Cancer Coverup and Corruption, Rep. Dan Burton, Indiana

HON. DAN BURTON OF INDIANA
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Monday, December 31, 2012

Mr. BURTON. Mr. Speaker, as we close the
112th Congress and I prepare to retire from
Congress, I would like to leave a few comments
regarding health related matters for my
colleagues who will return to the 113th Congress.
Throughout my decades in public service,
I have strived to give consideration to
those whose issues fall through the cracks of
our government, and to those who become
targets of government authorities for daring to
deliver or seek alternative therapies.

Complementary and Alternative Therapies:
While Chairman of the Committee on Oversight
and Government Reform, I initiated a
comprehensive evaluation of the role of complementary
and alternative therapies in our
health care system. During this time we heard
from researchers, practitioners, and patients
about the value that complementary and alternative
therapies can play in our health system.
These therapies include acupuncture, massage
therapy, traditional healing systems from
various cultures around the world such as Traditional
East Asian Medicine, Kampo, Native
American Medicine, Homeopathy and energy
therapies such as QiGong and Reiki as well
as the use stress management tools and nutrition
and dietary supplements. These also include
conventional therapies used for purposes
not yet recognized as mainstream such
as Chelation Therapy for cardiovascular benefit.

I hope my colleagues in 2013 will continue
to protect access therapies and products so
that Americans can continue to make their
own choices in health care and retain their
health freedom. I also believe a hard look at
the management of resources provided to
these issues is overdue. For instance, the first
ever head to head research study looking at
an alternative cancer treatment for pancreatic
cancer as compared to the mainstream therapy
was an absolute management disaster.
Ten years, millions of dollars, and several federal
investigations validating violations of patient
protections by the academic conventional
cancer therapy principal investigator has been
swept under the rug by the National Institutes
of Health’s National Cancer Institute and the
National Center for Complementary and Alternative
Medicine. Too often, I hear that the
studies that are funded, especially those on
herbs are ‘‘designed to fail’’. After 20 years
and more than a billion dollars, too little quality
research on the therapies Americans are most
interested has in has been conducted. When
my colleague Senator TOM HARKIN gave the
initial instruction to the National Institutes of
Health to ‘‘investigate and validate’’ therapies
being used around the world, we all envisioned
an aggressive campaign to go into the
field and look at what is working an report this
to the American people. Former Congressman
Berkley Bedell championed this issue after
being successfully treated with alternative
therapies for Lyme disease and Prostate Cancer.
Much good has been accomplished, but
better work can and should be done.

In early 2013, the results of a national multisite
Chelation Therapy study will be published.
I hope my colleagues will review this study
and look to the history of how doctors who
have provided this therapy have been attacked
for daring to use a therapy approved
decades ago by the Food and Drug Administration
to treat heavy metal exposure in children
‘‘off label’’ for cardiovascular benefit.
Medicine is increasingly recognizing that exposure
to lead, mercury and other heavy metals
have on the body including the cardiovascular
system. Chelation Therapy may be improving
cardiovascular health by removing heavy metals.
This study was attacked by closed-minded
individuals who oppose chelation therapy and
all alternative therapies. Sadly, we have lost a
decade in looking at the benefits of chelation
therapy in children as the National Institutes of
Health reneged on its promise to conduct a
study at the Clinical Center on chelation therapy
in the pediatric population. The American
people deserve honest inquiry into chelation
therapy for all its possible benefits.

Keep in mind, 1 in 6 women of childbearing
age are carrying a higher than normal body
burden of mercury, and mercury is the second
most toxic substance on the planet. Mercury in
all its forms can be harmful especially to babies
in the wound and in the first years of life.

We first became aware of mercury in vaccines
after the FDA was required by our body
to conduct an inquiry on the amount of mercury
in the products they regulated. A new inquiry
is due in 2013 to determine the amount
of mercury still in all FDA regulated products.
Congress will once again need to require this
of the FDA. I am disturbed that in 2013 we
continue to have mercury in any form in medicines
and in other products Americans routinely
use without the knowledge they are exposing
their families to mercury. It is a travesty
that public health authorities have discounted
the risk of mercury in vaccines and other products
because it is a ‘‘trace amount’’. The
whole body of evidence on mercury shows it
can be harmful and is best avoided. Sadly the
American Academy of Pediatrics and the public
health officials at FDA and the rest of the
Department of Health and Human Services
should be leading the charge to get mercury
out of all medicines, and they have instead
continued to protect the industry and not our
children. It has been left to families who have
formed organizations such as the Coalition for
SafeMinds to fight for children to be protected
from exposure to mercury through medicine.

