What My Parents Never Told Me About Vaccines: The Terrible Tales Of Vaccine Sam

Vaccines didn't save us! After all, death rates were declining years before the vaccine, and they were declining for the diseases that didn't even need a vaccine! It's not surprising that death rates were declining before introduction of the vaccines. More importantly, supportive care was improving. For example, take the case of polio. Before the introduction of the iron lung and its widespread use, for example, if a polio patient developed paralysis of the respiratory muscles, he would almost certainly die.

The iron lung allowed such patients to live, some for decades. No doubt improved nutrition also played a role as well. However, if you want to see the impact of vaccines, take a look at this graph from the CDC of measles incidence, not death rates:.

Similar results were seen most recently from several other vaccines, including the Haemophilus influenza type B vaccine, as the CDC points out:. Hib vaccine is another good example, because Hib disease was prevalent until just a few years ago, when conjugate vaccines that can be used for infants were finally developed. The polysaccharide vaccine previously available could not be used for infants, in whom most cases of the disease were occurring. Since sanitation is not better now than it was in , it is hard to attribute the virtual disappearance of Haemophilus influenzae disease in children in recent years from an estimated 20, cases a year to 1, cases in , and dropping to anything other than the vaccine.

In the post to which I referred, the most intellectually dishonest graph is this one:. Note how this graph, unlike all the other graphs used to make the claim that "vaccines didn't save us" actually uses incidence data, in this case from Canada from to I was immediately suspicious of this graph, though. The reason should be obvious; the decline in measles incidence is far too smooth.

Measles incidence typically varies greatly from year to year. Fortunately, in his chutzpah , Obomsawin included a link to the actual source of the graph. Naturally, I couldn't resist checking it out, and I found that the link leads to the Canadian Immunization Guide section on the measles vaccine. And this is the actual graph from which Obomsawin allegedly extracted his data:. Note how Obomsawin left out a section of ten years to during which measles was not nationally reportable. Also note how he's, to be charitable, cherry picked the years to produce the impression of a smoothly declining measles incidence from to As I said, it doesn't get much more intellectually dishonest than that, nor does it get much more intellectually dishonest than this description of Obomsawin:.

A search of Pubmed reveals only one peer-reviewed publication from , and it's only a commentary. None of these are scientific positions. More tellingly, he is "currently engaged with government funding as Senior Researcher relative to establishing a Public Sector Policy on Traditional Medicine in Canada. He's somehow managed to get a government grant to try to promote "traditional medicine" in Canada.

Apparently, the Canadian government has its own problems with government money going to promote unscientific and pseudoscientific nonsense of the type that NCCAM promotes. In any case, besides Obomsawin's disingenuous and intellectually bankrupt distortions of incidence data used to serve his apparently anti-vaccine agenda, he has no qualifications to speak of with regard to science or epidemiology that I can find.

It also turns out that Dr. Obomsawin has some other--shall we say? For instance, he is approvingly featured on that aggregator of all things quackery and woo, Whale. So what we have here is a woo-meister using cherry picked points on a graph to give a false impression that the measles vaccine was not responsible for the dramatic decline in measles incidence in Canada in the s. Another rebuttal to the idea that vaccines didn't reduce the incidence of the diseases against which they were designed comes from the simple observation that, as vaccine uptake falls, the disease vaccinated against returns.

This is described by the CDC quite well:. Finally, we can look at the experiences of several developed countries after they let their immunization levels drop. Three countries - Great Britain, Sweden, and Japan - cut back the use of pertussis vaccine because of fear about the vaccine. The effect was dramatic and immediate. In Great Britain, a drop in pertussis vaccination in was followed by an epidemic of more than , cases of pertussis and 36 deaths by In Sweden, the annual incidence rate of pertussis per , children years of age increased from cases in to 3, in It seems clear from these experiences that not only would diseases not be disappearing without vaccines, but if we were to stop vaccinating, they would come back.

The United Kingdom is an excellent illustration of this trend. Back in the mids, it declared measles as under control, thanks to the vaccine. Then came Andrew Wakefield and a credulous, sensationalistic British press to spread his message that the MMR vaccine causes autism. The result was that measles came roaring back in the U. The Vaccine Liberation graphs and the even more deceptive graphs produced by "Dr.

