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I recently received this press release from the wonderful organization called Every Child By Two, a national non-profit set up to make sure children get their vaccinations. As you might expect, they are concerned about the recent rise of the antivax mob, who seemed determined to misinform parents and ensure we have a whole generation of kids susceptible to easily preventable potentially fatal infections.
The press release is important, and I reproduce it below in full. If you are so inclined, please show ECBT your love. Spread the word. Kids are dying, all over the world, and it’s incredibly easy to prevent it. All we need to do is make sure parents get real information.
Congressional Briefing on Vaccines Addresses Local, National Disease Outbreaks
Mother of Hib Meningitis Victim Shares Story with Congress
(WASHINGTON, D.C.): Amidst recent disease outbreaks, Congressmen Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Joseph Barton (R-TX) held a Congressional briefing with several vaccine advocacy organizations to communicate disease risks and consequences. In light of recent resurgences of disease both locally and across the country, Every Child By Two (ECBT) and the American Medical Association (AMA) co-hosted the briefing to educate Congressional members and their staffers on the importance of timely immunization. Several public health organizations and medical associations joined ECBT and AMA as co-sponsors of this important briefing.
In 2008, five children in Minnesota contracted the vaccine-preventable infection Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) resulting in the death of one. Reports indicate that several of the children were intentionally unvaccinated. However, one of the victims was fully vaccinated but suffered from an immune disorder, which prevented the vaccines from working. This child, Julieanna Metcalf, barely survived according to her mother Brendalee Flint, who spoke to Congressional members today. "My daughter endured multiple seizures, brain surgery and a month in the hospital because of this terrible disease," she said. Julieanna remains developmentally delayed due to her illness. "Parents need to understand that when they choose not to vaccinate, they are making a decision for other people’s children as well. Somebody else chose Julieanna’s path. I still see the scar every day. Our family should not have had to endure this suffering."
"We are now seeing the severe impact that vaccine-preventable diseases can have on our children," said Amy Pisani, MS, executive director of Every Child By Two, "A man from the Washington, D.C. area brought the measles virus back with him after a recent trip to India. By the time the man realized he had the illness and sought medical attention, he had already visited seven places throughout the Washington region and infected an 8-month old child in a hospital waiting room. While this particular instance was not due to parental refusal to vaccinate, several other outbreaks have been attributed to misinformation about vaccines."
Pediatric Infectious Disease Specialist Dr. Mark Sawyer, who treated children during the San Diego measles outbreak of 2008, spoke about the importance of community immunity. "It’s false and reckless to assume that these diseases have disappeared. We have seen the return of Hib in Minnesota and elsewhere as well as the resurgence of measles both on the East and West Coasts. No community is immune to vaccine-preventable diseases. Parents need to be aware of the critical importance of vaccinating their children on time to protect them when they are most vulnerable," said Dr. Sawyer.
Recent cases of swine influenza highlight the importance of maintaining a robust public health infrastructure that can rapidly detect and contain disease outbreaks. In addition, as stressed by CDC Acting Director Richard Besser, MD, people need to be community-oriented. Preventing disease and containing outbreaks are everyone’s responsibility. For more information on swine influenza, visit the CDC’s website at www.cdc.gov/swineflu.
Every Child By Two, the Rosalynn Carter/Betty Bumpers Campaign for Early Childhood Immunization, works to ensure that all children receive timely immunizations and continues to seek methods to institutionalize vaccine delivery and ensure access to vaccines for all children.
For more information, please visit www.ecbt.org and www.vaccinateyourbaby.org.
May 5th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
Phil, you need to fix your links at the end of the article. Because those are good links as ECBT has a pretty comprehensive and plain english summary of all the vaccination studies that have been done.
May 5th, 2009 at 2:19 pm
I’ve often wondered why someone doesn’t begin an anti-woo organization, the sole purpose of which would be to publicize accurate, scientific information to rebut the incessant flow of crapola these slingers of s–t throw at anyone who will give them a forum. Letters to the editor, calls to the producers of Oprah, e-mails to the appropriate members of congressional committees and the like. I’d certainly contribute to keep an outfit like this afloat, and I bet it could be organized as a not-for-profit, tax-free outfit. If the churches can get away with their tax free status, why not?
May 5th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
Thanks for that, Phil.
Like I’ve done with other vaccine-related threads, to anyone who is going to comment on how bad vaccines are, before you comment, please read the page at antiantivax.jottit.com. Either copy the address into your browser address bar or click on my name. It’s not comprehensive of all the myths, but it tackles some of the main ones.
May 5th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
Please fix your links, Phil.
May 5th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
Just sent out the vaccinateyourbaby link in a tweet. Very good stuff in there- very accessible. How could I have not seen it before?
May 5th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
Too bad most of Congress has already been vaccinated against common sense. They’ll probably end up believing either whoever trots out the most celebrity names or whoever uses the words with the least syllables.
May 5th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
Ah, the “fill up your children with fancy liquid stuff” again!
May 5th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
Fancy liquid stuff? Like homeopathy?
May 5th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
QUASAR, you’ve trolled with this line often enough. Move along please.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Any risk analysis of vaccinations shows them to be a no brainer and all kids need them. Unfortunately there is a minor risk in vaccinations, and parents need to know that too. The site below is good because it enumerates the risks
http://cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/6mishome.htm#risk
May 5th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
The brief bloom of hope I just had wilted when I read that the other congressman was Rep. Joe Barton. If the science of plate tectonics has him stumped, immunology and evolution must just leave him drooling.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Yeah, QUASAR, that ’smallpox’ thing just kinda went away on its own.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
QUASAR, read this: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2007/07/15/politics-science-me-and-thee/
Realize this is Dr. Plait’s blog, not your blog…
Since this will have to wait for moderation, here is a clicky for you http://antiantivax.jottit.com
May 5th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
Thanks Dr. Plait for working hard to spread common sense in this world that is so blinded by ignorance. I love this blog. You have opened my eyes to so many issues that I had not even realized existed. Thanks.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:30 pm
Odd, I put in a submission with a couple links and they didn’t even show on my screen as awaiting moderation. Dr. Plait, mind checking that out (or sending one of your minions to do it. You have minions, right?)
May 5th, 2009 at 5:17 pm
Phil, thanks for keeping up the reality-based posting on the anti-vax loons.
Please see Shannon Rosa’s new post, My Child Has Autism and I Vaccinate
http://www.blogher.com/my-child-has-autism-and-i-vaccinate
(Todd W., I sent her your anti anti vax link and she found it quite informative).
May 5th, 2009 at 5:37 pm
It’s good to see an organized effort to counteract the anti-vax nonsense. We need more of this.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:33 pm
“Ah, the “fill up your children with fancy liquid stuff” again!”
Considering it strengthens their immune systems and makes it much more difficult for them to catch certain infectious diseases, I’d say fill them up.
I’ve been filled up with more vaccines in Eastern Europe than I can count. That included MMR shots and smallpox vaccines. So was pretty much every person in the country and the last case of smallpox in Eastern Europe was when my parents were still young.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
What Congress needs to do is schedule a hearing, subpoena Jenny “Killer” McCarthy, and then roast her alive for being a public health danger.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:47 pm
@Liz Ditz
Thanks for passing it along and for providing that link. Great that she shared her story.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
@ Greg Fish
Make sure you do fill them up like water in a bottle!
May 5th, 2009 at 6:55 pm
@QUASAR
Why do you keep posting the same line every time Phil posts a vaccine thread? Perhaps you should try, y’know, reading and educating yourself about vaccines. Click on my name for a start, or go to the CDC or FDA web sites on vaccines.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
I saw a segment on CNN today with Dr. Sanjay Gupta who reported that there appears to be a connection between the size of the amygdala and development of autism. He said that autistic children studied had larger amygdalas than control children who weren’t autistic. I tried to find something about it at CNN’s site but couldn’t run it down.
May 5th, 2009 at 6:59 pm
Wait–found it.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/05/04/autism.brain.amygdala/index.html
There may be a connection between amygdala size and autism, but VACCINES HAVE NOTHING DO TO WITH IT!!! Which part of my last statement gives the pro-disease people difficulty?
May 5th, 2009 at 7:02 pm
@ Todd W.
Sorry, but I just can’t help myself with the thought of “filling up your children with some fancy liquid with dead germs in it” which they claim it “prevents” diseases!
May 5th, 2009 at 7:08 pm
@Quasar – ummm….so what happened to Smallpox?
May 5th, 2009 at 7:13 pm
@ Lawrence
Hmmm, who is that? I don’t know!
May 5th, 2009 at 7:15 pm
Rock on, Quasar. The way they talk, you’d think your body hunts down little germs all by its lonesome and all it needs is a little push in the right direction! HA!
May 5th, 2009 at 7:20 pm
@ Decent Weasel
‘…a little push in the right direction!…’
What do you mean by that?
And, I know that my body or any other normal human body can’t kill every pathogen.
May 5th, 2009 at 7:23 pm
Special magical humor water, or whatever it is. I agree, we can’t kill every pathogen; better to purge them from the body entirely. Bring back bloodletting, I say.
May 5th, 2009 at 7:28 pm
@ Decent Weasel
*falls off the chair while laughing*
May 5th, 2009 at 7:30 pm
HEY! The four humors are REAL, man! >:C
May 5th, 2009 at 8:49 pm
Phil, you have got to bring your vax common sense to New Zealand, my good man. We’re having problems with anti-vaxxers going ape over HPV for girls. The un-educated and scaremongering is driving me CRAZY.
May 5th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
*sigh*
I’d feel so much better if Joe Barton wasn’t anywhere near this hearing.
May 5th, 2009 at 9:25 pm
QUASAR,
Do you have even the slightest idea how the immune system works on the cellular level? If you can give an explanation of the body’s immune response, even a simplified one, and THEN explain why you think vaccines aren’t useful, I think everyone would be happy to listen.
May 5th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
@ Autumn
I’m not an expert in the human immune system but I know that it has something to do with white blood cells.
May 5th, 2009 at 10:40 pm
Phil,you were the man for debunking the “faked moon landing” bs,but perhaps you should consider sticking to astronomy.Here is the other side of the story: Vaccinations:Parents’ Informed Choice
May 5th, 2009 at 10:51 pm
Chris, so you see it on a website and assume it’s true? There are a lot of plain wrong claims in that tract. Vaccines don’t bypass the immune system; they train that system! She makes lots of other baldly false statements as well. Do the research, read what doctors — real doctors say.
Funny that you’d tell me to stick with what I’m classically trained for, considering that the vast majority of vocal antivaxxers have no medical training at all. I wonder why that would be?
May 6th, 2009 at 12:07 am
Here is what’s funny Phil.You are a bit vague saying there are “a lot of plain wrong claims”,and that she makes “a lot of other baldly false statements”.If you can,be more specific.
To answer your question,no I don’t see it on a website and assume it’s true.I scroll down to the bottom,to the endnotes,and I research the information they lead to.Do you read what a doctor says and assume it is true?A lot of a doctor’s medical training consists of diagnosing a disease,and prescribing either a drug,which I believe from what I have read only mask the symptoms of disease,and do not treat the cause of disease.I wonder why that would be?It is because pharmaceutical companies trade on the stock market,and are legally obligated to increase their stock value.If people were cured of disease,these companies would be out of business.
Now,there are some doctors-real doctors,who say just the opposite of the medical business propaganda you are posting.Unless you don’t count the following to be authentic medical journals,or “real doctors”:
1871-72:England,with 98% of it’s population aged between 2 and 50 vaccinated against smallpox,experienced its worst ever smallpox outbreak with 45,000 deaths.Durring the same period in Germany,with a vaccination ratio of 96%,there were over 125,000 deaths from smallpox.(The Hadwen Documents.)
1960:In the USA two virologists discovered that both polio vaccines were contaminated with the SV40 virus which causes cancer in animals as well as changes in human cell tissue cultures.Millions of children had been injected with these vaccines.(Medical Journal of Australia,March 17,1973,p.555.)
1967:Ghana was declared measles-free by the World Health Organization after 96% of its population was vaccinated.In 1972,Ghana experienced one of its worst measles outbreaks with its highest ever mortality rate.(Dr. H. Albonico,MMR Vaccine Campaign in Switzerland,March 1990.)
1970-1990:In the UK over 200,000 cases of whooping cough occured in fully vaccinated children.(Community Disease Surveillance Centre,UK)
1970’s:Tuberculosis vaccine trial in India involving 260,000 people revealed that more cases of TB occured in the vaccinated than the unvaccinated.(The Lancet,January 12,1980,p.73.)
1977:Dr.Jonas Salk,who developed the first polio vaccine,testified along with other scientists that mass inoculation against polio was the cause of most polio cases through the USA since 1961.(Science,April 4,1977,”Abstracts.”)
1978:A survey of 30 states in the U.S. revealed that more than half the children who contracted measles had been adequately vaccinated.(The People’s Doctor,Dr. R. Mendelsohn.)
1979:Sweden abandoned the whooping cough vaccine due to its ineffectiveness.Out of 4,140 cases in 1978,it was found that 84% had been vaccinated three times!(British Medical Journal 283: 696-97,1981.)
1981: 90% of obstetricicans and 66% of pediatricians refused to take the rubella vaccine.(Journal of the American Medical Association,Febuary 1981.)
In the USA the cost of a single DPT shot had risen from 11 cents in 1982 to $11.40 in 1987.The manufacturers of the vaccine were putting aside $8.00 per shot to cover legal costs and damages they were paying out to parents of brain-damaged children and children who died after vaccination(The Vine,no.7,January 1994,Nambur Qid.)
1988-89: A polio outbreak occured in Oman amongst thousands of fully vaccinated children.The region with the highest attack rate had the highest vaccine coverage.The region with lowest attack rate had the lowest vaccine coverage.(The Lancet,September 21,1991.)
1990: A UK survey involving 598 doctors revealed that over 50% of them refused to have the hepatitis B vaccinedespite belonging to the high risk group urged to be vaccinated.(British Medical Journal,January 27,1990.)
1990: “Although more than 95% of school aged children in the US are vaccinated against measles,large measles outbreaks continue to occur in schools,and most cases in this setting occur among previously vaccinated children.(Journal of the American Medical Association,November 21,1990.)
In the USA,from July 1990 to November 1993,the U.S. Food and Drug Administration counted a total of 54,072 adverse reactions following vaccination.The FDA admitted that this number represented only 10% of the real total,because most doctors were refusing to report vaccine injuries.In other words,adverse reactions from that period exceeded half a million.(National Vaccine Information Centre,March 2,1994.)
1994: A study found that over 80% of children under five years of age who had contracted whooping cough had been fully vaccinated.(New England Journal of Medicine,July 1994.)
Therefore,I would say it is inaccurate to say that “the vast majority of vocal antivaxxers(nice dehumanizing label by the way)have no medical training at all”.It would be more accurate to say that those the mainstream media outlets(which the pharmaceutical companies advertise their products on),shine their spotlight on have no medical training at all.Great way to “debunk” something that could adversely affect your profits.It is always best to question “Who benefits?”
Oh,and not to hijack the debate here,but you were way off on the attacks of 9/11/01 as well.It has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt that the U.S. government provided technical assistance to the hijackers.Most notably in Michael C. Ruppert’s book “Crossing the Rubicon:The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil”.If you care to debate that,you could start a new blog thread,or you have my E-mail address.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:10 am
P.S. I forgot to add in the fourth sentence of the second paragraph of my last reply that a doctor will prescribe either a drug,or surgery.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:16 am
Chris, you clown. “Pro-disease” is the preferred nomenclature.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:22 am
Thats quite a compelling argument there Garth.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:47 am
@ Chris
Nice cut and paste job ( dub dub dub dot vaccinationdebate.com/web2.html)
Now if we actually go out and show you why those references are incorrect, misleading, or completely made up out of whole cloth, will you actually listen? Or will you do what others have done on other threads here and diverge into random conspiracy theories to explain why those finding aren’t actually wrong?
Put another way: what evidence will you accept as compelling enough for you to decide that your position is wrong?
May 6th, 2009 at 12:51 am
Case in point… it took about thirty seconds to find this: “The incidence of whooping cough has risen dramatically in recent years in countries where the use of the vaccine was limited (e. g. the FRG) or completely abandoned (e. g. Sweden [6]).”, from ” Treatment and prevention of pertussis by antimicrobial agents (Part II)”, Infection, Volume 16, Number 3 / May, 1988…
May 6th, 2009 at 1:01 am
Here’s another: “Wholecell pertussis vaccine became available combined with diphtheria and tetanus toxoids (DTP) in 1948. Despite nearly eliminating pertussis mortality and
morbidity, the whole cell vaccines has been among the least satisfactory vaccines because of the adverse reactions they cause. The wholecell pertussis vaccine currently
available is a suspension of inactivated Bordetella pertussis (i.e.whole cell vaccine) combined with diphtheria and tetanus toxoids.
The whole cell pertussis vaccine had evoked public controversy in several countries because of the temporally associated neurologic events and deaths after pertussis immunizations, which were never substantiated in various meta-analysis. The experience of countries where rates of pertussis vaccination have markedly declined provides strong support for continued routine immunization of infants and young children.”
(”Pertussis Vaccine Controversies and Acellular Pertussis Vaccine” Raju C. Shah and Anuj R. Shah, Indian Journal of Pediatrics)
Note, of course, that to date, nearly 24 acellular pertussis vaccines have been developed, using different number and quantity of components. No acellular vaccine is most or least immunogenic with respect to all included antigens. Vaccine efficacy and duration of immunity is comparable with whole cell pertussis vaccine. The adverse events are two thirds less compared to whole cell vaccine. (from the same article)
In other words, (a) Sweden was probably wrong to pull the vaccine, (b) they didn’t pull it for efficacy reasons as you state, and (c) in fact the entire point is not relevant, as we have 24 acellular pertussis vaccines now, and the whole cell vaccine isn’t used any more.
May 6th, 2009 at 1:03 am
Wow,that is interesting.I was not aware of that website until not.Nice assumption though.I actually typed that word for word from a book that I read on the subject of health.Never the less,pointing out the original source(thank you by the way,I’m going to save that to favorites now so that I can site it as a reference in future debates on the issue)doesn’t refute the information in any way.
Instead of asking me what my reaction will be to you pointing out why those references are incorrect,misleading,or completely made up,why not just do it?Lets see what you’ve got.
May 6th, 2009 at 1:19 am
The whooping cough rise in recent years is interesting.Does the source you site mention other factors that may have contributed to the rise in cases such as methods of sanitation,sewage disposal,distribution of food and water,or the nutritional value of their food and water supplies?
You do know that many other things can contribute to disease besides a vaccine definciency?When you break it down,it is a combination of four things:
1.Too many toxins in the body
2.Nutritional definciencies
3.exposure to electromagnetic chaos
4.mental and emotional stress.
May 6th, 2009 at 2:04 am
5. A complete lack of ability to internalize information contrary to previously held beliefs.
May 6th, 2009 at 3:03 am
6. Goblins.
May 6th, 2009 at 3:29 am
OK, I know, DNFTT, but Quasar is asking for a roasting here…
Quasar expectorated:
You do not seem to be sorry. I simply don’t believe you are sorry.
Vaccination has been proven to prevent viral infections.
If you disagree, go and educate yourself about both immunology and epidemiology. Any university library will have hundreds of textbooks on these topics. If you still disagree after reading around the subject, then perhaps you should publish your critiques of the science in the scientific literature, which is the proper forum for debate in science.
Posting your garbage here merely highlights your ignorance of the facts, and wastes valuable electrons. Well, I know individual electrons have a very low value, but they still have more value than your comments. In science, an opinion founded in ignorance has almost no value at all.
If you have genuine questions – arising from an honest and earnest desire to learn – then, by all means post them. Otherwise, just stop commenting.
May 6th, 2009 at 4:56 am
7. The One Ring
May 6th, 2009 at 5:14 am
@Chris – the article a magazine dedicated to holistic treatments and the author is a self-described “alternative health care activist” and 20 year member of the group that publishes it. This means she probably promotes junk homeopathic remedies that have no scientifically verifiable benefits. And you’re going to listen to some quack who writes for a quack organization promoting alternative therapies? I feel sorry for you.
May 6th, 2009 at 5:14 am
@Mark Hansen: If I recall correctly, The One Ring is bad for mental health, but I don’t think it causes any physical problems.
It may have something to do with the rise in autism, though. Oh, I almost forgot, it cannot be The One Ring causing autism, because blaming vaccines is so much more truthier.
May 6th, 2009 at 5:29 am
I haven’t read what the latest version of antivaxxers are saying or writing, but do not buy into the one size fits all program.
