Why are Washington residents opting out of vaccinations? Because they think they know better than doctors.

So you're calling Washington stupid for not complying and Mississippi smart for complying?

Mississippi is currently ranked at the bottom of the American Human Development Index. Mississippi had the highest rate of obesity of any U.S. state from 2005–2008 and also ranks first in the nation for high blood pressure, diabetes, and adult inactivity.
In 2007, Mississippi students scored the lowest of any state on the National Assessments of Educational Progress in both math and science.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi…

Why would the state of Washington want to emulate Mississippi in any way?

So Mississippi has a 99.5% vaccine compliance rate?

Wow, good for them. They are also the fattest, dumbest state in the union!

Mississippi is currently ranked at the bottom of the American Human Development Index.
For three years in a row, more than 30 percent of Mississippi's residents have been classified as obese.
It ranks first in the nation for high blood pressure, diabetes, and adult inactivity.
In 2007, Mississippi students scored the lowest of any state on the National Assessments of Educational Progress in both math and science.

Do you still want to emulate Mississippi?

@5, 6:

we're talking about vaccines, here, not Mississippi.

I know they're easy to mistake for one another, but try to keep up, now.

Hey Goldy, I bet you fell for the great swine flu hoax of 2009, didn't you? You listened to the government "experts" and ran out in a panic and got jabbed with an untested vaccine, didn't you?

Think twice before you call other people stupid.

@7:

The point of the article is: Washington's low vaccine rates are dangerous/bad.

My point is: Mississippi's high vaccine rate (99.7%) might be dangerous/bad.

I hope that clarifies it.

Who put lighter fluid in your beer? WA state is one of the lucky states where parents have three exemptions, medical, religious, and philosophical. Your kids don't have to receive chemo and you don't have to be a snake handler to delay The Schedule.

Brain control chemicals and UN conspiracies

@5 @6: I see what you mean. I was vaccinated as a child, and at 5'5" and 110, I am morbidly obese, as a direct cause of my childhood vaccinations.

Fucking idiot.

1.So in order to not emulate Mississippi, parents should refuse to vaccinate their children with proven, safe vaccines that otherwise would protect them from potentially deadly disease to look "smarter" than Mississippi?

That's the dumbest thing ever.

2. So if a pharma company is owned by rich people it doesn't matter if the vaccine is effective. Voice your opposition to greed by endangering your kid and other kids' lives by showing the man you aren't buying his vaccine.

That's also one of the dumbest things ever.

Whooping Cough is experiencing a resurgence in Washington State. It is entirely preventable. And yet, grungy granola eating hippies don't really give a crap about their own children or any other children because they read something on the Internet that has been spread like chain mail. This is the sort of ignorant science illiteracy that has serious consequences for this country.

My sister was one o' them hippies...travelled Renaissance Faires and WOULD NOT vaccinate her precious b/c he could get autism. Well, after the study came out DEBUNKING that assertion...she got her son vaccinated. To get your head around WHY hippies suffer their children...think GLOBAL WARMNING/AL GORE in a syringe.

The author is right. It's pretty clear to me that there will be a measles outbreak in time(like the one in Minneapolis this year), and some of these children might die or become brain damaged. No vaccine lead to autism. These are facts in that they have been proven the best ways we know how.

this is, like, not journalism.

you're supposed to try to answer in the subhead: "why?"

instead you're yelling and calling people stupid.

You anti-vaccine people are not only using ad-hominem attacks, but some of you (eg, #8) are using ad-hominem attacks based on SHIT YOU MADE UP (if your sentence starts with "I bet," just don't even bother to type the rest of it).

The reason you have to resort to this is because you have absolutely no real logic or valid science to back up your paranoia on vaccines. The only study linking vaccines and autism was debunked; once a study is debunked, believing in it *really hard* doesn't re-validate it (this is the difference between science and fairies).

See, when I find that a belief of mine is contradicted by all the available reliable science, I change my belief, because I view this as a pretty telling sign that said belief was wrong. Failing to do this is the textbook definition of that "willful ignorance" stuff that we all hate those stupid Mississippians for in the first place.

I have my own problems with the pharmaceutical industry, but this does not mean jack w. shit about vaccines. A medical procedure is either valid or not, and proof of either one has nothing to do with who is making money off of it. The practices by which big pharma operates serve as arguments against for-profit health care, not as arguments against specific medical procedures that happen to be included on the list of things they sell.

To say otherwise is akin to refusing to eat vegetables because they're grown by farmers, and farmers also grow tobacco, which is bad, so vegetables must be bad, too. It's a huge logical fallacy.

As a card-carrying hippie, I'd just like to say that I have NOT fallen for this eye-crossingly stupid hysteria, and will most certainly be vaccinating my unborn son. Jenny McCarthy is an asshole.

#25 FTW

Somewhere here there is middle ground. Vaccines have potnntial side effects (vaccine reaction, immune mediated issues, possible link to allergies) not vaccinating has some serious health issues-potential life threatening illness. Bigger cons on the non-vaccinating side. It'sa black or white issue but pretty damn close. My vaccinatd 8 month old was tested for whooping cough (negative). How would I feel if she had cuaght from the kd in town who had it and wasn't vaccinated? Pretty stupid

Against my better judgement, since this 'discussion' seems to be mostly name calling and lots of posturing, I would like to point out one thing about the opt-out statistics which I think is misleading: They lump everyone who does not follow the suggested vaccination schedule into the 'anti-vaccine' category.

For example, we have our children on a delayed schedule. They are getting 2 vaccinations per visit rather than the regular 5 or 6 per visit to the doctor. If they aren't on the same schedule as the state suggests by kindergarten, the parents have to file an opt-out form and they are counted in the same statistical category as a kid with no vaccinations.

If the kid is current with all their vaccinations except for one (in our case Hep. B), they need an opt-out form.

Personally, we opted out of the Hep B since we don't anticipate the kids sharing dirty needles or having unprotected sex in kindergarten. Maybe we'll revisit that one when they are a bit older, but for the mean time we need to file the opt-out form and are statistically considered 'anti-vaccine'.

If you and your children are vaccinated..what business is it of yours what others do?

*Cue the taxpayer dollar speeches* yawn

@34: It's everyone's business because children too young to be vaccinated yet depend on herd immunity until they reach the age where they can be vaccinated. If stupid fucking hippies don't vaccinate their kids, that reduces herd immunity, and puts those un-vaccinatable children at risk.

Heavens. Between this and the comments for the Intiman article, we're finally seeing Seattle have a good old fashioned melt-down screaming meemie hissy fit in print. Right now there's a 1994 Volvo weaving across Greenwood with an assistant English professor furiously texting away on his iPhone - I guarantee you.

@34 As someone who has a young nephew who was born premature and still continues to have health issues years later, it matters that all the other children on the playground are vaccinated to make sure my nephew doesn't become sick.

Another 2 cents: I kinda like living in a time in history where smallpox epidemics don't happen. I would like to keep it that way. I think it's safe to say vaccines are way more helpful than harmful; not just for my nephew but for global health in general.

*posts about how this is a stupid thing to post about*

*completely misses the irony*

I object (!)
to the term hippies being used in this article; it would be better titled:

"Stupid Fucking Anti-Vaccine Morons", or,
"Stupid Fucking Anti-Vaccine Asshats", or,
"Stupid Fucking Anti-Vaccine Selfish Bastards"

or really, anything but "hippies".

Because then in some other article, you'll be promoting green space or public gardens and farmers markets with oh-so-local-and-organic foods, or perhaps the joys of commuting by bicycle.

