newmum35, schools mandate vaccines because state law requires them to. States tell schools which vaccines to mandate, and states pick those vaccines because of concerns about public health in many environments and over the long term. Vaccines that are mandatory are covered by health insurance companies, and vaccines that are not mandatory are usually not covered. This is why the list of diseases that schools mandate is much longer than the list of diseases a child could conceivably catch during normal school activities.
I'm a selective/delayed vaxer and I only come here through the "New Posts" page when a specific topic interests me. I understand that many people inherently distrust the pharmaceutical industry and the medical establishment and think that vaxes are being pushed solely for profit and aren't effective and so on and so forth.
Here's what I don't understand:
At the moment, the Plague is being handled well in the US. Numbers of cases are low, there hasn't been a case of human-to-human transmission of plague in the US since the 1920s, the major preventive measures involve educating people about the dangers of contact with rodents and environmental management in areas where the disease is endemic in rodents, suspected cases are quarantined and treated. This management strategy has no side effects for the general public. No one faces undue burden or health risk from any of these prevention strategies. Big Pharm and profit-driven health care marketing aren't involved.
Given how well the US is managing the plague, why use the plague to criticize vaccination?
This:
is basically saying "if people were doing something stupid, that would be stupid." "If" refers to a situation that does not exist. There is a vaccine. It's not mandated. It's no longer commercially available in the US. This suggests that even the most pea-brained and panic-driven of state legislators can't see the point of mandating plague vaccine so that it would be profitable to produce in the US.
If anything, the plague should be seen as a beautiful example of how to handle a potentially very frightening threat to public health.
I'm a selective/delayed vaxer and I only come here through the "New Posts" page when a specific topic interests me. I understand that many people inherently distrust the pharmaceutical industry and the medical establishment and think that vaxes are being pushed solely for profit and aren't effective and so on and so forth.
Here's what I don't understand:
At the moment, the Plague is being handled well in the US. Numbers of cases are low, there hasn't been a case of human-to-human transmission of plague in the US since the 1920s, the major preventive measures involve educating people about the dangers of contact with rodents and environmental management in areas where the disease is endemic in rodents, suspected cases are quarantined and treated. This management strategy has no side effects for the general public. No one faces undue burden or health risk from any of these prevention strategies. Big Pharm and profit-driven health care marketing aren't involved.
Given how well the US is managing the plague, why use the plague to criticize vaccination?
This:
Quote:
| If the media focused attention on the small number of plague cases that occur in the US each year, AND there was a vaccine for it they were trying to push (thus, using fear to sell it), AND it was "mandated" on the school schedule... guess how many people would "opt out" of it? (not many, as they would all be too uneducated enough to do so- everyone would simply be vaccinated for it without really needing it, without asking questions, etc) ... |
If anything, the plague should be seen as a beautiful example of how to handle a potentially very frightening threat to public health.