I was fortunate enough to be a stay at home mom for the first 8 years of my marriage and I did not have any of my children vaccinated. They are now 26, 24 and 19 and only one of them had a mild case of chicken pox. Other than that, they did not have any of the typical childhood diseases and all reached 18 without so much as a broken bone. I also studied nutrition extensively and ensured that they had proper sleep. That is really all that is necessary for good health in a reasonably healthy environment.
When they began to attend public schools, they were required by law to be vaccinated and at that time, I complied because I was working and could not home school.
The concerns that vaccinations could cause permanent damage to children are warranted, even though it is rare, it does happen. If children are not in day care and in constant, close company with other families and children day in and day out, there is no need for the early vaccinations. The time for vaccines is the time at which the child will be likely to be exposed to dangerous illnesses.
In the case of impoverished, undernourished children in the 3rd world exposed to myriad viruses and bacteria with limited sanitation available, that is different. Please be informed and understand that both sides have merit. Excessive use of antibiotics is actually creating more virulent diseases. There is no cure-all for anything and even good intentions can go awry. There is no substitute for being well informed and responsible.
Best to all,
Gail S
May 6th, 2009 at 7:27 am
@Chris
Here are some statistics for you. In any fully vaccinated population, there will be some individuals who contract the disease. On average (some pockets may differ), around 2%-15% of vaccinated individuals will contract the disease. This is partly dependent on the individual, as well as how many shots of the series they have received.
Now, if an unvaccinated population is exposed to the disease, nearly 100% will contract the disease. So, 2%-15% of vaccinated people versus nearly 100% of unvaccinated people.
May 6th, 2009 at 7:28 am
Has anyone ever considered that while we may have reduced the amount of infectious disease thru vaccines, we have also seen a subsequent rise in autoimmune disease. Nobody here ever wants to notice the elephant in the room. Depriving the immune system from naturally overcoming disease by the use of vaccines and drugs has weakend the overall health for all children and adults. How many children do you know have digestion issues, allergies, learning disorders, chronic ear infections… The human immune system has been replaced with an artificial system that in my opinion opens the door for many other types of disases to take root.
May 6th, 2009 at 7:38 am
The 14th century plague in Europe is the best documented pre-modern science epidemic I know off. There was no pharmaceutical industry, all food was organic, there were no vaccines, every cure was essentially natural.
There were much more factors into this, often caused by lack of critical thinking (it was, for example, deemed a divine punishment, an argument from ignorance). Still, the lack of any healthcare was most disastrous.
In a macabre way, it does proof that mankind can survive without vaccination, let alone limited vaccination. Yet, I don’t care to see how that will work out.
May 6th, 2009 at 7:50 am
@Jim
Do you understand how vaccines work? Vaccines contain a little bit of the antigen (weakened or dead virus/bacteria or the responsible protein) from the natural disease that triggers the immune response and creation of memory cells. The immune system is reacting the same way, just without the full-blown symptoms of an actual infection. So, the only part of how it works that is unnatural is avoiding the often debilitating symptoms. If you have a study, though, that shows that vaccines do not work like this, please present it.
Ah, the goalpost shift begins. First the cry (not necessarily from you) is “vaccines cause autism”. As evidence mounts showing that opinion to be false, the cry becomes “vaccines cause autoimmune diseases”. May I ask what made you come to this conclusion? Have you seen any studies showing a causal link between vaccines and allergies, learning disorders, chronic ear infections or digestion issues (and which digestive issues, precisely)? Have you ruled out other possible causes, such as over-sterilization of the environment? I seem to recall studies (don’t have them to hand at the moment, so I may be wrong) that suggest declines in exposure to dirt, pets, etc. is linked to a rise in allergies.
Speculation is all well and good, but without some solid evidence, it should not be the basis of medical decisions.
May 6th, 2009 at 8:23 am
@ Chris -
Well, it looks as though you don’t accept the expertise of immunologists, epidemiologists and organisations of medical professionals suchas the AMA.
Perhaps you should elucidate for us about what makes you a better judge of the risks and benefits than a bunch of scientists and doctors who have studied these things for decades?
Chris said:
Why should he bother?
The whole of mainstream medical science acknowledges that immunisation programmes prevent diseases.
Really? And how do you determine the veracity, expertise and reliability of those sources?
For my money, I will always rely on peer-reviewed research as the most reliable source of information, although much of that needs to be regarded carefully. Are you aware of Andrew Wakefield? You know, the guy who started the MMR scare about a decade ago? It turns out (after some lengthy investigations) that he not only had an undeclared interest in a company making a rival vaccine to MMR, but he made up his results.
Well you have obviously not read very much, or you have been reading the wrong things.
I would heartily recommend the last 50 years of the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy. It gets a bit dry from time to time, but it is all about antimicrobial agents and their use to cure diseases.
While several of the large pharma companies have indeed conducted themselves in a less-than-ideal manner, that does not change the fact that you are talking rubbish. Antibiotic resistance is a constant problem. Several pharma companies make a lot of money out of penicillin and its derivatives, but they are constantly researching new antibiotics.
Have you ever heard of vancomycin? It is at present our last-ditch antibiotic. When an infection fails to respond to other antibiotics, doctors prescribe vancomycin. Unfortunately, the next antibiotic (to follow vancomycin once pathogens evolve resistance to vancomycin) has not yet been discovered. So don’t try to tell Phil or anyone else that pharma companies don’t make money out of curing disease.
Who are these people, what is their expertise, and what the hell do they know about epidemiology?
The 19th century? Oh, puh-lease.
Yeah? And guess what?
Scientists found a problem, and scientists fixed it. And, BTW, even though SV40 causes “changes in human cell tissue cultures”, as far as we can tell it doesn’t harm us. Almost anything can cause changes in human cell tissue cultures, because these cultures are difficult to culture and are exquisitely sensitive to their environment. This is because they aren’t in a human body. Did you even read the paper you cite?
And, 1973? Come on, have you got anything less than 30 years out of date?
Again, guess how? Vaccination rates dropped off and someone with measles visited Ghana. So, for 5 years, Ghana was free from measles.
What this illustrates, BTW, is not any failure of the medical profession, but that pathogen eradication can only be done internationally. Local efforts, no matter how successful, will never endure because of the way people travel.
So, in 20 years, there were only 200,000 cases. That’s an average of 10,000 cases a year out of at least 5 million children. No-one has ever claimed that vaccination was perfect. The failure rate here was roughly 0.5% (assuming that you are correct about 100% vaccination). BTW, those statistics include me, and I never even knew or knew of anyone who got whooping cough. And my parents and my friends’ parents were mighty pleased about it, too.
What you seem to ignore is that people visit countries where vaccination rates are lower. All it takes to re-introduce something like whooping cough is for one person for whom the vaccine did not work to go abroad and catch it.
And, again, part of your dataset is from more than 30 years ago.
Well, this is only 29 years ago, so it’s less than 30 years out of date. I don’t believe the result, though, and I could not obtain this paper through PubMed. TB vaccination sometimes causes disease-like symptoms, but it would indeed be unusual to have a higher incidence of actual TB in vaccinated than unvaccinated subjects.
I’ll reserve judgement on this one – you may be right, you may be wrong. I don’t currently have access to a good library, so I can’t go and look that paper up.
Did you read it?
Again, 30 years out of date. But also indicating, in fact, that polio was eradicated in the USA through vaccination by 1961. Polio is one of those vaccines that is an attenuated live virus. Occasionally, it mutates sufficiently to become virulent in humans again.
But it is still a far smaller risk than not vaccinating against polio.
Again, 30 years out of date. And therefore not really applicable to modern virology. But probably indicative of the low level of measles at the time. A low level that can only be attributed to mass vaccination.
Again, no-one has ever claimed vaccination was perfect. Just because it is not perfect, that does not mean that the alternative (i.e. endemic measles) is better.
Yes, and guess what? Subsequently, more effective vaccines were developed. Again, scientists identified the problem, and scientists came up with a solution.
Hey, I don’t like needles either.
Yeah, this is due to the weird legal system you have in the US. Children who died after vaccination were not necessarily killed by the vaccination. And how many would have died if there was no vaccination?
Any chance you could supply page number and author’s names for this one? I can’t find it on PubMed.
Again, this result strikes me as unusual, and it may indicate some failure of the vaccine itself. What it sounds like is a batch of vaccine where the virus was not successfully attenuated. This probably indicates a failure of the vaccine manufacturer. However, it was 20 years ago. The regulations have tightened up since then. Such an occurrence is extremely unlikely to occur again.
Again, I don’t like needles either. Besides, you don’t supply any real information here. What type of doctors were they? GPs? What was their real risk of exposure to Hep B? Again, this is not available in PubMed.
You really need to find some examples that actually are in the recent scientific literature (say, the last 10 years or so).
Again, couldn’t find this on PubMed (the month is not a searchable field, so your citation method would force me to wade through thousands of papers for the whole year, which I’m not about to do).
This is from 19 years ago. Again, it could be an indication that the existing vaccination programme of the time was insufficient to provide immunity.
Don’t you antivaxxers normally complain about the number of shots given to children? You cannot have it both ways. Either you can cite this as an example of the failure of vaccination, and accept that scientists identified a problem and worked to fix it, or you cannot.
Yes, and an “adverse reaction” is most commonly an itchy rash that goes away after a few days. Isn’t this better than having polio, or whooping cough, or smallpox?
How significant is 80%? 80% of how many? 100? 500? 1000? These are trivial sample sizes, so 80% may not be very significant.
However, it could be that this was another instance of doctors or scientists highlighting an issue with a vaccination regime that needed to be fixed. This is a part of what science does.
Actually, it is perfectly accurate.
You have cited fewer than 20 examples, none of which were written by anti-vaccination campaigners. The majority of your examples are so out of date that the problems the articles highlighted have almost certainly all been addressed by now.
You have done a little bait-and-switch there. Phil’s comment was about anti-vaccination campaigners, and you cite a slew of old articles that highlight problems that needed the attention of the medical community because they needed fixing. And I would be fairly confident that those problems are now fixed. Why? Because you most recent article was 15 years old.
The most vocal pro-disease campaigners – such as Jenny McC and Jim Carrey – have no medical training at all. The genuinely do not know what they are talking about.
Other pro-disease campaigners, such as Andrew Wakefield, have been shown to have made stuff up.
But Andrew Wakefield does have medical training. He was just a selfish and unethical cad.
But that is not how the anti-vaxx campaigns have been debunked. They have been debunked by being shown to:
(A) Be making claims that are demonstrably wrong;
(B) Be making claims backed up by nothing but hot air and wishful thinking.
None of the papers you cited supports what the anti-vaxx campaigners are claiming.
Well, in Wakefield’s case, it would have been Wakefield and his fellow directors.
In the case of mass vaccination programmes, governments and individuals benefit:
(1) Less misery from getting unpleasant / fatal diseases;
(2) Lower healthcare costs overall;
(3) Less time taken off work due to illness.
I could go on, but I’m getting bored.
Who doesn’t benefit? Big pharma. They would make more money from treating the diseases than they do from vaccines.
Oops, too late.
What? This is insane. And irrelevant.
Anyhow, Chris, you have demonstrated to my satisfaction that you have no idea what you are talking about.
Have you actually read even one of the articles you have cited?
May 6th, 2009 at 8:34 am
Keith you have an interesting opinion.It would be more interesting if you could provide some facts to back them up.
May 6th, 2009 at 8:51 am
Chris said:
Done that.
Most of them were irrelevant. None of them support not vaccinating at all. Nearly all of them are out of date.
May 6th, 2009 at 8:55 am
Chris said:
Again you demonstrate your ignorance of the basics.
The aetiology of whooping cough (pertussis) was worked out decades ago, and is well understood.
Or are you privy to information that has so far eluded the experts, most of whom have studied their field (be it immunology, epidemiology or virology) for decades?
May 6th, 2009 at 9:17 am
@ Gail S.
> I was fortunate enough to be a stay at home mom for the first
> 8 years of my marriage and I did not have any of my children
> vaccinated. They are now 26, 24 and 19 and only one of them
> had a mild case of chicken pox. Other than that, they did not
> have any of the typical childhood diseases and all reached 18
> without so much as a broken bone.
Oh, good Lord. Did you travel internationally? Do you live in a large city? Frequent bus terminals or airplane terminals? I’m guessing the answer to all of those questions is, “No.”
The main reason why your three children were able to attain majority without getting one of the nasty diseases we are talking about is *because* the US has around a 90% vaccination rate for the diseases we’re talking about.
> I also studied nutrition extensively and ensured that they
> had proper sleep. That is really all that is necessary for good
> health in a reasonably healthy environment.
Nutrition, exercise, and adequate rest are all great ways to avoid being sick. However, you must *first* have that “reasonably healthy environment”… and quite frankly, by not immunizing your children you were contributing to the lack thereof. The more people who avoid getting immunizations for their children, the more likely it is that we have an epidemic breakout.
May 6th, 2009 at 9:20 am
Chris:
Exposure to Electromagnetic CHAOS??? WTF are you talking about?
That line alone indicates you have no idea what you’re talking about.
GAry 7
May 6th, 2009 at 9:33 am
@Gail S
The anti-vax side, as espoused by the likes of Jenny McCarthy, Meryl Dorey, Age of Autism, Generation Rescue and the like, actually has very little merit. If they were to provide some solid research, then maybe. As it stands, however, they do not have science on their side.
Why do you mention this? It has nothing to do with vaccines, and it only condemns the overuse and overdemand by people who don’t understand that antibiotics do nothing against viruses.
Agreed, there is no cure-all for everything. No one is saying that vaccines are a cure-all. They are, however, a splendid defense against diseases, not only for the individual, but for the people with whom they come in contact, as well. And I agree that there is no substitute for being well informed and responsible. Well informed, in this case, is understanding that the risks of injury (either to the individual or to the community) from not vaccinating is much greater than the risk of injury from vaccinating. The science is there. The evidence supports this. Responsible is acting in accord with what the evidence and science says.
That said, there are individuals for whom some or all vaccines are contraindicated, such as those with egg allergies, those on immunosuppressants or who are otherwise immunocompromised and those too young to receive the vaccine. Attention to medical histories are usually pretty good at identifying these individuals and preventing administration.
I’m glad you got your kids vaccinated when they started school, because if they were not vaccinated and continued to be unexposed to many of those diseases, the complications would be much worse if they caught the disease as an adult. E.g., chicken pox is much worse in adults than in kids, mumps can cause sterility in male adults, etc.
May 6th, 2009 at 9:39 am
From http://dr-king.com/
Based on current puiblished studies on influenza effectiveness and the CDC’s actual reported “influenza illness and mortality data during the period 1987-2000:
.The current influenza vaccines are not effective for children two and under or adults over 65.
.For all other groups,the current influenza vaccines are less than 50% effective in a good year and not effective in years where there is a “strain mismatch”.
.For the past 20 years,the CDC’s claimed 36,000 people die each year from “flu” or “flu-related pneumonia” is a knowingly false claim.When called on the truth of their statements concerning vaccines,CDC officials have admitted (in their “sworn” testimony before Washington State and Deleware legislators)that they knowingly lie about various aspects of vaccines because their “job” is to promote vaccination at all costs,and count the people who die of pneumonia during the “flu season” as “flu-related” deaths even though most are not confirmed to be infected with the flu virus.
.The factual approximate “flu-related” pneumonia deaths per year for the CDC data available to the public in the period from 1997-2000 are as follows:
a.About 600 to 3,000 deaths each year,which translates into a death rate of about 1.7 to 8.3 persons per 1,000,000.
b.The range of influenza cases is from 34 to 130 million per year or,in percent of the population,24.4% to 50.8%.
c.Between 13,000 and 44,000 people were hospitalized for “flu” or “flu-related pneumonia” in the years the data was reported by the CDC
d.There is/was no correlation between the percent of the population inoculated for “flu” and either the “attributed” deaths or the percent of population getting the “flu”.
When it comes to children,the available CDC data indicate that:
.For the 1-4 year age group,”flu attributed” deaths were 6-16 each year,and
.For the 5-14 year age group,”flu-attributed” deaths were 1-14 each year.
Based on the preceeding facts,the CDC’s “36,000 deaths per year” is a 12- to 60- fold inflation of their own data on “flu deaths” and an obvious fabrication.Thus,today’s “flu” vaccines are not effective in preventing you from getting the “flu”.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:00 am
@Nigel Depledge, Thanks for addressing this clods “research”. I know it took awhile to look at the references. Now we have additional information to destroy these pro-disease arguments.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:01 am
Todd,
I have a little understanding of how vaccines work but I’m not sure you do. First of all the antigen in the vaccine would not produce an immune response without an adjuvant The most common adjuvant used are aluminum hydroxide, aluminum phosphate and calcium phosphate. Secondly, vaccines do not provide life long immunity, thus the need for continuous boosters. So, the vaccine being unnatural does not provide real immunity. Also, not everyone produces enough antibodies to all vaccines which render them vulnerable to the disease the vaccine is supposedly protecting them against. I also find it ironic how you consider not enough natural exposures to the environment (dirt, pets, etc.) as a possible explanation for increased autoimmune disease but dismiss not enough exposure to natural infection as possible cause.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:05 am
@Jim
I have a little understanding of how vaccines work but I’m not sure you do.
Oh that is the funniest thing I’ve read today.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:09 am
Strictly speaking, he didn’t say that the incidence was higher in vaccinated than in unvaccinated subjects. He said that more cases occurred, which may well be true, if the vaccination rate was sufficiently high.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:14 am
@Nigel,
Your comment on
1978:A survey of 30 states in the U.S. revealed that more than half the children who contracted measles had been adequately vaccinated.(The People’s Doctor,Dr. R. Mendelsohn.)
could probably use some elaboration for the thick-headed. The summary does not give us enough information to determine whether or not vaccination was effective. To throw some (random) numbers at it,
10,000,000 = total children
99% = vaccination rate
9,900,000 = vaccinated children
99% = vaccine effectiveness rate
99,000 = vaccinated children vulnerable to disease
vs
100,000 = unvaccinated children vulnerable to disease
So just because half of the sick kids had the vaccine does not give us enough information into the effectiveness. In this case, vaccination reduced the disease incidence by a factor of 50 (10,000,000 potentials vs 199,000 potentials, not accounting for “economies of scale” for disease), but leaves about the same number of vaccinated and unvaccinated vulnerable children. Also, children who are vaccinated but end up getting sick usually get a milder form of the disease. So saying “Look! Half the sick children had the vaccine!” does not prove anything. Even this
1994: A study found that over 80% of children under five years of age who had contracted whooping cough had been fully vaccinated.(New England Journal of Medicine,July 1994.)
is worthless as to the efficacy without numbers to back it up. For instance,
10,000,000 = total children
99% = vaccination rate
9,900,000 = vaccinated children
96% = vaccine effectiveness rate
396,000 = vaccinated children vulnerable to disease
100,000 = unvaccinated children vulnerable to disease
gives us “80% of children with whooping cough had the vaccine”. In this (totally random) case, the vaccination still reduced the disease incidence by a factor of 20.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:20 am
On May 6th, at 12:07a.m., Chris posted a list of excerpts he contends show that vaccines are bad or not working. I don’t know enough about most of these excerpts to give an opinion, but Chris’ excerpt about Jonas Salk was taken out of context and is inaccurate. Chris posted: Dr.Jonas Salk,who developed the first polio vaccine,testified along with other scientists that mass inoculation against polio was the cause of most polio cases through the USA since 1961.(Science,April 4,1977,”Abstracts.”)
The Salk polio vaccine is a “dead” vaccine. You can’t get polio from the Salk vaccine. The other polio vaccine was developed by Albert Sabin. It is taken orally and is a live, but weakened, vaccine. If you have a compromised immune system there is a very, very small risk of getting polio as a result of the Sabin vaccine. Since 1961, when the U.S. started using the Sabin vaccine there were about 6 to 8 cases of polio attributed to this live vaccine. That is 6 to 8 cases for every 5,000,000 doses.
In his testimony Salk was advocating for a return to his vaccine. He believed it was safer. I’m sure there was some pride involved in his testimony also. Since 2000 the U.S. has, indeed, returned to the use of the Salk vaccine.
From the late 1940s through the middle 1950s there was an average of 30,000 documented cases of polio in the U.S. The reason we don’t have hospitals filled with polio patients today is because of vaccines. Pulling quotes out of context is misleading, and could be dangerous.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:22 am
Getting the disease “naturally” is no guarantee of lifelong immunity EITHER. People who have had chickenpox sometimes get it again as adults- sometimes they get shingles.
