[Deborah]

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2017/12/15/peds.2017-3449

Thanks to vaccines, this present generation of parents no longer have experience with these diseases. However, some saw the opportunity to exploit these circumstances for personal gain by spreading vaccine misinformation over the internet and social media to fuel parental anxiety and promote sales of their supplements and books,1 leading to increased use of nonmedical exemptions.

I think there is a bit more to concerns about vaccine safety and efficacy than lack of experience with disease.

 

[applejuice]

The very worst claim is that water is the most dangerous ingredient in vaccines. As if, ... !

I have never seen a room evacuated for any quantity of spilled water, but one vaccine, yes.

What a complete moron.

Where did he get his degree/license/education?

Or who paid him off for this lunacy?

 

[theoppositeview]

I don't agree with the negative or positive misinformation about vaccines, the actual findings are being skewed in two opposite directions. A basis for opinion can not be had from these.

The basis of opinion I have, is from the "help vs hurt" I have personally noticed from two separate regions, San Antonio Texas and Northeast Alabama.

Working at a military hospital BAMC, almost all adults and children were given all available vaccines (some on necessity and rarely declined) and the rate of flu was minimal along with 0 cases of certain viruses, mainly flu and mmr which can be deadly.

Here in AL however anti-vax is a way of life. My kids (who do get vaccinated) get sick more often here from a much broader range of illnesses than san-an. The case of mutated measles from public school in alabama, which can't exist without original unvaccinated hosts, almost killed my infant daughter.

The only thing I can say and be sure of is looking up deaths/ major issues from things that can be vaccinated for effectively. vs issues and deaths from vaccinations. Do the research yourself yearly, and never trust what someone online puts out for or against, because it will likely be biased.

 

[applejuice]

Do the research yourself yearly, and never trust what someone online puts out for or against, because it will likely be biased.

Of course one should do the research and never trust what anyone online says for/against vaccines. We all make the decisions that we as parents live will live with. That is the way it should be. We as adults and Americans are educated to read and weigh the evidence.

You decided to vaccinate and it works for you. Aren't you glad you could make that decision and follow through? As a nonvaxer, I have done the research for myself and would like to refuse vaccinations without being treated as a pariah or idiot. I am well educated and may know more about the subject than some doctors.

Bottom line: my one and only argument with Dr/Sen Pan and his ilk is that I, the parent, should make the final decision. My sole interest is my child's welfare and health. Other extreme claims come from the likes of Dr Offit who advocates for the termination of parental rights to those who decline vaccines for their children and Professor Reiss has advocated for using the police force to deliver vaccines at gun point.

These are extreme claims.

 

[Deborah]

I'm going to work my way through Pan's statements and point out lies and misrepresentations.

Paragraph 1
He states that vaccines are safe and effective.
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Certainly it is absurd and unscientific to make statements with no qualifications. Science isn't about absolutes.

Then he uses the phrase "community immunity" which I guess is supposed to sound better than "herd immunity." Claiming that getting the vaccination rate high enough will protect people...note that no actual percentage is mentioned, no list of vaccines with percentages is provided, and all statements are utterly vague and unsupported...

From this farrago of blurry non-facts, he leaps on to the claim that vaccination laws were originally instituted to protect public safety. Again, no documentation, no actual history, no examples of laws, when they were passed or any other facts...

Continuing on, he makes (also unsupported) the claim that exemptions were originally provided in order to get vaccination school requirements passed. I can think of a few other reasons that exemptions might have been offered:
1) legislators disapproved of forced medication of children
2) legislators didn't want the state to be legally liable for negative consequences of vaccinations (at the time these laws were passed there was no liability shield). If parents had the option of turning down the vaccines, then I suspect that the state would not be liable, but if there was no option to refuse, it is hard to see the state as off the hook
3) there may be other reasons and unless we research the history of each state's vaccination laws and exemption rules we have no idea of who was concerned or what they were concerned about.

I strongly suspect that Pan is trying to rewrite the history of the vaccine program in the US.

In his final sentence Pan claims that parents understood the dangers of diseases and that was why they accepted vaccines without protest. However...given the very small number of vaccines that were required for school...given the fact that vaccines were originally given much later than they are today...given that vaccine reactions were often acknowledged and those who reacted put on a delayed or selective schedule...it is equally possible that most parents went along with the vaccine program because it wasn't nearly as scary as it is today. With vaccines starting in the womb and ending in the grave, the picture has changed dramatically over the last 70 years. Pan acknowledges none of that.