Autism and Vaccine Injury: The Committee
did not set out to investigate the epidemic rise
in autism rates; however, in late 1999 as we
were looking at reports of injury within the military
form the adulterated anthrax vaccine, we
began hearing about children being injured
from vaccines and developing autism. It was a
crisis we could not ignore.

Just as Bob Wright, the founder of Autism
Speaks, recently testified before the House
Oversight and Government Reform Committee
that his daughter Katie reports that her son
suffered a vaccine injury and developed autism,
my both of my own grandchildren suffered
vaccine injuries and my grandson developed
autism shortly after he was vaccinated
with multiple vaccines, exposed to high levels
of mercury and suffered adverse reactions.
We heard from thousands of families whose
experienced similar injuries. Almost 5,000 of
these families sought relief through the Vaccine
Injury Compensation Program (VICP) as
is required by law. Congress and the American
people are repeatedly told that vaccine
injury does not cause autism. Of the 5,000
families only 1, a little girl named Hannah Poling,
has received justice in this program because
her parents, both health professionals
were able to document a mitochondrial dysfunction
that was exacerbated by exposure to
mercury and vaccine injury. The government
conceded her case, but it still took years of
negotiations and legal battles for little Hannah
to be compensated. This program is not working
at Congress intended and I hope my colleagues
in the 113th Congress will conduct a
thorough review of the management of the
VICP and direct through legislation improvements
to the law so that all that are seriously
injured may be compensated swiftly, fairly and
without long litigious battles. Sadly the autism
omnibus proceeding was fraught with injustices.
There was only limited discovery, many
actions by government lawyers that in any
other court would lead to disbarment, and an
appearance of bias by the Special Masters
who seemed to work as partners to Justice to
defend against vaccine injury rather than to sit
as unbiased administrators and many other
matters deserve a thorough oversight review
by Congress to insure the program operates
as it was designed.

While government officials who settled the
Hannah Poling case reported her
mitochondrial dysfunction is rare, others reported
that it is very prevalent in the autism
population. Maybe as many as 1 in 5 with autism
may have this same mitochondrial dysfunction.
These same government officials
have failed to share what their database of
vaccine cases show—that almost since the inception
of the VICP, the government has
quietly been settling cases of vaccine induced
brain injury that resulted in autism. The Elizabeth
Birt Law Advocacy Center (EBCALA)
conducted a review of settled cases within the
program for vaccine induced brain injury such
as encephalitis and seizures, confirmed dozens
of cases in which the government compensated
the vaccine injured. The way that
the government has shielded this is that it is
not listed as the primary injury. However, the
EBCALA investigators validated through families
and records that autism resulted from vaccine
injury. There needs to improved transparency
within this program. Every case that
is settled should be published online in such
a way that the public is informed what injuries
have been acknowledged and the management
of the program improved so that all
cases for like injuries are compensated quickly.
At present each report of injury is handled
in isolation, with no discovery, no ability to
refer to other cases and evidence previously
accepted in cases, the program is wasteful in
the use of its resources and certainly not fair
to the injured. If we want to preserve vaccine
policies in this country, it is essential to insure
that the VICP works as Congress intended. I
urge my colleagues to engage and stay engaged
in investigating this program, talking to
the lawyers and petitioners in the program,
and improving it through legislation.