First, they contain enough of a grain of truth to them to sound plausible. After all, better nutrition and better sanitation have decreased the incidence of many infectious diseases. But they were not enough. Indeed, part of the reason we vaccinated against some diseases is because sanitation wasn't enough. Was sanitation so much worse in the late s before the Hib vaccine was introduced than it is now? Was it probably even that much worse in the s, when the measles vaccine was introduced? Yet, such is the myth that the anti-vaccine movement would have parents believe.

Such is the intellectually dishonest nonsense they promote. Steve Novella has pointed out that there is a better version of the graph in this reference , and he was kind enough to send it to me, given that, for whatever reason, my university doesn't have a subscription to the relevant journal:.

Note how this graph looks at raw case numbers and shows 40, cases the year before the ten year interruption in the data. All in all, it's a much clearer representation of the data than the first graph, showing a clear drop that occurred during the ten year period, in the middle of which the measles vaccine was introduced. It also shows another obvious drop in measles incidence later on in the s, when the two-dose measles vaccine program was started.

As for why it appears that there is a steep dip in the first graph before the ten year gap, that appears to be an artifact. There is no data for , but the line appears to go to a datapoint at or My guess is that whoever made the graph simply set the value for to. In other words, the graph is a rather poor representation of the data, and the Canadian government would do well to replace that graph on its website with something more like the second graph, which makes the point much more clearly.

Your Disclaimer says this: For the first time ever, in Orac received a little bit of pharmaceutical money in the form of a seed grant. Unfortunately, it's not enough money for his lab to live on and will soon be gone. What that means, though, is that for the next several months Orac will no longer be able to use his favorite joke before talks, namely that no pharmaceutical company is interested enough in his research to want to give him any money. Even with that little bit of pharma lucre, like most biomedical scientists in academia, Orac must still beg the NIH and other granting agencies for the money to keep his lab going.

Being a "pharma shill" doesn't seem to pay as much as supporters of alt-med think it does. Anon - I don't think you understand the words coming out of your mouth Anon, do you think the fortune Mercola makes shilling his fake remedies might make him biased also? Mercola selling products is also biased because he convinces you of something in an article, and then at the bottom of the page he offers to sell it to you, and he makes money off of it.

Look up what a shill is, they get paid to convince people on behalf of who is employing them. In response to Kelly Bray: Mercola selling his products is also biased because he convinces you of something in an article, and then at the bottom of the page he offers to sell it to you, and he makes money off of it. Hey anon, I knew what the word "shill" meant in the third grade. I know how to use it, and you know how to misuse it. In the end, it's not always who is doing the research, it's how they are doing the research.

It's amusing that anon is complaining about Orac being a pharma shill on a post that was written a year and a half before Orac received any money from any pharmaceutical company. Sanitation hasn't improved much in Africa, but measles and polio vaccines have dramatically reduced death rates. The usual smoke and mirror stuff we are unfortunately quite used to seeing in the antivax propaganda war. This is one of those things I need to address over at AntiAntiVax.

It's also a variation on one of the nine questions that will supposedly stump pro-vaxers, namely, "Could you please provide scientific evidence which can prove that disease reduction in any part of the world, at any point in history was attributable to inoculation of populations?

COMMENTS (533)

Here are two studies out of many showing the efficacy of 7-valent pneumococcal vaccine, to pick just one vaccine: Impact evaluation, continuing surveillance and future perspectives. Here's a CDC link which has graphs showing the decline in vaccine-preventable diseases after immunization was introduced. Antivaxers commonly use that trick of showing abridged graphs selected to begin at one of the cyclical low points of incidence of a disease to attempt to demonstrate that the disease was on the way out before vaccination. An honest presentation would demand that they show how incidence rates had been cyclically rising and falling for many years before the vaccine was introduced, and after that declined to extremely low numbers or in the case of diseases like polio, were eradicated altogether.

If pressed, I could make a chart that showed how tomatoes are decreasing the incidence of anything But only people who see evidence without a critical eye would believe it.

And that is the problem. Much like the antivaxxers claim that the media has had a hand in promoting vaccines, that same culture of having talking heads interpret data for us is what makes antivaxxers claims seem reasonable to the untrained mind. If you really want to blow their mind, you'd plot incidence on a log scale, and then see a "ginormous" drop in cases. But that would be dishonest, and we don't play by their rules. I was going to find any web site associated with Dr.