But really,
“I have a little understanding of how vaccines work…”
How about we stick to the topic at hand instead of shifting goalposts. Can you demonstrate that vaccines cause autism or can’t you? Simple question. You make the claim, you bear the burden of proof. Oh wait, you can’t because you just admitted to knowing nothing to little about vaccination. Tsk, tsk, what a pity.
This is the part where you should have stopped talking.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:31 am
@Chris – electromagnetic chaos? I’m guessing you are one of those “Power Lines cause Cancer” guys, right?
Seems like you’ve been reading way too much Science Fiction (well, the 9/11 conspiracy garbarge tells me that), and not enough actual Science.
Again, it all goes back to people being complacent – because we’ve been spared most of the childhood traumas of disease by the successful application of vaccine programs in this country. Parents who were vaccinated as children are now able to put their own children’s lives at risk, because they don’t know how bad it used to be.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:34 am
@Jim
Wrong. The body will produce an immune response without an adjuvant. What the adjuvant does in vaccines, as I understand it, is bind with the antigen to prevent the body flushing it out quickly, as well as stimulating the immune system to respond. Without the adjuvant, the number of antigens needed in a single dose of vaccine goes up by a lot. Additionally, the more antigen required, the greater the risk (in live attenuated virus vaccines) for mutation to occur, leading to a full case of the disease.
Can you provide citations to studies that show that those diseases prevented by vaccines requiring boosters (e.g., tetanus) do provide lifelong immunity? In the case of tetanus, given the high death rate from the disease, I could see a person having lifelong immunity. At any rate, cite some studies that a) support your claim and b) show that the same diseases being prevented grant lifelong immunity.
Decades of vaccine use resulting in decrease or elimination of diseases would seem to contradict you.
Agreed. Which is why herd immunity and high vaccination rates are important. I would also venture to guess that not everyone who contracts a disease naturally produces enough antibodies, rendering them susceptible to future infections as well. I recall on one of these threads someone commenting on how a family member had a mild case of chicken pox as a child, then a full-blown case (not shingles) as an adult.
May 6th, 2009 at 10:38 am
See, what gets me about the passionate antivaxxers is that they never have any facts to back up that passion. Well, scratch that actually- they do have facts occasionally, it’s just that they’re never relevant or applicable to the issue at hand.
Really all they do is sit around, jerk their heads, and wriggle their eyebrows suggestively while saying, “You do realize vaccines cause autism, don’t do?” Of course when challenged, or when evidence is demanded of them, they immediately go to, “You do realize that pharmacuetical companies are eeevil?” (as if we didn’t know).
Then it’s, “Vaccines cause autoimmune disorders.”
Then it’s, “Vaccines are full of toxins.”
and it goes on and on ad nauseam.
When I was growing up, we used to play soccer barefoot in the streets of my neighborhood, it would be in the middle of a residential road, and the sidewalks were the bounds. We had to get out of the way every time a car came by, and I only wish we had a few skilled antivaxxers back then to help us move goalposts.
PS- Phil, you know you can’t ignore the preview window crowd forever… (^_~)
May 6th, 2009 at 10:44 am
@The Chemist
Well, back in the mid ’90s, I heard that the president of Johnson & Johnsons worshipped the devil. Granted, this was from the same kind of folks who would say that evolution is not true, the Earth is 6,000 years old, gays are devil-spawn and life absolutely could not possibly exist on another planet, because that would make humans not special.
May 6th, 2009 at 11:21 am
It must be the Trilateral Commission’s fault, right?
Damn that Colonel Sanders!!!!
May 6th, 2009 at 11:39 am
C’mon guys, you actually fell for Quasar’s troll? He has never contributed more any of the vaccination threads other than his “fill up your babies with magic water” line which is meant as nothing more than throwing a rock at a hornets nest.
This is a case where he doesn’t have an opinion. He just wants to watch the bloodbath.
May 6th, 2009 at 11:45 am
I haven’t read any of the comments, so this has probably been mentioned prior: Looks like our old friend and global warming denier, Joe Barton, headed this hearing. I guess at least he is on board with vaccination.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
I tried to get my son a smallpox vaccination about 2o years ago, when it was almost eradicated, but was told they were no longer available because the risks of the vaccination outweighed the chances of needing it to prevent smallpox. I mention that only to counteract the continual nonsense we hear about how vaccines are unnecessarily pushed to make profits for doctors or drug companies.
If you need to simplify information articles for the general public, I have some plain language training and experience.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
It is ironic and worth noting that it is the failure of vaccination, not its success, which is used as justification for requiring its use.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:54 pm
@Jim
Well we could just drop vaccination entirely and let the wild state ensue. That would be one way to find out just how effective vaccination really is.
May 6th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
@Jim
Vaccines are successful. Look at how polio is now no longer occurring in the U.S. and much of the developed world. That’s thanks to the polio vaccine. Measles have dropped dramatically, thanks to vaccines. Likewise every disease that vaccines prevent. Their success keeps people from suffering from the diseases, and it also succeeds in preventing the transmission to others with whom they come in contact. That alone is a big reason to use vaccines.
When we talk about what you call the “failure” of vaccines, by which I assume you mean the fact that they are not 100% effective, just like any medicine, we are being honest. They have a success rate of around 85%-95% after the first shot of a series, depending on the vaccine and the individual. By the end of the series, the efficacy rate is around 97%-99%. Because of that reality, high rates of vaccination are necessary to establish herd immunity. This will protect not only those for whom the vaccine does not work, but also those who, for medical reasons, cannot receive a vaccine, as well as ignorant people who, for erroneous personal beliefs, refuse vaccines. When vaccination rates drop, diseases come back. Take a look at California, Australia, Germany, the U.K. and so on.
May 6th, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Wow, this thread has devolved rather spectacularly.
I doubt any of the anti-vaxxers will be persuaded by the arguments above. Its difficult to reason a person out of a position they came to irrationally or that they cling to out of fear or cognitive-dissonance.
The most you can ever do is lead them to a point where they come to the reasonable conclusion on their own. I don’t see that happening here today.
However, there are a lot of people who are trying to make informed, rational decisions about their child’s health-care and there’s so much noise and fear-mongering in the media that its very difficult.
THAT is something the folks on this forum can do something about.
If this is an issue you care about, follow Phil’s example and help get science-based information about the benefits of vaccination to any young parents you know.
-Sean
May 6th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
Sorry, I’m not part of the herd. I haven’t been vaccinated in over 40 years. I’m sure their are many other adults just like myself. Disease will always be part of the human experience, no matter how much we vaccinate. New diseases will appear, especially the ones with many different virus strains. We have no answers for the rise in autoimmune diseases but drug companies and their government are positive it couldn’t be related to vaccines. The problem is there is a big problem with our childrens health. It could be the food, the air, the drugs.. nobody seems to know in your circle but one thing is for certain, something is terribly wrong. Until you have the answers, people can only go by what they see with their own eyes. When thousands of parents swear that vaccines are resposible for their damaged kids, you really have to step back and listen.
May 6th, 2009 at 1:34 pm
and to Sean,
Fear works on both sides of this issue, I’m sorry to say.
May 6th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
“# Gail S Says:
I was fortunate enough to be a stay at home mom for the first 8 years of my marriage and I did not have any of my children vaccinated. They are now 26, 24 and 19 and only one of them had a mild case of chicken pox. Other than that, they did not have any of the typical childhood diseases and all reached 18 without so much as a broken bone. I also studied nutrition extensively and ensured that they had proper sleep. That is really all that is necessary for good health in a reasonably healthy environment.
When they began to attend public schools, they were required by law to be vaccinated and at that time, I complied because I was working and could not home school.
The concerns that vaccinations could cause permanent damage to children are warranted, even though it is rare, it does happen. If children are not in day care and in constant, close company with other families and children day in and day out, there is no need for the early vaccinations. The time for vaccines is the time at which the child will be likely to be exposed to dangerous illnesses.”
Gail you need to get a little realistic. Take the MMR vaccine. Say no one vaccinated, well 6 % may get pneumonia and live, maybe 2 in a thousand would die. In a country’s population that is a heck of a lot of dead kids. But still many many more kids will survive. So a story of how your family did fine is what for the most part we would expect.
The rates of an exceptionally bad reaction that may involve brain damage from the vaccine is about one in a million. As you saw your kids got vaccinated and they were fine. That too, is what we would expect.
However, when you look at a population as a whole you save a lot of lives at a very small cost with vaccinations. They need to be early, because if not, quite a number of young kids will end up getting damaged. If you had vaccinated your kids at the normall time the odds are overwhelming that they wou d have been fine and you would have been saved one chicken pox sickness. I grew up before many of these vaccines and believe me, the only way you can think the way you do, is because the vaccinations have been so effective. If you saw, as I did when I was young, so many people crippled with polio you would not give one thought to being anti vax.
May 6th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
@Jim
If you are part of society, then you are part of the herd, regardless of whether you’ve been vaccinated or not. But, you have, at least in part, I’m assuming. So, you have benefited from vaccines.
Agreed. Nature is continually changing and evolving. We are in an arms race, of sorts, with viruses and bacteria. Even without vaccines and modern medicine, this is still true. Our bodies change to fight something off, that something changes to infect us more effectively, etc. Modern medicine, e.g., vaccines, allow us a much better chance of succeeding in surviving against these diseases. If you feel that people fare better without vaccines, then I suggest you take a look at the measles outbreak in Duisburg, Germany in 2006. About 86% of the population was not vaccinated. There were numerous serious complications, increased financial burden on the medical system, and two of those unvaccinated people, babies, suffered measles-induced encephalitis, which in turn killed them. I have a link to more info on that if you click my name.
Scientists did step back and listen. They did some research into the concerns about vaccines causing autism, and they found that there was no connection. Now, they can still swear all they want that the vaccine is responsible, but, at least where autism is concerned, the science is pretty clear. You are making the claim that vaccines cause a host of other disorders, like asthma, allergies, etc. Got some science to back that up?
May 6th, 2009 at 2:35 pm
“If you are part of society, then you are part of the herd, regardless of whether you’ve been vaccinated or not. But, you have, at least in part, I’m assuming. So, you have benefited from vaccines.”
What kind of statement is that? I probably represent 50% of society, so your saying that it doesn’t matter whether you’re vaccinated or not you’re part of herd immunity? Now that’s some whacky scientific thinking.
Plenty of science out there to support it if your eyes are open:
Money J et al. Autism and autoimmune disease: A family study. J Autism Child Schizophr 1971; 1: 146-160.
2. Comi A. et al. Familial clustering of autoimmune disorders and evaluation of medical risk factors in autism. J Child Neurology 1999; 14: 388-394.
3. Sweetwen TL et al. Increased prevalence of familial autoimmunity in probands with pervasive developmental disorders. Pediatrics 2003: 112: 420.
4.Creen LA et al. Maternal autoimmune disease, asthma and allergies, and childhood autism spectrum disorders: a case-control study. Arch Pediatr 2005;159: 151-157.
5. Dalton P et al. Maternal antibodies associated with autism and language disorders. Ann Neurol 2003;53: 533-537.
6.Singh VK, Rivas WH. Prevalence of serum antibodies to caudate nucleus in autistic children. Neuroscience Lett 2004; 355: 53-56.
7. Singh VK et al. Antibodies to myelin basic protein in children with autistic behavior. Brain Behavior Immunol 1993; 7: 97-103.
8. Singer HS et al. Antibrain antibodies in children with autism and their unaffected siblings. J Neuroimmunol 2006; 178: 149-155.
9. Singh VK et al. Circulating autoantibodies to neural and glial filament proteins in autism. Pediatr Neurol 1997; 17: 88-90.
10. el-Fawal HA e al. Exposure to methylmercury results in serum autoantibodies to neurotypic and gliaotypic proteins. Neurotoxicology 1996; 17: 531-539.
11. Havarinasab S et al. Immunosuppressive and autoimmune effects of thimerosal in mice. Toxicol Appl Pharmacol 2005; 204; 109-121.
12. Hornig M, Chian D, Lipkin WJ. Neurotoxic effect of postnatal thimerosal are mouse strain dependent. Mol Psychiatry 2004; 9: 833-845.
13. Tishler M, Shoenfeld Y. Vaccination may be associated with autoimmune disease. Isr Med Assoc J 2004; 6: 430-432.
14. Shoenfeld T, Aron-Maor A. Vaccination and autoimmunity-‘vaccinosis’ a dangerous liaison? J Autoimmunity 2000; 14: 1-10.
15. Vojdam A et al. Antibodies to neuron-specific antigens in children with autism: possible cross-reaction with encephalitogenic proteins from milk, Chlamydia pneumoniae and Streptococcus group A. J Neuroimmunol 2002; 129: 168-177.
16. Lucarelli S et al. Food allergy and infantile autism. Panminerva Med 1995; 37: 137-141.
17. O’Banion D et al. Disruptive behavior: a dietary approach. J Autism Child Schizophr 1978; 8: 325-337.
18.Vojdani A et al. Immune response to dietary proteins, gliadin and cerebellar peptides in children with autism. Nutr Neuroscience 2004; 7: 151-161.
19. McGeer PL and McGeer EG. Autotoxicity and Alzheimer Disease. 2000; 57; 289-290.
20. Malek-Ahmadi P. Cytokines and etiopathogenesis of pervasive developmental disorders. Med Hypothesis 2001; 56: 321-324.
21. Wizeman A et al. Abnormal responses to brain tissue antigen in the syndrome of autism. Am J Psychiatry 1982; 139; 1462-1465.
May 6th, 2009 at 4:16 pm
12. Hornig M, Chian D, Lipkin WJ. Neurotoxic effect of postnatal thimerosal are mouse strain dependent. Mol Psychiatry 2004; 9: 833-845.
What does Hornig’s most recent paper say? It is one that tried to replicate Wakefield’s study. Or does it not fit in your cherry picker?
The science has been done, the link between vaccines and autism does not exist. It is a dead link… “It’s not pinin’! ‘It’s passed on! This link is no more! It has ceased to be! It’s expired and gone to meet its maker! It’s a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If you hadn’t nailed it to the perch it’d be pushing up the daisies! Its metabolic processes are now ‘istory! It’s off the twig! It’s kicked the bucket, it’s shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-LINK!! ” (hat-tip to Monty Python and the dead parrot sketch)
May 6th, 2009 at 4:44 pm
@Jim – the rate of vaccinations, adult & child is way above 50%. So you are getting the benefits of it. Diseases can’t get a foothold due to the size of the vaccinated population – so deal with it.
May 6th, 2009 at 4:59 pm
@Chris
Then there’s this article. Give it a look:
Low-level neonatal thimerosal exposure: further evaluation of altered neurotoxic potential in SJL mice.
Berman RF, Pessah IN, Mouton PR, Mav D, Harry J.
Toxicol Sci. 2008 Feb;101(2):294-309.
May 6th, 2009 at 7:24 pm
How do you diagnose autism in mice? Which is what Hornig was asked on her first paper.
From the article Charlie Young mentioned:
Hornig’s more recent paper: PLoS ONE. 2008 Sep 4;3(9):e3140.
Lack of association between measles virus vaccine and autism with enteropathy: a case-control study.
I repeat: The science has been done, the link between vaccines and autism does not exist. It is a dead link… “It’s not pinin’! ‘It’s passed on! This link is no more! It has ceased to be! It’s expired and gone to meet its maker! It’s a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If you hadn’t nailed it to the perch it’d be pushing up the daisies! Its metabolic processes are now ‘istory! It’s off the twig! It’s kicked the bucket, it’s shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-LINK!! ” (hat-tip to Monty Python and the dead parrot sketch)
And this is a fun listen (stealing the URL munging from up thread!):
dub dub dub dot quackcast.com/spodcasts/files/48f9db861d8a83f764792aa4b77990f8-29.html
Read his stuff (and others on the subject) here:
dub dub dub dot sciencebasedmedicine.org/?cat=36
May 6th, 2009 at 7:58 pm
Comment in moderation… I looked, it confirmed that thimerosal (which is no longer in the pediatric vaccines, except for some influenza vaccines, and has NEVER been in the MMR) does not cause problems in mice.
Measles, mumps, pertussis and Hib are real and coming back. They are definitely more dangerous than DTaP, MMR and Hib. I repeat (again):
The science has been done, the link between vaccines and autism does not exist. It is a dead link… “It’s not pinin’! ‘It’s passed on! This link is no more! It has ceased to be! It’s expired and gone to meet its maker! It’s a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If you hadn’t nailed it to the perch it’d be pushing up the daisies! Its metabolic processes are now ‘istory! It’s off the twig! It’s kicked the bucket, it’s shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-LINK!! ” (hat-tip to Monty Python and the dead parrot sketch)
May 6th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
Here’s some new research, Autistic kids ‘have enlarged amygdala’…
http://www.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/autistic-kids-have-enlarged-amygdala-20090507-avw1.html
May 7th, 2009 at 3:18 am
Todd W. said:
I take issue with this, Todd.
The anti-vax side has no merit. None at all.
May 7th, 2009 at 3:40 am
Jim said (in a response to Todd W.):
Be careful, Jim. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
Even though I have a PhD in biochemistry, I am aware of gaps in my knowledge of immunology.
This is only true sometimes. More often, the adjuvant induces a stronger immune response than the antigen alone.
Yes, but just because these are most common, does not mean they are the only ones used.
A more modern approach is to encapsulate the antigen in some form that resembles a virus particle (a virosome), which induces a more specific immune response (aluminium-based adjuvants induce local inflammation, which is what causes the leukocytes to congregate at the site of injection).
This is not quite true.
A suitable course of vaccination can indeed induce lifelong immunity. However, in most cases, the course of vaccination that will achieve this has not yet been fully worked out. Certainly, some modern courses of vaccination can induce immunity for long terms. Otherwise, why do we not have tetanus boosters every year, or every month?
I have no idea what this is supposed to mean.
The artificial nature of the vaccine does not induce immunity ever. The artificial nature of the vaccine is what prevents it from (in most cases) causing the disease. I am, of course, forced to assume that by “unnatural” you refer to the facts that a vaccine is either a killed or attenuated pathogen or a fragment of a pathogen, and that it is delivered with an adjuvant.
Of course, if I have misinterpreted your incoherence, I am sure you will delight in correcting me.
Yes, but who ever claimed that vaccines were perfect?
Vaccines are still way, way better than not using vaccination.
So, you think the risk of having polio, mumps, measles, smallpox etc. is better than having a shedload of allergies, or asthma?
I disagree. Vaccination is all about relative benefits. If it were a choice between vaccines and autoimmune disease, it is surely better to prevent or eradicate diseases that frequently kill, sterilise or maim than it is to suffer from afflictions where a life-altering impact is far rarer.
Besides, if autoimmune diseases can be reduced or prevented by exposure to dirt, pets etc., this has nothing to do with the choice of whether to vaccinate or run the risk of catching and spreading a killer disease.
May 7th, 2009 at 3:55 am
Heck with it.. with the pro-disease people running amok, I’m investing in Iron Lung Manufacturers.
J/P=?
May 7th, 2009 at 5:18 am
Jim said:
Ah, Jim, lad, that is only true if you twist the facts to suit your feebly inaccurate world view.
Vaccines work: if they did not, we would not use them.
Vaccines are not perfect, so in many cases vaccination will not eradicate a disease (either too small a proportion of the population becomes immune, or the virus can go dormant until the immunity has faded, or the virus evolves too fast, or whatever). However, in some cases, it is not the vaccine that is imperfect. Smallpox, for example, has been eradicated in the wild by an international vaccination effort. Polio would have been eradicated had it not been for antivaccination campaigns in (IIRC) Nigeria.
However, to describe the imperfection of a very successful medical procedure as a “failure” is just lying.
So, Jim: no, it was not worth noting, except as another example of antivaxxers’ ignorance or dishonesty.
May 7th, 2009 at 5:38 am
Jim said:
Sorry, but you are.
Since there is no reasonable justification for your distrust of vaccines, your following the anti-vaccination crowd is a perfect example of herd behaviour.
So, presumably you were vaccinated prior to that?
Quite correct. There are many people who cannot distinguish the words “there”, “their” and “they’re”.
What does this have to do with vaccination?
So? Why is this justification to not try?
Irrespective of our ultimate long-term success, should we not use the best tools available to prevent diseases wherever we can?
Hmmm … not really. New diseases will be identified, as will new strains of old diseases, but most of the “new” diseases that have been identified in the last 30 years had been around for a considerable time already. Just because modern travel habits bring a new disease to the attention of western medical science does not mean the disease itself is new.
Incidentally, did you know that the “swine flu” that has been making headlines recently has the same serotype as the 1918 Spanish Flu?
That’s because it isn’t. The evidence is available to anyone with eyes to see it.
Besides, where the hell does your fixation on autoimmune disease come from? Have you given up touting autism as the evil consequence of vaccination?
