In what must have been a slow news week last week, the flap du jour had to do with, of all things, vaccination of children against diseases for which we have actual vaccines that can actually prevent disease.
The only -- and I mean only reason that it got to the level of being a news item was because of comments made by New Jersey's governor, Chris Christie, in England where he was asked about mandatory vaccination and remarked that parents had a role in deciding in certain cases when children should be vaccinated.
Since Christie may be running for president in a year, it is imperative that the press find ways to damage him. His words were a bit muted -- "Mary Pat and I have had our children vaccinated and we think that it’s
an important part of being sure we protect their health and the public
health ... I also understand that parents need to have some measure of
choice in things as well, so that’s the balance that [the] government has
to decide." However, that gave the press plenty of ammunition to jump on him.
So gee, what's the right answer? If you properly parse the governor's full text, he seemed to be saying that for many diseases, the combination of severity of the disease, availability of the vaccine and minimal risk of adverse consequences makes it right for the government to mandate vaccination. He suggested that for others, parents should or could have input.
Unfortunately, his having said anything at all distracts from the discussion -- what he said is less important than the broader issue -- shall government ever mandate vaccination for any disease and, then, what is the process for determining which diseases and vaccines are to be on the mandate list?
Way back in September when I started writing, one of my very first pieces was this one, in which I explained that "moderate" was a terrible name for people who had a few views on issues that conflicted with their basic tendency toward conservatism or liberalism. I suspect my belief here will not track so well with some who agree with my points on other unrelated issues.
I say "Give the kid the shot."
I say that -- and I also say that Government mandates are necessary -- because it is within the Federal and state governments' jurisdiction to protect the health and welfare of the citizens. Now, I neither trust the Federal Government to make any decisions regarding the education of children, nor believe it is in its constitutional authority to do so, but health and welfare is a different topic.
We legitimately expect the Federal Government to research threats to the health of its citizens and promote (but not dominate) research into prevention and cure of those threats.
I consider it a public threat to the health of my children if they are in school with an unvaccinated peer. I especially get worked up if that unvaccinated peer is in the USA illegally, but that's another topic. If, through whatever legal process in place, a vaccine is mandated for use on all children of a certain age, then not vaccinating that peer is a criminal threat to the well-being of the community.
I also contend that, once approved for mandatory use, the manufacturer of such a vaccine should be insulated against lawsuit for adverse effects not connected to improper manufacturing process.
This is going to stir up a few folks, but there certainly should be a national policy on immunizing children, and that policy should be that a list of vaccines proven safe and effective against contagious illnesses be developed and continually updated. All children shall be vaccinated in accordance with the list and their parent or guardian subject to Federal penalty if not.
And above all, the law shall mandate that unvaccinated children illegally in the USA shall be immediately vaccinated and then subject to deportation depending on their status under the current law (that's "law", not "executive order"). None of us can possibly think we can safely ignore the health threat of the tens of thousands of unvaccinated illegals flooding the USA.
Give your kids the shot.
Copyright 2015 by Robert Sutton
My kid got MMR and then I discovered he's autistic, therefore MMR is the cause. No, my kid got MMR and is just fine, so MMR is OK. It's sad that the screamers on both sides don't know what's a statistically valid sample size. And the difference between cause and effect and stuff just happening at the same time.
ReplyDeleteWas the only paper ever published that links MMR to autism retracted due to pressure from Big Pharma? I'd like to see more publicity for the facts that the author had a financial conflict of interest between his own single disease vaccine and the multiple disease MMR, and he falsified some raw data to advance his own financial interest.
I remember reading some time ago that in a spectacular auto accident the driver's life was spared when thanks to not wearing a seat belt he was thrown out of the car before it fell off a bridge. Does that mean we should not wear seat belts?
Nothing is risk free, and some large settlements have been paid to MMR victims. I'd like to know the percentages of serious side effects and deaths legitimately attributable to MMR vs. the percentages of serious side effects and deaths legitimately attributable to pneumonia and other complications of measles.