Should parents have a choice about vaccinating their children?

[Renew Deal]

16 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Yes, they may accept or decline any vaccine they choose without consequence
	5 (31%)
	Yes, they may accept or decline any vaccine with the risk of public shunning or infection
	0 (0%)
	No, no choice. Forced vaccinations based on government standards
	10 (63%)
	Not Sure
	0 (0%)
	Other
	1 (6%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[longship]

1. If they want their children to attend school, Yes!

If they want to ignore the science and roll the dice with the mortality of childhood diseases, no school for them. Period. Let them home school. And yes, that includes higher education.

[mike_c]

2. I don't like the choices as written...

...but I'm not sure how I'd suggest changing them. My feeling is that parents SHOULD have a choice, and every parent should choose to vaccinate their children. I suppose that isn't realistic, but there it is. If people made educated and informed choices rather than choices influenced by pseudoscience nonsense, they'd generally choose to vaccinate, or at least I'd like to think so.

[markpkessinger]

5. But we know there will always be people who DON'T make "informed choices" . . .

. . . and in this case, that can have consequences for public health. So how to address that? You are simply wishing for an ideal world that has never and will never exist.

[mike_c]

9. I agree....

I'm an idealist. My career is science education, more specifically biology education, so I tend to see education as the best solution. I completely agree with you about the need for universal vaccination-- that's part of the problem, in a way. It's difficult for me to believe that any educated person would choose otherwise. I also agree that the world is full of ignorant and misinformed people, but again, I see education as the best solution for that problem, not coercion. So yeah, I'm an idealist.

[TerrapinFlyer]

3. Should add to the poll choices:

If they choose not to vaccinate, then they cannot attend public schools.

[MohRokTah]

4. If they refuse to vaccinate, CPS sould remove the children.

It shouldn't be that harsh for flu vaccines, but for MMRV, polio, and the otehr prevenatble diseases where the immunity compromised depend upon herd immunity for protection, the penalty for refusing to vaccinate children shouldbe removal of the children from the home.

[LittleBlue]

6. Have to say yes to this poll

I don't have a dog in this fight, it seems like a boring debate.

But the way the poll is written, a no vote sounds like the police seizing children, tying them down and forcibly vaccinating them. Fascism doesn't appeal to me. So yes, that shouldn't happen.

If the question is whether school districts may use vaccination requirements for admission, I wouldn't oppose that.

[AtomicKitten]

7. I'd like to know what genius made it okay

to admit kids to public school without proof of vaccinations. It used to be mandatory back in the day and for good reason.

[Warpy]

8. Parents should be able to choose to expose their children to deadly diseases

but they should never be able to choose to send their kids to day care or public school unvaccinated.

That's the choice: save your kiddies that 5 minute cry after a needle stick and have them be barred from public school and daycare or get them those shots and have them be allowed everywhere and without the risk of deadly disease.

And no, I don't believe in charging antivax parents with child neglect. I only want them to provide proof of vaccination for their kids to get into daycare or attend public school.

After all, I fully support the Amish in their right to keep their kids unvaccinated, even though even they took the kids in for their MMR when they had a measles outbreak some years ago. I also support their right to maintain their own schools for those children so they don't put the larger community at risk.

[mike_c]

10. several folks have mentioned preventing unvaccinated kids from attending public school...

...which surprises me somewhat because I didn't know that was optional. Do schools frequently allow unvaccinated kids to attend? I obviously don't have kids in school anymore. If I recall, we had to specifically show proof that my daughter was vaccinated against measles when she was in school, and every college and university I've attended or been on faculty has also required proof of measles vax. I was always exempted because of my age-- as I mentioned in another thread, I got my immunity the old fashioned way-- but my students all have to prove immunization in order to attend campus. That is as it should be. It's bad enough sharing their respiratory viruses at the beginning of winter semester every year!

[Starry Messenger]

19. There are laws in CA now to opt out.

I was surprised too, and then whooping cough showed up. Twice.

[TwilightGardener]

11. They can choose not to, but I agree with vaccines as a requirement in

public schools, state or federally run daycares or preschool, that sort of thing. I think they should be encouraged as much as possible, but not absolutely forced.

[dissentient]

12. Yes, as I said in another thread, the only exception

and scenario in my opinion - where the government should forcefully require citizens to receive a vaccine - is if there was some type of plague sweeping the world, and it was killing off populations with high lethality. In that case, where human extinction may be at stake, the governments should require everyone to receive a vaccine or a quarantine.

That said, like others, I don't like the wording in the poll. "without consequence" to me means without being forced, but of course, schools and people might shun someone who decided against getting a child vaccinated.

That is not up to the ones choosing not to be vaccinated, that is out of their control.

[AngryAmish]

13. Of course they should have a choice.

Left or right asscheek.

[ChosenUnWisely]

14. Yes but their kids can't attend public schools until they have them

[NaturalHigh]

15. For the most part I say no.

I can't make that an absolute, though, because I remember a few years back when Goodhair Perry tried to make it mandatory for girls to get a HPV vaccine that was new on the market and, just coincidentally, a bunch of his friends stood to make a fortune selling.

If we're talking chicken pox, measles, mumps, polio, etc., then no, not if the kids are going to be attending public schools.

[MiniMe]

17. I voted no in this poll, but there are valid reasons that kids can't have immunizations

And allergies are one of them. That is the whole idea behind herd immunity. If enough people get the vaccine, the people who can't take the vaccine won't be harmed.

[Ilsa]

18. I don't believe in religious exemptions, just exemptions

if a close family member has suffered a rare Adverse Event. In those situations, it is possible the children shouldn't be vaccinated.

BTW, I have a friend with poultry allergies. Includes eggs. She has an anaphylactic response to vaccines unless they are not egg based.

[Brigid]

20. People like your friend are why herd immunity is so important.

Except for medical reasons, people need to get vaccinated. And apparently the force of law is necessary because some people are feckin' idjits.