I swear my state is full of idiots...

[fireheart17]

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/s...-1226523789892

Long story short: immunisation rates go down the toilet.

Despite the fact that:

-There has been NO evidence proven that there is a link between autism and MMR. (in fact, someone pointed out that despite Japan switching to individual MMR vaccines (so one each of measles, mumps and rubella) the rate of autism didn't drop )

-In order to claim certain tax breaks, you need to have your kids immunised or have a damn good reason as to why you can't get them immunised (i.e. egg allergies or similar)

-The Australian Academy of Science PUBLISHED a vaccine brochure detailing EVERY little tiny thing about vaccinations...

People are still refusing vaccinations. These aren't the optional ones that you might get because you're a health worker, or going into a certain country, I'm talking about childhood vaccinations.

I think I need to move interstate.

[Ginger Tea]

I'm not too sure on how MMR is faring here in blighty, same scaremongering as what you posted (though not read the link yet) when I last heard about it over 5 years ago.

I think there was a university that had an outbreak of one of those three and had a fatality, or was it meningitis (still say that needs an MiB joke made) and alot of students in their late teens never had a jab and getting it later in life is worse than in childhood.

If you don't want the MMR jab cos you think the cocktail could cause Autism or anything else, fine, but get the damn individual jabs FFS.

Would it be wrong to insist that a child can not go to school if they have not had certain jabs, I have no idea how nasty these are individually, but schools are always a hot bed for the lurgy.

[Nyoibo]

I know when I went to school in the US one of the requirements was a MMR immunisation, sadly it's not the case here.

[draco664]

Meh, there's idiots everywhere. People whose ignorance is so pervasive that they can't tell that their opinion is formed on a faulty premise.

Mind you, it doesn't help that the truly evil arseholes like Jenny McCarthy get such pervasive (and perverse) coverage of her anti-vaccine views.

It wouldn't be so much of a problem if these people were only risking themselves, but they're risking their helpless children's lives.

[Duelist925]

*snip*

Would it be wrong to insist that a child can not go to school if they have not had certain jabs, I have no idea how nasty these are individually, but schools are always a hot bed for the lurgy.

I would say no. I know it's a requirement in some US schools (Havent studied it closely, so can't say if its all, or just some), and it makes sense to me--these children are, potentially, carriers of illness's that can not only make a lot of kids and families lives very miserable for a time, but can be deadly in some instances.

It's a basic safety precaution that children who are not immunized should be be allowed into a public school setting.

[AdminAssistant]

MMR is a requirement now at some universities, particularly those with high numbers of international students. When you enroll for your first semester, a hold is automatically placed on your account, and to get the hold removed you have to either provide a full shot record or go to the campus clinic to get a booster. My university also requires, rather than suggests, the meningitis vaccine for dorm students.

[Panacea]

Long story short: immunisation rates go down the toilet.

We're having the same problem here in the US. The vaccine denier crowd does a good job of scaring the shit out of people. As a result, whooping cough is making a roaring comeback. We had a number of infant deaths in my local area earlier this year; the babies got it from Mom, whose immunity had worn off (pertussis needs a booster every 10 years).

Meh, there's idiots everywhere. People whose ignorance is so pervasive that they can't tell that their opinion is formed on a faulty premise.

Mind you, it doesn't help that the truly evil arseholes like Jenny McCarthy get such pervasive (and perverse) coverage of her anti-vaccine views.

In the US you can refuse on religious reasons, but you still have to be vaccinated to attend public school. Some parents are home schooling as a result, other kids just manage to slip through cracks in the system.

I don't think McCarthy is evil. I think she's just stupid. She had to have an answer as to why her kid has autism; now she has one and can claim to be an "activist." Too bad, she could have used her celebrity much more productively advocating for support for the real research that will identify the cause of the problem, and possible treatments.

MMR is a requirement now at some universities, particularly those with high numbers of international students. When you enroll for your first semester, a hold is automatically placed on your account, and to get the hold removed you have to either provide a full shot record or go to the campus clinic to get a booster. My university also requires, rather than suggests, the meningitis vaccine for dorm students.

It's a requirement at every university I know of these days.

Back in the 90s when I went back for my RN, I had to provide proof of immunization in order to go to clinic at the hospital. Mom had lost my records from childhood, so I had to get a titer done; everything was immune thank god, except my Hep B (which I'd gotten several years earlier at a job; optional, but I opted to do it).