And if that good, socially responsible stuff isn't based in hippie-dom, I'm not sure what is.

So FUCK YOU for using the term hippie. I'm proud to be a tree-hugging fool. Besides, trees can't get away when you try to hug them.

And yes, my kids have all their vaccinations. ;P

It is stupid to not protect your children and others from preventable disease. It is selfish not to do so. But it doesn't automatically make you a hippie, it automatically makes you an asshole.

OTOH? There is an argument to be made for what we're doing to the fitness of our genome by using all of the immuno-modifications we use, including vaccines and antibiotics, and other medications...but that's for another philosophical discussion. And since immunization is the socially accepted way of NOT LETTING YOUR KIDS DIE FROM HORRIBLE PREVENTABLE DISEASES...anyone who doesn't, better come up with something better, or quit being stupid and selfish.

And I do have to agree with the points made about FDA/BigPharma collusions to scare the shit out of the public and rake in the $dough$. I don't like them or trust them, but I'm not sure how else my 5 year-old could be spared mumps.

Final Thought: You could also use an accurate photo, that's not a vaccination needle and syringe, it's for *insulin*, you twitty twat. Or maybe a TB test. But that's not a vaccine system.

The blanket "hippie" label is getting a little old. The world has changed, and unlike 30 or 40 years ago, not everybody who lives outside the mainstream in some way is a "hippie". The religious right shares a lot of extreme hippie views about conventional medicine, processed food, and technology in general. To make it even more complicated, another significant kind of paranoid worldview is urban and highly technical, even techno-utopian, easy marks for both 9/11 conspiracy theories and anti-vaccine conspiracy theories.

It's not really wrong to label anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists "hippies". It's just limited, and dated, and it misses the boat on a lot of social trends that are interesting, and worth understanding.

Here's what I find hilarious about the Big Pharma conspiracy people. It used to be that Big Pharma was making treatments instead of cures because treatments are for life and cure are a one shot deal and not profitable! Now the Big Pharma conspiracy is that vaccines - a one shot cure - make big money and thats why Big Pharma makes them!

Pick one. You can't have both.

And even if someone is making big money off of something, it doesn't mean it's bad for you. Raise your hand, stupid hippies, if you buy organic at Whole Foods every week. Put that local grown apple down, buddy. Someone made a huge profit off of it!

Whatever you think of big pharma, measles/mumps/rubella/etc KILLS CHILDREN IN DROVES. Big bunches of dead kids that we don't have anymore because of vaccines.. Just try to remember that because it's really freaking important.

wow! Is that what vaccination spawns? Reading that drivel is enough to change one's mind against vaccinating...

Or is spouting such moronic phrases as "stupid fucking hippies" supposed to come off as some sort of hipster badge of honor?

Holy crap, Stranger, are you recruiting your writers right out of high school now?

The truly frightening aspect of many of these comments is the lack of scientific literacy. Truly frightening.

@20:

Why would Nancy Brinker, founder of this marketing organization known as the Susan G. Komen Foundation (although it keeps going through name changes), be believed, given her record???

Please let those name changes continue so that my irrational annoyance at every encounter with "Susan G. Komen for the Cure" can end.

Right on, Goldy. Great headline too.

Thanks for writing this, Goldy.

The Big Pharma argument just doesn't work! Sgt. Doom, you are complaining about corporate monopolies and privatization. I, myself, am also against privatization. But are you seriously telling me that you would be 100% in favour of vaccines if only they were made by government agencies instead? No, I bet you'd still be against them and you'd start grumbling about government control.

Bottom line, you don't understand that vaccines are good for humanity, and you're making excuses why we shouldn't have them. Well, we should all get vaccinated because it prevents death: ours and others'.

You're wrong that rising autism diagnoses strongly correlate with vaccinations. Not everywhere! Apparently, Japan halted its vaccine program completely in 1993 for a time. Because of this, scientists were able to study populations of children who were vaccinated, and compare them with the populations of children where no vaccines were administered. The autism rate continued to climb, even though no children in new birth years were being vaccinated at all, so there was no correlation in that case.

Autism is a developmental disorder that appears in the first 3 years of life, and affects the brain's normal development of social and communication skills.

Many parents are worried that some vaccines are not safe and may harm their baby or young child. They may ask their doctor or nurse to wait, or even refuse to have the vaccine. However, it is important to also think about the risks of not having the vaccination.

The truth is our water supply has so many chemicals in it that frogs are evolving into oddity's as well is everything else?

If you cant even guarantee a clean water supply then your twisting at the end of a rope to start.

Have those vaccinations been tested on animals?
if so for how long? just how bad and evil is this sickness that you want to go and poke a needle into every single child in America and the world?

As the world is made more toxic by humans do humans need to introduce humans to more toxins to make humans more resistant to toxins?

I find it sad that my own children--who are still vulnerable to any respiratory illness even if they get vaccinated--are at risk of contracting deadly or serious illnesses just because other people are too selfish to vaccinate their own children. If people are really worried about the vaccine schedule, they can always delay some of the shots rather than refusing them altogether. Otherwise, their actions are basically saying that they want little premature babies and cancer-compromised kids to contract deadly illnesses. What kind of jerk does it take to treat other people that way?

Maybe it's worth looking into what it was like for kids to get polio, once upon a time, or measles. Maybe it's worth looking into what it would be like for you, as an adult, to contract some of the previously-rare childhood illnesses that you're helping destroy immunity for today.

@47 - droves? Vaccines kill children in droves? Please show me your statistics from a source more reliable than a B-list actress.

How old are you? Do you remember iron lungs? People on crutches after polio? Do you remember pregnant mothers worried about their unborn babies when an older child contracted mumps or rubella? I remember all of that and I hate that the young parents of today make uninformed and unsafe choices based on junk science and the word of a "celebrity".

The true droves are the people who died from the infectious diseases that you have been protected from.

Measles, so contagious that 80-90% of people without immunity who are exposed will catch it, can be fatal in up to 25% of cases - particularly in those with compromised immune systems like newborns. Smallpox killed nearly a half a million Europeans a year in the 18th century.

Pertussis, even in the days of modern medical care and kills about 1% of newborns who contract it and it's on the rise.

Everything in life has risks. You have the right, in this wonderful country of ours, to choose whether to have your child vaccinated. Unfortunately, you are endangering other people's children and grandchildren who are too young to be immunized when you make this choice.

I chose to have my children vaccinated and they, informed enough to read valid statistical data, made the decision to have their children vaccinated.

@ Sgt Doom, in response to this particular comment "Such that, if that chemical which has been introduced (thimerosal) with the rise of the number of vaccinations, deserves much, much more study."

This is in fact being done. Indeed in a 2008 study by Schechter and Grether published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, looked at the prevalence in autism in California for the years of 1995-2007. A close look at the years before and after thimerosal was phased out shows NO CHANGE. (This result agrees with a 2003 study of Danish children, Madsen et al., in fact this study showed that prevalence continued to increase) Therefore, if there is no change to pre and post thimerosal then thimerosal cannot be causal.

And a more general comment I believe we could all keep in mind is that correlation does not equal causation!

Penn & Teller did a great visualization of the relative risk of vaccinating vs. not. Can't post links, but Googling "penn teller vaccination" brought it up right away for me.

