Dan Burton: “Autism is one of the most misunderstood maladies that children have and adults have in this country, and it is a growing…”

“Autism is one of the most misunderstood maladies that children have and adults have in this country, and it is a growing problem. We have one out of every 200 children in America now becoming autistic. It used to be one in 10,000. It has been multiplied by 50 the number who are affected. Many of these children do have problems occasionally, where they flap their arms, they will bang their heads against the wall, they will even speak incoherently. It takes somebody who understands to be able to deal with them. It is very difficult on parents, but it is more difficult even for people who are trying to educate these children. So I think this is a great amendment... the parents of these autistic children for the past 5 or 6 months here in the Congress have been fighting a very difficult battle with pharmaceutical companies, because they think, and I believe, that many of these children were damaged by mercury in some of the vaccines that we had.”