Obomsawin I could where I could address his anti-vax distortions, but I have to run to class. I'll check the National Office of Health Development later, after my exam. For now, at least the NAHO conference site that mentions him also links to a government site promoting vaccines. That's linked from an aboriginal health conference website by others. I still want to see what anything he himself commands looks like, to see if he preaches the anti-vax propaganda from his official positions in a public, online way, besides the usual duck nests.

It makes my head hurt to see the anti-vaxxers claim that sanitation is more important than vaccination. Hey, surprise, one doesn't replace the other, kids! I mean, breathing may be "more important" than eating, but that doesn't make starvation a good idea. Cue the pro-anna and airimentarian twits The best way to demonstrate this is to go on to the very first website that currently shows up on a Google search for "vaccines didn't save us. Yes vaccines help prevent communicable diseases, just as nuclear weapons and their use deter death.

I do have a question though, we have been around on the earth for many many years right? And vaccines are just a recent development. Do you suppose there have been a few diseases that have become extinct prior to vaccines? Is the human body able to build their own defense, perhaps over generations? I know, I know, there are more people and disease spreads easier, but we are also well fed, sheltered, and have advances in medicine to counter the symptoms and deal with the complications.

Im just curious, is it wrong to think that even without having everyone vaccinated if we would survive as a species? However, entire societies and cultures would perish or be slow in growing because these now preventable, communicable diseases would have taxed them in resources and lives time and time again. What would Europe be without all those epidemics of smallpox? What would different kingdoms and cultures be without tuberculosis, influenzas, poxes?

You have a son How many children would have grown up to be great leaders, scientists, presidents, had they not succumbed to polio? Yes, we got through, and we will even if antivaxxers bring vaccine practice to its knees, but just think of the possibilities that would never get to be. The problem with a "sit and wait" approach, apart from the deaths and injuries that take place while waiting, is that at the same time humans develop ways to counter diseases, the bacteria and viruses that cause the diseases are developing new ways to get around the defenses.

It's a little thing called evolution, and every living thing does it in their attempts to survive. Vaccines in general are able to prevent infection a lot faster than the germs can mutate to get around the vaccine. A notable exception is influenza, but then, natural immunity doesn't fare much better. It's not in the interest of a pathogen that depends upon a host for its spread and survival to wipe out that host completely. Humans and pathogens are constantly co-evolving.

I'm not sure I understand this. I am trying to figure out if you are being disingenuous, intentionally misrepresenting the pro-health position of vaccines, or under the delusion of a massive strawman. Seriously, if this the bar you work for? Disease is ok as long as it doesn't wipe out the human race?

In addition, I'm pretty sure if we got rid of airbags, seat belts -- fuck, traffic lights and stop signs, even -- we would still survive as a species. Come to think of it, these silly laws against stealing and rape and murder I'm pretty sure we survived as a species for millennia without them, and I'm pretty sure it would be just about the same now. We'd probably also survive as a species without the anti-vaccine movement In addition, I'm pretty sure if we got rid of airbags, seat belts -- hell, traffic lights and stop signs, even -- we would still survive as a species.

Equating vaccines and nuclear weapons is a good example of how horribly twisted the antivax mindset can and often does become. Yes, populations can evolve defenses over a period of generations. One of the more interesting is sickle cell anemia. It's really not a good condition to have except for one thing: Since the condition itself is painful and can be debilitating, it isn't selected for outside of regions with endemic malaria and indeed, not all human populations in malaria-prone regions ever developed the defense in the first place.

But it's slow, imprecise, and usually just improves the odds rather than actually making anyone invulnerable to the disease. People with sickle cell anemia, for instance, can still contract malaria. They're just far less likely to do so, and they pay a fairly heavy price for that protection. Part of this is because the pathogens evolve too generally far more quickly than us, since their generations are counted in minutes rather than decades , but part of it is because our evolution is more constrained.

Most of the genetic changes available to us result in non-viable humans, or humans crippled in some way. No, it's definitely not wrong. We survived as a species without vaccination for a very long time. We also survived as a species without a great many other things: There's never any guarantee of species survival; anybody can go extinct. But we have a pretty good capacity for surviving. The Black Death killed a quarter of the population of Europe -- but it didn't empty Europe entirely, and the population rebounded within a few centuries.