I found the mixed bag of comments here interesting. I don't want to be patronizing, but as someone who grew up in a third world country I think we Americans have the luxury of debating whether we should practice vaccination. Most of us haven't seen children with polio limping down the street, so we can focus the possible consequences of getting vaccines instead of the horrific consequences of a preventable disease spreading from child to child,leaving a trail of corpses. Maybe it will take a real epidemic to spread across the U.S. before people are again convinced of the need for everyone to be vaccinated. Heartless as it may sound, even if there was a proven causal pathway between vaccines and autism, were less than 5% of the vaccinated get autism, wouldn't that be better than 20% or more of the population dying every time there was an outbreak preventable by vaccination?

The comments here make me depressed. Seriously, how can people be THIS willfully stupid?

Just don't argue with Sgt. Doom; he's not even really talking about vaccines anymore. Here's how an argument with him goes:

Normal Person: "The rise in reported autism correlates with a huge number of things other than vaccines, which is why it's foolish to just cling onto this one correlation and assume causation. Big Pharma is shitty and needs far more regulation, but the studies on vaccine safety are more relevant than Pfizer's reputation."

Sgt Doom: "Hey dipshit! Ever hear of a little company called MONSANTO?????????????? Those assholes are KILLING legitimate soybean farmers with lawsuits while growing GMO soy!!!!!!!!!! And don't even get me started on Chevron dumping cancerous oil all over those Ecuadorian natives! Or how about mountaintop removal mining? That shit fucks up ENTIRE FORESTS and poisons ENTIRE TOWNS and they use lousy intimidation tactics on detractors!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And here you're trying to tell me that vaccines aren't linked to Autism? Nice tryyyyyyyy!"

I like to think of Sgt doom and Seattleblues as a little salt and pepper set of wingnuttery. And Bonefish, that was lovely.

@54:
"As the world is made more toxic by humans do humans need to introduce humans to more toxins to make humans more resistant to toxins?"
If this is a reference to vaccines, well, then, you don't know how vaccines work. They have nothing to do with toxins. They are a way of "showing" your immune system a pathogen so it will "remember" that pathogen the next time you encounter it and fight it off so that you don't get "sick" with it. You only get the outward manifestation of the illness the first time you're infected with a particular pathogen; vaccination is a way of bypassing the getting sick part but still getting immunity from it. So it doesn't have anything to do with toxins.
If that's not what you meant, well then, can't help ya, because what you said doesn't make sense.

Wow, the dipshits are really coming out of the woodwork here.

re: vaccinations and Mississippi: LOOK, A CORRELATION! WE'D BETTER TAKE THIS TO DR. JENNY MCCARTHY FOR CONFIRMATION THAT IT'S CAUSAL!

re: corporate conspiracies and shadowy government poisonings: the idea that because you don't like Pfizer they could never in a million years do even one thing that benefits the entire population of the world even though they only make a modest profit off of it is so incredibly infantile it barely rates refutation. Protip: corporate executives are cold professionals, not Snidely Whiplash.

Look, you fucking prima-donna new age yuppie assholes, you go to West Africa for a while and watch some children die of measles, then go to India and check out some kids who were paralyzed by polio, and then you come back here and moan some more about how evil "needles" and "toxins" are.

Oh, yeah... retroactive FLAME ON warning.

See what I mean? This guy glosses over the parts where I spell out the reasons that I myself hate Big Pharma and concludes that I must be a Big Pharma loyalist. Then he shows an article about how one specific new vaccine may be effective but may not, and this is his giant proof that vaccination is an entirely useless technology.

Hey sarge, do you take herbal supplements? You shouldn't, because some of those are in a form called "pills," and I hear that [Corrupt Company X] once made a medicine that had deadly side effects, and guess what: it was a PILL! So never, ever, ever take any medication in this dubious "pill" form.

Oh, also, don't use fresh herbs either. Many of them are these things called "plants," and I've read all sorts of outdoor survival guides that told me that HUNDREDS of "plants" are deadly poisonous! Anybody recommending "plant" consumption for medical or dietary health reasons is clearly just trying to make a buck off of your death.

And did you know how many people die in car accidents? Cars largely use "wheels" to move, so anything with "wheels"-- tricycles, wheel barrows, grocery carts, etc-- needs to be avoided at all costs. Also, Henry Ford was an anti-Semitic douche bag, so clearly cars (as a technology)do nothing but hurt Jews all day long.

Now that I've been convinced that vaccines are poison (Donald Trump's low character is all the proof I needed), I can't help but wonder how Smallpox got wiped out, and why Polio is only prevalent in countries where people have little to no access to its VACCINE? Maybe some unsung new age magicians that just fucking hate Africa? Any thoughts, sarge?

All of the vaccine bashers up there in WA sound an awful lot like the Followers of Christ Church down here. http://photos.oregonlive.com/oregonian/2… The adult members (supports in this photo) wear glasses, but refuse to take their kids to the Dr. for an eye infection. I would guess that the majority of you who bemoan vaccines are indeed vaccinated.

And regarding the "Mississippi" argument. Of course they are the most vaccinated, if you got all of your health care for free from a community clinic staffed by nurses and Doctors you would probably trust their advice to vaccinate your children too.

@74, I think you may be confusing journalism and scientific literature, which is not surprising given your clear confusion of propaganda and politics with empirical data.

And while I think the irony of you calling me "scientifically unread" will be completely lost on you, rest assured I am appreciating it for you from the comfort of my position here within the wheels of the conspiracy, aka a medical genetics lab at the UW.

Formaldehyde, human diploid cells from aborted fetal tissue, aluminum hydroxide, continuous line of monkey kidney cells, mouse serum proteins, polysorbate 80 (Tween-80), thimerosal (mercury), ammonium sulfate, vesicle fluid from calf skins, residual components of MRC-5 cells including DNA and proteins, bovine serum, rhesus monkey fetal lung cells, monosodium glutamate (MSG), aspartame, phenol, polydimethylsiloxane (silicone), guinea pig embryo cells, albumin from human blood, 2-phenoxyethenol. Mmmm, yummy. A few common ingredients in the vaccines you all are so eager to shoot your kids up with. Why would I go to pains to grow and eat real food, avoid toxic home and body care products including pharmaceutical drugs but put these sorts of toxins into my precious new human being? Did you know that our government has a special agency devoted to compensating parents of vaccine-injured children? Between fiscal years 1989 and 2011, over $2 billion was awarded to families for vaccine injuries, including autism. Shooting our children with so many dangerous and toxic substances at such a young age--ANY age--does not strike me as being very loving. There is abundant and easily researchable information available to make informed choices. I have educated my children from early on that because they are partially and unvaccinated, there are precautions and health issues they need to be aware of, and I've taught them how to protect themselves and others in case of outbreaks. My unvaccinated child stepped on a rusty nail in my absence and did not tell me till much later. When I asked what he did for it, he replied, "I did exactly what you taught me to do!" Flush, peroxide, flush, peroxide, goldenseal and later, comfrey. Taking a look at the connections between our increasingly polluted and toxic world and epidemic proportions of childhood illnesses, including cancers, obesity, respiratory illness, autism and other developmental syndromes is not just a smart thing to do, but our progeny's future--or lack of it--may depend on just that. I for one, refuse to follow the herd mentality that has been promulgated on the population. And I take responsibility for my own health. Doc-caused death is now the fourth leading cause in our country.

After my first child had severe reactions to his first vaccines (fevers >103, high pitched screaming for more than 2 days, lethargic and refusing to eat) we decided to delay them in our other children,starting them at 2yrs instead of birth, and opted out of the hep b until they were older, ie sexually active. Thank goodness my state (PA) has exemptions that allowed us to do so. We do one shot per visit to make sure that if there is going to be a reaction we will know which one is the culprit.
I do not agree with not vaxing at all, but I do support a parent's right to decided which ones their children get and when. Without medical and/or philosophical/religious exemptions I suspect the number of severe reactions would be much higher. The CDC doesn't compensate for vaccine-related injuries for no reason.