Eh?
Infant mortality is a tiny fraction of what it was 100 years ago. In most western countries, people can realistically expect to live to adulthood, which is a pretty big improvement.
If there is a problem with our children’s health, it has very little to do with pathogens. Most forms of heart disease and cancer involve no pathogen at all, but these are now the biggest killers in North America and Europe.
What? Apart from lack of exercise and a diet unhealthily high in fats and carbs, you mean?
Well, your knowledge of medicine, for a start, is terribly wrong. Why should anyone listen to your whining about children’s health?
No, you don’t. Reality is what it is irrespective of how many people claim otherwise. Vaccines have a proven benefit. The anti-vaccinatin campaigners have no evidence at all to support their claims.
You are boring me now. Back up your claims with actual evidence, or stop making them.
May 7th, 2009 at 5:41 am
Jim said:
Maybe so, but in the case of fear of polio, smallpox etc., these diseases are known to be killers and maimers of children, so it is reasonable to fear them. The fear of the antivaxxers is entirely artificial – it has been manufactured by people like Andrew Wakefield to serve agendas of their own.
May 7th, 2009 at 5:51 am
Jim said:
And the goalposts move again.
Jim, those papers imply a link between autoimmunity and certain cases of autism.
What the hell does any of this have to do with vaccination?
May 7th, 2009 at 5:57 am
Except this review:
Shoenfeld T, Aron-Maor A. Vaccination and autoimmunity-‘vaccinosis’ a dangerous liaison? J Autoimmunity 2000; 14: 1-10.
Here is the entire abstract:
Notice the sentence I have bolded.
Now, Jim, did you actually read any of those articles you have listed as supporting your case?
May 7th, 2009 at 6:53 am
I haven’t seen any factual science by the so-called experts on this board that proves vaccines are safe but they continually ask for proof that they aren’t safe. I provided many links to studies that show a possible link but they were removed by the people on this board. Except for the one above…
And lastly, if there was absolutely no connection between vaccines and autism, then the Vaccine Court would not have ruled otherwise in two seperate cases of Michelle Cedillo, and Bailey Banks.
May 7th, 2009 at 7:35 am
@Jim
You clearly have not read the site linked via my name. In those cases, the court did not rule that the children had autism induced by vaccine. For Michelle Cedillo, the court ruled that she had a rare, underlying mitochondrial disorder (not autism) that was exacerbated by vaccination. In the case of Bailey Banks, he had another rare disorder called acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM), again, not autism.
Go back and read again what I said. I did not say you are part of herd immunity. I said you are part of the herd. Herd immunity is when a sufficient portion of the herd (i.e., society) is vaccinated. So again, whether you are vaccinated or not, you are part of the herd. And the more there are of people who refuse to vaccinate, the lower the percentage of the herd that is vaccinated, thereby lowering the protection of the portion that is not vaccinated (including those who refuse to vaccinate, those too young, those with compromised or suppressed immune systems and those with other conditions preventing immunization).
Here is a link that explains what herd immunity is. Please read it. wisegeek.com/what-is-herd-immunity.htm (copy into your address bar with www at the beginning)
I’ll take a look at some of those studies as I have time. In the meantime, for some data on relative risks of certain diseases versus risks of the vaccines that prevent them, please this CDC site: cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/6mishome.htm#risk (copyinto your address bar with www at the beginning).
May 7th, 2009 at 7:35 am
Nigel Depledge says:
“Maybe so, but in the case of fear of polio, smallpox etc., these diseases are known to be killers and maimers of children, so it is reasonable to fear them. The fear of the antivaxxers is entirely artificial – it has been manufactured by people like Andrew Wakefield to serve agendas of their own”
Children have been killed and maimed by vaccines. It is a fact! To say that this fear is entirely artificial, is a bold outright lie.
May 7th, 2009 at 7:43 am
Jim, which links were removed? If you have read many of the threads here, a lot of posters decry the inability to edit their own comments, let alone anyone else’s. If you mean that they were held up in moderation, well that happens to everyone eventually.
May 7th, 2009 at 8:07 am
@Jim
First, citations. Second, to justify that giving vaccines is worse than natural infection, you need to show that the risks of death or serious injury from the vaccine is greater than the risk of death or serious injury from the disease. Again, see that CDC link I gave you.
May 7th, 2009 at 8:10 am
Oh, and just to clarify. By my last post asking for citations, I am not denying that vaccines can cause serious injury or death, before you or anyone else tries to berate me for denying that they do. I am only asking for citations to support your claim.
May 7th, 2009 at 8:12 am
Part of the herd..ok. I’m part of the herd but the point is that 50% or more of the population is part of the herd, so how can you prove the theory of herd immunity when you have less than 50% of the population that are vaccinated for many of the diseases that are supposedly being supressed through herd immunity? Whatever fancy term that the court wants to label these cases of vaccine damage, is not the point. It obviously revolves around the fact that they are willing to admit that vaccines caused these disorders as long as the families and lawyers accept that it will not be labled Autism.
Mark, I’m sorry, the links were not removed.
May 7th, 2009 at 8:20 am
@Jim
Where are you getting this 50% figure? Please provide a citation that “less than 50% of the population [are] vaccinated”.
Yes, it is the point. People say that vaccines cause autism. They bring up these two cases saying, “See! The courts have said vaccines cause autism!” However, they are wrong.
No. What is obvious is that the petitioners either did not seek a ruling relating to autism, or that they did not succeed in presenting their case that there was autism caused by a vaccine. I would also point you to the autism omnibus hearings. The first three test cases, selected by the petitioners as the best cases to prove their claim, have failed. Bear in mind that the standard of evidence for this court is “more likely than not.” In other words, they just need to show that the vaccine is 50%+a hair likely to have caused the autism.
May 7th, 2009 at 8:24 am
Jim said:
No-one has ever claimed that vaccines are 100% safe.
However, they are significantly less harmful, and less likely to cause harm, than the alternative (e.g. pertussis, shingles, polio etc.). Any vaccination carries a small risk, because a small proportion of people react badly to them.
You have whined a lot, but not really provided any evidence that the risk of vaccination outweighs the benefit of vaccination. I am convinced that this is because you cannot.
The BA does not do this. However, any comment that is loaded with links will be interpreted as spam by the automatic filters.
However, your comment in which you cited c. 20 studies is still there to be seen. What you did not realise is that only one of them actually considered any link between vaccination and harm (the rest were about the potential relationships between autoimmunity and either autism or alzheimer’s). This review paper was published in 2000, just 1 or 2 years after the initial MMR scare. It concluded that vaccination conferred enough benefit to outweigh the known risks, and that the proposed link between vaccination and autism was not proven.
Subsequently, further studies sought a link between vaccination and autism and found none. These studies have sufficient statistical power that we are able to rule out any significant link between vaccination and autism.
Nope. Your earlier citations are still there for anyone to see that most of them are nothing to do with vaccination.
As others have pointed out:
(a) neither of these people has autism;
(b) the “vaccine court” has the lowest standards of evidence anywhere (certainly lower than a criminal court, and science would laugh at the standards of evidence applied by it); and
(c) the three absolutely “best” cases (where antivaxxers were convinced of the link between vaccination and autism) were rejected by the “vaccine court”, despite (b). By extrapolation, we can infer that the anti-vaccination campaigners have no evidence that indicates a link between vaccines and autism.
Basically, the “vaccine court” applies the precautionary principle, rather than any rigorous standard of evidence. It does not apply “innocent until proven guilty”. Instead, its approach is to determine whether whatever damage is claimed was caused by a vaccine if it seems more likely than not based on extant evidence at the time.
May 7th, 2009 at 8:27 am
Jim said:
Prove it.
Where is your evidence?
The fear is artificial, because it is out of all proportion to the real risk associated with vaccination.
May 7th, 2009 at 8:54 am
If the vaccine court has low standards, than why aren’t these cases being held in a criminal court? Drug lawsuits are held in a criminal court. Why do we need special protection for vaccine manufacturers through the Injury Compensation Act? If vaccines are so safe, why do they need these special protections. No other product in history has ever receved such protection from the government. This act was put into effect because the drug companies were buried under litigation from families of damaged children and they told the government, either you do something or we’re out of this vaccine business.
At least you are finally admitting that their is risk associated with vaccines. Now it’s seems the question is whether the benefits outweigh the risks. I believe that this should be determined by parents and not government. That’s pretty much where I stand on this issue.
May 7th, 2009 at 9:09 am
@Jim
Once again, I see that you have not read the site linked via my name (antiantivax.jottit.com). It has some info on the Vaccine Court. Please give it a read. It answers a lot of the questions you bring up.
No other product represents as much of a public health issue. In other words, vaccines play such a huge role in preventing diseases and reducing the burden on the medical system (manufacturers, providers, insurers, employers, etc.) that costly and lengthy tort trials would jeopardize the supply. The system was set up by a coalition of people, including normal, everyday citizens that are not affiliated with drug companies. All of the costs of a case in the vaccine court is paid for by the government, even if petitioners lose their case. The turnaround time is faster than in a criminal case. The standard of evidence is lower, meaning it is easier for petitioners to prove their case.
Furthermore, individuals can still pursue a tort case against a manufacturer, if they want to. No rights being infringed.
While the ultimate decision is for the parents, that decision should be based on sound science, not on misinformed beliefs, not on lies spread by those looking to make a buck on “alternatives” or increase their own fame by demonizing vaccines, and not even simply because the government says so. The evidence, the science should be the basis for answering the questions about the risks vs. benefits.
May 7th, 2009 at 9:10 am
@Jim
We’ve never denied it. Every medicine has risks. Where did we say there were none? This is a common canard that anti-vaxers like to say, that pro-vaxers believe vaccines are 100% without risk. Just another one of their mistakes and lies.
May 7th, 2009 at 9:46 am
Because for the people doing the suing, it is in their best interest to go with the courts with the lowest standards of evidence.
Compared with their normal drugs, vaccines have an extremely low profit margin. With the added cost of fighting lawsuits, even if there was no chance the lawsuits could ever succeed it would still be in the vaccine manufacturer’s best interests to just stop making vaccines. And considering how essential vaccines are to our public health, as we are seeing with the sudden resurgence in one nearly unheard-of diseases when vaccination rates drop just a little, having all vaccine manufacturing stop dead would be a public health disaster.
I guarantee you, if people were saying antibiotics caused autism we would be seeing the exact same sort of courts set up. Antibiotics are very similar to vaccines, a fundamental component of our disease-fighting arsenal that are used extremely widely, but with extremely low profit margins for drug companies. NSAIDs like aspirin, tylenol, and advil may be similar as well, but I am not as sure about their profit margins. But if their profit margins were as low the same thing would happen there. They are essential to our disease-fighting arsenal and are used ubiquitously. I should point out that I am not talking about issues with a single antibiotic or NSAID, I am talking about an all-out attack on antibiotics or NSAIDs in general like we are seeing with vaccines.
The reason that we are not seeing those sorts of courts set up is because there are no such attacks. Amongst the core components of our disease-fighting arsenal, only vaccines are under serious threat. Sure there are occasional attacks on individual medications, sometimes justified, sometimes not, but never before has there been an all-out attack on an entire class of treatments like we are seeing here.
The only thing similar I can think of are silicone breast implants, the attack on which was similarly without any medical validity whatsoever but instead based entirely on anecdotes, lies, and hysteria. But since it was of only trivial public health importance (and are now allowed in reconstructive surgery cases if I recall correctly), the government thought it was better to just ban them outright then deal with the difficulty of educating people who were too-closed minded to be educated.
No, it should be determined by the evidence. The evidence is clear and unambiguous. The answer is yes, the benefits do outweigh the risks. They outweigh the risks by many orders of magnitude. Even if it was true that all cases of autism were caused by vaccines, the dangers posed by the diseases are still orders of magnitude more common than autism. Brain damage alone, brain damage that is far more catastrophic than autism, is more likely than developing autism. And even the most ardent anti-vaxxers are claiming that only a fraction of autism cases are caused by vaccines, which makes the discrepancy even greater.
May 7th, 2009 at 11:30 am
The 50% figure covers all vaccines that were introduced after 1970. Also, if it takes multiple series of the traditional shots to confer immunity (tdap, polio) than those born in the 60’s and before can be considered not totally immune because most adults have not received any type of boosters for many of the traditional diseases.
Let me ask all you people a question? What has decreased the rate of all infectious disease the most in your opinion?
Sanitation and improved living conditions or vaccines.
Another question?
Are humans genetically superior survivors possessing top-class immune system technology derived from millennia of natural selection? Or are they chemically-deficient, immune-suppressed failures of immune system technology that warrant aggressive pharmaceutical intervention?
So much for Darwinism.. So much for natural selection.
You are changing the order of nature that has been operating for millions of years. Our food is genetically engineered, our bodies are injected with genetically engineered materials. That’s a road that some of us do not wish to take… History will show that unless man gets back to the natural order of nature, he will continue to suffer with infectious diseases far worse than a case of chicken pox or the measles. Autism, Alzhiemers, autoimmune diseases, AIDS, Lyme disease, Diabetes, 8,000,000 children on depression meds..
And let’s not forget heart disease, cancer, obesity..
You can’t hide the truth. The tide is turning and some of us are waking up to your big scam.
I think you have all replaced science with religon. The religon of vaccines.
May 7th, 2009 at 11:48 am
@Jim
Again, please provide a citation for this.
If we’re talking all infectious diseases, and not just those prevented by vaccines, then it is a combination of multiple factors, including sanitation, improved palliative care, improved knowledge of how the diseases work and vaccines. If we’re talking vaccine preventable diseases, then vaccines have had a far greater impact than sanitation. Just a couple examples, when the polio vaccine was introduced, polio cases dropped dramatically. Likewise with the measles vaccine. We also have plenty of evidence that when vaccination rates drop, infection rates for the diseases prevented by those vaccines increase.
Well, humans, like every other animal, has evolved a nice, robust immune system. The problem with your question, though, is that it does not take into account the fact that viruses mutate and bacteria evolve to get around the immune system improvements. Like I said (either in this thread or another), it’s an arms race that will never end. Vaccines are just another weapon in our arsenal.
If we abandon vaccines, then many, many more people will die every year (heck, every day) from diseases than currently succumb to them. Even more will be marred for life by the disease.
Autism is not an infectious disease; it’s looking to be a genetic disorder. Alzheimer’s is not an infectious disease; again, genetic disorder. Autoimmune diseases are not infectious. AIDS actually is from an infectious virus, HIV, and there is work being done on a possible vaccine for it. Lyme disease is infectious, transmitted by ticks; I’m not sure off-hand whether a vaccine is in the works for this. Diabetes is not an infectious disease; it is a breakdown of insulin production and/or absorption systems in the body. Depression is not an infectious disease. Heart disease and obesity are not infectious diseases. Some types of cancer are infectious (e.g., cancer caused by HPV).
So, you got 2, 3 if we count cancer, infectious diseases in your list out of 10.
You continue to show an ignorance of how science works, how vaccines work and generally how immunology works as a whole. You also appear to continue to not read any resources provided to you.
May 7th, 2009 at 11:53 am
@Jim
Umm…what “truth”? What “scam”? You haven’t provided any real evidence to support anything you’ve said.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
The 50% figure covers all vaccines that were introduced after 1970. Also, if it takes multiple series of the traditional shots to confer immunity (tdap, polio) than those born in the 60’s and before can be considered not totally immune because most adults have not received any type of boosters for many of the traditional diseases.
Again, please provide a citation for this.
Why do you need documented proof for something that is just a common fact. Adults born before 1970 have not been vaccinated for many of the diseases (because they didn’t exist) and most have not received boosters for the original ones (because most adults don’t get boosters). You can ask any average american over 40 if he’s been vaccinated for Hep B or A, Rotavirus…and all the others. Man, how thick in the head can someone be.
I realize that all the diseases I listed are not infectious but they all have increased in occurence while the traditional diseases have decreased. So, you’re so proud of the fact that we don’t suffer from measles and chicken pox but you offer no solutions for all the other diseases that are around today. Again, your best defense is a healthy immune system supported by good nutrition, clean water, exercise and sleep. Injecting all these antigens and forcing the immune system to react to them all at the same time is madness. There is no way that someone would ever catch all these diseases in a lifetime.
Ok, so keep fighting your chemical warfare against disease because you will never win. If I had to choose between full blown Autism or being crippled from polio, I’d take the polio.
Polio:
“Prior to 1954 any physician who reported paralytic poliomyelitis was doing his patient a service by way of subsidizing the cost of hospitalization and was being community-minded in reporting a communicable disease. The criterion of diagnosis at that time in most health departments followed the World Health Organization definition: “Spinal paralytic poliomyelitis: signs and symptoms of nonparalytic poliomyelitis with the addition of partial or complete paralysis of one or more muscle groups, detected on two examinations at least 24 hours apart.” Note that “two examinations at least 24 hours apart” was all that was required. Laboratory confirmation and presence of residual paralysis was not required.
In 1955 the criteria were changed to conform more closely to the definition used in the 1954 field trials: residual paralysis was determined 10 to 20 days after onset of illness and again 50 to 70 days after onset…. This change in definition meant that in 1955 we started reporting a new disease, namely, paralytic poliomyelitis with a longer-lasting paralysis. Furthermore, diagnostic procedures have continued to be refined. Coxsackie virus infections and aseptic meningitis have been distinguished from paralytic poliomyelitis. Prior to 1954 large numbers of these cases undoubtedly were mislabeled as paralytic poliomyelitis. Thus, simply by changes in diagnostic criteria, the number of paralytic cases was predetermined to decrease in 1955-1957, whether or not any vaccine was used.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
@Jim
I see. So you’re just pulling the number out of nowhere and asserting that it is so. If you make a claim such as that 50% of the population is unvaccinated, then it is good etiquette to provide your source for that information so that others can verify it for themselves.
We have improved on diagnostic tools for some of those diseases, so there are more people being identified. We have expanded the criteria for some, like autism, so more people are being classified as having it. Others, like heart disease, certain cancers and Alzheimer’s are ones that primarily affect older individuals. As people live longer, these show up more frequently. Diet also plays a role in some of them, and so on. None of them is linked to vaccines. And “traditional” diseases, like measles, have decreased thanks to vaccines.
Seeing as the topic of the post is vaccines, why should I offer solutions for them? Just because I have not said anything does not mean that treatments or preventative measures do not exist or are not being worked on.
Generally, yes. This will help you get through some diseases without major harm. For others, like tetanus, a healthy immune system doesn’t significantly improve your chances of surviving. Death rate is, IIRC, about 1 in 20. Others, like certain flu strains, are more dangerous for those with healthy, robust immune systems. And even a healthy person can still be blinded or rendered deaf by measles, crippled by polio, sterile by mumps and so on.
How about living the rest of your life in an iron lung? Or death? Would you choose death over autism? Besides which, vaccines do not cause autism.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Actually, yes. I would rather be dead than be brain damaged for the rest of my life and a burden to society.
You seem to be stuck on that 50% statement. Is 40% better..? The point is that it supposedly over 90% vaccination rates to create herd immunity and that isn’t the case. Stop nitpicking, you know what the point is.
Sterile by mumps..that’s why we have two of them. lol
You really need to stop being such an alarmist.
No reply to my polio info? I’m very suprised.
May 7th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
“Actually, yes. I would rather be dead than be brain damaged for the rest of my life and a burden to society.”
So, you’re a bigot as well as an anti-science goofball?
May 7th, 2009 at 6:33 pm
Pity Jim does not realize that measles, Hib, and other diseases do cause real and very serious brain damage at a greater frequency than they cause death.
Actually, he lack of thinking may be the result of a childhood bout with disease:
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2006 Mar;160(3):302-9
Impact of specific medical interventions on reducing the prevalence of mental retardation.
(some of those medical interventions include the MMR vaccine)
May 7th, 2009 at 8:16 pm
@Jim,
“…Are humans genetically superior survivors possessing top-class immune system technology derived from millennia of natural selection? Or are they chemically-deficient, immune-suppressed failures of immune system technology that warrant aggressive pharmaceutical intervention?…”
It isn’t aggressive pharmaceutical intervention. It is simply the same as being subjected to the disease without the deleterious side effects.
“…You are changing the order of nature that has been operating for millions of years. Our food is genetically engineered, our bodies are injected with genetically engineered materials. That’s a road that some of us do not wish to take… History will show that unless man gets back to the natural order of nature, he will continue to suffer with infectious diseases far worse than a case of chicken pox or the measles…”
Mankind has been changing the order of nature ever since he found out that he could. That’s what gives you higher yielding crops, bigger meat animals, better milking animals, and prettier flowers. When we were closer to the “natural” order of nature in the Middle Ages, the Black Death didn’t take time off and it was far worse than chicken pox. The natural order of nature you want is only achievable by resuming a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. And the diseases won’t give a rat’s posterior – they’ll still take any opportunity to infect.