Autism: Autism in and of itself is a national
emergency. We have gone in the time that I
served in Congress from 1 in 10,000 to 1 in
88 children age 8 on the autism spectrum.
This cannot simply be genetics—there is no
such thing as a genetic epidemic. There are
many issues that I urge my colleagues to address
in 2013. The ERISA fix for insurance
coverage of autism therapies such as Applied
Behavioral Analysis is ‘‘low hanging fruit’’ for
Congress. There is an urgent need to address
adult and transition services for individuals
with autism including those with higher functioning
autism who, while often able to live
independently as adults, are often under employed.
We have a severe shortage of adequate
housing for adults with autism who are
no longer able to live with their parents. We
have invested a billion dollars in autism research
over the last decade, mostly on epidemiology
and genetics. The autism community
is frustrated that environmental factors are not
given a greater share of the research dollars
and that practically no funding has been provided
to evaluate the dozens of therapies families
who are able to pay out of pocket are
using very successfully. Many of these are dietary
related and alternative therapies and if
there is ever to be insurance reimbursement,
Medicaid coverage, or access through other
government programs such as for military families,
research to investigate for safety and
benefit is needed. I hope my colleagues in
2013 will direct federal research resources to
these much needed efforts in collaboration
with the families and practitioners who have
experience using them. The government cannot
continue to sink significant resources simply
into counting the children, without addressing
the causes of the epidemic increase and
focuses on prevention and treatments.

I am pleased that Chairman DARRELL ISSA
committed during the November 29 autism
hearing to stay engaged in looking at the federal
response to autism. He is learning as I
did while Chairman that the families and professionals
involved in this community are desperate
for Congress to do something to improve
the Federal response, to hold accountable
those who are subverting the truth about
the causes of autism, and who have poorly
managed the resources provided by taxpayers
to get to the truth on autism and vaccine injury.
I urge a review on how the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has
managed the Vaccine Safety Database, how
Poul Thorsen was able to steal more than $1
million from the autism grant in the CDC–Denmark
project, and why Diana Schendel of the
CDC has continued publish studies as a coauthor
to Thorsen. Why does the CDC continue
to promote his research after his federal
indictment for 22 counts of wire fraud and
money laundering? I am concerned that individuals
at the CDC have participated in malicious
acts of covering up the data showing a
direct connection between exposure to mercury
in vaccines in the first six months of life
and an eleven-fold increase risk of autism. I
urge the 113th Congress to shine the light of
day on their actions and seek justice.

Military and Veterans: I cannot leave Congress
without giving mention to the men and
women of our armed services, active duty, National
Guard, Reserves and Veterans. We recently
lost one our own in the Congress, Senator
Daniel Inouye, a World War II veteran. All
across the great nation, in veterans’ hospitals,
hospices and retirement homes, we are losing
tens of thousands of World War II, the Korean
Conflict, and Vietnam War veterans each
month. Too many have no remaining family
members to be with them and it is VA staff
and volunteers who spend the last hours and
days with them.

The signature injuries of the Global War on
Terror of the last 12 years is Traumatic Brain
Injury and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
(TBI/PTSD) I like many Members of Congress
have been informed of the benefits of
hyperbaric oxygen therapy at 1.5 ATA for
members of the military who have had concussive
injury and developed TBI/PTSD. Professional
athletes such as Washington Redskins
quarterback Robert Griffin III who suffer
a concussive injury are immediately provided
access to all therapies that show benefit including
hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT).
Sadly our troops not provided the same access.
For a decade members of the military
and veterans have been working to gain access
to HBOT and other therapies and to
have these therapies paid for through Tricare.
Evidence show HBOT is both safe and effective,
and unlike the anti-depressant, anti-psychotic
and other drugs being handed out like
candy by military doctors, do not have black
box warnings for increased risk of suicide and
suicidal thoughts. I urge my colleagues returning
in 2013 as well as President Obama, the
Secretaries of Defense and Veterans Affairs to
work together to make HBOT at 1.5 ATA (the
validated dose) and other therapies as outlined
in the TBI Treatment Act we passed
twice in the House available to those with TBI/
PTSD. Those who stepped up and volunteered
to serve our nation deserve nothing
less.

Health Freedom and the Constitution: At the
foundation of all of my time in public service
is the Constitution. The prevailing theme of the
right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness
for all Americans are as important today
as it was when I was first sworn in. As I leave
Congress, I am grateful for the opportunity to
serve the people of Indiana and the nation. I
am grateful for all those who have worked with
me over the years in my Congressional office
and on Committee Staff. I am thankful to a
God who has provided me strength and health
to serve and pray that as we enter 2013 and
I enter a new phase of my life, with a beautiful
and intelligent wife and family whom I love,
that new champions for health freedom will
emerge.