I'm sure just like everything else it's much more complex than it is presented.
I really hate when people oversimplify things and say ignorant things meant to be intentionally hurtful.This happens all over the place all the time and this is obviously no exception. Vaccines do work and they have been around for a long time. Ben Franklin writes about this very issue in his autobiography (whether or not to trust vaccines has always been a controversial issue). So don't blame it on Jenny Mccarthy. Just use good sense, and don't expect everyone else to take the same precautions you think you should.

"Mississippi's high vaccine rate (99.7%) might be dangerous/bad."
Ok. first of all, vaccine rates are not the corollary you're looking for to the reasons that Mississippi has high rates of obesity, diabetes, teen pregnancy, high blood pressure, and lower education scores. Some of the reasons for this include, but are not limited to:
Mississippi is extremely rural, therefore people tend to drive more, and walk less. Also, it's hot, really, you can't understand it without being there hot for most of 7 months of the year, which, again, leads to people driving instead of walking. Even in the more tightly packed urban areas, the public transportation is abysmal, and sidewalks rarely exist outside of older neighborhoods.
It is also poor. For the most part. Really, crushingly poor. And the rich people who are there tend to use their power to do things that further disenfranchise the poor. This creates several problems. No teachers want to come to the Mississippi Delta to teach in the schools there, so they end up with whatever they can get. There isn't really any money to pay them well, or even to a standard that the rest of the country would find acceptable, hence, it's hard to get teachers to come in, even when we get the teachers, there simply isn't any money being put into the schools. School funding here (and other places, I know) comes from property taxes within a certain district, meaning the haves and have-nots are pretty starkly divided. Also, when you have this kind of poverty, you look at a lot of people using government assistance to get by, leading to them buying more processed food because it lasts longer and has more calories, so may be more filling.
Also, you have a huge church influence, especially in the African-American community, which leads to more young people keeping their sexual experimentation a secret, and young girls feeling pressured into keeping the baby if they do become pregnant.
Churches also have a bit to do with the obesity aspect, because church is a very important part of the culture (Black and white) in most of the South. Things like fish fries and cookouts reinforce the Southern food traditions. Food and family are very closely intertwined, and the kinds of food that have been passed down and have not just nutritional, but also emotional value are not exactly artery friendly.
The idea is that we are trying to totally rework decades and generations of how people think about and cook food. It has not been easy, and it will not be easy, but slowly, people are starting change a little.
YES. For anyone about to say this, most of these things are about personal choice, and what we have to do is make people here see that they need to make the healthier choices, not just for themselves, but for their children and the future. It is not easy, and there are a lot of people down here who are working to make a change, not just in people's health, but in their access to education and access to making better sexual choices (and not the abstinence-only folks either-ugh).
So, yes, things down here can get ridiculous, and there are things to be made fun of, but if you want to help, you can, or you can just sit there and laugh. That's ok too, I guess, we're used to it.
We can hope to educate people to make Mississippi a healthier place, but at least most of us won't die of measles, mumps or whooping cough while we do it.

I have a BA in chemistry, an MS in biology, worked for a year at a public health lab on a CDC fellowship, two years doing medical research at the Seattle Children's Hospital, and am in my third year of a PhD program in bacteriology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I do not do any vaccine work, but many of my friends do such research.

I see the debate over vaccines as being a collision of immediate and long-term fears. There is the immediate fear of a vaccine causing a medical condition - and vaccines can do this, but only very rarely. There is the long-term fear of an epidemic - and years can pass, sometimes even generations, between epidemics (at least in the USA). I think that people are in general equating the long-term fears with "impossible scenarios" and that worries me, because it means that when an epidemic does occur it will involve a much greater loss of life than otherwise.

Yes, vaccines are made by big companies, and yes, vaccines make money for those companies. They also keep people from dying of preventable diseases, and the science behind how they work is not particularly difficult to understand at a basic level. If you are worried about what is in a vaccine, then look up the ingredients and spend the time with a scientific reference (not "the internet", which has only shaky scientific information at best) to understand what each component is, and why it is in there.

Please take the time to read about vaccines in scientific journals, or the CDC. They make no money from what they do, and are not a part of any pharmaceutical company. It is your right to make a decision, but make it an informed decision of the risks involved.

@kelseaJewell: thanks for your sane comment.

Everyone else: you up to date on the controversies surrounding Gardasil, the HPV vaccine they're pushing on your daughters, and now your sons? The risks of cancer, paralysis, other permanent damage and death are well documented, originally denied by the CDC. The National Vaccine Information Center has an outstanding compilation of the stories, the press, and denials, the evidence about Gardasil on their website. Please check it out, if you're interested in 'the other side' of the intense propaganda surrounding vaccines. Or just look at the product circular and its list of post-approval reactions. You do read the circulars each time you shoot up, don't you? Note that contrary to what I've seen espoused in these forums, the mechanisms for immunity by vaccine are NOT fully understood, as is stated quite clearly in the Gardasil vaccine circular. That's the immunologists responsible for designing these moneymakers speaking for themselves.

I really am amazed at all the people here in Washington State who are against vaccines!
What about immunizations for school-aged children, who are the most contagious of spreading illnesses (i.e: intestinal flu, chicken pox, colds, etc.)?
What about the elderly in hospitals and nursing homes who also have weak immune systems? Don't these fearmongering naysayers care about avoiding unnecessary illness?

Personally, if I don't get around to having a flu shot every October / November, you don't want to get within 50 miles of me if I get sick!

Kudos, KelseaJewell, for a well-written and informative post!

Maybe it's not a question of vaccines being effective but an overreaction / fear of the disease hey are supposed to prevent.

Between 1987 and 2000, the case fatality rate across the United States was three measles-attributable deaths per 1000 cases, or 0.3%

The mortality rate for the average yearly flu we deal with is .1%

The mortality rate from mumps is reported as 1.6% (160 in 10000 cases) according to Medscape.

The rate of encephalitis in mumps is about 3 per 1000 cases.

Yeah, yeah mumps and rubella are bad for adult males and females but at that point isn't it up to the adults to keep up with their shots if they are so concerned. And those kids who are exposed because their immune systems are compromised, what percent of the population do they represent and how does it compare to the percent that even the CDC would admit to suffering from adverse effects of immunizations? Shit Goldy why so one sided? What were your parents hippies or something?

@86, I think you're missing the point that those mortality rates are so low...because we vaccinate and have herd immunity.

I think it's more relevant to consider what it was like before vaccinations. A quick Google search finds a NY Times article, for example, about WHO's efforts to reduce measles in Africa. Deaths have been reduced due to vaccinations from 396,000 deaths in 2000 to 36,000 in 2006. That's a huge number of deaths. The Wikipedia measles page describes how quickly outbreaks can happen in unvaccinated communities.

And that's just measles. And that's just deaths. My father contracted measles as an adult and permanently lost some of his hearing. I took a class with a woman who contracted polio just before the vaccine came out, and has had to wear a brace since she was a child. The human misery caused by these preventable illnesses used to be staggering. We are fortunate in the U.S. that it's no longer that way, but I hate to see people being so complacent. The next case of measles--or whatever--is just one plane ride away. And in my community, anyway, it's the people with enough money to send their kids to Waldorf schools who don't vaccinate--the same ones who have the money to hop on airplanes.