May 7th, 2009 at 9:10 pm
@Jim the insensitive dill said Sterile by mumps..that’s why we have two of them. lol
Mumps Orchitis is an inflammation of the testicle tissue. Those affected may sustain permanent damage to the testicles which may lead to infertility. What part of that do you not understand?
May 7th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
@Jim said You seem to be stuck on that 50% statement. Is 40% better..?
Well at least we know that you’re pulling numbers out of your… number producing area, so apparently anything else you supply should be taken with a grain of salt.
May 8th, 2009 at 5:37 am
Jim, seemingly determined to prove his closed-mindedness to the world, said:
The point is, Jim, lad, that you appear to be plucking figures out of thin air.
If you cannot back up these numbers by reference to actual studies that have nmeasured them, then how can you know they are correct, and why should we take your word for it?
And you need to back up your assertions by reference to actual measurements.
Why does it surprise you that no-one has responded to that comment?
After all, you have ignored pretty much every question any other commenter has asked you.
May 8th, 2009 at 5:46 am
Jim said:
From people like you, no-one needs to.
In fact, we have tried to club you over the head with the truth and all you do is close your eyes and shout “La, la, la, not listening”.
Your fantasies about the alleged evils of vaccination are not supported by any facts. When you cited a list of 20 articles and claimed they supported your argument, in fact only one was anything to do with vaccines at all, and that was a review conducted just after the initial MMR scare that concluded that the benefits of vaccination quite clearly outweigh the potential risk, and that that risk was not proven. It is quite apparent that you did not read the articles you cited.
From your more recent posts, it is becoming clearer that you are not interested in learning what really is. Your interests appear only to lie in rationalising and affirming your preconceptions.
May 8th, 2009 at 5:52 am
Jim said:
If you were not aware of what the “vaccine court” is and what purpose it serves, why did you mention it in a comment as if its conclusions proved your point?
Seriously, Jim, lad, if you’re going to make an argument from authority, then you should at least learn something about that authority first.
May 8th, 2009 at 6:40 am
Protecting small children against “deadly diseases” like measles is the usual mantra of the pro-vaccine crowd, but just what is the likelihood of someone actually dying from the measles? Consider the following approximate statistics:
*The odds of being struck by lightning: 1 in 5000
*The odds of being killed by terrorist in the US: 1 in 100,000
*The odds of dying in single car trip: 1 in 4 Million
*The odds of dying in single plane trip: 1 in 50 Million
*The odds of dying from Swine flu in the US: 1 in 300 Million
*The odds of dying from measles: 1 in 300 Million
Thus a person is 75 times more likely to die in a car accident every time they get behind the wheel than they are likely to ever die of measles. These statistics should put in perspective the type of fear mongering taking place in the media and at the hospital. Clearly, the measles and “swine flu” should be least of our worries. Any time a warning is issued about something “deadly” one must ask “how deadly”. In most cases the “cure” is far worse than the disease.
Some who are more trusting of vaccines will argue that the low risk of measles is due to the success of the vaccines themselves. However by the time the Measles vaccine was introduced in 1968 the measles rate had already declined by 99.4% (between 1901 and 1967) due to better sanitation. Most viruses were showing a similar downward trend long before vaccines were introduced.
May 8th, 2009 at 6:42 am
In 1976 there was a “Swine flu” and President Ford urged “every many woman and child” to get vaccinated. Only one person died of swine flu, but 25 died from the swine flu vaccine. Many others suffered permanent neurological disorders.
May 8th, 2009 at 6:49 am
You people have absolutely 0 common sense but you are very articulate. It’s amazing that you fail to see the truth about herd immunity. People over 40 years of age have not been vaccinated for most of these diseases because when they were children the vaccines were not yet approved for use. What’s so hard to understand here? Secondly, most adults do not receive boosters for the vaccines they did receive when they were children. You contine to be stuck on a statistic instead of just using a little common sense. That’s exactly what’s wrong with types of people like yourselves. Can anyone send me a doctor/scientists with an ounce of common sense??
May 8th, 2009 at 7:18 am
@Jim
Sorry. I was rushing to get some of the major points out of the way and posted before I had to run for an appointment. Responding to your polio bit would have taken more time than I had.
First off, again, please provide citations for your sources of information so that others can take a look at the source material. In the case of your polio quote, it appears to have been copied and pasted from whale.to, a web site devoted to bad science and misinformation.
That aside, assuming that Dr. Bernard Greenberg’s comments are correct, that would account for some decline in cases. However, there was approximately an 85%-90% decline in incidence (americanhistory.si.edu/polio/timeline/index.htm). Dr. Greenberg’s explanation would account for a portion of that, but not all of it. Do you have some statistics showing the actual number of confirmed cases of each disease before and after?
As further evidence of the vaccine’s efficacy, there is this, from the WHO (who.int/immunization/newsroom/global_immunization_data_october2008.pdf):
The WHO link provides info on other vaccines as well.
May 8th, 2009 at 7:22 am
@Jim
What is your source for the death odds? Here are the odds of death or injury from measles vs. the MMR, from the CDC (http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/6mishome.htm#risk):
DISEASE
Measles
Pneumonia: 6 in 100
Encephalitis: 1 in 1,000
Death: 2 in 1,000
Rubella
Congenital Rubella Syndrome: 1 in 4 (if woman becomes infected early in pregnancy)
VACCINES
MMR
Encephalitis or severe allergic reaction:
1 in 1,000,000
Again. Cite your sources! Otherwise, it’s nothing more than hot air.
May 8th, 2009 at 7:29 am
@Jim
Ah, I see where you copied and pasted your plagiarized post from: naturalnews.com/026227.html
Here is the bit on odds from that site:
Word for word copy and paste job with no attribution.
Also from that same site, the following:
Matching the text of your following post, again, word for word, with no attribution.
So, either you are plagiarizing rampantly, or you are the author of that site. Either way, no other sources are cited to support any of the claims made about odds.
May 8th, 2009 at 7:30 am
Jim; it’s a little late to appeal to “common sense” over stats when you’ve posted so many attempts to prove your case scientifically thus far. Just becaue they were all wrong doesn’t alter that.
And BA gang: don’t beat on Jim too much or he’ll get Jenny in here to shrill you all to death :p
May 8th, 2009 at 7:31 am
Hmm…I tried to post showing that Jim plagiarized two of his last three posts from another site, but my comment appears to have vanished into the ether.
May 8th, 2009 at 7:35 am
By the way, the site that Jim plagiarized from, word for word, for his odds post and his swine flu post was naturalnews.com/026227.html.
May 8th, 2009 at 7:36 am
By the way, Jim’s text theft was from naturalnews.com/026227.html. Word for word.
May 8th, 2009 at 7:37 am
Hmm…every time I try to post the site that Jim stole from, my comment disappears. Let’s try it this way: naturalnews (dot) com (slash) 026227 (dot) html
May 8th, 2009 at 7:39 am
The spam filter apparently does not like the site that Jim stole from. Every time I try to post the site’s name, my comment vanishes. At any rate, highlight some of the text from his odds post or the post immediately following it about swing flu, paste it into Google, surrounded by quotes, and you’ll find, word for word, the original article.
May 8th, 2009 at 7:48 am
@Jim
I was thinking about this, and, even if it is true that 50% of adults have not been vaccinated against many of the diseases that children are vaccinated against, they probably were exposed at some point in their life and represent those people who survived, including those who came through unscathed as well as those who were permanently injured by their brush with the disease.
So, what is really important for your argument to make any logical sense, is for you to show the percentage of people who meet both of the following criteria:
May 8th, 2009 at 8:01 am
Jim, firstly, where did you get your odds from? Not necessarily suggesting you made them up but it’s nice to be able to check. Second, it isn’t just death that you need to worry about. As was pointed out previously, sterility is but one side effect. There are others just as bad and worse.
May 8th, 2009 at 8:14 am
You’re right about the spam filter, Todd. Tried to post the site’s name myself without success. Let’s see if this works:
All one word, the site name is natural news dot com.
May 8th, 2009 at 8:24 am
Once again Jim, you are showing no source for your statistics. If you look at the following webpage, it paints a very different picture:
http://www.who.int/immunization/newsroom/wha2007/en/index.html
According to it, 2400 people died every day from measles, making your daily odds of dying every day 1 in 2.8 million. Your lifetime odds will be much, much higher (but it is harder to calculate since the probability of dying decreases as you get older). The daily odds of dying is projected to be down to one in 300 million by 2010 thanks to vaccination. This include countries with good and bad vaccination coverage, but if your statistics are correct then it shows just how enormously effective vaccination has been.
May 8th, 2009 at 8:33 am
Also found another interesting website:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/rxforsurvival/series/diseases/measles.html
Looking at this your statistics talking about the drop in measles rates by 1968 is pretty misleading. Yes the MMR vaccine was not licensed until 1968, but an individual measles vaccine was licensed in 1963.
What is more, in developing countries a child has a 5 to 15 percent> change of dying from measles (on in 6 to one in 20), far different than your 1 in 300 million statistic.
This bit is particular telling:
May 8th, 2009 at 8:33 am
That may not have been clear, those two excerpts are not close to each other in the actual article.
May 8th, 2009 at 9:16 am
Just came across this interesting site that gives a good explanation in reader-friendly terms of the immune system, immune response, immune memory, infant immune system and even the question of allergies.
immune.org.nz/?t=899
May 8th, 2009 at 9:43 am
Jim said: “In 1976 there was a “Swine flu” and President Ford urged “every many woman and child” to get vaccinated. Only one person died of swine flu, but 25 died from the swine flu vaccine. Many others suffered permanent neurological disorders.”
My understanding is that the 25 vaccine-related deaths were out of 40 million vaccinations, while the one disease-related death was out of 200 cases of influenza.
According to my maths, the vaccine was much safer than the disease.
May 8th, 2009 at 9:57 am
Jim lied with “*The odds of dying from measles: 1 in 300 Million”
Actually, that is so very very wrong… If you go to the CDC Pink Book you will find Appendix G, which as a table showing the cases and deaths of several now vaccine preventable diseases going back as the data allows to 1950. I took some of that data and created some blog friendly tables (mostly, this one has a bit of spacing weirdness).
Here are the numbers for measles fifty years apart:
Year_Cases_Deaths__Year___Cases____Deaths
2000____86___ 1____1950__319124____468
2001___116___ 1____1951__530118____683
2002____44___ 0____1952__683077____618
2003____56___ 1____1953__449146____462
2004____37___ NA__1954__682720____518
2005____66___ NA__1955__555156____345
2006____55___ NA__1956__611936____530
Total__460___3 or more___3831277___3624
Now look at the numbers for 1950 through 1956. Take the total cases and divide by the number of deaths: 3831277 / 3624 = 1057
That is more like one death per thousand, and it does not take into account those who suffered permanent neurological damage. Measles can also cause blindness, deafness, paralysis and permanent brain damage.
Now going on what The Black Cat said, I also have a table of when vaccines were introduced. You will note that 1963 was more than 40 years ago, and the MMR was licensed in 1971…
Disease: Measles in the USA
Year__Cases___Deaths
1961__423,919_434
1962__481,530_408
1963__385,156_364
(^^ first vaccine licensed)
1964__458,083_421
1965__261,905_276
1966__204,136_261
1967___62,705__81
1968___22,231__24
1969___25,826__41
1970___47,351__89
1971___75,290__90
(^^^ MMR licensed)
1972___32,275__24
1973___26,690__23
1974___22,690__20
1975___24,374__20
1976___41,126__12
1977___57,245__15
1978___26,871__11
(^^^ Measles Elimination Program started)
1979___13,597___6
1980___13,506__11
1981____2,124___2
Again, these were all hand typed from the CDC Pink Book Appendix G pdf file.
May 8th, 2009 at 11:08 am
So, basically what you are saying is that even today, Measles deaths are much higher in 3rd world countries then they ever were in the US before a vaccine was ever intoduced.
This just proves that sanitaion and living conditions play a crucial role in the severity of Measles. Also, the statistics provided above are not mortality rates of Measles. The mortality rate for Measles declined by over 90% before the vaccine was introduced. This is the case for all the traditonal diseases.
See: http://www.vaclib.org/sites/debate/Vaccines.html
This tells me that as we moved toward less crowded living conditions, improved sanitation, access to food, improved medical care(antibiotics),
and the fact that humans were developing a natural immunity, these diseases were becoming less severe.
May 8th, 2009 at 11:23 am
I was referring to Mortality rates for Measles in the US. How did I lie? There hasn’t been a Measles death, according to your stats, in the US since 2003 and 3 deaths since 2000. So, over the last 9 years, 3 people out of 300,000,000 have dies of measles. So, today you’re chance of dying from the measles are pretty darn low. 1 in 300,000,000.
The fact is that before the vaccines, the severity of these diseases were on the decline.
See: http://www.vaclib.org/sites/debate/Vaccines.html
You could conclude that improved living conditions through sanitation, less crowded housing, access to food, improved medical care (antibiotics) played a critical role in the decrease of infectious disease.
May 8th, 2009 at 11:40 am
@Jim
While sanitation and living conditions play a role, you are also ignoring the fact that vaccines are difficult to get in 3rd world countries, making that a factor for consideration.
Also, did you not read HCN’s post? He provided statistics for the U.S.. Death is also not the only measure to consider, since measles cases that would have ended in death in earlier years may have been averted due to other medical interventions, but at greater cost in time and money to the family and medical system vs. vaccination. For a look at the costs associated with a measles outbreak, see this link (who.int/bulletin/volumes/87/2/07-050187/en/index.html) about an outbreak in Germany in 2006. Average cost of medical care per patient was around 520 Euros (approx. $698). Compare that to vaccination, in which a parent pays around a $15 co-pay, depending on their insurance, totaling $30 for the two visits to complete the series.
Here’s a question for you. Should we do away with all vaccines? If so, what is your rationale? If not, which ones should be kept, and why? Which should be stopped, and why?
BTW, thanks for actually providing a source this time.
May 8th, 2009 at 11:40 am
Darnit…forgot to close the bold tag after “the U.S.”
May 8th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
I do not believe we should do away with any vaccines. Vaccination should be a choice, not a mandate for a public education. I do not accept the herd immunity theory and if you choose to vaccinate your child then you should accept the premise that he is protected. Forcing everyone to vaccinate because the may be a 10% perceived threat to another vaccinated child is not reason enough for forced vaccinations.
I always hear the story of the unvaccinated child that goes on vacation to another country and contracts, let’s say the measles, and brings that diseases back to infect a vaccinated child.
I don’t understand the logic in this because I say, if a unvaccinated child can contract the measles while in another country, then why can’t a vaccinated child accomplish the same thing and thus bring it back and infect another vaccinated child.
May 8th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
So, Todd you are saying this about money.
Let’s talk medical spending.
The US spends more on health care than any other nation in the world.
Infant mortality
http://www.mapsofworld.com/world-top-ten/countries-with-lowest-infant-mortality.html
Notice that we don’t rank in the top 10.
May 8th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
@Jim
Okay. So we agree on that.
Agreed, though the choice should be based on the science, taking into account, as well, the impact on other people.
Accept it or not, it’s still true.
A vaccinated child has a near 0% (not quite 0, but very close) chance of being infected. An unvaccinated child has a near 100% (again, not quite 100, but very close) of being infected. Our concern is not only those who receive vaccination with no immunity being granted, but also for those individuals who cannot be vaccinated, such as infants that are too young, people whose immune systems are compromised or suppressed, and those for whom immunity (”natural” or otherwise) has worn off.
So, if people are not vaccinated, they have a nearly 100% chance of being infected and spreading that infection to others. If they are vaccinated, then they have a nearly 0% (depending on the individual and how much of the series is completed) chance of being infected and spreading that infection to others.
May 8th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
You obviously did not read my post at all. Here is the relevant excerpt from the PBS page again:
This has nothing to do with improved sanitation and living conditions, it is due to the vaccination initiatives in those countries.
May 8th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
Jim, what a maroon!
The reason so few people have died from measles in the USA is that we still have a fairly high rate of MMR uptake. When the rates go down, people do die. Over 120 Americans died of measles between 1987 and 1992.
Also, Japan did make measles voluntary in the mid-1990s and that resulted in an epidemic of measles that closed several schools, and at least 88 dead from measles. It also shows that the “sanitation argument” is pretty worthless.
You claim that there is a 1 in 300 million chance of death from measles in the USA — but the reason is because of that thing you claim to not be a part of: the herd. But herd immunity is a fragile thing, and when people get medical information from fact-free sites that “naturalnews” the herd immunity goes down… and the disease comes back. That is presently happening in Europe, and it happened in the USA twenty years ago, and it can happen again.
May 9th, 2009 at 6:45 am
A vaccinated child has a near 0% (not quite 0, but very close) chance of being infected. An unvaccinated child has a near 100% (again, not quite 100, but very close) of being infected.
Ok, great than I think you shouldn’t worry about parents who choose not to vaccinate. The day the state physically forces parents in this country to vaccinate themselves or their children is the day Freedom will be officially gone forever in this country.
Black cat says:
It’s hoped that the Measles Initiative can repeat the success of the seven African countries which have reduced their numbers of measles cases from 60,000 to 117, and their number of reported measles deaths from 166 to zero.
Seven African countries were only reporting 166 deaths from Measles?
Let’s get real here. Try this:
There are more than 10 million children around the world who die before their fifth birthday every year, according to a new report by UNICEF, the United Nations Children Fund.
Diarrhoeal diseases and pneumonia — both illnesses that thrive in poor communities where sanitation is severely compromised, and where residents are often undernourished and exposed to pollution — account for a further 40 percent of child deaths. Another major killer is AIDS.
http://allafrica.com/stories/200805300890.html
You people on this board need a reality check.
Also, if your child contracts Measles, complications can be greatly reduced with vitamin A.
http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/abstract/54/5/890
HCN, try to refrain from childish name calling.
May 9th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
*Sigh* Jim, once again you are ignoring what I posted. Did you forget the earlier statistic where 1 out of every 6-20 children die from measles alone in developing countries? Or the one that 2400 people a day die from it? That is 876,000 a year.
And I take it you did not even read the link you provided. Here is an excerpt from your own allafrica.com link:
(Emphasis added)
So your own link, one that you are citing as evidence against the effectiveness of vaccination, actually lists vaccination as one of the primary reasons for the decrease in mortality.
They also say:
(Emphasis added)
Looking at the report, Measles is responsible for 4% of the deaths. By comparison, Diarrhoeal diseases are 17%, malaria is 8%, and Pneumonia 19%. So measles is smaller, but also much cheaper and easier to prevent.
And in regards to pneumonia:
So there is a vaccine that could prevent the most common cause of the number 1 killer disease amongst children in Africa. There is also strong efforts to develop a malaria vaccine.
So thank you very much for that link of yours. It provides so much evidence about how important vaccination is.
May 9th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
Jim said:
Since, as usual, you supply no reference to where you got these figures from, you are asking me to take your word for their validity.
Tough luck, I shan’t.
So all the rest of that comment is so much garbage – it may or may not be correct, but it is based on a set of figures that, for all I know, you just made up.
May 9th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
Jim said:
Oh, the irony.
So, asking you to back up your claims with, like, y’know, facts is a failure to show common sense, is it?
If you are so convinced that there is no threat from measles, polio etc., then perhaps you could share with us the facts that you have found so compelling. Of course, you must also show where those facts have come from, preferably with some kind of summary to show that you understand how they were measured.
May 9th, 2009 at 2:54 pm
Jim said:
Well, yeah. Facts are facts, but “common sense” can be wrong (and frequently is).
Define an “ounce” of common sense.
In fact, most scientists and doctors possess common sense, but they know how easy it is to be fooled by our intuition.
We have made so much medical progress in the last 100 years precisely because scientists and doctors have relied on facts instead of common sense.
May 9th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
Jim said:
After a little more refelction, I’ve realised something about these figures that you plucked out of the ether.
You appear to have incorporated the likelihood of catching the disease in the first place into the likelihood of dying from it. However, the former likelihood depends on you living in a country that has herd immunity due to a comprehensive vaccination programme. So, as an argument against vaccination, it sucks. And that assumes that the figures are correct.
May 10th, 2009 at 3:42 am
Jim said:
Well, obviously – are you saying that medical knowledge in the US was zero before there was a vaccine? Quarantine would have been the best option, something that probably was not and is not put into effect in many developing countries.