Smallpox killed off huge numbers of Native Americans -- but most tribes did survive, even if severely depleted. And now that they were getting regular smallpox exposure, there was some degree of herd immunity. Not sufficient to prevent outbreaks, but sufficient to prevent devastation. So yeah, we can certainly survive as a species without vaccination. There's a lot of stuff we could give up and still be fairly sure of there being H.

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Vaccination, even though the strategies focus on herd immunity, is really about saving individuals -- and saving cultures. Europe survived the Black Death, but greatly changed. Whole villages died; the entire power structure changed. Indeed, it was a major factor in the decline of feudalism and the rise of the merchant class, by creating the appropriate power vacuums at the right time.

Plagues are an awful thing to go through. Yes, our species will survive, but at a terrible cost. Vaccination gives us the chance to avoid that cost, and survive on our own terms.

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By your logic we shouldn't put seat belts, airbags, crush zones, child seats, dual circuit brakes, rollover protection etc. You have reached a new level of stupid. Let me guess, you think virii are intelligent beings who, when they read in the newspaper that a vaccine for their strain has been introduced, refuse to infect us because of fear of mutually-assured destruction MAD? This triumvirate of internet woo stress the importance of "getting out in the sun", sans sunscreen, Health Tips HealthRanger recommends "one hour daily"! All three woo-meisters claim huge followings Seriously,Vogue magazine has been a more realistic source of health information concerning sun exposure.

I may be uninformed here, not being either a biologist or physician, but it was my understanding that the sickle cell anemia gene is recessive and that it must be present on both chromosomes in order for the individual to suffer the condition. It was also my understanding that having the gene on one chromosome was sufficient to provide resistance to malaria. I was under the impression that this provides an explanation for the continued presence of the gene as individuals not having it in areas with high incidences of malaria leave fewer descendants and individuals having it on both chromosomes also leave fewer descendants.

Thus, in such regions, individuals having the gene on one chromosome would have a selective advantage and thus leave more descendants. If I am incorrect in this impression, I would appreciate being corrected. You all keep using the auto examples: No need for the extra expense. The sentiment above was an actual reason to be against healthcare reform. They didn't need insurance. They would just drive really carefully to prevent accidents.

Anti-vaxers are the same. They will just breathe really carefully or eat really carefully so they don't need vaccines. Thanks for your time to answer my questions, most of you were helpful, others just attacking me once again. I do love the, "so maybe you should sit the fsck down before the stoopid makes your hair catch on fire.

I have to address the nuclear weapons thing. I use this because some people object to nuclear weapons because they have the potential to kill millions of people, as do communicable diseases. Vaccines on the other hand only kill a handful. I just find it odd that people can calculate the number of deaths of innocent people weigh it against the number of lives saved and determine the value of the weapon in terms of acceptable collateral damage. I mean what is the magic number?

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One life for 1,? Again I know vaccines save lives, but questioning the safety of vaccines is an important and legitimate part of human nature, especially by parents who subject their children to these vaccines. Orac, it may be Wakefield and then again it may be the news headlines of the time that said vaccines killed children. I really dont think the cause of people rejecting to comply with vaccine schedules is because of Wakefield's paper, it has to do with a lack of trust in the pharmaceutical industry and the agencies that should be protecting us against abuses and injuries.

Infectious disease viruses can only evolve if they infect a host, change and then infect someone else with the evolved virus. High rates of vaccination mean that the virus is not going to have much less chance of evolving into something that the current vaccines will not stop. I like how you once again use the psychiatrist case as a reason to condemn industry and FDA, when, in fact, FDA were the ones taking action against the psychiatrist, and industry was not involved at all.

Getting to your "making vaccines safer" line, you need to be a bit more specific. What is "safe" to you? Do you argue that if something does not meet your criteria for "safe" that it should not be used at all? Vaccines are relatively safe, and companies are working to make them safer all the time. Or why RotaShield was removed from market. Perhaps there is a solution: No matter how often I see it, it's hard to believe people will make these kinds of claims.

Two questions about the Canada graph, though. First, why was measles not reportable for eight years? I tried a quick Google but didn't find a reason. And second, is that supposed to be a data point in , or is that just a dropping off from lack of data? I could see why a person would look at that and think that incidence was dramatically falling off prior to the vaccine licensure.

That is correct; it is a regressive trait, and just carrying the trait gives you some protection against malaria. I didn't go into adequate detail, but it was only meant as an example. In any case, the point is that it's an awfully steep price to pay for malaria resistance. I understand some people, if they can't get medications for it, turn to illegal drugs to get some relief from the symptoms. Thalassemia is another genetic blood disorder which appears to confer some protection against malaria.

