The state of the antivaccine movement in the United States

PLOS Medicine ^ | 6/12/2018 | Jacqueline K. Olive, Peter J. Hotez , Ashish Damania, Melissa S. Nolan

[spintreebob]

A social movement of public health vaccine opposition has been growing in the United States in recent years; subsequently, measles outbreaks have also increased. Since 2009, the number of “philosophical-belief” vaccine nonmedical exemptions (NMEs) has risen in 12 of the 18 states that currently allow this policy:

Arkansas (AR), Arizona (AZ), Idaho (ID), Maine (ME), Minnesota (MN), North Dakota (ND), Ohio (OH), Oklahoma (OK), Oregon (OR), Pennsylvania (PA), Texas (TX), and Utah (UT).

Several US “hotspot” metropolitan areas stand out for their very large numbers of NMEs. They include Seattle, WA, Spokane, WA, and Portland, OR in the Northwest; Phoenix, AZ, Salt Lake City, UT, Provo, UT, Houston, TX, Fort Worth, TX, Plano, TX, and Austin, TX in the Southwest; Troy, MI, Warren, MI, Detroit, MI, and Kansas City, MO in the Midwest; and Pittsburgh, PA in the Northeast.

Additional smaller counties—especially in ID, WI, and UT—also stand out for their high exemption rates.

[wgmalabama]

+1. Give the idiots hell.

[MichaelCorleone]

I don’t think most people are anti-vax so much as they no longer trust the medical community in general and big pharma in particular.

Mercury, aluminum, and other preservatives are basically neurotoxins. Injecting young ones with several shots at once is also suspect. Both the aforementioned are deemed safe by the AMA (as far as I know).

0bamacare and what it really means for health care and data mining (been to the doctor lately? They spend more time with their face in the computer recording information than they do with the patient’s ailments).

Not saying this is a good reason to keep a child exposed to disease, just that the ‘anti-vaxers’ as they’re called (and demonized) are not without their reasons.

[JimSEA]

You’re bothering because the truth is important and the health benefits are well documented. Keep it up.

[daniel1212]

re high NME rates associated with preventable and costly disease outbreaks? Whereas measles was thought to have been eliminated from the US in 2000, we have seen local outbreaks of this vaccine-preventable disease and others, like measles and pertussis (whooping cough), in recent years due to inadequate immunization coverage in schools. For instance, a child with an NME from the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine is 35 times more likely to contract measles than is a vaccinated child [4]. Moreover, a child without the diphtheria, tetanus, and acellular pertussis (DTaP) vaccine is 3 times more likely to contract pertussis than is a vaccinated child [5]. NMEs weaken herd immunity that protects the population at large, particularly children who are unable to get vaccinated for medical reasons. The target vaccination coverage rate to achieve the ideal herd immunity is 90% to 95%, depending on the infectious agent [6].

Overall, states with more NME students exhibited lower MMR vaccination rates. In contrast, states that have banned NMEs—MS, CA, and WV—exhibit the highest MMR vaccine uptake and lowest incidence of vaccine-preventable diseases. - http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1002578

[snarkpup]

One of Styx's presentations from this morning:

Socialist Paradise Venezuela Sees First Polio Case in Three Decades

War & chaos => lapsing vaccination program => disease comes roaring back.

[Mom MD]

Wait til the first of their kids contracts polio... people who are against vaccines never knew or have forgotten what it was like to risk life long paralysis from a visit to the swimming pool in the summer. It was expected 100 years ago that 1/2 of your children would die before they left the toddler stage not to mention those that were left blind deaf or paralyzed by diseases we only read about in text books now. We have come a long way thanks to evil vaccines.... but we are starting to go backwards thanks to the anti vaccine crowd.

[Manuel OKelley]

My youngest has not yet had any vaccines (we would do some but cant get them individually, far from opposed to modern medicine) and is the most good natured healthy bright child anyone we know has ever met

1400 word vocabulary at 2, becoming mutilingial at 2,started learning violin at 2.5, and basically at kindergarten level at 28 months. And physically absolutely beautiful (thanks mom) to the point many of our friends dont believe that jr. Is NOT a CRISPR baby (they exist in our peer group)

Not saying its because we didnt go crazy with the nuerotoxins but combined with and ultra disciplined health/nutrition regimen i wont say it had nothing to do with it and our sole purpose in life at this point is to give our children every possible advantage

[Engraved-on-His-hands]

Here is a chart showing measles cases before and after vaccines. I'm old enough that I had the measles--not the "three day" or "German" measles. Red measles. The real deal. Missed four weeks of school. Many, many millions of people died in the early 1900's because of measles. Think twice, three times, many times, before you jump on any of the anti-vaccine crusades. Both measles and most of the anti-vaccine crusades are deadly.


The Effect of Vaccines on Measles

[YogicCowboy]

I will make it simple for vaccine apologists:

1) Research Louis Pasteur versus Antoine Bechamps.

2) Research the secretive Vaccine Court and its many payouts.

[fruser1]

“Right”

It’s my belief that the rash of peanut allergies stems from yuppies not wanting to feed their kids peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in the high chair days because that bread, fat, and sugar wasn’t “healthy”.

I don’t actually remember smearing that stuff all over my face when it was my turn, but later on I enjoyed watching others doing it, all back in the day.

