[mysterio]

I was wrong. The 7,600 number is the correct figure. The 20,000 number came from a search I didn't spend much time on because I was busy.

However, the vaccine is safe. The anti-vaccine crowd swarms all over the internet spreading misinformation, and that gets people sick or dead when they could have been safely vaccinated.

I'm not advocating forcing some kid to get Gardasil. But I will refute anti-vaccine hyperbole every time I see it.

[Arizona Carolyn]

The vaccine is safe??????? and you know this for a certainty, how?????? That is as definitive a statement as your 20,000 die each year from aspirin statement.

[metmom]

It’s safety has yet to be established, and people opposed to a relatively untested vaccine administered to a group of people who it hasn’t been tested on, are not *anti-vaccine*.

If you read the posts, for the most part, the objections are to mandating it for a condition for which it may not be really effective and which is not nearly as fatal as it could be if other less risky health practices were followed.

The whole anti-vaccine label attached to people who have reasonable concerns about something is hyperbole at it’s worst. You’d find a lot more people willing to listen if you’d quit with the blanket labels when they express legitimate concerns.

If you want your kids to get the vaccine, knock yourself out. Just don’t demand that everyone else do it because you think they should and don’t go hysterically mislabeling everyone as *anti-vaccine* as if they oppose them all, when they are merely being cautious about one.

[mysterio]

See 72.