While sickle-cell anemia is most common among Africans, Thalassemia mainly afflicts Mediterraneans or people decended from Mediterraneans. It's a bit more complex than sickle-cell anemia, and there are both dominant and recessive forms of the disease. It's possible that similarly protective effects may be discovered for some other genetic disorders; sometimes people point towards these anemias when warning against eugenics programs and abortion following genetic testing of the fetus or the selection of test-tube embryos based on whether or not they carry such traits -- the point is that we don't know just what it is we're removing from our gene pool.

That is my interpretation. And on that plot, it is bloody obvious where the line of demarcation occurs. That is why, I think, this clown used the Canadian data, because more was missing and he could be more deceptive. One thing that I always wish would work against this particular antivax meme is asking them to show me the common effect across diseases of sanitation and nutrition.

After all, we've seen some really dramatic decreases in the rates of these diseases over the past century, haven't we? I mean, if it was the addition of French fries to school lunch menus that wiped the floor with polio in the s, and not the polio vaccine, then surely French fries should have also been wiping the floor with measles, and mumps, and rubella, right?

But sadly the kind of people who would respond to that argument, who wouldn't take refuge in some delusional special pleading about "rubella just took longer to respond to French fries", would not be the kind of people who'd present the "vaccines aren't what caused the declines in these diseases" delusion in the first place I find it amusingly contradictory that you are posting about being intellectually dishonest and insert that which you criticise.

The majority of people carried Hib harmoniously, it was a small subset of people in which it became invasive. What has happened to nontypeable HI since Science decided to remove B from the environment? You raise a good point. Those who claim that improved sanitation or nutrition are the reason for declines in deaths and that vaccines do nothing are always a bit cagey about which specific advances contributed to the declines. For example, what specific advances occurred before the decline in measles in the s? Why did they have no impact on Hib? And what specific advances occurred to cause the decline of Hib in the past couple decades?

Parents of Ben, sensationalistic newspaper articles are not considered scientific evidence. Funny how you are claiming vaccines cause death, when you admitted that the diseases cause death. And it seemed you would have preferred Ben to die from a disease than to be autistic. Until you can show that the vaccines cause more harm than the diseases you have nothing. Also, if you pull out the very dishonest call for a "vax versus unvax" study, just keep asking Handley, Blaxill, Redwood and friends to fund that study.

The problem with your analogy is that you didn't compare nuclear weapons to communicable diseases -- you compared them to vaccines. Furthermore, unlike vaccines, nuclear weapons are designed specifically to kill large numbers of people. It shouldn't be surprising that this comparison bothered people, because it implies that you think vaccines were designed specifically to kill people. That a very small number of people have been injured by vaccines far fewer than alleged by the anti-vax contingent, which is prone to the post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy is not evidence that they are designed to kill.

The fact of the matter is that accidental deaths happen all the time, from every intervention ever designed. If someone falls down a manhole and dies, is this an indictment of municipal water supplies? Of course not, even though that person would be alive today were it not for municipal water supplies. Really, you cannot reasonably compare nuclear war or even the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction with vaccination.

So this reasonably leads some to wonder if you were intending to inflame. I rather suspected you were, which is why I initially ignored the comparison. I did not believe it was intended for the purposes of actual debate, but just for stirring the pot. Of course it's not just Wakefield, and I don't see any reason to accuse Orac of saying it's just Wakefield. Wakefield is just one of the recent voices.

There is definitely a lack of trust in the pharmaceutical industry, and the agencies assigned to watch over them. But this is not neccesarily a sign that there is something wrong in either. They're not perfect, but there also is not the vast conspiracy that is often alleged. The autism connection is actually a relatively new player in the anti-vax thing. Older claims usually are more along a eugenics line. In Africa, for instance, the most common anti-vax claim came from Islamic fundamentalists arguing that the polio vaccine was actually a secret attempt by Christian nations to sterilize African Muslims.

It wasn't, of course. But over there, Christian colonialism is a serious bogeyman. Here, it's mainly the government and big corporations that are the bogeyman, and so they are the ones pointed to. But not everybody notices that, and if people who are afraid get together, they feed off one anothers' fears and become even more afraid. And sometimes people such as Wakefield but certainly not limited to him take advantage of that situation, because such people are vulnerable to exploitation.