@90: Ever eat chicken after dental work? I bet you've had bird DNA injected directly into your bloodstream too. As for me, I'm a vegetarian. I just finished a delicious home-made spring vegetable tajine, and I have a canker sore... uh-oh! I might wake up tomorrow half human, half turnip!

In short: Do you actually know what DNA is and how this thing called "biology" works?

93: "the supreme court of the united states has deemed vaccines to be UNAVOIDABLY UNSAFE in an official ruling."

http://www.petitiononline.com/h2o/petiti…

This petition is for the complete ban of Dihydrogen monoxide.

Dihydrogen monoxide is colorless, odorless, tasteless, and kills uncounted thousands of people every year. Most of these deaths are caused by accidental inhalation of DHMO, but the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide do not end there. Prolonged exposure to its solid form causes severe tissue damage. Symptoms of DHMO ingestion can include excessive sweating and urination, and possibly a bloated feeling, nausea, vomiting and body electrolyte imbalance. For those who have become dependent, DHMO withdrawal means certain death.

Dihydrogen monoxide:
- is the major component of acid rain
- contributes to the "greenhouse effect"
- it can cause severe burns in its gaseous state
- contributes to erosion
- accelerates corrosion and rusting of many metals
- may cause electrical failures and decreased effectiveness of automobile brakes
- has been found in tumors of terminal cancer patients

Despite the dangers, dihydrogen monoxide is often used:
- as an industrial solvent and coolant.
- in nuclear power plants.
- in the production of styrofoam.
- as a fire retardant.
- in many forms of cruel animal research.
- as an additive in certain "junk-foods" and other food products.

Companies dump waste DHMO into rivers and the ocean, and nothing can be done to stop them because this practice is still legal.

It was Rick Perry the Gov of Texas who was going to make a vaccine mandatory that started this crap? One he is an Idiot Republican who wanted to inject politics into the Vaccine field?

I have no problems with the medical field but the clown show that closely follows the medical field for exclusively for profit is a convicted killer at large? and I have been given bad drugs from good doctors who meant well?

Perscribed drugs kill more people then the illegal ones do and Napal sticks to kids?

Chemical companys like Dupont have your mind in mind.

It's pretty fucked up that the Stranger would run such a bigoted headline to this opinion piece. From a magazine that has been trying to turn the tide of anti-gay bigotry (and succeeding very well), we get a headline that labels a group of people with different ideas and lifestyle as "stupid fucking hippies.

Well done, Stranger editors.

Now I'll add Goldy's name to Mudede's for writers that I just skip over when I read the Stranger. Mudede is only guilty of not being able to write. Goldy appears to fit the adjectives used in the headline to this pathetic story.

My daughter was given the hep-B vaccine at the hospital the day she was born, started to scream inconsolably for days and nights on end (encephalitis), and was later diagnosed with autism. On the PBS series Autism Today, Allison MacNeil's son screamed inconsolably after getting many vaccines at once, and developed autism and bowel disease. There are thousands of us who tell similar stories, which is why educated parents who love their children are refusing the vaccines in record numbers. We would much rather confront measles, mumps, rubella, chickenpox, even whooping cough (not dangerous in babies older than three or four months), than inflict permanent disability on our children. Your insulting terms mean nothing when the stakes are this high for our children.

I just read a comment about measles, apparently the author doesn't remember when measles was an ordinary household word. I got measles when I was six, most of the children in my first-grade class did (spring 1963), we were sick for two weeks, then got well. At that time in the U.S., statistics show that there was one death in a thousand from complications like pneumonia or meningitis. Healthy children who stayed in bed and were well cared-for by their parents (no drugs to misguidedly reduce the fever), felt awful for a week or two, then recovered, permanent immunity, developmental strides, stronger immune system. The death rate for measles in the western world has never been 25%.

WA exceeds the national averages for vaccination rates for school required vaccines.

96% coverage of the required vaccines for 6th graders
http://www.doh.wa.gov/cfh/immunize/docum…
(DPT looks low because a booster is required at age 11 and the report is filed at the beginning of the year. )

Kindergartners start school with over 95% MMR, and over 90% of the other required shots.
http://www.doh.wa.gov/cfh/immunize/docum…

You can't have 95 % vaccination rates and a 6.2% exemption rate- that adds up to more than 100%!

The WA exemption rate appears artificially high for 2 primary reasons:

1. "Paperwork" exemptions. Fully 1/3 or more of the exemptions (2% of the 6%) are vaccinating families who simply don't have their documentation in order at the time of school enrollment. Sympathetic school staff are incorrectly providing exemption forms to permit the children to attend school, when they should be using a "non-compliance" form. WA Health Secretary Mary Selecky recently described this phenomenon on OPB Talk Out Loud radio program.
http://www.opb.org/thinkoutloud/shows/im…
That means the true vaccination rates are even higher than documented, when you factor in the paperwork exemptors.

2. Chicken Pox- Another 1/3 of the exemption rate (2%) is due to making Chicken Pox a mandatory vaccine. Many parents do not consider Chicken Pox as important as the traditional vaccines. An exemption is needed to delay or opt out of any single dose. Therefore a WA child who is fully current on all of the regular shots still needs an exemption to delay or opt out of the Chicken Pox vaccine. Informed parents are doing the Chicken Pox separate from other vaccines as the CDC notes that getting the Chicken Pox (Varicella) vaccine in the same visit with the MMR increases the normal MMR seizure rate from 1/3500 to 1/2500, and if you use the MMRV combo the seizure rate jumps again to 1/1250. What is unscientific about cutting your childs' seizure risk by 70% if you can do it by delaying or skipping a vaccine for a disease that was once considered a routine childhood illness?
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd-vac/comb…

When you back out the paperwork exemptions and the Chicken Pox exemptions you get the same national average, a statistically insignificant 2% or so of people who have reasonable medical, religious, philosophical, or personal objections.

All vaccination public health objectives are exceeded with the 95% rates currently achieved. Any epidemic risk tipping point is long past at 95%. If 95% isn't enough to suppress epidemics then the issue isn't vaccine coverage it is vaccine efficacy.

Public Health Canada clearly states that 1/100,000 doses in all vaccine campaigns result in a serious adverse event (SAE), defined as a Hospitalization, Disability, or Death. This is why the safety question will never go away. While that may be a low individual risk rate, (although certainly more dangerous that Chicken Pox or mumps), the sheer volume of vaccines is overwhelming achievable safety factors. There are 900,000 children in WA public schools. That means each dose of vaccine in the schedule (50 or -) is causing 9 SAE's. This is the population pool of "true exemptors". There have been a scientific statistically inevitable 2 to 3 thousand legitimate SAE's in WA over the last 20 years. The 18,000 or so "true exemptors" represent the family members and friends, and others who have first hand knowledge of these injuries.
http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/alert-alerte/…
Jun 14, 2011 | Reply to this comment

WA exceeds the national averages for vaccination rates for school required vaccines.

96% coverage of the required vaccines for 6th graders
http://www.doh.wa.gov/cfh/immunize/docum…
(DPT looks low because a booster is required at age 11 and the report is filed at the beginning of the year. )

Kindergartners start school with over 95% MMR, and over 90% of the other required shots.
http://www.doh.wa.gov/cfh/immunize/docum…

You can't have 95 % vaccination rates and a 6.2% exemption rate- that adds up to more than 100%!

The WA exemption rate appears artificially high for 2 primary reasons:

1. "Paperwork" exemptions. Fully 1/3 or more of the exemptions (2% of the 6%) are vaccinating families who simply don't have their documentation in order at the time of school enrollment. Sympathetic school staff are incorrectly providing exemption forms to permit the children to attend school, when they should be using a "non-compliance" form. WA Health Secretary Mary Selecky recently described this phenomenon on OPB Talk Out Loud radio program.
http://www.opb.org/thinkoutloud/shows/im…
That means the true vaccination rates are even higher than documented, when you factor in the paperwork exemptors.