[Right Wing Assault]

When I was a child of 5 in 1952, the worst summer for polio, parents were scared to death to let their kids go where they could get polio from another kid. I was scared when I saw pictures of people in "iron lungs" because their breathing muscles were paralyzed by polio.

There are probably three people still alive in the US that can't breathe from the polio back in the 50s. Here's their story:

https://gizmodo.com/the-last-of-the-iron-lungs-1819079169

Can you imagine seeing your beloved child not able to breathe? What happens today if you get a bad case of polio? Are there iron lungs or breathing machines around? I don't know. But your child might be tied to one of these machine for all of their shortened life. No running around with their friends. No games. No sports. No dancing.

When I went to first grade, there was a kid named George. He could barely walk with the help of steel braces on his legs. He was lucky. He could breathe.

When I went to high school, there was a teacher in a wheel chair who couldn't walk. He could not breathe without a pressure thing he wore. When he wanted to speak, he had to wait until the machine helped him gasp in enough air that he could say part of a sentence. I don't know how old he was, but he died a few years later because he caught pneumonia and his paralyzed breathing system couldn't fight it off.

Can you imagine what it will be like if your child catches polio and can't breathe without a machine. One day they will say, with the help of their breathing machine, "Mommy, daddy, why did you let me catch polio? Why didn't you help me? I want to be like the other kids, but I never will! Why did you do this?" Can you do this to you kid and then live with yourself?

If you are lucky, your child will have a mild case of whatever diseases they will catch. Or if it is severe, and they die, it will be fast, unlike those who had polio.

For those who want to serve in the armed forces, guess what? You will need maybe six vaccines, maybe a dozen if you go to one of the disease shitholes. Here's some info:

https://usarmybasic.com/about-the-army/army-shots

[zeestephen]

Over the last five years, Washington state has had repeated outbreaks of Pertussis (Whooping Cough) in both child and adult populations.

I don't know how the numbers compare to earlier years, and I don't know how many were foreign born.

In any event, I live east of Seattle, in a city that is almost 40% foreign born, and when you walk around a grocery store here in the winter time, it sounds like a Tuberculosis sanatorium.

[logi_cal869]

No mention of race or country of origin either.

A curious omission when both are factors in other statistics.

[hinckley buzzard]

Of course he doesn't. Antivaxxers are the intellectual heirs to the crop circle nuts and the chemtrail fanatics. They don't need no damn facts, their minds are made up.

[Yaelle]

A lot of FReepers understand not to blindly trust the government, until you start talking about the one (primitive science) and only group of products in the country that has zero legal liability.

The risks right now are greater for neurological (brain!) damage over one’s lifetime from the insane pediatric vaccination schedule than for any healthy child with informed parent who gets a childhood (vax oriented) disease.

Real science would involve lighter composition in the vaccine product itself, maybe expensive single use vials, less metals, adjuvants, preservatives. Real science would involve waiting until the child has developed an intestinal biome (at least one year of age, closer to 2 would be better) then testing the child to see if his personal bacterial biome was ideal for the onslaught of vaccine ingredients. Then only vaccinating children who have tested ready for it. And only one vaccine a month, none in the virus and flu season.

And vaccine manufacturers should be help responsible for their products LIKE EVERY OTHER PRODUCT.

[House Atreides]

I react to anti-vaccine folks who lecture me the same way I react to anti-SUV folk who lecture me. I ignore them and our family gets their vaccinations and we drive in our SUVs.

[Yaelle]

I am so sorry. My first child was also vaccine injured because I blindly believed pediatricians too. Now I like ACTUAL science instead.

Now that I’ve had four, you will not be surprised to learn that only the vaccinated baby had constant ear infections and colds. The unvaccinated kids were never sick. Just anecdotal, but it was my anecdote so I see something to that. A baby’s natural immune system (the bacterial biome in us) cannot develop normally if they have had to endure that number of immune onslaughts in the demanded vaccine schedule.

[Mom MD]

Real science would let your child die of hemophilus meningitis at 6 mos old because they were waiting until what you scientists think is a safe age to vaccinate. Right

[Alter Kaker]

Patrick Henry would have been an anti-vaxxer.

Patrick Henry opposed the United States Constitution.

[Yaelle]

Polio is actually a sequela of one of various enteroviruses. It’s a symptom from the worst of cases of these enteroviruses. A few years ago, a different enterovirus swept the USA, and some kids did get the “polio” symptom: permanent flaccid paralysis. Two facts emerge:

1) another enterovirus not covered by the vaccine can clearly end in a worst case scenario with the paralysis symptom.

2. To prevent your child getting the worst case of any illness, their vitamins and minerals should be at optimum. This can be hard to achieve but it’s health promoting, moreso than vaccinations which clearly can’t prevent any enterovirus from your child’s environment. Most people exposed to an enterovirus won’t even know they were exposed. They might have an evening of mild upset stomach and fatigue. Some might “come down with a 24 hour stomach flu” and get well again. On;y the worst cases would ever get the paralysis.

I was just reading a story about when polio hit the immigrant areas of NYC in the early 20th century. Almost every family was hit. The family I was reading about made sacrifices to get their kids out to the beach all summer, renting a place with other families. Their family was not hit. Because the kids were getting much more vitamin d from the sun than they would have, in close quarters in smoky tenements in town.