Posted on 01/13/2009 11:01:34 AM PST by PurpleMan
When Jonas Salk invented polio vaccine, he was a hero — and I’m a terrorist?” he jokes, referring to a placard denouncing him at a recent demonstration by antivaccine activists outside the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
In recent years, the debate over vaccines and autism, which began in fear and confusion, has hardened into anger. As Dr. Offit’s book details, numerous studies of thimerosal, measles virus and other alleged autism triggers in vaccines have been conducted, and hundreds of children with diagnoses of autism have undergone what he considers sham treatments and been “cured.” Both sides insist that the medical evidence backs them.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Basically, none of this would really be an issue if the vaccines were optional. It’s such a hot topic because the government is forcing parents to give them to their children (or trying to). You can’t really separate the controversy from the government mandate aspect because that’s what takes the choice away from people and makes them feel cornered.
Vaccination has been the single greatest advance in medicine since the development of the germ theory of disease. These anti-vaccination crusaders will be responsible for thousands of unnecessary deaths and untold unnecessary suffering if we allow it.
Well, if you eliminate the requirement, then all bets are off. You do as your intellect sees fit. So why do you insist on arguing a moot point to me? I have a boy, and I see justifiable risk/reward in the vaccine for him.
Well, if you eliminate the requirement, then all bets are off. You do as your intellect sees fit. So why do you insist on arguing a moot point to me? I have a boy, and I see justifiable risk/reward in the vaccine for him.
That would be Hep A.
They are afraid that if they wait, parents will forget them later.
Or wise up, do research and start to push back. Get parents when they are new, nervous, and overwhelmed and want to do everything ‘right’ to protect their children- that’s when it’s easiest. I know parents that have told their doctor they either don’t want to vaccinate or want to wait and are told ‘well, then there’s no reason to come to well-child checks. Just come back when you want the shots’. And that’s if the doctor is somewhat tolerant and doesn’t tell the parent they can never bring their child back UNLESS they get vaccinated. Look no further than that to find out what vaccines are really all about.
My only objection to that particular vaccine, then, is that it’s based on fetal cell lines. But you should certainly do what makes the most sense to you for your own children. And see how easy it is for one person who wants their child to have the vaccine and one who doesn’t to agree once the government mandate is taken off of the table?
There is no 'we' here.
Either we have an individual right to decide what's best for our children, or our 'freedom' is just a sham.
I would argue that antibiotics are more important than vaccines, but vaccines are big, too. But since it would be impossible to vaccinate every person for every possible disease that they might catch (assuming a vaccine is some day available for every disease), how does one decide which diseases warrant a vaccine and which warrant a government mandate? And is a vaccine that loses effectiveness over time really better for diseases that most people catch, fight off, and then have a lifetime immunity against like Chicken Pox? And I’m curious why the same arguments being made in these threads about “herd immunity” aren’t being made to justify giving the HPV vaccine to boys as well as girls since boys are generally the infection vector for the disease.
FYI Glaxo is now recommending Gardasil for boys as well, for just the reason you mentioned, they are usually the source for HPV
“ither we have an individual right to decide what’s best for our children.”
Prostitution?
Child Labor?
Forced Marriages?
My main concern here is not with one particular vaccine or another. It's with the anti-vaccination movement in general. The arguments against vaccination are based on bogus science that has been thoroughly debunked. Withholding vaccination from children places them at risk of enormous suffering. There have been several recent mini-epidemics of measles in the past few years due to failure to vaccinate. I'd hate to see polio return to this country.
Forced VACCINES?
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Nice try in attempting to skew the argument by equating illegal activities with whether or not parents should have the ability to decide when and/or if THEIR children should get vaccines.
Its a blatantly liberal tactic, and it won't work.
Oh, come on! Are you seriously equating wanting to protect your child from the toxic effects of dozens of injections to child prostitution, labor and marriage?
We don't have the right to withhold education from our children, to force them to marry, to force them to work and to withhold life-saving medical care. This "right" is already properly limited.
These injections are not toxic. Claims that they are are based on bogus science and have been thoroughly debunked. Now polio, diphtheria, measles etc., those are toxic.
I had chicken pox, whooping cough, measles(both kinds) and mumps. I am not sterile, at least my ex-wife doesn’t think so and my daughter, who celebrated her 45th birthday today, doesn’t think so either. I am glad for the Polio vaccine, I remember as a child every year during the summer we were warned not to swim(but we did anyway)and then Salk’s vaccine came out, and we were ecstatic. He did a great service to the country, but that doesn’t mean all vaccines are great. Small pox vaccine is a winner, I will buy into that! Most vaccines help more than they harm, I would wish that I didn’t ever have chicken pox or measles(both kinds), but I did.
BINGO!!!!
It’s not 100%, I realize that. But the risk is there, and I simply want to try to void it if possible. I’m not telling anyone they should be forced into any vaccine.
Well, the real issue here is the number of vaccines required before the age of 2 has been rising exponentially. When you were a child, you got a lot few vaccinations that I got. Now, doctors want to compel children to have even more vaccinations before the age of 2.
I think it’s fearmongering among the pro-vaccine folks to tell parents that they MUST get the vaccines on the CDC’s schedule.
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