2. Chicken Pox- Another 1/3 of the exemption rate (2%) is due to making Chicken Pox a mandatory vaccine. Many parents do not consider Chicken Pox as important as the traditional vaccines. An exemption is needed to delay or opt out of any single dose. Therefore a WA child who is fully current on all of the regular shots still needs an exemption to delay or opt out of the Chicken Pox vaccine. Informed parents are doing the Chicken Pox separate from other vaccines as the CDC notes that getting the Chicken Pox (Varicella) vaccine in the same visit with the MMR increases the normal MMR seizure rate from 1/3500 to 1/2500, and if you use the MMRV combo the seizure rate jumps again to 1/1250. What is unscientific about cutting your childs' seizure risk by 70% if you can do it by delaying or skipping a vaccine for a disease that was once considered a routine childhood illness?
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd-vac/comb…

When you back out the paperwork exemptions and the Chicken Pox exemptions you get the same national average, a statistically insignificant 2% or so of people who have reasonable medical, religious, philosophical, or personal objections.

All vaccination public health objectives are exceeded with the 95% rates currently achieved. Any epidemic risk tipping point is long past at 95%. If 95% isn't enough to suppress epidemics then the issue isn't vaccine coverage it is vaccine efficacy.

Public Health Canada clearly states that 1/100,000 doses in all vaccine campaigns result in a serious adverse event (SAE), defined as a Hospitalization, Disability, or Death. This is why the safety question will never go away. While that may be a low individual risk rate, (although certainly more dangerous that Chicken Pox or mumps), the sheer volume of vaccines is overwhelming achievable safety factors. There are 900,000 children in WA public schools. That means each dose of vaccine in the schedule (50 or -) is causing 9 SAE's. This is the population pool of "true exemptors". There have been a scientific statistically inevitable 1 to 3 thousand legitimate SAE's in WA over the last 20 years. The 18,000 or so "true exemptors" represent the family members and friends, and others who have first hand knowledge of these injuries.
http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/alert-alerte/…
Jun 14, 2011 | Reply to this comment

Are Vaccines Magical?

It is magical thinking that there are almost no injuries caused by vaccines and the vaccination process. The safety factor promoted is completely unrealistic and could not be achieved by a placebo. Why? Because virtually all vaccines are injected, and injection is by definition an invasive medical procedure with multiple known risk factor rates greater than current vaccine safety claims.

Ask a responsible medical professional if it is possible to perform 1,000,000 insulin, Vitamin B12, or even saline injections without an injury.

http://www8.nationalacademies....

You cannot even guarantee sterility using proper procedures, as illustrated by the recent recall of contaminated Triad alcohol wipes, which the FDA didn’t correct for several years.
http://www.fda.gov/Safety/MedW...

Imagine every potential failure point- manufacturing, packaging, labeling, shipping, storage, reconstitution and preparation for injection, correct injection method, proper sanitary procedures followed, etc. Project that out over the several hundred million vaccine injections given annually.
Is it really reasonable to claim that every dose administered is manufactured, labeled, etc. perfectly?

The World Health Organization doesn’t think so, that’s why they have a manual for investigating the expected, inevitable Adverse Events Following Immunization, or AEFI.

http://www.who.int/immunizatio...
http://www.who.int/vaccines-do...

In the real world all kinds of failures occur. Vaccines are some of the most complex pharmaceutical products manufactured, that require very specific handling- some have to be frozen, some refrigerated. Many have to be reconstituted with a “diluent”. It is a common mistake to mix the incorrect diluent, or even inadvertently use another medicine.

Medical mistakes are made all the time- why would vaccines be different?

http://www.meddrahelp.com/JMcM...

Dennis Quaid’s children were almost killed by a medical error at Cedars-Sinai, and we are assigning perfect safety records to vaccine administrators at Rite Aids and Walgreens? http://www.cbsnews.com/stories...

How many conventional medical mistakes are being masked by the near hysterical defense of vaccine safety? Since we know that vaccines are incapable of causing harm, any and all temporally associated adverse events are coincidental?

In a “non-vaccine” medication error investigation the first thing confirmed would have been what was actually in the vial? Was it mislabeled? Did the patient receive the correct injection? Maybe the patient was injected with a syringe intended for a person in another treatment room, as can happen when the injections are prepared in a central area. (It is not a good idea to accept any injection that you do not witness the preparation of.) Next, was it manufactured properly? Contaminated or adulterated in some way? Was it properly prepared, mixed with the correct diluent and dosage ratios? Was it used within the recommended timeframe, as some products have a limited window for administration. A toxicology report could be performed to see if any common medical office medications were improperly administered.

The bottom line is that because of the foregoing, for some people the scenario, “My child was fine before the shot, and then was injured or killed”, is a true statement. And perhaps not because of what the WHO classifies as a “vaccine reaction”, but from a “programme error”. Not everyone who claims vaccine injury is mistaken or lying. Vaccines are not magically exempt from the normal natural laws of statistics and errors.

Can we really have a picture of vaccine and vaccination safety in this environment?

From the “Arizona Immunization Conference” April 28, 2011,
slide 36;
Reporting Vaccine Administration Errors
CDC currently has no mechanism for reporting vaccine administration errors
If an adverse event occurs it should be reported to VAERS
(the organization that Offit disparages in the article)
Discussions are underway to develop a reporting mechanism
Slide 38
“Rights” of Medical Patients
Right patient
Right vaccine or diluent
Right time
Includes administering at correct age, correct interval, and before vaccine/diluent expiration
Right dosage
Right route, needle length and technique
Right site
Right documentation

www.azdhs.gov/.../2011conferen... .ppt

All medical procedures involve risk. A parent must have the ultimate right in accepting that risk for their child.

Recent evidence of vaccination administration errors:

Children At Fort Collins Clinic Need To Be Tested After Syringe Mix-Up
http://denver.cbslocal.com/2011/04/13/ch…

3 Myths About Safe Injection Practices- better hope your HCP is not one of these

....Premier survey conducted in May and June last year, indicating that of 5,446 provider respondents, the following engage in unsafe injection practices:

•6% sometimes or always use single-dose/single-use vials for more than one patient
•9% sometimes or always reuse a syringe but change the needle for a second patient
•15.1% reuse a syringe to enter a multidose vial
•6.5% save that vial for use on another patient.

http://www.healthleadersmedia.com/conten…

Mississippi has the highest rate of vaccination because it is one of only two states that does not permit religous or philosophical exemptions. This is, of course, benighted on their part, and I'm sure that soon there will be a consumer rebellion.

The argument of nephews being born prematurely doesnt really constitute forcing others to get vaccinations. I'm just saying to each his own.

Personally, I worry about the immune systems of the human race. With antibiotics and flu shots being the norm these days. We are one weak civilization. Don't worry with all these precautionary steps we are taking...there will be plenty of killer vaccine/antibiotic resistant epidemics just around the corner.

Get off your soapbox's because your point will be mute eventually. Your just wasting your breath.

I am a 74 year old WA state grandmother whose healthy grandchildren are NOT vaccinated because I and my family have WORKING BRAINS, unlike Goldy, the author of this erroneous drivel. Because my original healthy immune system was undamaged by vaccines, I lived and thrived through all of the childhood diseases (including polio) that big pHARMa has since labeled "life threatening" in order to fear monger their multi-billion-dollar industry upon an ignorant population. Autism and other neurological disorders such as ADD and ADHD were unknown; all appeared and flourished concurrently with the advent of and increase in vaccines.

