Posted on 05/20/2019 3:56:15 AM PDT by Kaslin
The news headlines are full of articles about parents refusing vaccines for their children. Now some of those children are infecting others with measles and other contagious diseases. We’re in the middle of the worst measles outbreak in 25 years.
But do these parents have valid concerns, that the vaccines could cause harmful side effects? The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states that allergic reactions and other serious side effects of vaccines are “very rare.” Vaccines prevent hundreds of thousands of cases of a deadly disease — but it’s true that it may come at the expense of a smaller number of side effects. The controversy arises over determining the degree and type of side effects caused by the vaccines.
The debate has become vicious, with many who oppose vaccines going after the doctors who promote the measures. Doctors find themselves buried with horrible reviews online by anti-vaccine activists.
Part of the problem with resolving the issue is it’s impossible to prove a negative. Cody Meissner, the chair of pediatric infectious disease at Tufts University School of Medicine, told The Atlantic that when a health problem appears after a child has received a vaccine, it’s easy to assume the vaccine caused the health problem, and impossible to prove it didn’t. So there’s doubt left in people’s minds.
One condition that has been blamed on vaccines is autism. A 1998 study in the prestigious British journal The Lancet linked the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine with autism. Investigations concluded the research was fraudulent 12 years later, and the lead author was stripped of his medical license. A legal review called the Omnibus Autism Proceeding found no causal relationship between the two. But partially as a result of the article, more than 5,000 cases were filed by 2010 claiming a link between vaccines and autism.
Charles Nelson, a professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and a neuroscientist at Boston Children's Hospital, said progress is being made researching autism. Doctors are seeing signs of autism at three to six months of age, well before babies are vaccinated with the MMR vaccine at one year old.
Over 90 percent of kindergarteners in the U.S. are vaccinated for most types of immunizations. Some states have laws that allow exemptions. But if parents decide not to give their child the MMR vaccine, they risk no only infecting their child and their peers but also babies under 12 months and people with cancer or weakened immune systems.
In 2017, approximately 110,000 people around the world died from the measles, mostly children under five. This is primarily because they were located in third world countries and did not receive the vaccine. Immunizations prevent some 2 million to 3 million deaths a year.
Larry Cook, a prominent anti-vaxxer, runs the Facebook group Stop Mandatory Vaccination. Facebook has taken down some of his ads because they reportedly contained misinformation about vaccines. A Facebook spokesperson told The Daily Beast that “these ads contained verifiable hoaxes identified by leading global health organizations like the World Health Organization and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.” Some of the ads linked to stories of children who died within hours after receiving vaccines.
There are prominent people in the anti-vaccine movement, such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Alex Jones of Infowars also rails against vaccines. The actress Jenny McCarthy has become an activist on the issue due to her son’s diagnosis with autism after he was vaccinated. The governor of Kentucky said he exposed all of his nine children to chicken pox rather that have them vaccinated. But this is risky since there can be severe side effects. President Trump used to be a vaccine skeptic before he became president, but has since changed his mind and now encourages people to vaccinate their children.
Parents who refuse vaccines are more likely to be college-educated and earn an above average income. As many as 20 to 25 percent of American parents don’t want their children vaccinated.
I recently met a young woman who has become an activist educating people about myasthenia gravis, an autoimmune disease she has. I asked her if she has any idea why she acquired the disease. She said she believes it was due to some vaccines she got when she was 18 in order to go study abroad.
There is an emotional appeal to the anti-vaccine movement. Paul Offit, an author and infectious disease physician at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, says it's easier to understand a parent or a celebrity who says children are injured or develop autism because of vaccines than it is to understand the science of why 26 shots are needed in the first few years of life to prevent 14 diseases few have ever seen.
The vast majority of the medical community supports vaccines. According to Sean O’Leary, a Colorado-based doctor specializing in pediatric infectious disease, “There is no debate in the scientific community about whether or not the benefits of vaccines outweigh the risks.”
While it appears that the evidence weighs in favor of vaccines, it is best to be fully informed about the controversy before deciding either way. This is a contentious issue that does not appear to be going away anytime soon.
VACCINES FAIL
A military ship is parked off shore. This is the ideal quarentine example.
100% MMR vaccinations of every crew member.
100% booster shots for everyone.
Who wants to explain to me why the people are infected with MUMPS?
BECAUSE VACCINES DO NOT WORK!
VAX IS FAILURE !
Vax is Snake Oil for fools.
VAX ?
DOCTORS LIE.
PHARMA LIES.
GOVT LIES.
CDC LIES.
PATIENTS ARE FOOLS.
BIG MEDICINE LIE.
CABLE TV is all Pharma Lies.
Tell that to Smallpox...
Vaccines in general have proven their worth beyond a doubt in the elimination Smallpox, Polio and other diseases.
You want to argue about the effectiveness of a specific vaccine, knock yourself out, but bring evidence not allegations.
But the effectiveness of vaccines in general is a fact.
Then go get your behind on that sick ship.
100% vax.
Denial of obvious basic science, a floating experiment, is DELUSION.
Vaxers are scientific illiterates.