There are too mnnay confounding factors for any simplistic comparison to be realistic and meaningful. Probably the closest you can get to a meaningful region-to-region comparison is between mediaevel Europe and Africa – but there are no accurate statistics available.
BTW, does this mean you are prepared to acknowledge that (as the figures prove) vaccination prevents infection?
It does no such thing.
What it proves is that something about the USA in the 1950s was better than in developing nations now. That something is more credibly medical knowledge than it is simple standard-of-living (although general health and fitness could indeed play a role).
Er, yeah, actually, the number of deaths compared with the number of cases is the mortality rate, so your contradiction of the previous comment is a simple lie.
You’re just making stuff up again, aren’t you?
Oh, no. You’re borrowing from someone else who just made up that stuff.
Do you have any references to actual studies to back up your claims, or is referring to another fruitlooop’s website the best you have?
Which again demonstrates that you know nothing of biology.
Antibiotics have nothing to do with viral infections – viruses are immune to antibiotics because antibiotics target bacteria.
Improved sanitation has nothing to do with measles, although it does, of curse, prevent diseases such as cholera.
As for humans developing a natural immunity, we have been doing that for millions of years, which is the only reason why measles has not succeeded in annihilating the human race. However, the process by which this occurs includes many deaths (because, of course, the measles virus is also evolving to adapt to our adapting immune systems).
As for less crowded living conditions, the key factor is not how crowded one’s home is. The key factor is how many people one comes into contact with during one’s normal life. At the time (the ’60s), this was most probably increasing, as more people were moving to city suburbs and commuting to work.
Seriously, Jim, your arguments have no credibility at all. It is painfully obvious to me that you have not the slightest idea what you’re talking about.
I will reiterate a suggestion I made further up this thread: go and find a decent library (preferably a university library, because they will have the most reliable selection of works). Educate yourself about epidemiology by reading the work of people who actually study the subject.
May 10th, 2009 at 3:58 am
Jim again:
So, what you quote is not the mortality rate of the disease. What you have crudely calculated is the likelihood of someone living in a country with a high (albeit declining) vaccination rate dying of measles in a 3-year period.
If anything, this proves the effectiveness of vaccination.
Saying the same wrong thing twice does not make it right.
Can you cite any actual studies that support your claim, or are you determined to rely on the assertions of other anti-vaxxers?
Well, perhaps you could, but no real scientist would. Your conclusion smacks of nothing but ignorance and wishful thinking.
The aetiology of measles has been understood for several decades. Vaccination is the best means of preventing infection. In a rather distant second place is quarantine. Below that are such factors as general health and fitness. Most of the factors you mention have a trivial impact on the spread of an infectious virus like measles (although sanitation in particluar does play an important role in preventing diseases such as cholera).
May 11th, 2009 at 3:47 am
Jim said:
Unfortunately, life is not that simple.
There are a (very) few people who simply cannot be vaccinated, for reasons that another commenter has described earlier in the thread.
There are some people who suffer an allergic reaction to a vaccine (and who thus should not subsequently be given the booster shots).
There are some people who can receive the vaccine, but in whom it does not elicit an enduring immune response.
Now, entering ever so gently the field of epidemiology, to address your rejection of herd immunity (BTW, it ain’t a theory, it’s a fact). For a disease to become widespread, the pathogen (let’s take measles as an example) needs to travel from host to host. To spread, it needs for each host to infect more than one other person. Some especially virulent infections can have a host infecting many people, and these spread extremely rapidly.
If, however, most of the potential hosts are immune to infection from that pathogen, suddenly the number of new hosts that a sufferer can infect will drop. If the proportion of immune individuals in the population is sufficiently high, the average number of new hosts infected by each host will drop below 1. Thus, the virus will not spread.
Thus, herd immunity. Vulnerable individuals are protected from pathogens by the inadequate supply of susceptible vectors for the pathogen.
Well, actually, that depends on the disease against which you are immunising people.
I would contend that, yes, anyone refusing the vaccine is jeopardising other people. The question then becomes one of balancing the good of the population as a whole (i.e. protecting the whole population from e.g. smallpox, polio, pertussis, rubella or whatever) against the freedom of the individual to remain susceptible to whatever diseases they wish.
By way of analogy, consider “national security”.
When you travel internationally, airport security procedures can be intrusive and inconvenient. Do you accept them, given that they are in place (allegedly) to protect “national security”? If so, then why not vaccination? Ultimately, it serves the same purpose (protecting the lives and wellbeing of the people).
No, the story should go that the vaccinated child is one of those few for whom the vaccine does not work. Remember how long it took us to get it into your head that vaccines are not perfect (and that no-one ever claimed they were)?
But the story would be the same were it a group of unvaccinated children being infected with a virus that would not exist in their community had that one unvaccinated child not holidayed abroad.
Well, in principle, this can happen. However, because the proportion of people for whom vaccines fail to work is so small, the latter scenario is extremely unlikely.
Taken for what it is, though, the story is merely an illustration of a wider principle. Get your kids vaccinated. Not only is it 99-point-something % likely to protect them from a range of nasty and potentially fatal diseases, but it is also 99-point-something % likely to contribute to the protection of their friends and family from those same diseases.
May 11th, 2009 at 5:17 am
Jim, once again trying to score points by introducing the irrelevant, said:
And why should you expect to?
In the USA, healthcare is an almost-entirely private enterprise. You guys spend far more than most other nations on such things as cosmetic surgery and antidepressants, yet at the same time there is no real safety net for those who cannot afford the most basic level of healthcare.
Infant mortality is not correlated with how much you spend on healthcare, it correlates with where the spending is focussed.
What on earth can any of this have to do with the fact that vaccines do not make the big bucks for Big Pharma?
May 11th, 2009 at 5:25 am
Interesting point here, I think.
Back on May 6th, Jim said:
Then on May 8th, he said:
So, Jim, which is it? You seem on the one hand to be advocating that vaccines cause harm, and a scant couple of days later accepting that they prevent infections.
Are vaccines harmful (i.e. risk outweighs benefit), or are they beneficial (i.e. benefit outweighs risk)? Please include in your answer a description of why you conclude what you do, so that the rest of us may clearly understand you.
If you are not sure, that’s fine. Just leave it to the experts and keep your opinion to yourself until such time as your “little knowledge” becomes actual understanding.
May 11th, 2009 at 5:31 am
Jim said:
Hypocrite.
May 11th, 2009 at 6:31 am
Nigel asks: Jim, provide what you think is an ounce of common sense.
Ok, an ounce of common sense would be to realize that you can’t continue to try and fight the world’s diseases with vaccines when it’s obvious that the best way to decrease the rates and severity of all diseases is to improve living conditions, provide access to nutritious food, and provide access to antibiotics for severe infections. Also, we haven’t even discussed the fact that vaccines can have devastating side effects many of which are still unknown and being debated.
In reply to my comment: “This just proves that sanitaion and living conditions play a crucial role in the severity of Measles”.
Nigel says: “It does no such thing”.
Again, the main cause of death from Measles is the development of a bacterial infection (Pneumonia). These children are more susceptible to these diseases because of poor sanitation. Also..
Each year 1.6 million children die from diarrhoea, more than malaria, measles and HIV/AIDS combined. The WHO estimates that 88%, or 1.4 million, of these deaths are caused by poor sanitation.
http://www.wateraid.org/documents/tacking_the_silent_killer_the_case_for_sanitation.pdf
May 11th, 2009 at 6:32 am
Nigel says:
Antibiotics have nothing to do with viral infections – viruses are immune to antibiotics because antibiotics target bacteria.
Why do people die of measles?? They usually develop Pneumonia (bacterial infection). The virus itself does not usually kill the person. So, antibiotics can play a crucial role in preventing deaths. Are you going to argue this fact too because there isn’t a link to back it up?
Black Cat says:
Did you read your own article where it says: . These gains can be attributed to dramatically expanded immunisation programmes, the increased use of insecticide-treated bed nets and the provision of vitamin A supplements to children.
Mainstream articles always boast about how vaccines are mostly responsible for the decline of diseases. The fact is that improved living conditions, not vaccines are more effective at reducing deaths from infectious diseases. The developing world has many diseases that aren’t vaccine preventable but that doesn’t mean their epidemic in the modern world. Cholera, malaria, dengue fever…the list goes on and on. Efforts to provide sanitation and clean water to these areas would reduce deaths by a much greater number that any vaccine program ever could.
The article also says:
Vaccines to protect against Streptococcus pneumoniae – the most common cause of severe pneumonia among children in the developing world – will be increasingly become available for infants and young children
Vaccination against HIB has stopped the spread of capsular Hib,but not non-capsular, or other strains of Hib. The hole that was made by the removal of Hib was immediately filled when Pneumococcus which stepped in and took its place. So the other thing that ‘herd immunity’ can do is cause holes, which are then filled in by yet another pathogen, which preys on the same immunological “breaches in defenses” that the previous pathogen preyed on. Death rates due to infections have not dropped. Something else just takes its place.
“By encouraging the child’s immune system to primarily attack the specified seven bugs, Prevnar may be allowing other bacteria to thrive and develop resistance to antibiotics.”
http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2007/09/19/prevnar-problems-at-wyeth.aspx
May 11th, 2009 at 6:41 am
@Jim
Much of what the US spends on health care is for palliative care. We have very expensive beds with electronic adjustment and built-in controls and signals instead of simple cots. We have all kinds of electronic monitoring devices, which are also expensive. And there is a host of other things which make our hospital stays some of the most comfortable in the world. The flip side of this is that all of that fancy medical equipment that makes us more comfortable costs a lot o’ money without actually treating the disease or condition itself.
But, all of that is really off topic. You seem to have missed the point I was trying to make, not addressing it at all, in fact. Manufacturers stand to make more money if people do not vaccinate than if everyone that can be vaccinated is. Actually, your bringing up the cost of care supports my argument. If people don’t get vaccinated, they are more likely to be infected and, therefore, more likely to need care, where they need to use those expensive resources that make the whole experience more comfortable and safe. That creates greater demand for all those palliative things, as well as all the medicines that help the person make it through the infection.
May 11th, 2009 at 6:53 am
In developing countries 80 percent of all disease results from a combination of poor hygiene, contaminated water and poor sanitation.
Even if aid donations were increased by tiny amounts, there can be no reasonable expectation that it will be spent on issues such as poor sanitation
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/apr2002/san-a18.shtml
That’s because the aid is being spent on vaccines because they fit a political agenda. Trying to rid the world of a few small pockets of polio seems to be more important. And alas that seems to be a failure..
Research has revealed that this vaccine is less effective against ‘Type 1’ virus found in India especially UP. Experts also suggest that the high population density coupled with the poor sanitation prevalent there interfered with the action of the OPV, thereby lowering its efficacy.
There’s that poor sanitation problem again..
http://discover-it.blogspot.com/2006/11/polio-eradication-failure.html
May 11th, 2009 at 6:55 am
You people on this board need a reality check.
[snip]
HCN, try to refrain from childish name calling.
Hypocrite.
When did calling for a reality check become childish name calling??
May 11th, 2009 at 9:17 am
@Jim
We are not denying the role that sanitation can play in general health. For certain diseases or conditions (e.g., diarrhea from contaminated water), it can help reduce the rates of infection. But, it is not, by itself, going to protect people from being infected and spreading disease, except by super-sanitizing the environment.
For example, while polio can be spread via contaminated water, it is also spread through person-to-person contact, touching surfaces that are contaminated (e.g., a door knob touched by someone with polio who has fecal or mucosal matter on their hands) then touching one’s mouth, sharing eating utensils and so on. Here is a link with more about how it is transmitted: polio.emedtv.com/polio/polio-transmission.html.
So, cleaning the water supply will help a great deal. But in order for sanitation improvements to wipe out polio, efforts would need to go to basically wiping down every surface, placing every infected person in quarantine before they are contagious (very hard to do), sanitizing every single thing they touch, etc.
Looking at it from an infrastructure point of view, vaccinations are a lot cheaper than upgrading or building new sanitation structures. I agree that sanitation should be improved, but when it comes to certain diseases, vaccines are more effective (the second article you link to mentions that monovalent IPV should be used instead of the trivalent OPV) than infrastructure improvements when looking at a cost analysis. In the long term, infrastructure improvements, such as water treatment plants, are a definite necessity. But to control the spread of contagious diseases, vaccines are faster and more reliable.
May 11th, 2009 at 9:22 am
If anecdotal evidence is what counts, here is some.
Growing up, I got the polio and smallpox vaccinations. I had all the childhood diseases. And thus I was “naturally” immunized against chickenpox, measles, German measles (rubella), mumps, and whooping cough (pertussis). I was out of school by the time vaccines for Hib and so on were invented. In my twenties, I had my rubella immunity tested and there was effectively no immunity left. Natural immunization by surviving a disease is no better than vaccination. Immunity still wears off in some people. Without regular boosters, we all depend on herd immunity to some extent. And perhaps we should all check the schedules and get up to date with what’s recommended, as the father of an infant girl who died of Hib recently begged us to.
Do not go back to the bad old days! My mother’s brother died of diptheria, and she felt guilty for her whole life because she couldn’t save him. My older cousin was crippled by polio, having just missed the polio vaccine by a few years. Bullies used to force him to walk up and down stairs on his hands. My beloved swimming teacher died of pneumonia. At the age of 22, he had already saved three people’s lives. There is a price to not vaccinating . Look around you! It is being paid in the third world right now.
The chance of dying of measles is tiny now, but it used to be about 1 in a thousand, with several others surviving but with damaged hearing. Have you ever wondered why Alexander Graham Bell had a job as a teacher in a School for the Deaf? Have you noticed that there are no more schools for the deaf in North America?
Please investigate the history and science behind vaccines. Look at the numbers. Speaking of shills, Andrew Wakefield was paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for his “expert testimony” against the MMR vaccine and he owns a business that sells an alternative type of vaccination–a conflict of interest that he did not declare. Other anti-vaccination scaremongers own “alternative therapy” clinics where they sell expensive not-cures. One teenaged boy has died from “chelation therapy.”
In 2002, Paul Offit and several others looked at what is in vaccines now compared to older vaccines. They wrote a paper, which I’ve linked to. I created a graph showing the amounts of foreign proteins &c. (called antigens) that are used to provoke immune reactions. I used numbers from the paper, which lists the vaccines and how much each contributes to the numbers. The number of antigens in all the recommended vaccines is now less than it has been since 1900. And with the improvement to pertussis vaccine, children are getting _in all vaccines_ about 4% of the antigens they got in the 1960s and 1980s.
Refrigeration is better, so vaccines can have less or no mercury. The mercury was taken out of Canadian vaccines in the early 1980s and American vaccines in the early 1990s. The rise in autism diagnoses corresponds to a drop in diagnoses of mental retardation and delayed language. The amount of formaldehyde in vaccines (a microgram amount left over from manufacturing) is so low that it actually dilutes the formaldehyde we make in our own bodies as we make energy for our cells.
Follow the money. The people who promote fear of vaccines get a big audience of concerned parents. They get lots of calls and e-mails. Sponsors snap up their advertising time. They get their own shows. Just exactly who is a shill, here? The doctor who gets $9.47 – $20.09 for administering a vaccine or the con man who charges thousands for a worthless therapy? Or the TV star with a glamor wardrobe and adoring fans?
May 11th, 2009 at 9:27 am
Forgot the link! Science Notes: Vaccines and Immune System Overload
May 11th, 2009 at 9:45 am
We’ll never get rid of flu because a reservoir of influenza viruses lives in swine and birds, including wild, migratory birds. You’ll never get rid of malaria because it lives in other mammals and in mosquitoes. But there’s a huge lure for getting rid of measles and polio. Like smallpox, they have no animal reservoir because they can’t infect animals–yet.
Measles is passed only from one person to another. In fact, it can only be maintained where there are enough people to keep passing it around to new victims. If we can once immunize everyone around each victim, the disease will die out forever. And we won’t have to keep fighting it forever.
Some very dreadful diseases have jumped to humans: hantavirus and ebola fever among others. They wreak havoc in our systems because they’re adapted to their animal hosts. It’s important to get rid of our “mild” viruses before they learn to live in animals and create their own reservoir. That may be unlikely, but with the chance of eliminating them forever on the horizon, it’s another reason to hurry.
May 11th, 2009 at 11:31 am
You keep claiming this, but you have yet to provide any evidence backing it up. The only article you presented to support this claim actually said the exact opposite, which you conveniently neglected to mention.
That does NOT mean measles on its own is not deadly and worth fighting.
That does NOT mean measles on its own is not deadly and worth fighting.
No one is arguing that antibiotics are not important. But they wouldn’t need the antibiotics if they didn’t get the measles in the first place. And, as we keep saying, even without pneumonia the disease itself is deadly.
If you thought the article is unreliable, then you shouldn’t have cited it as evidence backing up your claims in the first place. This is your article, not mine. You can’t cite an article as backing up your position and then dismiss it completely when you find out it actually explicitly contradicts your position. It completely ruined any remaining credibility you might have had.
That doesn’t mean that vaccines are not a critical component of a comprehensive disease-fighting initiative, which is exactly what the article you cited stated. No one is claiming that we should just vaccinate and ignore every other cause of disease. But vaccines are a safe and highly effective means to protect against a number of major killer diseases, and additional vaccines like a malaria vaccine are in the works. So far you have provided lots of evidence that there are other killer diseases, but you have provided no reason whatsoever to think that vaccines, considering the extremely low cost and extremely high effectiveness, should not be an important component of a comprehensive program like your link suggested.
Really, do you have evidence to back up this claim? Because the information I found paints a very different picture:
“Hib conjugate vaccines are highly effective in reducing the incidence of invasive Hib disease, with similar effectiveness seen across geographical regions and different levels of socioeconomic development (figure 2). Invasive Hib disease has gone from a major cause of childhood illness to a rare disease in every country where conjugate vaccine has been introduced into the routine immunisation schedule.”
From: Haemophilus influenzae type b conjugate vaccine use and effectiveness, Shaun K Morris MD, William J Moss MD and Prof Neal Halsey MD, The Lancet Infectious Diseases
Do you have any evidence to back this up, or are you once again just pulling supposed “evidence” out of thin air? You make these sweeping generalizations with absolutely nothing to back them up besides your own word.
Wow. It would have be nice if you hadn’t cut out the next couple of sentences, but it is no surprise that you did considering they directly contradict your position. I could give you the benefit of the doubt with the WHO article since you might just not have read the whole thing, but when you leave out half of a paragraph because it contradicts your position I have no choice but to conclude it was intentional.
Here is the complete paragraph, so everyone can see just how dishonest Jim is when he cherry-picks quotes. The part in italics is the part he left out:
So as you can see from the complete quote, one strain of polio has been eradicated, and the single-strain vaccines are effective. What the article is criticizing is the use of one triple-strain oral vaccine instead of three single-strain injected vaccines, not the use of vaccines in general.
He also left out this interesting tidbit from the same article:
So the incidence of polio dropped by a factor over 45. It would be great if all of our failures were that successful.
May 11th, 2009 at 11:39 am
Oh, one more thing:
So can antibiotics.
May 11th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
Monado Says:
The chance of dying of measles is tiny now, but it used to be about 1 in a thousand, with several others surviving but with damaged hearing. Have you ever wondered why Alexander Graham Bell had a job as a teacher in a School for the Deaf? Have you noticed that there are no more schools for the deaf in North America?
Quick correction: there is the Arizona School for the Deaf and Blind in Tucson, AZ. However, since both blindness and deafness have multiple causes, this does not support anti-vax claims. In fact the reduction of such schools (only one for the entire state of AZ)is demonstrative that vaccination has moved the causes of deafness from preventable illnesses to such causes as genetic disorders or other causes.
DISCLOSURE: a friend’s adopted daughter suffers from deafness and attended the school, and led to my learning (at least some) sign language.
J/P=?
May 13th, 2009 at 5:31 am
Jim said:
Actually, I’d prefer if you quoted my exact words, instead of paraphrasing…
I said:
In so doing, I was pointing out that “common sense” is not quantifiable, but perhaps I was too subtle.
Jim again:
Smallpox has been eradicated in the wild through vaccination programmes.
Polio was very nearly eradicated, and would have been, had it not been for antivaccination campaigners in (IIRC) Nigeria.
So, you can fight diseases, and win, using comprehensive international programmes of vaccination.
It may be “obvious” to you, but you have proven that there are many aspects of vaccination that have either escaped your notice or eluded your comprehension, so your opinion is worthless.
If it were genuinely obvious, it would be simple to prove by reference to actual studies. Your failure to support your claims about standards of living being responsible for immunity to (or protection from) diseases suggests that you cannot. My bet is that this is because the evidence actually supports the fact that vaccination is our most effective tool to prevent infectious diseases.
