I am happy that there now appears to be a significant backlash against anti-vaxxers

[Godhumor]

It is about damn time. For too long, there has been this push to engage anti-vaxxers in discussion that gave weight to their insane beliefs. This quasi-legitimizing has contributed to parents thinking it is OK to opt out of vaccination and that, what is more, doing so was some kind of righteous stand.

The measles outbreak in Disney had rightfully turned increasing ire on the horrendous decision some parents have made (as always, excepting medical necessity). It is actually refreshing to see. There should be public shaming. There should be consequences for the insane doctors who tell the parents they don't need to vaccinate. There should be tremendous societal pressure on protecting the children from this kind of thinking.

There should be no tolerance, no trying to understand a contradictory point of view and no empathy. If you do not vaccinate your child for any reason other than medical necessity, then you are a fuckwit and don't deserve a civil conversation on the pros and cons of vaccination.

If we are lucky this is the death knell of the anti-vaccination movement before it causes actual death for our children.

[jeff47]

1. But how will I make a buck selling coconut oil as a measles cure?!

Vaccines are evil! And for only 5 payments of $19.95, I can sell you an all-natural miracle cure! Or buy my book for $39.95!

[HuckleB]

2. Exactly!

[Godhumor]

4. Horseshit website. Peddle it somewhere else n/t

[Hari Seldon]

6. because you disagree its horseshit?

I think you are the naive one

Vaccines are a crapshoot, and you should stop peddling your nonsense.

[MohRokTah]

10. IT's horseshit because there is no scientific basis.

100% woo.

No truth to it whatsoever.

[HuckleB]

15. Do you not know that the web page is anti-vaccine conspiracy BS?

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Anti-vaccination_movement

[HuckleB]

17. PS:

http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/vaccines-work-period/

[gregcrawford]

19. Staggering stupidity...

... is bad enough, but when you risk the lives of others because you haven't the strength of character to admit you're wrong, it's criminal.

[GP6971]

36. So tell me why

measles were mostly eradicated in the US for the baby boomer generation. Simple truth is you can't. Proof of inoculations was required before we were allowed to attend school

[Hekate]

39. Actually, we Boomers got all that crud. It's our children who got the MMR ....

Boomer vaccinations were smallpox, DPT, and finally polio. Most of us caught chickenpox, measles, rubella, and mumps, and there was one final big polio epidemic in our childhoods that scared the bejesus out of every parent, but we were spared whooping cough, lockjaw, diphtheria, and smallpox.

It was our kids who never got any of those diseases, and somehow the masses forgot they were dangerous.

You're right about having to show proof of vax to enroll in school back then. I think there were some religious exemptions, but they were a very small number and I think you had to show some proof your family was actually a member of one of the sects that forbade certain medical procedures. This "personal reasons not because I'm religious but because I'm bloody ignorant" crap has gotten out of hand.

[stevenleser]

48. Thou hath disrupted... poorly.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=profile&uid=317043&sub=trans

[NuclearDem]

5. ...

[zappaman]

7. Let me help translate the crap site you linked to...

[stevenleser]

47. And EARLG has masterfully handed the troll his pizza

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=profile&uid=317043&sub=trans

[jeff47]

8. The naive person is the one arguing that the medical industry wants to lose money

Vaccines make much less money than treating the disease they prevent. The MMR vaccine costs about 1/1,000th to 1/10,000,000th the cost of treating the diseases it prevents (cost varies based on complications).

As for "vaccine failure", we know all vaccines have a failure rate. You need about 90% of the public to be effectively vaccinated to stop a disease from spreading. As long as vaccine failure rate + medical exemptions from vaccines + Christian Scientists is less than about 10% of the population, the vaccine works well enough. Herd immunity will protect the rest.

In other words, you have no idea what you're talking about, so you think you found a "GOTCHA!!". You didn't.

[eggplant]

9. That's a pretty easy question.

Either you are being naïve or you are just trolling. Vaccination works.

[MohRokTah]

11. I think we have an LG sleeper account. eom

[Godhumor]

12. haven't seen an accusation that vaccinations and atheism are linked yet

But it is possible that it is just a matter of time...