So I agreed to a 2nd series. Still non-immune. They recommended a 3rd series but since it was and still is optional I said no. I figured after 2 series if I didn't sero convert, I never would.

I have to get a flu shot every year. The hospitals now require it for all their employees unless they have a documented egg allergy, including clinical instructors and nursing students. They have all fired employees who refused to get one.

I also had to get a TDaP booster (tetanus, diphtheria, and Pertussis) booster this year, a hospital not college requirement. They wanted it even though 1) it was a year early, and 2) I have a documented allergy to tetanus vaccine. I didn't mind getting it a year early, though I was worried about an allergic reaction to tetanus. Unfortunately, my doc couldn't supply the diphtheria and pertussis separately, though he thought the Health Department might be able to. But I'd had such problems with them trying to get vaccinations to go to Korea last summer that I opted to go ahead with the TDaP instead. Doc put me an Benadryl and steroids for a week just in case, and between the two I didn't have an allergic reaction.

[anakhouri]

This is one of my pet peeves. Despite the fact that the only study ever to connect vaccines with autism has been thoroughly discredited, and despite the fact (I recently read this) that it is likely Jenny McCarthy's son is not even autistic (instead having a little-known childhood neurologial syndrome that is often misdiagnosed as autism, and which children usually grow out of- hence his 'progress'), people still want to scream about how vaccines are evil and give kids autism. No, kids usually begin showing signs of autism around the same time they receive a load of vaccines- it's a pure coincidence. Kids are not getting autism more these days because of vaccines; it's just being diagnosed better. In the old days they were just declared mentally retarded or insane and locked up. I understand people whose kids are autistic want someone to blame but they should really be grateful that there are more resources to help theor children live full lives instead of being thrown into Bedlam.

You know what's really evil? Putting not only your child but other children as well at risk of contracting a potentially fatal disease because you are too paranoid or stupid to understand how science works. Some children really can't get vaccinated for medical reasons, and they rely on herd immunity to keep them healthy. Which non-vaccinators royally screw up.

(I had to get a whooping cough vaccine the day after I gave birth. I was shocked as I'd thought it was pretty much wiped out in the US- but the nurses were as aggravated as fireheart, complaining about people not vaccinating their children).

[Seifer]

The only reason those people have the luxury to refuse the vaccinations is because their children are protected by all the other parents who do vaccinate their children. However, if the numbers of non-vaccinated get to a dangerous level, those parents will have to understand that they are putting their children's health (and lives) in danger due to an unjustified fear.

(I wonder how people in third-world countries would feel if they knew that people were refusing these life-saving vaccinations? Can we send the unused vaccinations to them? I'm sure they'd appreciate being immunized against the diseases that wipe out huge numbers of people in poorer, less technological areas.)

[BlaqueKatt]

I don't think McCarthy is evil. I think she's just stupid. She had to have an answer as to why her kid has autism; now she has one and can claim to be an "activist."

Jenny McMarthy's son WAS NOT EVER AUTISTIC.

He had Landau-Kleffner syndrome, which is sometimes self limiting, you can "grow out of it", she tortured her child with vitamin and chelation therapy when doing nothing would've worked just as well. Also many of the "my kid got shots and spontaneously regressed to autism, is actually the misdiagnosis of Landau–Kleffner syndrome as autism, because autism is "easily recognizable" while LKS has similar symptomolgy but isn't as well known.

[Aethian]

I also had to get a TDaP booster (tetanus, diphtheria, and Pertussis) booster this year, a hospital not college requirement. They wanted it even though 1) it was a year early, and 2) I have a documented allergy to tetanus vaccine. I didn't mind getting it a year early, though I was worried about an allergic reaction to tetanus. Unfortunately, my doc couldn't supply the diphtheria and pertussis separately, though he thought the Health Department might be able to. But I'd had such problems with them trying to get vaccinations to go to Korea last summer that I opted to go ahead with the TDaP instead. Doc put me an Benadryl and steroids for a week just in case, and between the two I didn't have an allergic reaction.