Unless someone else jumps in, I'll tackle his second paragraph tomorrow.

I've got to give the guy credit. That is amazing amount of utterly undocumented and probably grossly inaccurate stuff to get into a single paragraph.

People are definitely welcome to try and defend Pan's statements. But only if they want to go to the trouble of digging up some supporting facts.

 

[applejuice]

I strongly suspect that Pan is trying to rewrite the history of the vaccine program in the US.

That appears to be correct. There is a video somewhere of him talking to a parent in an airport relating the tale of the CA pertussis outbreak in 2010 in which ten babies died. They died because they were not vaccinated, he says. That is a half truth.

They were not vaccinated because they were too young for the first dose. They also died because the attending doctors did not diagnose them in a timely manner so proper treatment - antibiotics? - sodium ascorbate? could be begun to help them. Even if the babies were vaccinated, they could have acquired pertussis since the full 3-4 doses need to be given to achieve full immunity, when the baby is 6-12 months. And even then, babies have been known to have pertussis despite being fully vaccinated on time.

Sadly, people do not bother to do the proper research.

His opening statement -

Vaccines are safe and effective

contradicts the Supreme Court's ruling in Bruesewitz in 2011 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruesewitz_v._Wyeth AND
https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/562/223/ -
AND in the National Vaccine Law passed by Congress in 1986.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Childhood_Vaccine_Injury_Act
https://www.in.gov/isdh/files/VICP.pdf

The correct statement from SCOTUS and Congress is

Vaccines are UNavoidably UNsafe.

 

[theoppositeview]

@applejuice
That video was full of bs from both sides, do people really get this heated about this, that it comes to complete ignorance of the truth between sides?

The water in vaccines he stated was more dangerous because water is actually one of the leading causes of death (drowning) which kills a mind blowing 7% of the world population yearly, 3,536 yearly from non boating accidents in the usa! 1,000 a year live with permanent brain injury because of this. And yes WATER is actually being researched as a cause for autism :/

In the grand scheme (solid reported deaths even potential cases) the deaths from actual and possible vaccine side effects are 63, permanent issues have nothing but skewed data that has no real average. Again the cause of autism is a multi part issue dealing with solid genetic autism, and predisposition autism. (i have the latter that kicked in mildly at 5 and was diagnosed at 16, but at least i have an iq of 186 even if I cant grasp potato (inside joke about my inability to deal with raw potatoes))

What both sides failed to do is listen to one another without their views blocking each others valid points. This is becoming prevalent in our society, and really hurts humanity as a whole. I don't see things in side vs side, i see an ambiguous culmination of both (grey area).

 

[samaxtics]

Here in AL however anti-vax is a way of life. My kids (who do get vaccinated) get sick more often here from a much broader range of illnesses than san-an.

I've lived in different countries, in different provinces and different cities. Before I moved away from my place of birth, I was rarely ill. Each time I moved I seemed to get sick more often during the first year in the new place. My kids who have lived in the same city now for the majority of their lives, are rarely ill. New location- new microbes/bacteria/germs/etc - for your body to get used to; I'm not sure why you are inferring the unvaccinated are responsible for your children's illnesses.

The case of mutated measles from public school in alabama, which can't exist without original unvaccinated hosts,

Do you have a link for this?

 

[applejuice]

And yes WATER is actually being researched as a cause for autism :/

?

Link?

The human body is 69-76% water, depending on your source, so I doubt that. Are we talking about contaminated water? Contaminated with what exactly?
2/3 is in intracellular, 1/3 is extracellular. 50-75%? https://www.thoughtco.com/how-much-of-your-body-is-water-609406

https://water.usgs.gov/edu/propertyyou.html

Babies are 74% water - https://www.livestrong.com/article/445521-how-much-water-does-the-human-body-need-daily/

You fail to note that Pan's statement about water being dangerous is completely ridiculous. How accidental drowning compares to a medical procedure for children to be injected with human diploid cells and neurotoxins being mandated by the state is completely incongruous.

I was trying to show what a buffoon he is for making such a comparison, but if you see logic in it, go ahead. Pan certainly did not listen to anyone in the audience. Do you also agree with the views of Offit and Reiss as stated in post #2 ?

Meanwhile, read the link in the OP and see if you can defend the rest of what Pan is saying. I look forward to it.