[Indykatie]

13. 17 Failures Identified Out Of Millions of Doses Seems Like an High Success Rate To Me

[Barack_America]

14. Why should I click "vactruth.com"?

[MohRokTah]

16. The backlash needs to be bigger. eom

[Legender75]

18. So do you have allergies?

I do - to many things. My family does. My brother the last time he took antibiotics had to be hospitalized because he couldn't breather. My daughter cannot eat wheat products because she gets the most awful colic you can imagine. Me, many foods. And when I go to the doctor (rarely, because I have weird reactions to drugs), they ask me if I have allergies and THEY LISTEN. So if I have to get a vaccination, I READ the ingredients before having it. Last time I had to visit Africa (many years ago, I have to have a yellow fever shot and was I sick!!!). So it isn't that I am against vaccinations, but they have to be considered and thought about before doing so.
To assume that everyone will be rendered immune by vaccinations is not borne out by the number of people who are vaccinated, and who have had their second shot and who still get the condition.
Vaccines are not and never were the reason why we had such a dramatic decrease in contagious diseases. It is more matter of cleanliness and better nutrition.

[Atman]

20. You sound like a family full of hypochondriacs.

EVERYONE is sick and allergic to one thing or the other. Wheat? Welcome to the gluten-free band wagon. The latest food craze, despite the fact that actual celiac disease is not very common. But your family seems to be infected with everything...so you don't get vaccinations. Hmm. Sounds like a smart strategy.

[Major Nikon]

22. or...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemophobia

[SunSeeker]

21. Bullshit. Vaccination ended measles in the US...until idiot Anti-vaxxers brought it back.

If you're deathly allergic to the ingredients in vaccines, of course you should not get vaccinated. That is why everyone else must get vaccinated who can be vaccinated: to protect people like you and newborns and chemo patients, and anyone else with compromised immune systems.

It was not "cleanliness" that stopped measles in the US. It was nationwide vaccination. Cleanliness and good nutrition will not stop measles. Please stop peddling your dangerous bullshit.

[Iliyah]

31. With so many millions still not covered re healthcare coverage

and with US Supreme Court possible knocking off millions from health insurance, and if the measles are not contained quickly, the outbreak will go across the USA like wild fire.

[dflprincess]

24. Several years ago I saw a Nova program about polio

Unlike most diseases, polio is one that gained ground as sanitation improved. The polio germ lives in dirt, once upon a time most people were exposed to that way and in such small doses that relatively few people developed more than a minor case that might have been brushed off as a cold. As plumbing improved people had less exposure to the virus and when they were exposed, there immune systems could not fight it off.

And, given how contagious measles is, I really doubt that all the kids who are coming down with it come from dirty environments where their nutritional needs are not being met.

[jwirr]

34. So this guy thinks that all of us older citizens who remember getting it because there was not

vaccine were dirty? My God what an insult. I wonder if he saw the long list on one thread tonight of DUers who had all those diseases before the vaccines were invented? Whoever is peddling that idea is an idiot.

[laundry_queen]

38. There is some serious need of reading comprehension between you and the poster below you

Polio does live in dirt. Babies used to play in the dirt. Often (And they often acquired other nasty things like worms from playing in the dirt and being lucky to bathe once a week - ask my mother who lived in poverty on a farm) a baby would contract polio when they were small, which is when polio is more mild. Kind of like the difference between chicken pox in a toddler and an adult. That was commonly how it worked for most of human history until the mid-20th century. Because of more cleanliness, keeping babies indoors and bathing them often, they didn't get the exposure to polio until they were older children and caught it from other children (some of whom probably played in the dirt). But that resulted in a much more serious disease, and so the deadly outbreaks began to occur. Has nothing to do with being 'dirty', I have no idea what pretzels you had to twist to come up with that one.

[jwirr]

56. The poster was talking about measles. Also how did all the clean families end up with polio if

it was being dirty caused it? FDR

[laundry_queen]

67. You serious?

Dude, if you have ever eaten a root vegetable you've probably come into contact with dirt. Being in contact with dirt occasionally does not make one dirty. Jesus.

[Arugula Latte]

45. What? Do you lack a basic comprehension of germs, immunity, and science?

You're looking for an insult in a fully reasonable explanation for why polio gained ground as sanitation improved? Really?

[jwirr]

57. Polio gained ground as sanitation improved - you are saying it got worse as we got cleaner?

[Arugula Latte]

59. Yes. Yes I am.

Back when things were generally dirtier, people were exposed to the polio germ in small amounts, and they developed immunity. Indoor plumbing comes along -- poof -- they don't get the gradual small-dose exposure anymore and they don't have the immunity to fight it when they come in contact with it. That's why there were big polio outbreaks in the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s. Indoor plumbing made big inroads then.

