A Verdict on the Vaccination Boogeyman

Liz Ditz I Speak of Dreams lizditz@gmail.com

Let's see if this comment goes through.  I couldn't figure out what was wrong -- kept getting trapped in the spam filter even after I took out all the URLs.  Thanks, Shannon for helping.

Elena, thank you for your understanding.

I was paying really close attention to the national U.S. flu stats before the vaccine became available because my daughter-in-law is pregnant and the other grandchildren were also high-risk.  I got really nervous around Thanksgiving because several schools in our area closed early, or for an extended period, because of high rates of flu-caused absences.

The novel H1N1 didn't strike uniformly in the US.  Seems like there were pockets of severe disease (high rate disease, with high rates of hospitalizations and deaths). So if you (for example) weren't in one of the pockets, it might indeed have appeared that H1N1 was overblown.

Thankfully, my family too has been unusually healthy so far this winter.

Wakefield's famous press conference was in 1998 -- the "autistic entercolitis" show was on the road.  The "do vaccines cause autism" debate changed in 1999, with the suspicion that thimerosal in vaccines had something to do with autism.  Safe Minds was founded in 2000 and Generation Rescue in the spring of 2005. At the time Safe Minds was founded,  "vaccines cause autism?" was a reasonable question, as the research had not yet been completed. 

But by 2007 (at the latest), the studies had been done. Wakefield's research had been thoroughly discredited on several grounds. Further, no link between thimerosal and autism could be found.  Safe Minds, Generation Rescue,and Age of Autism moved the goal posts.  Now it was "toxins" and later, "too many too soon."

I think for those of us who are science-based advocates for people with autism, the years of frustration with Wakefield and his allies is just assumed.  Someone who isn't familiar with the backstory may not understand what the GMC ruling means in terms of those years of frustration.

your story, after reading about it through DPS. I saddened me greatly to read about his illness and subsequent death. Your faith in God amazed and touched me. 

Manda you are the one who sounds awfully angry.  Vaccines have saved millions of lives and has rid this planet of the pestilence of small pox. So anyone who says that vaccines are not proven successful is either misguided, ill informed or not willing to deal with the reality that there is no outside catalyst to autism other than a gene that you pass on to your children. 

 Just look at the recent measles outbreaks among college students. Because the vaccine wears off and most ppl do not revaccinate there is a risk of infection. Measles can cause, deafness, blindlness,  birth defects or death. You don't have all the facts and you don't have the right to scare people.

It is not a personal choice when that choice may lead to someone elses' death. Just like you don't have the right to drive drunk because it endangers someone else's life you do not have the right to expose others to harmful deadly and unnecessary diseases. Shame on you for your self-centeredness.

Elise http://asd2mom.spaces.live.com

Liz Ditz I Speak of Dreams  lizditz@gmail.com

Manda2177, I see that you feel very strongly about this.  I'd like to hear more about your feelings and reasoning.  But I find myself confused in a number of ways  by your comment.

Are you addressing Shannon, the author of the original article?  I have re-read her article carefully and cannot see where she is "terrorizing".

Are you addressing natalienorton?  Her son really did die of whooping cough (pertussis). That's not "terrorizing", it is a fact for her family.   He's not the only infant to die of pertussis.  As it turns out, pertussis is still with us, and is highly contagious. Before the vaccine was available, pertussis killed about 4,000 children and adults every year.  (source: immunizationinfo.org)

One of the reasons that pertussis is still endemic (circulating in the population) is that the immunity conferred by childhood vaccination wanes after five to ten years, just as immunity to lockjaw (tetanus) does.  So as a regular part of public health, people need to be revaccinated against tetanus, to protect themselves only, and against pertussis, to provide protection for infants who are too young to be vaccinated.  Happily, the adult booster combines both tetanus and pertussis.  (source: many.  the easiest to understand is  immunizationinfo.org)

PKIDS is a national organization for kids who with compromized immune systems.  In 2008, they launched an awareness and action campaign about pertussis, "Silence the Sounds of Pertussis".  One part of the campaign urged adults who might be in contact with infants to have  a booster shot, which confers immunity to tetanus and pertussis.

Whether you are addressing Shannon or Natalie, you write  "Your facts are off".  What facts are not....well, factual?  Or verifiable? Everything Shannon wrote is more than supported by the links she embedded in her post.  The facts of Natalie's son's death are easily verifiable.

Manda2177 wrote You DONT have the right to scare people into making a personal choice.

Everybody, including manda2177:  there's this idea out there that the decision to vaccinate oneself or one's children is a "personal decision".  It isn't, unless you live in a cave and never encounter another person.  The vaccination decision is a public health decision.  Here's why:

• Most vaccine-preventable diseases are contagious before the sick person appears ill. Thus your decision not to vaccinate yourself or your children has implications for others, if you are just out in the community.

• At least in the United States, we have lost the infrastructure for preventing contagion.  In other words, before universal vaccination for infectious disease, most pediatric practices had isolation waiting rooms for children. Those have disappeared.  In the 2008 San Diego measles outbreak, at least 2 infants were infected by sharing a pediatric  waiting room with child with measles.