I haven't been able to find numbers, but here's another graph that seems to be a little clearer: There is a slow trend downwards since WWII which probably reflects better living standards during this time. However, the difference in incidence once reporting was resumed is profound. I find it odd that anyone would do anything else leaving aside the use of inappropriate terminology e.

Lives saved and injuries prevented vs. It's what's used for all medicine, and indeed there's no credible alternative approach. It is amusing that you'd make this argument, though, in the context of an analogy with nuclear weapons. With nukes, you can't in any meaningful way quantify lives saved, and there have been no lives lost since There's just no meaningful similarity. So what you're saying is, if there's ever a decision to be made where either choice results in some harm coming to some people, the appropriate response is to curl up in the fetal position and start crying?

Any effort to make a decision is cold and calculating and "acceptable collateral damage"? The reason that "acceptable collateral damage" has become a dirty word is because it refers to civilian deaths in the course of accomplishing a military aim, and many people might argue with the benefits of that military aim. But if you are talking about reducing the total number of civilian deaths This is more or less true, but if you really believed that, then the person you should be most pissed off at right now is Obomsawin, because he is lying to people who are just behaving in a way that is part of human nature.

If you really believed that, then we are not the enemy, the anti-vax movement is. They prey on fears that are, as you point out, perfectly natural and expected. You are correct that it is unsurprising that many parents worry about this sort of thing It is this movement which exploits those fears to propagate itself, using misrepresentations and half-truths and outright lies in order to intensify the natural fear that people feel, that's the problem.

If you really believed this rhetoric about "questioning" and "human nature", you would feel a burning hatred for the anti-vax movement. So I can only assume that either a you don't really believe that and this is just mealy-mouthed apologetics, or b the anti-vax movement has succeeded in exploiting your fears and turning your own human nature against the best interests of your child. In which case maybe someday you'll wake up and hate them for the unnecessary suffering they have caused you.

Well there's a new one for me. Usually the line is the benefits outweigh the damage. So if the measles kill 10, a year and vaccines kill 9, vaccines are a good thing? Is that what you mean? Kill 9, to save the lives of 1,? Rob, this is exactly why I pose these questions. You want me dead yet I pose no direct threat to you. One serious injury, much less death, is too many to ignore. Seriously where do you draw the line, how many brain injuries and deaths from vaccines are too many? What would make it a good analogy is if millions of people were being killed by radiation from, e.

Diseases such as malaria kill millions each year. There were other diseases that used to do so until vaccines were developed for them. Now the numbers killed by those diseases are small, small percentages of the former tolls. Do some people die from vaccines? Try finding, from reliable scientific sources, reports of fatal vaccine reactions in, say, the last two decades in a country that keeps such records. Even if you do manage to find a very few, why exactly should this induce us to hand-wringing about "innocents"?

Bacteria and viruses don't attack only the "sinful. Whatever on Earth for? You asked what happened to non-b H. Meningitis is rare and occurs in children with underlying health issues such as VP shunts. I know of no increase in these infections since Hib vaccine was introduced.

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You may not like the teleological philosophy that preventing thousands of deaths at the risk of harming some children is a coherent and desireable outcome. But then the deontological philosophy rather thousands die than one child be put at risk that is deployed by the antivax tag teams is plain wrong.

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Part of my previous comment got eaten during posting - I have no idea what happened. Here it is again:. BTW, what was your point again? Yes, since "kill 9, to save the lives of 1," is wrong. Since vaccines are in fact orders of magnitude less risky than these figures, they're even better. Better abolish cars, drinking water, farming, and everything else in existence, then. Everything has risks; for virtually everything those risks include death.

When they're more than the lives saved and injuries prevented, of course. And in the real world, they are in fact several orders of magnitude less. In all seriousness - do you not see that NOTHING any human does, or indeed has ever done, would be an acceptable activity under the standards you're applying to vaccination?

Or if you do see that, how in the world do you justify the double standard? The anti-vaccine movement never got as much political support, mainly because vaccination is a government programme so they aren't against it, to achieve "consensus" status. Thus you don't quite have to be a guanphrenic to oppose it. However in pure scientific terms I would be interested to know how it is intellectually honest to oppose something purely on the basis that it is not state approved? Thus you don't quite have to be a guanophrenic to oppose it. If you've ever taken any course in introductory ethics, you'd understand why this is a stupid question.