[jwirr]

60. So, you want us to go back to that? I doubt that we can.

[Arugula Latte]

61. What?!

I want to get back to that? Where did you get that in my post?

I am pro-indoor plumbing AND pro-vaccination.

[jtuck004]

65. "I am pro-indoor plumbing AND pro-vaccination. " > AND a purveyor of a damn funny

animated penguin gif.

Isn't it odd how people twist what is written?

[Arugula Latte]

68. Indeed.

Thanks for the backup.

[SunSeeker]

37. Measles spreads through the air, not dirt.

FDR had polio. The Roosevelts were nor dirty nor poorly fed.

[dflprincess]

66. Exactly

FDR and his family had access to more hygienic conditions - as did most the kids of his class which is why he was not exposed to the germ as child.

Read my post again. Per the show on Nova, polio is a disease that became more severe as sanitation improved.

And, yes, measles is spread through the air, my response was to a poster who claimed that it is cleanliness and nutrition that has resulted in the drop in many contagious illness, not vaccines. I brought polio into the mix because it is a disease that cleanliness made worse.

[jeff47]

50. :facepalm:

Yeah, no. You don't get "a little bit" of polio. If you get enough of the virus to trigger a specific immune response (what you need to get immunity) then you've got a full-blown infection.

You can be exposed to a small enough quantity of the virus to not get ill, but that small quantity is not dealt with by the part of the immune system that makes you "immune" to the disease.

[ellennelle]

27. with all due respect

the effectivity of vaccines is, in fact - that would be scientific, data-driven fact - well-founded and solid.

see graph above. see also the new post by jeff47 explaining how they work. i'd already written what's below here, so i'll go ahead and post it, but his offering is more thorough.

nothing in nature is perfect, so certainly nothing that humans devise is, either; there will be a very small number of individuals who have severe reactions to the vaccines, but those numbers are very very small, minuscule, most particularly in comparison to the very large numbers who are sickened, scarred, and/or die from the diseases themselves.

and boy are you dead wrong about diseases being wiped out by cleanliness and better nutrition. there are scores of diseases that fly in the face of that misconception. the case of small pox provides the best example, as jenner discovered how to address that almost a century before pasteur developed germ theory; small pox was brought under significantly greater control long before pasteur's started pushing soap and boiling milk, so your point is destroyed by that one fact of history alone. and then, of course, there is the graph above.

another point to destroy your erroneous notion that better nutrition is the better explanation for eradicating disease, is that measles was essentially wiped out across the entire american population in 2000. now, do you really want to try to convince me that the average american in 2000 enjoyed better nutrition then than they did a century ago when they lived on farms and ate food they raised without pesticides and fillers and sugars? i thought not.

a final point to destroy your erroneous notion that vaccines are no better than good nutrition and cleanliness is the proven fact of the mechanism of vaccines, and how they trigger the immune system to build antibodies. (again, see jeff47)

and you are missing the more important aspect of herd immunity; immunity only works if virtually everyone is immunized. if not, the vulnerable infants too young to get the shots, and the ailing too sick to, will then be susceptible to the disease. jeff47 explains this very well, also.

it sounds as if you and your family may have challenged immune systems, given the allergies and extreme reactions to certain vaccines. that is most unfortunate, and i wish you well with that problem. but, it puts you way in the minority; that is not the norm. but still, is not your transient discomfort and illness from the shot far better than actually contracting the disease itself?

you are aware that this is the nature of immunization, right? you must be given some version of the disease in order your immune system to build up antibodies to it; this is how it works. it is not a bandaid, nor is it like surgery; it is truly a remarkable advance in medicine, but for it to work, we must all cooperate as a society, as a species.

which in itself raises a whole 'nother level to this issue that i hope will not get ignored. in fact, i pray that piece will get shouted from the rooftops. WE'RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER, PEEPS!!!