Actually, the side effects of many vaccines are known and understood. This is one reason why the vaccines industry is continually developing new vaccines for disease where we already have a vaccine. Having said that, it may be that we can never eliminate all possibility of adverse reactions in some people. However, in most cases where an adverse reaction is observed, the adverse reaction is a rash that fades after a few days.
May 13th, 2009 at 5:39 am
Jim said:
Sez you.
In fact, the correlation seems to be that having measles makes one more susceptible to other illnesses.
Otherwise, pneumonia would be endemic where poor sanitation exists.
And, as I pointed out earlier, no-one is denying that gastrointestinal diseases are correlated with poor sanitation.
What you have failed to show is how any of that is relevant to whether vaccines (which can be used to prevent a whole spectrum of infectious diseases) are beneficial or not.
May 13th, 2009 at 5:45 am
Jim, once again trying to dodge the issue, said:
So, is death the only harmful impact of measles? No.
Is measles the only disease that is preventable through vaccination? No.
Is your comment relevant to the wider debate? No.
Is it better to let people get measles and then treat those who develop pneumonia with antibiotics, or is it better to prevent people from getting measles in the first place? This is a no-brainer, surely: prevention is better than cure. Oh, wait. Antibiotics won’t cure people of measles at all.
May 13th, 2009 at 5:46 am
Jim said:
This is simply a lie.
May 13th, 2009 at 5:56 am
Jim said:
Just because a vaccine does not exist does not mean that a vaccine against these illnesses cannot exist.
This makes no sense, unless you meant “they’re” instead of “their”, and “endemic” instead of “epidemic” (”epidemic”, you see, is a noun, not an adjective).
Certainly that is the case at present for cholera.
Mosquito nets are the most cost-effective way to prevent malaria. Again, nothing to do with your sanitation obsession.
Dengue fever is one about which I know very little, so I cannot comment. However, based on your previous comments on this thread, it is possible that you also have a similarly limited knowledge of it. Again, proving me wrong would be easy… just demonstrate that you know what you are talking about.
May 13th, 2009 at 6:52 am
Thanks for the correction.
May 13th, 2009 at 9:55 am
@ Nigel: Just to clarify for others, malaria will not benefit at all from sanitation and clean water, since it is a mosquito-borne disease. According to wikipedia, Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne virus, so it will benefit both from anti-mosquito efforts AND vaccines, several of which are currently entering human clinical trials. Since it is also mosquito-borne, it will not benefit from improved sanitation, either.
The only one he listed that would benefit from sanitation is cholera. In 2007 cholera had 4031 reported deaths. By comparison, on average almost that many people die from measles in one week in 2007 than died from cholera in that entire year. If we assume the WHO estimate that only 10% of cholera deaths are reported, and we similarly assume that 100% of measles deaths are reported, then measles still kills as many people in 2 and a half months than cholera kills in a year.
http://www.who.int/wer/2008/wer8331.pdf
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2008/pr47/en/index.html
So cholera is a much less of a killer than measles is.
What is more, there are currently cholera vaccines, but they are ineffective. Work on more effective vaccines is currently well underway.
So the three diseases Jim listed as being not treatable by vaccines, diseases he listed as showing why vaccines should not be used, actually all have vaccines in advanced stages of development. I find this quite ironic.
May 14th, 2009 at 3:26 am
The Black Cat said:
Thanks for the additional info, TBC.
I was not aware that a malaria vaccine was under development, although, of course, I was aware that such a thing was possible. Given the insidious nature of the malaria parasite, I suspect that developing a vaccine will be a significant challenge.
That’s not to say I don’t think we can do it, just that I expect it will take a lot of hard work by very clever people.
May 14th, 2009 at 3:32 am
Jim said:
First, I will generously assume that you are correct about Hib and Pneumococcus.
Second, this kind of development is to be expected to some extent. After all, if we remove an organism from its ecological niche, we would expect that, some of the time, another organism would take its place.
Third, your claim that this will happen every time is wrong.
No pathogen has moved in to occupy the ecological niche that once was occupied by smallpox.
However (again!), you seem to be saying that, because (according to you) after a vaccine programme has eradicated a pathogen a new pathogen will move in to take its place, we should not even try to eradicate these pathogens at all. And that is plain wrong.
May 14th, 2009 at 5:15 am
Jim said:
Since you (again!) do not quote a source for this figure, you are expecting us to take your word for it.
However, assuming you are correct, what does any of this have to do with whether or not vaccination is beneficial?
Wrong. There are charities specifically dedicated to provding clean drinking water and improved sanitation.
If you refer only to government-aid donations, you may be right, but since all of these have strings attached anyway, what relevance does your point have to vaccination?
This is just nonsense.
Unless, of course, you can cite some kind of study that demonstrates this . . . ?
This is genuinely hypocritical. Polio eradication was made to fail by the actions of antivaccination campaigners.
This sounds like you just made this up, or copied it from someone else who made it up. Unless you are able to tell us exactly who these “experts” are and where they published this statement, I will not believe you.
May 14th, 2009 at 5:28 am
Jim said:
When it was so obviously projected. Saying that those of us here who really do know more about this stuff than you do need a reality check is tantamount to dismissing many years of hard-won expertise in biological sciences.
You are the one who needs to get in touch with reality.
The reality is that antivaccination campaigners such as Jenny McC are misleading the public and causing an increase in the prevalence of potentially fatal but preventable diseases.
You started blathering on about Africa as if that changes the harm that antivaxx campaigners are doing. It does no such thing.
You have implied that aid to Africa is being spent on vaccines to serve a political agenda (as if other aid to Africa did not), and you have claimed that the money would be better spent on improved sanitation (as if sanitation improvement were not taking place at all), yet you back up none of these claims with actual evidence.
You have admitted yourself to having “a little knowledge” of the issue, and yet you pontificate as if you know better than all of the experts. Seriously, there are aspects of this situation of which you are (quite obviously!) wholly ignorant. You have made yourself into a prime example of the dangers of a little knowledge.
Now, if you have specific questions, I am sure there are plenty of people here who can help you out.
I notice that you have ignored a question I posed earlier, so I’ll pose it again:
May 14th, 2009 at 8:44 am
Are you asking for my personal opinion? If you are then I personally believe that the risks of vaccinations today outweigh the benefits. This is due to the fact of the amount off vaccines that are currently given to babies on todays vaccine schedule. If you had asked me this questions 30 years ago I may have felt otherwise because at the time we were vaccinating for far fewer diseases and vaccinating children at an older age when their brains were more fully developed.
I take seriously Dr. Blaylock’s studies on this issue.
You can read his testimony in Family Court Matter 2002-006149 at this link:
http://www.vaccinationdangers.com/2007/11/dr-blaylocks-testimony.php
Dr. Blaylock’s credentials:
Dr. Blaylock: A board certified neurosurgeon, practiced for twenty-six years, a clinical assistant professor of neurosurgery—school of medicine for fifteen years, clinical assistant professor of neurosurgery at University of Mississippi Medical Center for ten years,
May 14th, 2009 at 9:41 am
Your appeal to authority fails: Blaylock has never been associated with the University of Mississippi Medical Center. He has actually removed that claim from his own websites when that school contacted him, you must have gotten that from some other site that has not been updates.
What he does now is sell supplements and writes articles that very little to do with reality.
What you need to do is get some real papers published in real journals (not “Medical Hyposthesis”) that show that the DTaP is worse than diphtheria (the Choking Angel), tetanus (Lock Jaw) and pertussis (which still kills over a dozen American babies each year). The papers must be available at my local medical school library.
Do the same for the MMR, a vaccine that has been in the USA since 1971 and has never contained thimerosal. IShow that the MMR is worse than measles, mumps and rubella. Measles and mumps each have a risk of serious neurological impact in one out of a 1000 cases, these ranges from deafness, blindness, and even death. Congenital Rubella Syndrome is a known cause of autism, along with deafness, blindness and still birth.
Again, the papers need to be accessible from my local medical school library.
May 14th, 2009 at 9:47 am
@HCN
You have a citation for that? I hadn’t heard of it.
May 14th, 2009 at 9:56 am
@Jim
Re: Dr. Blaylock, see my comment here: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2009/05/04/antivax-kills/#comment-181382
He has a number of conflicts of interest; he has no expertise in the field of epidemiology or infectious disease; he has no apparent doctoral training in nutritional medicine (even though that’s his primary focus now). In short, he does not appear qualified to speak on the issue of vaccines.
Can you quantify the risks and benefits, as you understand them? I.e., what are the odds of each of the different types of injury possible from the vaccines? What are the odds of the same injuries from the diseases the vaccines prevent?
Ah, so it’s not really the content of the vaccines as much as the number of vaccines given and the age at which they are administered. Do you have some evidence, from a reputable journal by people that actually have experience in an appropriate field, that shows that today’s vaccine schedule is worse than the schedule of 30 years ago?
May 14th, 2009 at 10:06 am
@Todd W and HCN
Well I’ll be stuffed. I had not heard of CRS was a suspected cause of autism but apparently there are some studies.
http://www.immunize.org/catg.d/p2065.htm
Interesting info on that page but the CRS relevent mention is, “Similarly, children with congenital rubella syndrome are at increased risk for development of autism.(18-24) Risk is associated with exposure to rubella prenatally, but not postnatally.“
May 14th, 2009 at 10:13 am
@Shane
Interesting. The studies that are cited for that quote are all from the 1970s, though. I’m wondering if there is anything more recent. I’ll need to check PubMed.
May 14th, 2009 at 10:43 am
He received an honorific title of clinical assistant professor of neurosurgery from the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, Miss., and is a visiting professor of biology at the Belhaven College, also in Jackson, Miss. Is that better?
How funny you are debating Rubella as a cause of Autism. Autism rates were 1 in 10,000 when children were actually contracting Rubella before the vaccine.
Can the medical journals be trusted to provide accurate, unbiased information about medicine even as they are almost entirely funded by drug companies?
Ex-medical journal editor reveals drug firms’ dirty tricks
IAN JOHNSTON
SCIENCE CORRESPONDENT
PHARMACEUTICAL companies are using their massive financial clout to corrupt medical journals by rigging clinical trials of new drugs, it was claimed today.
Richard Smith, former editor of the British Medical Journal (BMJ), has exposed a series of tricks used by drug firms to ensure good publicity for new products in prestigious journals. He said it was often impossible for editors of the journals to spot a rigged trial – despite the process of “peer review” where research is checked independently – and also highlighted a “conflict of interest” because publishing trials by major drug companies would result in increased sales.
The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry denied the allegations, saying it would make no sense to rig trials because they would eventually be “found out”.
Writing in the online journal PLOS [Public Library of Science] Medicine, Mr Smith, who is now chief executive of private firm UnitedHealth Europe, said action should be taken to ensure journals were not becoming “an extension of the marketing arm of pharmaceutical companies”.
“A large trial published in a major journal has the journal’s stamp of approval, will be distributed round the world and may well receive global media coverage,” he said. “For a drug company, a favourable trial is worth thousands of pages of advertising.
“The companies seem to get the results [in trials] they want not by fiddling the results, which would be far too crude and possibly detectable by peer review, but rather by asking the ‘right’ questions.”
Med journals ‘too close to firms’
Medical journals are an extension of the marketing arms of drug firms, says an ex-British Medical Journal editor.
Dr Richard Smith, who edited the BMJ for 13 years, criticized the journals’ reliance on drug company advertising.
Writing in Public Library of Science Medicine, he also said journals were undermined by relying on clinical trials funded by the drugs industry.
The BMJ said a debate was needed, but drug industry representatives rejected the criticisms.
Dr Smith, who is now chief executive of healthcare firm UnitedHealth Europe, said the most conspicuous example of the dependence was reliance on advertising, but he added it was “the least corrupting form of dependence” since it was there for all to see.
Dr Smith said the publication of industry-funded trials was a much bigger problem.
He said: “For a drug company a favorable trial is worth thousands of pages of advertising, which is why a company will sometimes spend upwards of a million dollars on reprints of the trial for worldwide distribution.”
And Dr Smith argued, unlike ads, these trials were seen as the highest form of evidence.
“Fortunately from the point of view of the companies which fund these trials – but unfortunately for the credibility of the journals who publish them – they rarely produce results that are unfavorable to the companies’ products.”
He said editors are put under further pressure by the demands of producing a profit.
“An editor may thus face a frighteningly stark conflict of interest – publish a trial that will bring in $100,000 (£54,000) of profit, or meet the end of year budget by firing an editor.”
Publicly-funded trials
He said there needed to be more publicly-funded trials – about two thirds are currently paid for by the industry – or journals should stop publishing such trials.
BMJ editor Dr Fiona Godlee said she agreed with much of what Mr Smith said.
“There is certainly a need for more transparency, it is something we are working on.
“The whole issue about advertising is something journals are uncomfortable about.
“On the one hand we are saying clean up your act, while we are fairly dependent on the advertising for our survival.
“What we need now is a debate about the issue.”
But Richard Ley, of the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry, said Smith’s criticisms were unfounded.
“There would be an outcry if a pharmaceutical company tried to put pressure on.
“And we must also remember these trials are peer reviewed.”
He also added it was not realistic to think trials could be funded form public money.
Excerpt from story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/health/4552509.stm
May 14th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
@Jim
Upon looking into CRS as a possible cause, I found that most of the journal articles mentioning it indicate that it accounts for a pretty small percentage of autism cases. Your two sentences here imply that rubella is not a cause, but rather the vaccine is. Can you show some evidence to support your statement that rates were “1 in 10,000″ when children were contracting rubella before the vaccine, controlling for changes in diagnostic criteria, greater public awareness, etc.? Also, the papers that talk about CRS as a possible cause of autism note that it is only a factor if the mother contracts rubella while she is pregnant; children that have already been born who contract rubella do not appear to be at risk for autism. So this would suggest that vaccination of the mother against rubella would lead to a decrease in CRS-induced autism.
Do you have any evidence besides a news article to support this? Also, the article doesn’t even state that the majority of funding comes from drug companies. Certainly, journals can be fooled. Just look at how Andrew Wakefield fooled the Lancet. Generally speaking, though, peer-reviewed papers in journals are leaps and bounds more reliable than anything you have given us thus far.
On a final note, go back and read my last post. It was in moderation because it contained a link, so you may have missed it. I await your answers to my questions.
May 14th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
I did not imply that the Rubella vaccine causes Autism. You drew your own conclussion on that.
I read your last post and it is not only extrememly demeaning but it’s pure fear mongering.
There are more than 28,000 deaths to children under 1 year of age each year in the United States.”
We are worse than 28 other countries in infant mortality.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/oct2008/mort-o18.shtml
Enough with your vaccine propeganda. The fact is that improved living conditions coming out of the 19th century is what’s most resposible for the decline of infectious disease.
The CDC’s statements on vaccines only provide a few facts and then draw a conclusion on this limited information. To understand the role of vaccines, we must use the raw information and analyze it over a long period of time. The Vital Statistics of the United States provides the most accurate information of death rates from various causes starting early in the 1900s.
http://www.vaclib.org/sites/debate/Vaccines.html
I have determined that you are blinded by the religon of vaccines and you continue to turn your blind eye to reality to push your vaccine agenda.
Bottom line is that you can not force anyone to vaccinate their child in America. I thank God every day for providing me with that freedom and my country for protecting it.
May 14th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
@Jim
Please point out where I was fear mongering.
Did you even read the article you linked to? It has nothing to do with vaccines. It mentions that differences in social class/wealth level seem to impact infant death rates. As I read it, I also wondered what effect our advanced medical system has on the figures. What I mean is this: does the availability of advanced medical resources that allow babies that would otherwise have been miscarried (and thus not factored into infant mortality numbers) lead to more births of children that are physically unfit to survive, while other countries with lower mortality rates have more miscarriages?
Again, no one is saying that improved living conditions and sanitation have not played a role in improved health. However, you have failed to show that it is solely responsible and that vaccines have had no impact.
Perhaps if you provided us with some science that supports your position, we’d change our minds. However, you have yet to produce anything based on quality science.
Again, who is trying to force you to do anything? Who here is saying that every single person, without exception, should be forced to be vaccinated?
And finally, since you did not answer my questions, I’ll post them again:
Can you quantify the risks and benefits, as you understand them? I.e., what are the odds of each of the different types of injury possible from the vaccines? What are the odds of the same injuries from the diseases the vaccines prevent?
May 14th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
Repeating something over and over again does not make it true. You have provided absolutely no evidence to back this up. You have provided absolutely no reason to think that you are a reliable source in the absence of any evidence. The articles you cite as evidence to back this up all explicitly say the exact opposite. When this is pointed out you simply dismiss your own sources as unreliable.
That only shows death rates, not incidence rates.
May 14th, 2009 at 10:07 pm
As far a rubella goes: remember autism, or an autism like outcome from Congenital Rubella Syndrome is just one of many outcomes. In the early 1960s there was a rubella epidemic, which resulted in many deaf, blind, mentally disable children, along with many stillbirths. It was also common for pregnant women who had rubella to abort the baby (legally or illegally).
I read about this in a couple of books, one being Paul Offit’s biography of Maurice Hilleman called “Vaccine!” (which has lots on the history of vaccine development). I also read about in a book about a child who was born deaf called “Deaf Like Me” by Spradley. Then there was a co-worker whose wife was excommunicated because in the early 1960s she got rubella while pregnant, the baby she carried died in utero and had to be removed…which was considered an abortion by the church (even though the baby was already dead).
This is just a reminder that rubella is not benign.
Oh, and did you all see the Amateur Scientist’s tribute song to Jenny McCarthy? It is on Orac’s blog.
(I will note that Jim has not produced any real evidence to show that vaccines are worse than the diseases)
May 15th, 2009 at 3:29 am
Jim said:
Yes, I was.
Is that it?
Seriously, is that the only reason that you believe the risks outweigh the benefits? Because we give lots of shots to babies?
Have I correctly understood what you said?
Because, if I have understood you correctly, that isn’t a reason at all. It doesn’t contain any assessment of what the risks actually are (neither their likelihood nor their potential severity), nor any consideration of the benefits (or, IOW, the risks of not vaccinating).
How can you call that a reason for dismissing the consensus of experts in the fields of virology, epidemiology and immunology?
OK, then, a few more questions:
1) What has convinced you that Dr. Blaylock’s opinion has more value than the consensus of many thousands of epidemiologists, virologists and immunologists? (IOW, why do you consider him a sufficient authority to make an argument from authority?)
2) Is (s)he an epidemiologist?
3) Is (s)he a virologist?
4) Is (s)he an immunologist?
5) Given that Dr. Blaylock’s field of expertise is neurosurgery, what makes you think (s)he is qualified to trump all of the thousands of experts who know more about vaccine modes of action, risks and benefits than Dr Blaylock?
May 15th, 2009 at 3:41 am
Jim said:
Duh, yeah.
Do you have any evidence to support this allegation?
If all you can do in reply is throw around unsubstantiated allegations, you have lost it already. Give it up, you are starting to bore me.
May 15th, 2009 at 5:53 am
Jim said:
Yeah, sure.
Apart from where you did.
May 15th, 2009 at 6:00 am
Jim, to Todd W, said:
Todd’s “last post” (the one containing the link), was this:
Well, Jim, if you feel demeaned by being asked to support what you claim, tough luck.
If you feel demeaned by being shown that your authority figure is in no position to express an informed opinion, tough luck.
I cannot see how any part of Todd’s comment is scaremongering.
May 15th, 2009 at 6:19 am
Jim, seemingly determined to prove he has lost the plot, said:
You have claimed this many times over, but you have not cited any evidence whatever to support your claim.
Saying the same thing four times over does not make it true. Reality has no obligation to bow to your wishful thinking.
The facts are that improved sanitation prevents gastrointestinal diseases (e.g. cholera), but no others; and that vaccination has been proven to be a most effective tool in preventing infections.
But they draw on a wealth of data. If you wish to dispute the conclusions of the CDC, the correct forum to do this is the medical literature. If you are not inclined to become familiar with the relevant information, your opinion matters not one jot.
Studies have been done, and they are in the medical literature.
No, they do not. There are many conditions that have been identified only during the 20th century. Therefore, many of the early data will be riddled with mis-diagnoses.
[url removed]
Don’t try to cite “vaclib dot org” as an authority. Either cite peer-reviewed studies published in reputable scientific or medical journals, and that you have actually read and understood, or accept that you have no evidence.
This is just rubbish.