I had the big vaccines as a child in the 50s. Smallpox and polio. These did not affect me. I caught measles mumps chicken pox as a child and had shingles from the chicken pox. No problem. I survived them well.
What brought me to my knees was a flu shot in 1999. Twenty years later I still have the chronic form of GB that the vaccine caused.
I would still advise the big ones, polio and smallpox vaccine (governments have the virus ready and waiting to weaponize).
But that’s it.
Do you also buy the global warming ‘basic science’. Please. The vaccines are a cash cow. We need to block infected people from $h!thole nations.
That isn't a valid argument. Back then there were just a few vaccinations....small pox, polio, and a few others. Now, there are so many vaccines that people are going to question "how much is enough?" Add to that the argument we're hearing is "the reward outweighs the risk". That's not an argument that vaccines are safe. Folks should decide if in their case the reward does in fact outweigh the risk.
I question herd mentality. This "measles epidemic" was about 800 cases. It was to condition people to accept being told they have to get vaccinated.
I support a few vaccinations, spread out. I'll not do something that's good for the herd but not for me. Instead, I'll avoid situations where I could be spreading diseases or be exposed to them. And I do question if being protected from everything builds a strong immune system. I also totally distrust big pharma. It seems they put profit before our well being, every time.
I think only smallpox has been eradicated. The virus that causes it now only exist in laboratories. For the others, the relevant bacteria and viruses still exist outside the lab.
I took many of these vaccines in the 50s’ as a kid - no problem with any of them. Of course none of them had Thimerosal in them. Now they all do.
Why?
Didn't make the vaccine any better. Did make somebody’s bottom line better. In fact almost all the changes that have happened to vaccines in the last 30 years to “lower cost” and “improve reliability” have in fact made vaccines one of the most lucrative substances on earth to produce.
Something smells.
There is a group of people who want humanity to die off. These are the same people who try to scare parents into not vaccinating their children. They mistakenly believe that enabling more children to reach adulthood causes overpopulation, without looking at the big picture, which is that when more children grow up as a result of not having diseases, people have fewer children.
There is no doubt that the movers behind the antivax movement want to return to the days when most children died before the age of five.
Nothing is 100% effective or 100% safe.
Vaccines can tilt the odds in your favor, and statistically speaking, I suppose that they do... That’s no comfort to those who have experienced negative effects or a failure of the vaccine to provide protection.
Like everything else in life, you make your own choices.
Not to be offensive, but it is the flu, not the vaccine, that causes GB. The reason you got GB was because of the flu virus in the vaccine. Had you gotten sick with that same strain of flu, you would have developed GB. It is unfortunate that we still do not know which particular protein on some viruses causes the autoimmune response that is GB, but we are researching that. The more we understand that, the better we can predict which vaccines contain parts of viruses likely to induce GB and avoid using them.
NO!
I’ve gotten the flu multiple Times ( various permutations) before I ever took a flu shot. I’ve gotten it maybe once since. ( not easy to get when your immune system is constantly attacking everything in sight including one nerves)
Don’t pontificate about what diseases I have or have not have. You have NO idea.
GB is an autoimmune disease. The form I have is called CIDP. It’s my immune system attacking the peripheral nerves.
Reality is not your strong suit.
My mother and aunt are both polio survivors from the late 40s early 50s. My aunt was permanently crippled for the remainder of her life. That being said, this doesn’t mean I take every vaccine that comes along. As a child in the 60s I had measles. I had mumps. This was common. Almost every sit-com had a measles story. At the time, you stayed home and got well. It wasn’t the end of the world. I currently avoid flu shots. I don’t think it’s healthy to inject whatever preservatives are used year after year after year. I’ve had flu a few times and many years I don’t get flu at all.
I refuse to blame Millennial mommies for any increases in measles or mumps when we have wide open borders and every day we dump more un-vaccinated people into the country. And we’re going to blame citizens???? Pfftt...
If all truth is ever revealed, I think we will find vaccinations responsible for MANY of the childhood maladies suffered today. From autism to cancer to leukemia to severe allergies, etc.
When we were vaccinated, it was 3 diseases that were injected into our little systems. I think it’s something like 70 diseases that are now injected into a little baby’s system....all at once.
I did a lot a research over 30 years ago when my own children were born because my senses told me that there’s no way on God’s green earth I was injected that stuff into a perfectly healthy little baby....and I didn’t.
“The news headlines are full of articles about parents refusing vaccines for their children. Now some of those children are infecting others with measles and other contagious diseases.”
Very first observation in the article...
Doesn’t this speak DIRECTLY to the (perhaps) failed efficacy of ‘vaccines’?
Yes, it’s likely that not all vaccines provide equal protection to all people. Consequently, there must also be the supposition that NOT all those vaccinated are truly ‘protected’.
I’m not arguing for either side on this issue. All our children were vaccinated. Now parents, our children are split on the vaccination issue; some elected to vaccinate their kids, some did not (citing increased autism rates, failed protections, etc.).
It does seem, though, that our raised alarm has been in evidence in near direct correlation to the flood of illegals invading our country.
Thirty million people per year are diagnosed with myasthenia gravis. Not all got inoculations.
The measles outbreak is NOT due to unvaccinated children. It is due to importing thousands of third world savages with who knows what diseases.
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