Maybe "stupid" isn't the right word, but it's a meaningless question that is often thrown into ethical debate to demonize the other side, and those who use it are almost always stupid. I am not saying this is the case for you, but that's the only circumstance I've seen it under. Saying that one death is one too many is a foolish standard to hold anything up to. From a purely utilitarian standpoint, your example of 10, lives saved at the cost of 9, lives is completely justified.

The proper way to ask the question is "how much of a return on investment or risk is conscionable to society? There are any number of examples where society seems to be comfortable with an "acceptable" amount of risk. I have no ethical concerns with vaccination, and I'd imagine anyone who does either doesn't know about vaccines or doesn't know about ethics. You can get into arguments about how many is worth it In the interests of time and energy, I will suggest the following - Since you are an HIV denialist, you are a loony and should be ignored.

Ben's parents, measles has a known level of a encephalitis of about one in That outcomes in that 1 in are known to be deafness, blindness, paralysis, mental retardation and death and actually, during the last major outbreak in the USA the death rate was more than 2 per Mumps is also known to cause meningitis, deafness, and sterility along with other things, including death, at a level less than measles.

Now, come up with some numbers with evidence that the MMR vaccine causes death at a rate greater than measles. That means you have to show that at least one person per getting the MMR has died. Since there are thousands of MMR vaccines given per week, that should be an easy number to find if it actually does happen.

Aside from your attempts to destroy herd immunity you may not pose a direct threat to anyone, I guess. Except if some poor misguided soul sees you people in all your ignorant outrage about the evils of vaccines and decides not to vaccinate his or her children, you are a direct threat to them the kids. If not, and I suspect it is not possible, would it be possible to find out where in the UK you can get the three vaccines separately.

The programme raised enough concern in my mind, and that of my husband, that I would certainly travel to the UK to get the vaccines separately for my second child. This is certainly not an issue that of whether or not to vaccinate but rather whether or not to vaccinate by way of MMR or by way of three separate vaccinations. I feel that the evidence is certainly sufficient for the Government to expend a little more energy in researching this issue and not so much in discrediting Dr. If you do have any information as to the venues for separate vaccinations, I would greatly appreciate receiving it.

My daughter developed measles within 48 hours of having the jab. This damaged her eyesight. But I would not take up the booster as she has already had 1 of the diseases. But I would let her have single injections against the other 2. But I am not offered it! Jules Swansea I have a 13 month old son, and I have already cancelled his first appointment for his MMR jab, due to the well publicised ongoing debate about its safety. I have requested information about the immunisations being given separately, but of course GPs and health visitors will only endorse the "Government's" advice and ruling.

If there is possibly a link, and as the Panorama documentary showed that a high percentage of autistic children had a measles virus in their intestines, what is the implication of the first separate jab being given? I understand the Government's view that it is their job to protect the whole community from a measles epidemic, but I cannot understand why they do not give a more free choice to parents to have the immunisations done separately.

There seems to be a lack of information on the subject of the safety and suitability of the separate vaccinations being given. Rebecca Morris Armitage, Staffordshire I am infuriated by the Government's refusal to allow parents choice by refusing to make the single vaccine for measles available. We would then immediately have our children vaccinated, as would thousands of other parents. We are quite prepared to pay. Mr Sandy Batho London If the MMR is safe, then why has the incident of autism increased and before you can dispute the MMR link by saying it is not responsible surely you must then be able to give an indication of what has caused the increase, or at least look into it.

Sharon Ruderham Edinburgh My 4 year old daughter has received the MMR but I am unsure of letting her have the booster vaccine Are there guarantees that if there isn't a problem first time round then the booster vaccine is completely safe? Gillian Pollard Newport My son is autistic diagnosed when he was 4 years old. Why can't children be tested for immunity levels prior to immunisation? They are for the BCG. My son would have been immune from rubella simply by being born as I was immune blood test proved this prior to pregnancy.

Also, daughter has juvenile arthritis, diagnosed a week before my son was born, and I have an under active thyroid. This was not diagnosed until my son was 3 so no medication given until then. I had an overactive thyroid at 11 years old which seemed to rectify itself at puberty. Should all this have been taken into account prior to my son being immunised? Also is measles can cause the terrible illness that that boy had on the programme, then surely injecting the live vaccine could have damaging effects. Mrs Melanie Phillips Croydon I have just listened to parents describing how ill their children became after the MMR, and how they regressed.