You have not even tried to demonstrate that any of your arguments is correct by citation of actual studies. All you have done is:
1) Repeat the same claim over and over as if this makes it less false than it was the first time;
2) Cited articles that did not support the argument you were making (and in some cases, actually said the opposite of what you were saying);
3) Bashed on and on and on about sanitation despite never even attempting to show whether or not that is relevant to the safety and efficacy of vaccines;
4) When finally expressing your personal opinion, explaining it with the feeblest of reasons for doing anything (Seriously, dude, do you genuinely and honestly believe that the risks of vaccination outweigh the benefits solely because of the nbumber of shots given to small children?);
5) Used made-up stuff from crackpot websites as if it had the same value as peer-reviewed research; and
6) Resorted, in the face of your utter failure to convince anyone that your fantasies are true or relevant, to calling us closed-minded.
Recall, of course, that I have several times pointed out how easy it would be for you to prove me wrong? If I am wrong, simply show me the evidence and I will change my mind. But that evidence must be reliable, it must be unequivocal, and it must be compelling.
Not relevant. The bottom line is that antivaccination campaigners such as yourself are a public health hazard. You, and people spouting the exact smae nonsense that you do, are encouraging concerned but bewildered parents into allowing a resurgence of many infectious and potentially fatal diseases that can easily and safely be prevented.
May 18th, 2009 at 8:48 am
An article written in the Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2003/dec/07/health.businessofresearch
Hundreds of articles in medical journals claiming to be written by academics or doctors have been penned by ghostwriters in the pay of drug companies, an Observer inquiry reveals.
Estimates suggest that almost half of all articles published in journals are by ghostwriters. While doctors who have put their names to the papers can be paid handsomely for ‘lending’ their reputations, the ghostwriters remain hidden. They, and the involvement of the pharmaceutical firms, are rarely revealed.
Healy says such deception is becoming more frequent. ‘I believe 50 per cent of articles on drugs in the major medical journals are not written in a way that the average person would expect them to be… the evidence I have seen would suggest there are grounds to think a significant proportion of the articles in journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine, the British Medical Journal and the Lancet may be written with help from medical writing agencies,’ he said. ‘They are no more than infomercials paid for by drug firms.’
So, NIGEL-TODD, what more proof do you need that medical journals are corrupted with special interests and all your so-called fact based studies that you hold as the holy grail of science is for the most part a fraudulant use of science.
Nigel says:
The Vital Statistics of the United States provides the most accurate information of death rates from various causes starting early in the 1900s.
No, they do not. There are many conditions that have been identified only during the 20th century. Therefore, many of the early data will be riddled with mis-diagnoses.
How convenient that you dismiss data that was comprised before the vaccines came out. After considering the material written above, one could say that this data may be more reliable than our more current statistics.
And lastly Dr. Blaylock as you said is not an epidemiologist or a virologist, or an immunologist?
He is a neurosurgeon!
This tells me he may have some knowledge of neurologocal disorders.
He serves on the editorial staff of The Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, the Journal of the American Nutraceutical Association, and acts as a medical advisor to the American Nutraceutical Association.
Not sure why you’re trying to discredit him? He has produced studies on the mechanisms of vaccine damage to the nervous system.
May 18th, 2009 at 9:04 am
Nigel says
Not relevant. The bottom line is that antivaccination campaigners such as yourself are a public health hazard. You, and people spouting the exact smae nonsense that you do, are encouraging concerned but bewildered parents into allowing a resurgence of many infectious and potentially fatal diseases that can easily and safely be prevented.
No NIGEL, it’s not the the antivaccer’s that are encouraging bewildered parents into not vaccinating, it’s the corruption of big Pharma that is causing this to happen. It’s the epidemic of nuerological disorders that are occuring today that is causing this to happen. It’s distrust in a corrupt system that puts profits first and science second. A prime example is what I’ve provided above with the corruption within the medical journals themselves.
I think it’s time to stop blaming antivaccer’s. Our system of government has become fascist in the sense that corporate power has merged with government to form a corporate state. Trust in government is diminishing because it protects the interests of big business over the interests of the people.
So, I am done here. Enough said. I’m going away for a couple weeks. Thank you for engaging me with these discussions. I can appreciate your thoughts on this matter even though I can assume that you don’t feel the same way about mine.
May 18th, 2009 at 9:32 am
@Jim
You’ve failed to show that “Big Pharma”TM is corrupt as far as vaccines are concerned.
You’ve failed to show that a) there is an epidemic and b) vaccines are responsible. We’ve shown how anti-vaxers have tried to blame vaccines for neurological problems, as well as where they are wrong.
Again, you have failed to show that this is true. By contrast, there is more money to be made if the diseases prevented by vaccines make a resurgence. The “profits first, science second” meme is one propagated by anti-vaxers without any supporting evidence.
Again, you have failed to show that such corruption is as rampant as you suggest. You likewise have failed to show that such corruption affects the journal as a whole (i.e., that they will absolutely not publish studies contradicting corporate-sponsored studies). In fact, journals do publish studies that contradict corporate-sponsored research, and those articles can and have lead to product recalls.
As long as they keep spouting misinformation and outright lies, and their actions lead to reductions in vaccination rates/increases in disease outbreaks, then they should be blamed.
So when you cannot provide quality evidence to support your arguments, you resort to conspiracy theories and paranoid anti-government rants. Got it.
Enjoy your time away. Thus far, I appreciate where you are coming from, even if you have not provided any quality evidence to support your stance. If you eventually are able to produce some, I will definitely give it due consideration and, if warranted by the evidence, change my stance. However, you have your work cut out for you, since the science pretty firmly shows that the benefits of vaccines far outweigh their risks, and significantly outweigh the risks of not vaccinating.
May 18th, 2009 at 10:17 am
@Todd W. et. al.,
Isn’t it a little bit ironic that you are called a”scaremonger” for trying to convince people to save their own lives, and the lives of others, by simply educating themselves?
May 18th, 2009 at 11:47 am
In response to:
Our system of government has become fascist in the sense that corporate power has merged with government to form a corporate state. Trust in government is diminishing because it protects the interests of big business over the interests of the people.
Todd says:
So when you cannot provide quality evidence to support your arguments, you resort to conspiracy theories and paranoid anti-government rants. Got it.
Wow..if you believe that Corporatism in America is a conspiracy theory and a paranoid anti-government rant, than there’s not much more to say to you.
Here’s a definition of Corporatism defined by FDR.
“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to the point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That in its essence is fascism – ownership of government by an individual, by a group or any controlling private power. — Franklin Roosevelt
If you can’t identify this in our society today than you truly are a brainwashed individual.
You also say
I will definitely give it due consideration and, if warranted by the evidence, change my stance. However, you have your work cut out for you, since the science pretty firmly shows that the benefits of vaccines far outweigh their risks, and significantly outweigh the risks of not vaccinating.
What evidence do you have? You haven’t provided any evidence of this. The only evidence that could prove this would be a study that compares the overall health of vaccinated individuals to a group of unvaccinated individuals. This study has never been preformed. Although, I do often ask myself why.
Did you not read the article I posted??
Hundreds of articles in medical journals claiming to be written by academics or doctors have been penned by ghostwriters in the pay of drug companies, an Observer inquiry reveals.
Estimates suggest that almost half of all articles published in journals are by ghostwriters. While doctors who have put their names to the papers can be paid handsomely for ‘lending’ their reputations, the ghostwriters remain hidden. They, and the involvement of the pharmaceutical firms, are rarely revealed.
Are you saying that none of these articles refer to vaccine safety or efficiency? If so, plese provide some proof.
And you are a fear mongerer because you use fear to push your agenda. The death of a baby not vaccinated who died of whooping cough. That’s using fear. 10’s of thousand of babies die very year in this country of all sorts medical conditions but you managed to find one baby in Austrailia that died of whooping cough. How can you prove this baby contracted whooping cough due to low vaccination rates? Especially when whooping cough outbreaks have occured in highly vaccinated community’s. You always seem to generate a hypothesis that fits your agenda.
I think you need to visit the VAERS to educate yourself on thousand of reported cases of babies that have died or are damaged by vaccinations every year. Oh, I know your response to that. The vaccines have never been implicated to have caused any of this. It’s just a mother who is looking to blame someone or someting. The scientist in the lab conducting studies doesn’t know what happened but they sure know it couldn’t be the vaccine because they are generally safe and effective.
I guess time will tell…. because this controversy will not end, it will only grow.
May 18th, 2009 at 1:43 pm
@Jim
Is there corruption? Yes. Does it influence every single aspect of government? No. Feel free to prove otherwise.
You are the one that came in here making claims that vaccines did not work as well as they are purported to work and that they could be more harmful than the diseases they prevent (implied if not explicitly stated). The onus is on you. I’ve already shown that vaccines do have a benefit, and I’ve provided links.
It has already been shown that vaccines prevent a number of diseases that would otherwise lead to various degrees of unnecessary illness, from mild to severe to death. As to other health effects, like increases in allergies, I’ve already addressed your point. Now, let’s turn it around, why has there been no study that shows that those who are unvaccinated are healthier than those who are vaccinated? Where are the studies that support your position?
See my previous comment addressing the journal issue.
That baby was in an area of New South Wales, Australia that had very low vaccination rates. The incident in California of a measles outbreak was among unvaccinated kids (cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm57e222a1.htm). In Minnesota, there was a small outbreak of Hib in which 5 kids were infected (children.webmd.com/vaccines/news/20090123/hib-outbreak-kills-unvaccinated-child); 1 was fully vaccinated but had an immune deficiency, 1 was too young to get shots, two were children of parents who refused vaccination, and 1 was the child of parents who wanted to wait until the child was 5. One of those kids whose parents refused vaccination died. In Germany in 2006, there was an outbreak of measles where around 86% of people were not vaccinated (who.int/bulletin/volumes/87/2/07-050187/en/index.html). That lead to lots of money being spent on treatment and hospitalization and included the death of two infants.
That is reality. It is supported by facts. It is not exaggeration. It is not fear mongering. It is a fact that when vaccination rates drop, infection rates increase. Feel free to post some good science showing that I am wrong. I have been up front about what the real risks of injury are from vaccines. I have not denied that in rare cases, a person could have an adverse reaction leading to serious, permanent injury or death. However, we’re looking at around 1 in 1,000,000 odds for a lot of the serious injuries from vaccines, which are much less than the odds of serious injuries from the diseases prevented.
What the anti-vaxers do, on the other hand, is fear mongering. They play on parents’ fears of their child being hurt by vaccines when there is no evidence to support their claims. Where there is a chance of injury, they exaggerate the actual risks involved. Anti-vaxers claim that thimerosal causes autism. Evidence presented: flawed studies and studies looking at different mercury compounds. They claim that MMR causes autism. Evidence presented: Wakefield’s flawed study. They claim that the number of vaccines causes autism. Evidence presented: none. They claim that the aluminum or other components are harmful. Evidence presented: flawed studies for some, irrelevant studies for others, and sometimes none at all. Click on my name for some info, which it appears you still have not read, on how wrong they are.
Citation, please.
Have you actually read the VAERS web site? You seem to have missed this bit (emphasis added):
Anything can be reported to VAERS, whether there is a real connection to vaccines or not. Some of the reports there are real. Some are not. It isn’t until the case has been investigated that we can conclude anything based on VAERS.
I’m sure it will grow, as long as people such as yourself continue to spew unsubstantiated drivel and throw scientific evidence out the window.
May 18th, 2009 at 2:19 pm
So, you are saying people aren’t smart enough to listen to both sides and make an educated decision based on logic? The problem with you provaccer’s is that you are convinced you are right and there are not two sides but only one. If what I spew is unsubstantiated dribble than what are you worried about?
The fact is that people that question vaccines never try to scare others into not vaccinating. We tell people to do the research and decide for themselves. People like you on the other hand try to bully concerned parents into believing they are follish for even questioning vaccines. Again, that is why you sound like a preacher and Vaccines are your Religon.
May 18th, 2009 at 2:34 pm
Especially when whooping cough outbreaks have occured in highly vaccinated community’s.
Todd of course asks:
Citation, please.
If you know so much about vaccines than why must I back everything up with a citation. How exhausting..
A Community-wide Pertussis Outbreak
http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/166/12/1317
Conclusion The predominance of adolescent and adult cases, appearance of new clusters despite aggressive control efforts, clustering of cases in hard-to-reach populations, and absence of modifiable risk factors for adult disease in this outbreak all suggest that universal booster vaccination of adolescents and adults might offer the only effective means to prevent such events in the future.
So, Todd.. it seems that adults can catch and spread pertussis. If you think you’re going to get adults to run out and get a booster shot than you are living in fantasy land. Also, you’re story about the child (too young to be vaccinated) who died of pertussis because of parents who choose not to vaccinate seems pretty silly after realizing that adults can spread pertussis.
Again, You are fear mongering whether you want to admit it or not!
May 18th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
@Jim
No. I’m saying that one side (anti-vax) is putting out misinformation and lies that sound very convincing to someone who is not trained in science or does not have the time or inclination to check up on the information.
When the other side actually produces some scientific evidence to support them, then we’ll talk.
So what do you call McCarthy and company’s efforts to say that vaccines cause autism?
Except that anything contradicting your opinion is clearly from “big bad evil pharma and cannot be trusted”. Slightly skewed perspective, no?
Who’s bullying? And it’s quite okay to question. The point at which someone becomes foolish is when they continue to question even when shown the facts and evidence.
Nope. Wrong again. Show me sound scientific evidence that I am wrong and I will change my tune. Far from being a religion.
So, are you going to present some science or continue to make character attacks and set up strawman arguments?
May 18th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
@Jim
First, so I know where you’re getting your information. Second, so I can evaluate your source for myself and determine whether you are misinterpreting the source or not. Third, so I can change my stance if the evidence warrants. It is standard practice to support one’s claims with citations. Apparently, you did not learn this in school.
Earlier, you made the claim:
I asked for a citation that pertussis outbreaks are occurring in highly vaccinated communities. You provide a link to a study looking at outbreaks among adults who either have never been immunized, or who have lost immunity (whether gained through infection of vaccination). The study does not state whether the subjects had been vaccinated. Further, the study says that boosters are called for, which goes against your argument that vaccines are “bad”.
Of course adults can catch and spread pertussis. It is one of the diseases for which humans do not gain lifelong immunity. Getting adult booster rates up is, admittedly, difficult, but proper education campaigns should have an impact.
First, the child that died was not the one that was too young to receive vaccination, according to the linked article (which you apparently did not read). Second, if the children had been immunized, they would not have been infected, whether an adult was the carrier or not. Furthermore, if those children (as well as adults) were up to date, the child that had the immune deficiency probably would not have been infected, either.
What exactly is your definition of fear mongering, because it seems we have a misunderstanding of what the phrase means. I interpret it as playing on people’s fears through exaggeration, misinformation and/or lying. I am not exaggerating, and I am not using misinformation or lying. I am presenting facts. I freely admit the truth about vaccines (including what the real risks are). Furthermore, I’m perfectly open to changing my views if the evidence warrants (as I’ve said before).
May 19th, 2009 at 8:39 am
Todd says:
Of course adults can catch and spread pertussis. It is one of the diseases for which humans do not gain lifelong immunity. Getting adult booster rates up is, admittedly, difficult, but proper education campaigns should have an impact.
So, Todd you just proved a point that I have been trying to convince you of on this board. How can there be herd immunity for pertussis considering your statement above?? And what other diseases fall into the same category?? So, if a parent decides not to vaccinate their child, how is it a threat to another child if adults can carry and transmit these diseases??
Ponder that and come up with a fancy answer. I can’t wait.
May 19th, 2009 at 9:07 am
@Jim
You don’t seem to understand herd immunity. With every person that is not vaccinated, herd immunity decreases. So, for every parent who refuses to vaccinate their child, that’s another additional person that can serve as a carrier or reservoir for the disease. For every adult that fails to keep up on their boosters, that, too, is another vector for the disease. If herd immunity drops, the contagion spreads. Your example is an argument for better vaccination programs, rather than against vaccination.
Okay, this is just silly. Let’s take your example. Parent decides not to vaccinate their child (we’ll call the child Jimmy). Because Jimmy was not immunized, he gets infected (could be from another child or an adult – it doesn’t matter for this example). He shows the preliminary signs – runny nose, cough – which are pretty much just like a common cold. The parent isn’t overly concerned; it’s just a cold. Jimmy goes to day care (or school) and infects other kids there who have not been immunized, who have immune deficiencies which prevented the vaccine from taking, who have allergies and could not be immunized, etc. He also infects any adults there who have lost immunity or never had immunity for various reasons. His symptoms get a bit worse with the appearance of a fever and a worsening cough. Jimmy’s parent takes him to the pediatrician. If they take public transportation, he can now potentially infect a few other people on the way to the doctor. Once at the doctor, there are other parents with their kids in the waiting room. Some are older kids who’ve had their shots and not at risk. Others are infants there for checkups. Jimmy can infect them. On the way home from the doctor, there is, again, the potential for spreading the disease if they take public transportation.
Assuming that Jimmy’s parents are not immune, they can spread the infection, too. But, for this example, let’s say they are immune. Jimmy’s doctor advised that he be kept home. Now, one of his parents needs to stay home to watch over Jimmy for anywhere from a couple weeks to months while he recovers. That eats up sick leave, if they have it, or leads to loss of income if their employer does not provide adequate leave time. The parents could hire someone to watch over Jimmy, instead, but that still costs a lot of money.
Let’s sum up. Because Jimmy’s parents refused to vaccinate him against pertussis, he has infected several other children and possibly an adult at day care or school. He infects a couple adults on the bus/train to the doctor’s office. He infected a couple kids, including infants, in the waiting room. Then there are a couple more adults on the way home. His parents have an increased financial and emotional burden caring for him as he recovers, and that is just assuming he has no permanent injuries from the disease. So, he potentially infects, all by himself, a dozen or more individuals, who are then able to go out and spread it even further.
Contrast this with the example of him getting vaccinated. He infects no one because he isn’t a carrier. His parents spend like $15 for the co-pay at the doctor’s office to get him immunized and no loss of work or leave time.
Kids typically come in contact with quite a few more people than an adult, thanks to day care, school, play dates and other activities, so they are a prime source for spreading a disease.
So, explain again why vaccination is a bad idea? You’ve yet to provide any convincing argument, let alone any evidence to support your stance.
May 19th, 2009 at 9:53 am
Hey Jim,
You do realize that you contradicted your own argument with your own evidence, right?
You said,
That link did not support your claim that the breakout occurred in a highly vaccinated community. In fact, it says flat out those who were infected did not show a history of vaccinations, and that the best way to prevent such outbreaks is to vaccinate.
Do you even read what you post?
May 19th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
@ Jim: you may find the guardian article convincing, but I don’t. It full of vague, unsubstantiated claims and a complete and total lack of specifics.
For instance,
“Estimates suggest that almost half of all articles published in journals are by ghostwriters.”
Estimates by whom? What did they base this estimate on? What does “almost” mean? What journals?
Does this happen? I am sure it does. But if you want to know how much, this article is totally useless. It so totally devoid of any substance that even if what they say is true we still have absolutely no clue how big of a problem it is.
And it does not affect the results on vaccine studies at all anyway, since the ones we are looking at were carried out publicly and with a great deal of oversight. Some even had prominent-antivaxxers participating.
October 29th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
Just wondering if anyone has considered the dangers of using human-tissue derived vaccines, like the aborted fetal tissue in the rubella and chicken pox vaccines? The autism spike in this country started when we switched over to using aborted fetal tissue. The autism spike in the UK started ten years later, when they started using aborted fetal-tissue vaccines.
Also, I find it very bothersome that the use of fetal tissue in these vaccines is not disclosed by doctors up front. I first found out through a newspaper ad, not my doctor.
See http://www.soundchoice.org/Images/June_2009__Autism-Vaccines-Contaminating_Aborted_Fetal_DNA.pdf
October 29th, 2009 at 7:05 pm
Deb, there is no aborted fetal tissue in vaccines. That’s an antivax lie. The cells used in vaccines were from fetuses decades ago, and are hundreds of generations removed from the original. You might as well complain that the hydrogen in the vaccines was created in the Big Bang.
November 7th, 2009 at 5:40 am
So Phil,
You are denying the information on Merck’s own product inserts?
November 8th, 2009 at 5:11 am
Phil,
check out http://www.cogforlife.org/cdc.htm and I’d be interested to hear your opinion of Children of God for Life’s responses to the CDC.
November 8th, 2009 at 5:18 am
Phil,
Look at http://www.cogforlife.org/cdc.htm and I would like your thoughts on Children of God for Life’s response to the CDC re aborted fetal tissue in vaccines.
November 8th, 2009 at 5:51 pm
Hi,
Just wanted to apologize for a double post – again, I wasn’t sure the first one went through.