 

[theoppositeview]

ok, to the measles outbreak... The kids got it in 2014 and were a part of the non amish population that got it, part of that communilty lives here in al.
https://www.cdc.gov/measles/cases-outbreaks.html
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/04/measles-outbreak-traced-fully-vaccinated-patient-first-time

im too tired to track down publications, this will have to do.
https://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/environment/item/6912-does-“contaminated-water-cause-autism?

My kids were born in maryland, florida and alabama moving to that location in texas from florida for 4 years really didn't cause that moving to alabama from texas however, kids are sickevery other month so are the classmates (seemingly sick all the time) it's really been one communicable thing after another here.
I'm not trying to say that it is antivaxer's fault for the entirety, but it's a thing here, badly enough that someone at work was telling be bacteria and viruses are a hoax.... and multiple farmers agreed with him (then they started talking about how blacks were the real cause) It's mind numbingly bad! it could be a combination of things here.


For apple.
I now see how people get so flamed on one side or the other... you are the proud antivaxer and he is the nazzi force vaxer NEITHER of your sides hold 100% validity!
Frankly they are both infuriatingly one sided! You are essentially calling me out as an idiot because I have a view other than yours.

Forcing vaccination at gunpoint doesn't even need comment by any rational person to be not agreed with, that is wrong on many levels. Might as well have said I likely agree to forced alien abduction of all blue cats. (makes no sense)

Let me make it clear that I do not agree with extremist views on either side, I did however get what his intent with it was, and it was likely one of the only things that he said that seemed coherent and not flamed, the autism comment was actually 100% flame and uncalled for to provoke the other side, and this is not how to relay actual information, but it seems like communication without a flamewar (which is starting here) is becoming regular in this day and age. People honestly have no respect for each other and choose to not learn something everyday that they can, just argue the same old mess day in day out.

Vaccines are necessary in modern society, as the population rises so do the risk factors of the harm viruses and bacteria could cause. I would hope that if there were a dangerous enough outbreak that could be halted by vaccination to limit the lives lost that people would not refuse vaccination based on the left wing. Example: Places like china could be wiped out by simple viruses if they didn't require immunizations. On the right wing however force immunizations is grotesquely immoral.

 

[theoppositeview]

Water is contaminated everywhere outside of a lab or hydrogen-oxygen combustion event. (even in your body)

 

[kathymuggle]

Working at a military hospital BAMC, almost all adults and children were given all available vaccines (some on necessity and rarely declined) and the rate of flu was minimal along with 0 cases of certain viruses, mainly flu and mmr which can be deadly.

.

This might be what you saw. If that is good enough for you to make decisions on, so be it. I have no issues with people weighing what they observed.

That being said, the flu vaccines offers very little protection against the flu on a population basis. The research on this is quite sound.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD001269.pub5/full

I will also point out that there has been no trend of a reduction in paediatric flu deaths over the last 10 years or so. Flu vaccine intake among children has gone up over the years, but flu deaths have not gone down. I will see if I can find some links...

Here, you can play with this. on the upper left hand corner you can select the time period you want to look at and you will note there has been no downward trend of pediatric deaths:https://gis.cdc.gov/GRASP/Fluview/PedFluDeath.html

 

[kathymuggle]

Vaccines are necessary in modern society, as the population rises so do the risk factors of the harm viruses and bacteria could cause. I would hope that if there were a dangerous enough outbreak that could be halted by vaccination to limit the lives lost that people would not refuse vaccination based on the left wing. Example: Places like china could be wiped out by simple viruses if they didn't require immunizations. On the right wing however force immunizations is grotesquely immoral.

Not sure why you think this. It is very scare mongerry.

There are thousands and thousand of viruses and goodness knows how many bacterial illnesses - and most do not have vaccines.

We in developed nation have a long lifespan and low child mortality for a variety of reasons - and almost none of it comes down to vaccines. Good nutrition, sanitation, antibiotics, accident awareness and education, ease of medical care access with simple things like rehydration therapy...these are the things that matter.

 

[samaxtics]

ok, to the measles outbreak... The kids got it in 2014 and were a part of the non amish population that got it, part of that communilty lives here in al.
https://www.cdc.gov/measles/cases-outbreaks.html
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/04/measles-outbreak-traced-fully-vaccinated-patient-first-time

im too tired to track down publications, this will have to do.
https://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/environment/item/6912-does-“contaminated-water-cause-autism?