I just got my shot today. I think I've had it before but as the nurse in the doctors office said, "If it's not listed, get it anyways and have it listed." I was kinda irked at the prospect of getting four different shots today, (only had to get two) but I see the point being made. I deliver to different areas and run into kids/adults in all those areas. I could be carrying more then just mail while not knowing it to those different people. And I know of one family where neither of their twins gets regular vaccines due to the egg allergy. She doesn't even let them answer the door anymore after their regular was heard telling the neighbors that she never gets vaccines because she doesn't believe in them.

[fireheart17]

See, the egg allergy I can understand. Ditto for those who have compromised immune systems already.

But saying that you shouldn't get a vaccine because big pharma wants to kill you/make you sicker is absolutely stupid.

[MrsEclipse]

Jenny McCarthy is stupid. Andrew Wakefield is evil.

People are so ready to blame Big Pharma for a conspiracy to inject our kids with everything but an anti-kitchen-sink booster for fear that it's a big, money-driven conspiracy that they forget one big, important thing: The reason Wakefield faked his data and published the study was because he wanted to turn people off the MMR vaccine because he had a huge financial stake in a new patent and some other stuffs. In other words, it was a big money-driven conspiracy. Well, maybe not big. Moderately sized.

I also hated it right around when the paper was officially retracted a few years ago, and some anti-vaccine heads were upset. Some points they brought up:

* Why did it take so long to retract the paper if it wasn't true? Isn't it more likely that Big Pharma is just trying to take it down now because they invented a new vaccine and they wanted to make people think it was safe? And why would the authors themselves retract it if they helped write it? That's very suspicious, don't ya think?
* It was a kangaroo court. Wakefield didn't stand a chance because they were already against them. Big Pharma paid off all the judges or whoever was in charge.
* I saw my child develop autism right there in the doctor's office after the vaccine, don't tell me I didn't.
* If science says that vaccines don't cause autism, they have to prove what does cause it before the vaccine thing can really be debunked.

Okay,
A) Just because you weren't following it doesn't mean that people haven't been calling bullshit since Day 2, and that it got retracted out of the blue for no given reason under suspicious circumstances.
B) You don't need to pay off anybody when you can use actual factual science to prove something,
C) The fuck are you talking about?, and
D) That is not how science works.

Seriously. I have heard more than one mother talk about "watching her son/daughter develop autism right in front of me after getting the vaccine."

The other issue, one that's even harder to reason out, is this one I've heard numerous times: "Maybe vaccines cause autism, and maybe they don't. I've seen enough evidence to believe they do, and as a mother my duty is to protect my child and raise him well. And I think that if I risked giving my child autism to protect him from diseases nobody gets anymore, I will have failed at that job."

...

EVEN PUTTING ASIDE the critical logic failure and lack of understanding of both how the scientific process and herd immunity works, thus meaning you fail your child because he dies of diptheria... look, I hate to be the one to say this, but you also have a duty to society. Don't be selfish.

PS whooping cough SUUUUUUCKS. Get your kids their jabs, dudes.

[Panacea]

(I wonder how people in third-world countries would feel if they knew that people were refusing these life-saving vaccinations? Can we send the unused vaccinations to them? I'm sure they'd appreciate being immunized against the diseases that wipe out huge numbers of people in poorer, less technological areas.)

They'd think we were crazy. People in third world countries travel for as much as 100 miles . . . literally . . . any time they hear about a vaccination clinic.

When the polio vaccine came out, people literally lined up around buildings to get it for their kids.

The problem is we've forgotten how devastating these so called "childhood" diseases can be. We're spoiled, we think these diseases don't do much harm and kids are better off having the disease than a vaccine--they have exposure parties where the purpose is to get the kid sick.

I cannot begin to describe the stupid on that one.

Jenny McMarthy's son WAS NOT EVER AUTISTIC.

she tortured her child with vitamin and chelation therapy when doing nothing would've worked just as well. Also many of the "my kid got shots and spontaneously regressed to autism, is actually the misdiagnosis of Landau–Kleffner syndrome as autism, because autism is "easily recognizable" while LKS has similar symptomolgy but isn't as well known.

She's triply stupid then. But still not evil; I don't think she did this to her kid for the jollies.

[Nyoibo]

they have exposure parties where the purpose is to get the kid sick.

I cannot begin to describe the stupid on that one.

I seem to remember that with chicken pox as a young child, I don't see the problem with that one, others though, that seems stupid.