MMR vaccine, and that's been shown and
proven over and over and over again. One interesting statistic
in this new study that came out the prevalence of
OUGHTO was much higher in minority communities than in whites. Well, guests,
(02:05):
who has the highest MMR vaccination rate? Whites?
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Yeah? No, I mean I was just waiting.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
You wanted me to answer, Yeah, you would have expected
to be the Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
And then they looked and they said, well, what about
by state. Well, you know about rates of what was it,
nine point seven in Texas and fifty three per thousand
in California. Well that doesn't make any sense. Well it
does when you say, well, the number of people with
(02:39):
access to screening in Texas was much lower than in California.
Then they've looked at things like, well, what if you
had a sibling who had autism, and then we looked
to see if the next child got MMR vaccine or
didn't get MMR vaccine, no difference. The courts have looked
at this, Expert groups have looked at this, multiple studies
(03:03):
have looked at this, and not one has demonstrated any
relationship with MMR vaccine.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
And the guy would originally put did the research on
this lost his license.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Yeah, well, you know, in fact, that's a very good point.
He was stripped of his medical license. Every co author
on that article took their name off the article, and
the journal that published it said it was absolutely fraudulent
and retracted it.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
First time ever they did that too, right, Is that right?
That was the first time ever.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I don't recall that it was the first time, but
you know, one of one of a handful of times
maybe that they've done it. And yet this sticks in
the public's mind. You can't get it out of their mind. Ye,
and people, you know, we're right now in the midst
of a measles epidemic in part because of this.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Right then, it doesn't cause autism. But let me let
me get something straight on this, because I want people
to realize this, because there's a lot of autism douters
out there, and this is personal to me. Because I
have both a nephew and a niece who have autism,
and so it's very personal to me. And for a
long time I was on the board of Autism Speaks.
And so it is true that they expanded the scope
(04:17):
of autism. That is true, and they included things in
that scope that haven't been there before. These numbers are
been going up since that happened. Am I correct?
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Absolutely, you are absolutely correct. As they broadened the diagnostic
for example, autism spectrum disorder didn't even appear until nineteen eighty.
They've added now eight subcategories to that. So as you
do that, you include more and more people, which makes
it look like the you know that everything was the
(04:48):
same and the rate is increasing. Well, the rate is
increasing only because the diagnostic capability and awareness and this
broadening of criteria have dramatic We expanded.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I understand that, but a lot of people say, well,
they expanded it, that's why it's going up. They've expanded it.
But it's important to point out, and I'm glad you
did that this has since that happened. Doctor Gregory Poland,
leader in Vaccines and Infectious Diseases and president of the
ATREA Research Institute in New York.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
This has been a podcast from wor
This is a podcast from WOR Here's Larry Minting with
more of the wr Saturday Morning Show.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Over the years, there's been a dramatic rise in autism cases.
But doctor Gregory Poland, leader in vaccines and infectious diseases
and president of the Atria Research Institute in New York, says,
actually that's a good thing, doctor Poland, thanks for being
here again.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Good to be with you. Larry.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Let's talk about what seems to be the big health
story today about an alarming rise in the autism rates.
What's causing this.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Well, let me let me first shock you by saying
this is very good news. Shocking. Yeah. And the reason
that I say that is this reflects a dramatically increased
awareness of the disease, screening and diagnosis of the disease,
(00:59):
and the fact that the diagnosis keeps expanding in criteria.
It's sort of like saying, well, nobody knew anything about
attention deficit disorder, you know, thirty years ago, and now
it seems like, you know, everybody has some form of it. Well, indeed,
because the criteria keep expanding. So you know when people
(01:21):
say alarming on this is a crisis, well, in the
sense that we're defining the full extent of the number
of people who have it, and we certainly would like
to find a cause for it. What we can say
after thirty years and over twenty studies in multiple countries
(01:43):
across multiple decades, is the one thing that does not
cause it is MMR vaccine, and that's been shown and
proven over and over and over again. One interesting statistic
in this new study that came out the prevalence of
OUGHTO was much higher in minority communities than in whites. Well, guests,
(02:05):
who has the highest MMR vaccination rate? Whites?
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Yeah? No, I mean I was just waiting.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
You wanted me to answer, Yeah, you would have expected
to be the Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
And then they looked and they said, well, what about
by state. Well, you know about rates of what was it,
nine point seven in Texas and fifty three per thousand
in California. Well that doesn't make any sense. Well it
does when you say, well, the number of people with
(02:39):
access to screening in Texas was much lower than in California.
Then they've looked at things like, well, what if you
had a sibling who had autism, and then we looked
to see if the next child got MMR vaccine or
didn't get MMR vaccine, no difference. The courts have looked
at this, Expert groups have looked at this, multiple studies
(03:03):
have looked at this, and not one has demonstrated any
relationship with MMR vaccine.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
And the guy would originally put did the research on
this lost his license.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Yeah, well, you know, in fact, that's a very good point.
He was stripped of his medical license. Every co author
on that article took their name off the article, and
the journal that published it said it was absolutely fraudulent
and retracted it.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
First time ever they did that too, right, Is that right?
That was the first time ever.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I don't recall that it was the first time, but
you know, one of one of a handful of times
maybe that they've done it. And yet this sticks in
the public's mind. You can't get it out of their mind. Ye,
and people, you know, we're right now in the midst
of a measles epidemic in part because of this.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Right then, it doesn't cause autism. But let me let
me get something straight on this, because I want people
to realize this, because there's a lot of autism douters
out there, and this is personal to me. Because I
have both a nephew and a niece who have autism,
and so it's very personal to me. And for a
long time I was on the board of Autism Speaks.
And so it is true that they expanded the scope
(04:17):
of autism. That is true, and they included things in
that scope that haven't been there before. These numbers are
been going up since that happened. Am I correct?
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Absolutely, you are absolutely correct. As they broadened the diagnostic
for example, autism spectrum disorder didn't even appear until nineteen eighty.
They've added now eight subcategories to that. So as you
do that, you include more and more people, which makes
it look like the you know that everything was the
(04:48):
same and the rate is increasing. Well, the rate is
increasing only because the diagnostic capability and awareness and this
broadening of criteria have dramatic We expanded.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
I understand that, but a lot of people say, well,
they expanded it, that's why it's going up. They've expanded it.
But it's important to point out, and I'm glad you
did that this has since that happened. Doctor Gregory Poland,
leader in Vaccines and Infectious Diseases and president of the
ATREA Research Institute in New York.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
This has been a podcast from wor
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