Re: Your link -http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/04/measles-outbreak-traced-fully-vaccinated-patient-first-time

Measles Outbreak Traced to Fully Vaccinated Patient for First Time

…a fully vaccinated 22-year-old theater employee in New York City who developed the measles in 2011 was released without hospitalization or quarantine. But like Typhoid Mary, this patient turned out to be unwittingly contagious. Ultimately, she transmitted the measles to four other people, according to a recent report in Clinical Infectious Diseases that tracked symptoms in the 88 people with whom “Measles Mary” interacted while she was sick. Surprisingly, two of the secondary patients had been fully vaccinated. And although the other two had no record of receiving the vaccine, they both showed signs of previous measles exposure that should have conferred immunity.

my emphasis

So my guess is that all four that the 22 year old infected had been previously vaccinated. Because had those two with no records been infected previously with the wild virus they more than likely would have stated it in the article. The rule seems to be when you have absolute proof of non-vaccinating make sure it appears in the article. However, if you are not absolutely certain the infected had been previously vaccinated (as in they can't find their records or they were vaccinated in another country), then use vague enough language so people will assume they were not.

I'm not sure how this article helps your statement that the measles mutates in the un-vaccinated. And neither does the CDC link you provided. I did find this though about the 2014 measles outbreak:

Alabama was one of 27 states that reported at least one measles case in 2014. So far, no patients in Alabama have come down with measles linked to the Disneyland outbreak.

oppositeview said:

My kids were born in maryland, florida and alabama moving to that location in texas from florida for 4 years really didn't cause that moving to alabama from texas however, kids are sickevery other month so are the classmates (seemingly sick all the time) it's really been one communicable thing after another here.

You know what happens when children start going to school? They get sick. So your children were younger when you lived in other states and had less exposure. You move to AL and now they are in school with more exposure to other children. The vaccine uptake rate in AL is actually higher than most states in the west and higher than some of its neighbours. AL's measles vaccine uptake rate (91.1) is actually better than Mississippi (90.8) which offers no non-medical exemptions.
Here is an AAP intereactive map which shows the rates in each state: https://immunizations.aap.org

oppositeview said:

I'm not trying to say that it is antivaxer's fault for the entirety, but it's a thing here, badly enough that someone at work was telling be bacteria and viruses are a hoax.... and multiple farmers agreed with him (then they started talking about how blacks were the real cause) It's mind numbingly bad! it could be a combination of things here.

Non-vaccine available diseases are not the antivaxxer's fault. Do you think being vaccinated protects your child from Fifth's Disease? It doesn't.

The rest of that paragraph is just...ugh. And what you are doing there is as subtle as a brick to the jaw. Please stop.

People can say crazy/racist sh*te no matter what label is attached to them. But the difference is when Pan says it he is saying it as a person who is a doctor and as an elected politician with power and authority. He actually said that the most dangerous ingredient in a vaccine is the water. And that is just so incredibly intellectually dishonest.

As for your link to support your claim that water is being researched as a cause of autism it is not just "water", it is "contaminated water". HUGE difference.

Administrator Jackson told the Senate Committee on Public Works that her agency could save children from autism by protecting them from contaminated water

my bold

 

[Turquesa]

Continuing on, he makes (also unsupported) the claim that exemptions were originally provided in order to get vaccination school requirements passed.

@applejuice can explain the history of exemptions in Wisconsin, where a woman's child had an adverse reaction, and she successfully lobbied for non-medical exemptions. I suspect that Wisconsin is not unique in having its vaccine policies influenced by concerns for choice and safety.

 

[Turquesa]

Here in AL however anti-vax is a way of life.

Excuse me, but this is simply not true.

http://www.dothaneagle.com/news/edu...cle_0b9788a8-b3f1-11e4-bf35-d7392fc4704c.html

http://www.al.com/news/index.ssf/2015/02/vaccination_rates_as_low_as_69.html

The case of mutated measles from public school in alabama, which can't exist without original unvaccinated hosts, almost killed my infant daughter.

Can you provide a link for this claim?

I am terribly sorry about your daughter.

Do the research yourself yearly, and never trust what someone online puts out for or against, because it will likely be biased.

We are in agreement. It's caveat emptor online.

 

[samaxtics]

Then he uses the phrase "community immunity" which I guess is supposed to sound better than "herd immunity." Claiming that getting the vaccination rate high enough will protect people...note that no actual percentage is mentioned, no list of vaccines with percentages is provided, and all statements are utterly vague and unsupported...