If Goldy and the rest of the vaccinated/vaccinating public understood the human immune system, they would never allow themselves or anyone they loved to be jabbed with the toxic poisons purposely included in all vaccines. Big pHARMa intentionally harms whole generations of children for profit, then sells medicines to the ignorant parents to perpetually treat (not cure) the illnesses caused by their vaccines. Talk about "win,win"!

When it comes down to the wire in fighting disease, all each of us have is our personal immune system...keeping it healthy should be a right and a priority; but vaccines ALWAYS damage the immune system. Further, if vaccines actually worked, why would your children have to be vaccinated in order to protect someone else's children?!!! Think about that for a moment. Sorry, Goldy, but "herd immunity" is a ludicrous fable, invented to create more fear...and more compliance.

Children need natural challenges to their immune systems to help strengthen and develop them; for example, a child recovering from measles will put on a healthy growth spurt. As for us old folks, ever wonder why so many are losing our minds? Dr. Hugh Fudenberg, a world renown immunologist, says that 4-5 flu shots in as many subsequent years increase the odds of Alzeimers 10-fold due to the mercury and aluminum in the vaccine.

Goldy, do you realize that you are advocating getting injected with these ingredients (and even more) that are in vaccines?: Mercury: neurotoxin and second most toxic substance on earth after plutonium; Aluminum: neurotoxin; Formaldehyde: poison; Beta-propialactone: carcinogen; Phenol/phenoxyethanol: anti-freeze, disables immune system's primary response mechanism; Human and animal cells: human cells from aborted fetal tissue, pig, horse and sheep blood rabbit brain, guinea pig and monkey kidneys, etc; Glutaraldehyde: poison, causes birth defects in experimental animals; Tri(n)butylphosphate: suspected kidney and nerve poison...and the horrifying list goes on and on. Check it out.

Goldy, I recommend that you read the vaccine primer "Vaccines; Are They Really Safe and Effective?" by Neil Z. Miller, 2010 edition. Try putting some accurate information in your brain instead of poisoning it with vaccines and lies. Then apologize to all the people you have misled.

Joan M.

@107 Joan M.: Okay....thank you for providing another insight into this debate.

I stand enlightened: vaccines can actually weaken the immune system? Perhaps it's good to proceed with caution. Either way, informed decisions are certainly best.
But do remember, though, that whether to get immunized or not varies from person to person. What may work for you might still not go so well for me.

No, @108, she's out to lunch- don't listen to her. Vaccination is the most effective mechanism of any kind that humans have come up with, hands down; Everyone should vaccinate their kids.

You can't put comfrey on mumps. Joan M's family's health is greatly in part due to the broad and obedient use of vaccine amongst her neighbors and friends.

I understand the natural reaction to injecting medicine into a totally healthy child. It goes against the "natural" lifestyle, and is at odds with what feels right. However, a quick look at the math and the epidemiology leaves absolutely NO DOUBT as to the complete truth of my first paragraph.

Razorclammer, you are dead wrong. Do the research. Here are some places to start:

(1) Neil Z. Miller's "Vaccinations: Are They Really Safe & Effective?" Try to get the 2010 edition as it is most current regarding autism.

(2) If you truly investigate the issue, you will soon discover that the CDC should be the last place anyone goes for accurate vaccine information. That organization, NIH, WHO, and other government agencies, have been in bed with the multi-billion $ vaccine industry for decades, increasing their profits by creating public compliance using statistical lies and fear. This short video, "Shocking Vaccine Coverup", featuring Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. reveals just the tip of the iceberg:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkyXaAojo…

(3) In this piece, "The Truth Behind the Vaccine Cover-up", Neurosurgeon Russell Blaylock also reports on the infamous Simsonwood meeting wherein government officials collaborated with vaccine industry reps to keep secret the findings linking autism, and other neurological disorders, directly to vaccines: http://www.whale.to/a/blaylock.html

(4) "There is a great deal of evidence to prove that immunization of children does more harm than good."---Dr. J. Anthony Morris, former Chief Vaccine Control ...
www.whale.to/vaccines/morris_h.html

(5) All these constituents of vaccines are toxic, and their toxicity may vary, as a rule, from one batch of vaccine to another. In this article, the first of a ...
www.whale.to/vaccine/adjuvants.html

(7) List of just some of the many sites giving factual information about vaccines:

Dr. Sherri Tenpenny: http://www.drtenpenny.com
Dr. Mercola: http://www. mercola.com
Vaccination Liberation: http://www.vaclib.org
(Search Vac-Lib for fascinating letters from doctors opposing vaccines going back to earliest times.)
National Vaccine Information Center: http://www.nvic.org

(9) Here are two petitions that I wrote and still stand by every word, except that the number of vaccines given to children has since increased markedly, as has the incidence of autism and other related neurological disorders. Click on the archived petition to 60 Minutes II, Nov. '04, scroll down past the photos and graphs of the children to find the meat of the petition with 42 interactive references and links. Therein you will find other sources of information. http://wwwvaccinetruth.org

Good luck in actually researching the facts, rather than repeating corporate lies. This is a an important, complicated, life-altering topic requiring a great deal more effort than blindly shooting from the hip. The life you save may be your own.

Joan M.

This is a very succinct article, a deft explanation of herd immunity, and the ignorance of the general public on basic science, however I think the name calling is not helpful in resolving the problem. Belkin may not even be a hippy, he is finance guy, but he does represent a demographic that have some education and thus think they have "enough" for all complex problems. One of the things I learned getting my graduate degree through the UW School of Public Health is what I don't know and what I am not an expert in. This type of "enlightenment" seems to be lacking from undergraduate programs. I,e, just because you can get through college doesn't mean you have the ability to perform high-level scientific analysis or to build systems for deployment of same. This attitude of accepting an embarrassing lower standard, as in the ex-Playboy model Jenny McCarthy, is endemic in the way decisions are made in this country. We need to strengthen our scientific inquiry and understanding of basic science to correct this social problem.
Last year I wrote Unraveling U.S. Health Care, which included much 50 state research on health care laws, clinical results, and other metrics, including immunizations. The states in the bottom three were Alaska, Wyoming, and Montana.
I supported Washington State Pediatricians who advocated for the new law, requiring a physician to sign off on the immunization waiver for the "informed parents" who are still willing to submit their children to life threatening illnesses. However, the question we really need to ask these parents is, " Whose children are you willing to risk to satisfy your irrational control needs, because it is everyone's children who are at risk due to your selfishness. Perhaps Mr. Belkin would understand if he were required to indemnify himself to this level of responsibility.
And Washington did loose several children to "whooping cough" or pertussis last year, so to those who say it isn't a big deal, tell that to the parents with the dead kids.

