Posted on 07/25/2011 4:37:40 PM PDT by AHerald
Gov. Perry chose to bypass the legislature and on Feb. 2, 2007, he issued an executive order making Texas the first state in the country requiring all sixth-grade girls to receive the three-shot vaccination series (which cost about $120 per shot).
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The controversy over Perry's decision deepened as it came to light that his former chief of staff was a lobbyist for Merck and that his chief of staff's mother-in-law, Rep. Dianne White Delisi, was the state director of an advocacy group bankrolled by Merck to push legislatures across the country to put forward bills mandating the Gardasil vaccine for preteen girls.
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Just six weeks after Perry put pen to paper, the Texas House rebuked him on March 14, 2007, passing HB 1098, overturning his executive order by a vote of 119-21. The Senate followed suit the following month by a vote of 30-1.
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On May 8, the day the law went into effect, Perry held a press conference surrounded by women touched by cervical cancer. He bemoaned the tenor of a debate that he asserted had been "hijacked by politics and posturing," and blamed future cervical cancer deaths on those who opposed his mandate -- many of whom were fellow Republicans.
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And in fact, two years later the National Vaccine Information Center issued a report raising serious questions over the harmful side effects of the drug.... an editorial on Gardasil in the Journal of the American Medical Association declared that "serious questions regarding the overall effectiveness of the vaccine" needed to be answered and that more long-term studies were called for.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
Perry was my second choice following Palin, but this story gives me pause. If Bevan's article is accurate, it sure looks like a textbook case of crony capitalism, influence peddling, executive arrogance and politics as usual.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2751348/posts?page=55#55
His pro amnesty views are also “old news” despite being no more than a year old.
It’s only a problem IF he didn’t believe in the underlying premise. Tough as nails to prove.
Yeah, like when you supported pro-abortion Rudy Giuliani for President about the same time as your totalitarian Gardasil fiasco.
Let’s hope he learned from the Gardasil issue.
Beyond that, I hope he shoots Obama’s butt full of Gardasil (politically speaking, of course)!
I think it will be a non-issue for most.
BY THE
GOVERNOR OF THE STATE OF TEXAS
Executive Department
Austin, Texas
February 2, 2007
WHEREAS,immunization from vaccine-preventable diseases such as Human Papillomavirus (HPV) protects individuals who receive the vaccine; and
WHEREAS,HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection-causing cancer in females in the United States; and
WHEREAS,the United States Food and Drug Administration estimates there are 9,710 new cases of cervical cancer, many of which are caused by HPV, and 3,700 deaths from cervical cancer each year in the United States; and
WHEREAS,the Texas Cancer Registry estimates there were 1,169 new cases and 391 deaths from cervical cancer in Texas in 2006; and
WHEREAS,research has shown that the HPV vaccine is highly effective in preventing the infections that are the cause of many of the cervical cancers; and
WHEREAS,HPV vaccine is only effective if administered before infection occurs; and
WHEREAS,the newly approved HPV vaccine is a great advance in the protection of women’s health; and
WHEREAS,the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommend the HPV vaccine for females who are nine years through 26 years of age;
NOW THEREFORE, I, RICK PERRY,Governor of Texas, by virtue of the power and authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the State of Texas as the Chief Executive Officer, do hereby order the following:
Vaccine.The Department of State Health Services shall make the HPV vaccine available through the Texas Vaccines for Children program for eligible young females up to age 18, and the Health and Human Services Commission shall make the vaccine available to Medicaid-eligible young females from age 19 to 21.
Rules.The Health and Human Services Executive Commissioner shall adopt rules that mandate the age appropriate vaccination of all female children for HPV prior to admission to the sixth grade.
Availability.The Department of State Health Services and the Health and Human Services Commission will move expeditiously to make the vaccine available as soon as possible.
Public Information.The Department of State Health Services will implement a public awareness campaign to educate the public of the importance of vaccination, the availability of the vaccine, and the subsequent requirements under the rules that will be adopted.
Parents’ Rights.The Department of State Health Services will, in order to protect the right of parents to be the final authority on their children’s health care, modify the current process in order to allow parents to submit a request for a conscientious objection affidavit form via the Internet while maintaining privacy safeguards under current law.
This executive order supersedes all previous orders on this matter that are in conflict or inconsistent with its terms and this order shall remain in effect and in full force until modified, amended, rescinded, or superseded by me or by a succeeding governor.
Given under my hand this the 2nd day of February, 2007.
RICK PERRY(Signature)
Governor
Attested by:
ROGER WILLIAMS(Signature)
Secretary of State
Perry supporters will say that there was an “opt out” provision. I suppose the question is why not an “opt in” or why push this in the first place?
The big question to me is would a conservative require that young Texas women be injected with a new drug via executive order and by doing so go around the voters? And would a conservative via executive order spend all the millions that the order would require the state to spend?
How can Perry bash ObamAcare after attempting such a thing?
The whole Gardasil issue disqualified him in my book, even before these conflicts of interest surfaced.
I think any politician whose track record lasts as long as 20 years is going to have some questionable ties and some self-serving directives. How much did the Keating Five hurt McCain last time around?
I think we're going to get in trouble if we ask our politicans to be saints. They're not. The temptations are great and are everywhere you look.
Look at the overall record and don't get too worried about a few warts. I guarantee that any politician with a long record in public service has a few things they wish they hadn't done and maybe a few candidates they wish they hadn't endorsed.
Perry isn't my ideal candidate and if everyone rumored to run gets in, he's not even my first choice but you have to understand that, as Republicans, every possible piece of dirt, true or not, is going to exposed. It's just the way the game is played. If you're a Democrat, the rules are different but if you're a Republican, every and all charges are going to come out.
Thanks for the link. I'll have to do some reading up on the subject because, outside of scanning headlines and a few stray paragraphs, I've really not paid close attention to the TTC or Gardasil stories.
It's even worse if he actually does "believe in the underlying premise."
Because if so, he believes that government (HE in particular) has domain over very personal family and religious decisions regarding out preteen daughters.
It was and is about identity politics. I asked at the time why it was being pushed on girls only (female voter interest) when guys (A) transmit the disease as well and could spread it to non-vacinated girls (who may moved to Texas later in life) and (B) can get testicular cancer from HPV.
He’s not the only one who pushed the vacination nationally. But the media’s call for boys to be forcibly vacinated came YEARS later.
This is the first article I've ever posted on Perry.
Oh boy...
Agreed. His knee jerk reaction to even think government knows what’s best for our children scares the crap outta me.
Considering Barack Obama supported letting babies die gasping for air in hospital closets because mama didn’t want the baby, this gardasil issue is ONLY important in the primary. Barack supports baby killing even when there is no longer any tie to the mother.
Perry’s Gardisil executive order is hitlerian.
Romneycare << Gardisil.
Romneycare only penalizes people $$ for not having health insurance
approved by the state. You can opt out; opt out of privacy concerns
and pay tax penalty, Sure it ain;t fair but you have a choice.
Perry used police power (supreme court immunization power; SUpreme
Court decision in 1920s) by executive order to MAKE 6th grade
girls REQUIRED to get these shots. At the time I knew this was all
a scam by the pharmaceutical company that had the patent to Gardisil.
Why do you need to vaccinate children— you know they are going to have
many many partners to contract HPV later in life??
Sorry Perry is a NO GO.
Well the Perry bashers came out in force...perhaps if their females in their families were diagnosed with cervical cancer they would have a different take....nah...most of them have no idea...they are too stupid to understand or assume that the female members of their families are immune. Sure dream on fools!
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