And the problem of adults not being vaccinated for some of the diseases younger children are, and that immunity for some of the vaccines they were given decades ago probably has long since waned. But yeah, all those 1-17 year olds are holding up the immunity for the community. :wink:

In his final sentence Pan claims that parents understood the dangers of diseases and that was why they accepted vaccines without protest. However...given the very small number of vaccines that were required for school...given the fact that vaccines were originally given much later than they are today...given that vaccine reactions were often acknowledged and those who reacted put on a delayed or selective schedule...it is equally possible that most parents went along with the vaccine program because it wasn't nearly as scary as it is today. With vaccines starting in the womb and ending in the grave, the picture has changed dramatically over the last 70 years. Pan acknowledges none of that.

Maybe parents weren't using the exemptions in the past because they didn't know they existed? Especially when they often frame/framed vaccine recommendations as requirements?

 

[theoppositeview]

Excuse me, but this is simply not true.
Can you provide a link for this claim?

That graphic does show that information, but there is a flaw, lies are counted, and I personally know that the medical records are being fudged for kids to go to school. The medical records for immunizations can EASILY be bypassed by saying I got shots here, and handing over a paper.

There can not be a link for everything, some information is still word of mouth. Example: Providing a link is not acceptable for the first hand knowledge of the color of your childs poop 2 days ago(then again, social media, and why people share this idk). Or The vows said during my wedding, there is 100% fact to these statements, but a link would be infeasible in exchange for first hand knowledge.

The links for that measles outbreak were already posted. It was all over the news so obviously I expected that (this site is all parent's, mostly moms right?) This place would not need proof of a big issue that was nationally covered to death. Then again, ive been asked for links about 9/11 and ww2 to the same effect. So humanity lately kind of boggles my mind. Is it not easier to search google and learn for yourself? Research is key to knowledge, and getting someone else to do it for you is a lazy approach, when the device with the ability to get that information is the same as the one to ask someone else for it.... so in reality the lazy approach is actually the harder one, it just shows the unwillingness to learn.

 

[Turquesa]

That graphic does show that information, but there is a flaw, lies are counted, and I personally know that the medical records are being fudged for kids to go to school. The medical records for immunizations can EASILY be bypassed by saying I got shots here, and handing over a paper.

There can not be a link for everything, some information is still word of mouth. Example: Providing a link is not acceptable for the first hand knowledge of the color of your childs poop 2 days ago(then again, social media, and why people share this idk). Or The vows said during my wedding, there is 100% fact to these statements, but a link would be infeasible in exchange for first hand knowledge.

The links for that measles outbreak were already posted. It was all over the news so obviously I expected that (this site is all parent's, mostly moms right?) This place would not need proof of a big issue that was nationally covered to death. Then again, ive been asked for links about 9/11 and ww2 to the same effect. So humanity lately kind of boggles my mind. Is it not easier to search google and learn for yourself? Research is key to knowledge, and getting someone else to do it for you is a lazy approach, when the device with the ability to get that information is the same as the one to ask someone else for it.... so in reality the lazy approach is actually the harder one, it just shows the unwillingness to learn.

We don't always agree with each other on this forum, but we do have an astute bunch and a well-established practice of asking each other to back claims with evidence. Usually, this evidence comes in the form of a link, but I have cited books on a couple of occasions.

It is actually your job to provide the evidence to back your own claims, not ours to look it up for you.

One of our pro-vaccine regulars frequently quotes Christopher Hitchens: "That which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence."

There are two claims lacking solid, non-anecdotal evidence - first that "anti-vaxxers" in Alabama are conspiring en masse to forage school vaccination records and second that children lacking the MMR vaccine are causing the measles virus to mutate. If there's no evidence for either, so be it. :shrug

 

[Deborah]

And the problem of adults not being vaccinated for some of the diseases younger children are, and that immunity for some of the vaccines they were given decades ago probably has long since waned. But yeah, all those 1-17 year olds are holding up the immunity for the community. :wink:



Maybe parents weren't using the exemptions in the past because they didn't know they existed? Especially when they often frame/framed vaccine recommendations as requirements?

Two very important points, thank you! Even today huge numbers of parents don't realize that exemptions are an option. And doctors and health departments use that ignorance to slide in vaccines that aren't even on the required list for school.