[dem in texas]

30. You are full of it.

Yes, sometimes the shots will make your children a little sick for a few days, but weight that against getting the disease and suffering physical damage or dying. I saw this growing up, children with heart, eye and hearing damage from red measles. Even had a neighbor boy down the street who got a secondary disease from chicken pox and almost died, not to mention all the people who used to be crippled or have to use iron lungs after having polio. I'd had small pox vaccinations when a child. then when living in Europe in the 1960's there was an outbreak of small pox brought in from Pakistan. I got a small pox shot and had a reaction, swollen arm and intense itching on the injection site. I was pregnant when I got the shot. It did not affect me or my baby who is now a bright healthy woman and I have lived to a ripe old age. I am now being treated for breast cancer. I certainly would not turn the cancer treatments away just because they make me sick, would you? Or are you so stupid that you will be against those too.

[NuclearDem]

33. BULL. FUCKING. SHIT.

Vaccines are not and never were the reason why we had such a dramatic decrease in contagious diseases. It is more matter of cleanliness and better nutrition.

THE FUCK DID I JUST READ HERE

THIS IS SO

I CAN'T

FUCK

[Blanks]

64. Yeah, I saw that too...

That seems to be a hard one to put to rest. In order to prove that it is true - you would have to have a control group that doesn't have access to cleanliness and better nutrition, expose them to the disease and compare their illnesses to the group that has access to cleanliness and better nutrition.

It would be extremely unethical to test this hypothesis and the folks who lay this theory out there don't have enough background in science to understand why it's impossible to prove that it is not true.

[rjsquirrel]

43. You are so wrong

Vaccines have caused massive declines in infectious diseases in third world countries with poor diets and hygiene and general medical care that are actually more dramatic than in first world countries that had those things before vaccines. You are just factually, ignorantly wrong about your lay pseudoscientific opinion. I'm sorry, but it's true. Look it up.

The rest of your comment indicates you know nothing about immunology or nutrition either.

It is not ok for non-scientists to decide their gut feelings and opinions are just as true as the scientific consensus. True for climate change, true for vaccines, etc. if you want to keep living in a safe first world society you need to concede that there are experts and that their conclusions should guide policy and social norms on matters of public health above all. We didn't get to be so healthy any other way. 100 years ago you had a 1/3 chance of dying in childbirth even in the US or Europe. Infectious diseases killed 20 percent of children before they turned 5. There were no antibiotics. Medical science got us here, to the point that ignorant people discount its importance.

So no, wrong statements of non-facts cannot go unanswered on DU or in the public debate. I'm a scientist. I vaccinate my kids with zero concern. Life entails risks so much greater than vaccination's every time you walk out the door. If you drive your kids five extra miles to patronize an anti-vaccine pediatrician, you expose them to far greater statistical mortal risk than if you just gave them an MMR shot. Youre staring into the wrong end of the telescope of knowledge.

[Arugula Latte]

46. "Vaccines are not & never were the reason we had such a dramatic decrease in contagious diseases"

Congratulations. That is one of the most fucking stupid things I've ever seen posted in my 14 years on DU.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

54. Which other scientific consensus have you decided you have an issue with based on a couple

of anecdotal situations?

[A Simple Game]

55. What?

It is more matter of cleanliness and better nutrition.

I don't know about kids that live in the cities but the rural kids that I know are every bit as dirty as when I was a kid. Better nutrition? Probably less so, we had no McDonald's or other fast foods when I was a kid, you ate home cooked meals or nothing.

Take a day off and go visit a farm some day, then tell me about cleanliness. And no, a petting zoo doesn't qualify, I mean a real farm.

[Arkana]

62. Then why does herd immunity exist?

Can you answer that question?

[KauaiK]

23. You can chose not to vaccinate but you cannot expose the public to the risk you have assumed.

The theoretic link between vaccines and autism has been thorough discredited.

I am too old to have been vaccinated AND my immune system is suppressed due to Chemo. P I have to fly from Kauai to Oahu for treatment monthly w/ visitors from the mainland. I will wear a mask rather to try to protect myself from being exposed to an anti-vaxxer - which would be a death sentence for me.

[HappyMe]

41. I wish you well.

It's a hard road.

I think the anti-vaxxers should wear hazmat suits. Keep their germs to themselves.

[William769]

25. Kick & recommended.

[TheCrankyLiberal]

26. Nothing like a little collective judgment:

To further alienate families who may lack the emotional and intellectual toolset to make real decisions. I think the ant-vaxxer bashing this season could only make things worse.