That could have been myself describing what happened to my son. When are the government going to listen to the parents, instead of repeating themselves over and over again, "there is no evidence"! However, there is also some work in Sunderland which shows that children with autism often have other biochemical problems. My own son has autism, and an intolerance to gluten. There is a possible mechanism which could link these food intolerances, autism and MMR. I think many parents of children with autism feel that there is a risk that needs a proper research study.

To date, the picture has been black and white - in reality most things are a shade of grey. I feel that parents should be given the choice while more work is carried out. Vaccination rates will only continue to fall, as parents we dutifully take our children to be immunised when we understand the consequences and risks.

It is not fair to insist on an 'all or nothing' approach. My other sons have 'high risk' factors - sibling with autism, food intolerances in the family, and we still have a stark choice between the MMR and no vaccination. This is not a logical or sensible policy for the Government. I know lots of children who have had MMR with no side affects at all and I am aware that the links with Autism are minimal. Laura Morcom Ashford My 15 month old is waiting for an appointment for MMR in hospital, under observation, due to an egg allergy.

My son also has a milk allergy, which was listed I am now really unsure about what I should do. Is there any evidence that an allergy to milk makes children have higher risk? Not all children given the MMR get autism. Not everyone who smokes gets cancer and yet we know that there is a risk because after many years of research the evidence has been proven. Just because the evidence has not been found yet for MMR does not mean that there is no risk.

The government should be allowing parents the choice of single vaccinations until more research has been done to prove that there is no risk whatsoever. Surely some kind of vaccination programme is better than none. Also, Tony Blair, by refusing to say whether Leo has been inoculated with MMR, has missed a great opportunity to reassure parents about the triple vaccine - that is of course if Leo has had all three inoculations at once and not separate vaccinations!! He was fine and appears not to have suffered any ill effects. However we delayed having the pre-school booster.

He is now six. We have not come across any discussion of the giving of the booster and would like to know what current debates there are on this. Does he really need it? Should we go for single dose injections or will he still be vulnerable to the 'double hit' problem? Is there any way of finding out if he is already immune?

Many parents with children of this age and a bit older must be in this position. Rob Bellini Hemel Hempstead It seems a little irresponsible of Andrew Wakefield to tantalise the medical fraternity with a few highly controversial figures related to his new research before disclosing full details of the populations he studied which presumably will not be available for scrutiny until April. I say irresponsible because snippets like those given tonight will only fuel anxieties in the general public which may or or may not of course be needless.

This information would go a long way to helping settling individual concerns but to date has been missing. Why are these facts avoided and where can we go to find them out? Andrew lane Marlow If the MMR measles bug stays in the body for years, then why does the bug not stay in the body's system after having the single measles jab?

We, as parents, should have the choice of single vaccinations. Vivian Kydd Dundee, Scotland It's like being caught between the devil and the deep blue sea I also feel that the advantages of the single vaccines have not been really mentioned at all After she had her first MMR she was extremely ill as she was pretty weak anyway. I am extremely worried about what to do now her booster is due, and have not taken her for it. How long does the first MMR injection really last for - is the booster the same strength? If single injections are available anywhere even if you have to pay for them, then where on earth do we get them?

Having watched the programme I do not feel any better informed, only more confused as to what is the best thing to do to protect my child. With the outbreaks of measles in some nurseries this is becoming an urgent worry. E Briggs York Why are parents who choose the single jabs made to feel guilty? Kate Hamshar London We have a daughter aged 2 years 8 months, who had MMR at the age of 17 months, apparently without any ill effects.

A court has ruled that a 5-year-old boy must get his booster shots, but should vaccinations for children be compulsory across the board? By Michelle Hennessy Friday 17 May , Yes Some should be No I don't know Vote. See more articles by Michelle Hennessy. Contribute to this story: Please select the reason for reporting this comment. Please select your reason for reporting Please give full details of the problem with the comment Stay civil, stay constructive, stay on topic. Please familiarise yourself with our comments policy here before taking part.

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The Irish state is a very bad parent - when its children turn 18 they often end up on the streets Shane Dunphy Sometimes we talk about people ending up as statistics. But there are no statistics compiled for how many children raised in state care become homeless, writes Shane Dunphy.