Researchers at Harvard School of Public Health have found a disturbing link between Clomid-type drugs and a raised incidence of children born with autism. An article on Time's website reviewed the data which revealed this:
A study presented Wednesday at the International Meeting for Autism Research in Philadelphia provides some of strongest evidence to date that Landes might be onto something. The study, conducted by a team at the Harvard School of Public Health, found that autism was nearly twice as common among the children of women who were treated with the ovulation-inducing drug Clomid and other similar drugs than women who did not suffer from infertility, and the link persisted even after researchers accounted for the women's age.
Moreover, the association between fertility drugs and autism appeared to strengthen with exposure: the longer women reported being treated for infertility, the higher the chances their child had an autism spectrum disorder (ASD).The study was conducted via questionnaire, nearly 4000 nurses who had used Clomid-type drugs themselves filled it out. Of those women, 111 reported bearing a child with autism.
While the research had some holes in it, it still presents a very compelling link between autism and Clomid. What worries me most is why has it taken this long for these kinds of correlational studies to be done?! Clomiphene was approved in 1967, and no one has asked if the children conceived during its use are suffering from abnormal effects? What is wrong with our pharmaceutical companies!!!
IVF is also known to cause a high risk of birth defects, especially since most IVF procedures involve attempting to implant multiple embryos, and twins and triplets are always at greater risk. (I've already posted about alternative methods that use just one embryo, Single Embryo Transfer IVF, and Soft IVF, which also uses lower doses of Clomid-type drugs.)
I worry that most doctors immediately resort to hormone treatments for infertility: fear of wasting time and money on phony products makes doctors and patients alike more biased towards pharmaceutical solutions. But the truth is, these drugs are some serious shit! Take a look at Clomiphene's Wikipedia page and one of the sections is "Use in bodybuilding", as in a follow up to a steriod cycle (!), and we all know that bodybuilders get pretty messed up.... Anyways, for a lot of people, natural methods work! Ovulation tracking, prenatal vitamins, a healthy amount of exercise... shouldn't our doctors be prescribing us these things first?
I'm all in a huff. Read the full article here and let me know how you feel.
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