[ellennelle]

29. quite possibly

at least at first.

check this out:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/02/us/a-discredited-vaccine-studys-continuing-impact-on-public-health.html?_r=2

at the end they point out that folks who have the science explained to them seem to understand better how it works, but - very oddly - are then LESS inclined to get their kids vaccinated!

this exposes just how thoroughly the anti-science push has brainwashed so much of the population.

grrr. not sure it's worth worrying about the fee fees of these folks, as there are laws in all 50 states imposing vaccination demands. we just need to pull back the exceptions at the state level.

starting about now.

[Major Nikon]

32. Sure, better to give the anti-vaxxer's a pass

That way the people you describe can consider their nutbaggery as if it were anything but.


Anti-vaxxers should be alienated and marginalized, as should everyone who promotes dangerous pseudoscience.

[Silent3]

40. Do you think all of the progress made in gay rights in the past couple of decades...

...was accomplished by coddling anti-gay bigots? By being careful not to offend them? By trying to respectfully account for why they feel the way they feel?

I dearly wish we lived in a world where careful, reasoned arguments were the biggest factor in public debate.

But sadly, we don't. Frankly a great deal of progress is made by playing the emotional game of making people feel stupid or ashamed to profess particular points of view. If people with reasonable points of view, points of view that can be defended by facts and rational argument, decide that they're always going to be "good cop" and never "bad cop", they hurt their own causes.

While certainly some people just dig in deeper in response to "bashing", and you hardly ever see people change their minds in direct response to being bashed, it's also true that you hardly ever see anyone change their minds at all, even when handled with gentle diplomacy.

Real movement in overall opinion happens slowly, as people slowly lose passion for points of view they once held strongly, slowly gain passion for new perspectives, as people feel social support for their own opinions wax and wane around them, as uncommitted people drift one way or another into different points of view.

Take away the what you call bashing of anti-vaxxers, leaving only patient, calm "understanding" and gentle diplomacy, and what you'll most likely accomplish is simply making anti-vax a more comfortable, welcoming position for more people to adopt or maintain.

[Godhumor]

42. Sometimes a square peg needs to be forced into a circular hole

Anti-vaxxers deserve to be collectively dumped on until they can make the right decision.

[rjsquirrel]

44. Shame

Has historically been a strong force for social motivation.

I will not feel sorry for people who thumb their noses at the health of my kids.

[Avalux]

49. Bashing? It's a matter of public health.

Parents who "may lack the emotional and intellectual toolset to make real decisions" are putting their kids and the lives of others at risk. This is a very serious problem and could potentially cause serious public health issues. It has to be stopped before it unravels the advancements we've made in combating infectious diseases.

What's making things worse are people in the public eye who see an opening to exploit an irrational fear, whatever their motivation for it may be.

To the ignorant, irrational fear trumps logic and facts every time.

So what's your answer?

[Orsino]

52. Make things worse?

They're already not vaccinating.

But thanks for your concern.

[Pacifist Patriot]

58. Um, no.

There is absolutely no evidence that making nice and putting scientific fact up for debate has ever worked. If that were the case, we wouldn't still be treating evolution and global warming as something one can believe in or not.

Frankly, it's about time anti-vaxxers got a little bashing. Tiptoeing around their fantasy world doesn't do anyone any favors.

[Arkana]

63. People with shitty opinions that try to make others share their shitty opinions

need to be called out on it. They need to be held up as an example and made a public spectacle of. They need to be LAUGHED AT.

Anything to stamp out this dangerous "HURRRR VACCINES CAUSE AUTISM, MY CHILD IS A PRECIOUS SNOWFLAKE" bullshit.

[TheCrankyLiberal]

69. Some humans..

Have a natural personal apprehension towards herd mentalities. This whole onslaught of holier than thou marauders that threaten to take children away and jail parents just make the situation worse..

[jwirr]

28. The backlash should wake them up. But I also think that we need some good public service

announcements on TV. Education. It is how they convinced my older generation to line up in the school cafeteria to get all our shots. That and seeing the results of these diseases.

[QuebecYank]

35. Canadians are also becoming infected

Last year in British Columbia over 400 people were infected. Four unrelated people in Toronto (2 adults, 2 children) are currently infected.
In the USA there's 100+ cases in just 14 States.
I think we're headed toward parents showing proof of their child being vaccinated, before being allowed in school.

[bluestateguy]

53. We need to make anti-vaxxers unacceptable in polite society

They are certainly not welcome in my home ,or any organization that I belong to.

[TheCrankyLiberal]

70. phew

I'm so glad I'm not a member of any of your tea and tickle clubs!