This is a very succinct article, a deft explanation of herd immunity, and the ignorance of the general public on basic science, however I think the name calling is not helpful in resolving the problem. Belkin may not even be a hippy, he is finance guy, but he does represent a demographic that have some education and thus think they have "enough" for all complex problems. One of the things I learned getting my graduate degree through the UW School of Public Health is what I don't know and what I am not an expert in. This type of "enlightenment" seems to be lacking from undergraduate programs. I,e, just because you can get through college doesn't mean you have the ability to perform high-level scientific analysis or to build systems for deployment of same. This attitude of accepting an embarrassing lower standard, as in the ex-Playboy model Jenny McCarthy, is endemic in the way decisions are made in this country. We need to strengthen our scientific inquiry and understanding of basic science to correct this social problem.
Last year I wrote Unraveling U.S. Health Care, which included much 50 state research on health care laws, clinical results, and other metrics, including immunizations. The states in the bottom three were Alaska, Wyoming, and Montana.
I supported Washington State Pediatricians who advocated for the new law, requiring a physician to sign off on the immunization waiver for the "informed parents" who are still willing to submit their children to life threatening illnesses. However, the question we really need to ask these parents is, " Whose children are you willing to risk to satisfy your irrational control needs, because it is everyone's children who are at risk due to your selfishness. Perhaps Mr. Belkin would understand if he were required to indemnify himself to this level of responsibility.
And Washington did loose several children to "whooping cough" or pertussis last year, so to those who say it isn't a big deal, tell that to the parents with the dead kids.

HealthPolicyMaven may need to explore whether these young children/babies actually died from pertussis. It would be interesting to see if the babies/children caught it from a vaccinated child at daycare or a sibling. A study in Israel of fully vaccinated children in a daycare center concluded that “Vaccinated adolescents and adults may serve as reservoirs for silent infection and become potential transmitters to unprotected infants. The whole-cell vaccine for pertussis is protective only against clinical disease, not infection. Therefore,
even young, recently vaccinated children may
serve as reservoirs and potential transmitters of
infection. ...[C]hildren ages 5-6 years and possibly
younger, ages 2-3 years, play a role as silent
reservoirs in the transmission of pertussis in the
community.” See Pertussis Infection in Fully Vaccinated Children in Day-Care Centers, Israel"
Emerging Infectious Diseases, Vol. 6, No. 5, Sept.-Oct. 2000

Ingri Cassel, the director of Vaccination Liberation in Idaho, claims to have records from her local health district as well as the CDC regarding the 1997 pertussis outbreak in North Idaho. Of the 253 cases reported in five counties, 81.5 percent had 4 out of 4 of their DTaP shots. According to Dr. Allen Banks who was on the board of directors of the Panhandle Health District, in Bonner County alone, 85 percent had 4 out of 4 of their DTaP shots and 15 percent had 3 out of 4 of their DTaP shots. There were no reported cases among those who had 2 out of 4, 1 out of 4 OR zero DTaP shots.
The CDC concluded that “[t]he myth of vaccine refusal played no role in this outbreak." Regardless, the local media continued to instill fear in the public as to the necessity of getting the pertussis vaccine since there were several deaths that resulted from the 1997 pertussis outbreak. Cassel decided to question the nurse in charge of the immunization program regarding these deaths. The truth was that there was only one death — an infant girl of about 7 weeks. She was hospitalized in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho that winter and died in the hospital. When an autopsy was performed they found some pertussis bacterium present in the infant's lungs. They then decided to put pertussis as the cause of death on the death certificate. It is important to note that the infant was hospitalized and yet never treated for pertussis. When Cassel inquired as to whether the infant was breastfed, malnourished, or premature, she received a blank stare since it never occurred to her that there are factors besides the presence of pertussis bacteria that could have contributed to this infant's death.

Source - Testimony of Ingri Cassel before the Idaho State Legislature, February 26, 2003 http://www.vaclib.org/news/boise.htm

HealthPolicyMaven may need to explore whether these young children/babies actually died from pertussis. It would be interesting to see if the babies/children caught it from a vaccinated child at daycare or a sibling. A study in Israel of fully vaccinated children in a daycare center concluded that “Vaccinated adolescents and adults may serve as reservoirs for silent infection and become potential transmitters to unprotected infants. The whole-cell vaccine for pertussis is protective only against clinical disease, not infection. Therefore,
even young, recently vaccinated children may
serve as reservoirs and potential transmitters of
infection. ...[C]hildren ages 5-6 years and possibly
younger, ages 2-3 years, play a role as silent
reservoirs in the transmission of pertussis in the
community.” See Pertussis Infection in Fully Vaccinated Children in Day-Care Centers, Israel"
Emerging Infectious Diseases, Vol. 6, No. 5, Sept.-Oct. 2000

Ingri Cassel, the director of Vaccination Liberation in Idaho, claims to have records from her local health district as well as the CDC regarding the 1997 pertussis outbreak in North Idaho. Of the 253 cases reported in five counties, 81.5 percent had 4 out of 4 of their DTaP shots. According to Dr. Allen Banks who was on the board of directors of the Panhandle Health District, in Bonner County alone, 85 percent had 4 out of 4 of their DTaP shots and 15 percent had 3 out of 4 of their DTaP shots. There were no reported cases among those who had 2 out of 4, 1 out of 4 OR zero DTaP shots.
The CDC concluded that “[t]he myth of vaccine refusal played no role in this outbreak." Regardless, the local media continued to instill fear in the public as to the necessity of getting the pertussis vaccine since there were several deaths that resulted from the 1997 pertussis outbreak. Cassel decided to question the nurse in charge of the immunization program regarding these deaths. The truth was that there was only one death — an infant girl of about 7 weeks. She was hospitalized in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho that winter and died in the hospital. When an autopsy was performed they found some pertussis bacterium present in the infant's lungs. They then decided to put pertussis as the cause of death on the death certificate. It is important to note that the infant was hospitalized and yet never treated for pertussis. When Cassel inquired as to whether the infant was breastfed, malnourished, or premature, she received a blank stare since it never occurred to her that there are factors besides the presence of pertussis bacteria that could have contributed to this infant's death.

Source - Testimony of Ingri Cassel before the Idaho State Legislature, February 26, 2003 http://www.vaclib.org/news/boise.htm

There are many reasons for a parent to think twice about immunizations. Those who educate themselves about vaccines are not necessarily "stupid fucking hippies", they can include educated proactive people interested in their child's well being.

Immunizations are just one of the many things parents can make an educated decision about, then decide what is right for their family. Autism is not the only fear on peoples' minds, the child can have a bad reaction, have seizures, damaged nerve tissue (yes, I have met a man who can no longer walk due to an immunization given before traveling), among other things. Now, you might say "well, the chances are really slim of anything bad happening", but I will tell you, when it is YOUR child, and you are envisioning all the ways you can screw them up, you think twice before exposing them to something that can give them a possible life-altering reaction. It matters. That's where the choice comes in. You must weigh the consequences of the disease vs. the possible consequences of the immunization and make a proper decision. It's not as easy as you might think.

Take, for example chickenpox (Varicella vaccine). Chickenpox suck. However, an immunization can have one run the possible risk of bleeding problems, pneumonia, skin infections, severe life-threatening rash, and Nervous system effects (Gullain-Barre' syndrome), encephalitis, seizure, and stroke. Makes the chicken pox not seem so bad, right?

Why shouldn't we educate ourselves about what goes into our child's body? We have educated ourselves about nearly everything else. Take food, for example. I, like many of you, had my fair share of hormones, msg, pesticides, and Lord knows what else in my system when I was a kid. I personally have taken an interest, and society at large has taken an interest in developing better quality food. If society has progressed in caring so much what we put in our bodies, it's only natural we should care about what vaccines are made of and what their dangers are.

One great book on the subject is "The Vaccine Book". If you care to educate yourself about vaccines, it's a great resource because it gives you the unbiased facts about the vaccines, what diesases they are meant to prevent and their likelihood, what exactly has is in the vaccine, and possible side effects. It's written by Dr. Robert Sears who spent 13 years researching the subject.

Anyhoo, you peobably shouldn't call people names and tell them what to do with their lives. It's not polite.