So, Imaginistan?
Folks, be careful.
Saying âF* youâ to âanti-vaxxersâ is going to backfire. Itâs counter-productive. Itâs going to widen the knowledge gap and cause more outbreaks. These are, in general, perfectly sensible people and concerned parents, who simply have been mis-/disinformed. The only way to convince such people is to stay calm and explain the benefits of vaccination in a clear and concise manner, and confront them with the caveats of anti-vaxxersâ arguments.
One of the most notable concerns is that parents all know someone whoâs child is diagnosed with autism. Such diagnosis likely occurs around the 2nd life year, when kids start to develop social skills. This coincides with whatever instance of a countryâs childrenâs vaccination program is in effect. So, the timing is responsible for a clear and noticeable correlation. It is in the human genes to suspect causalities between two coinciding events. However, concerned parents arenât trained scientists, and they have no notion of the concepts of correlation, bias, confounders and causality.
Itâs a complex matter thatâs not easy to explain in an age of short attention spans. Here is a reasonable attempt, that may not be as antertaining as anti-vaxxer videos, but nonetheless scientifically sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VW1IEqKuf6s
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Yeah, I think parents have quite a lot of rights that they should be able to defend, itâs just that they arenât immutable. I can choose which school I send the kids to or even homeschool them, but I canât just keep them at home or send them to work. I can choose how best to care for their medical needs, but at some point the state can insist that I do certain things for their good. We have the right to look after our own children, but that right can be taken away under certain conditions.
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Actually, no it isnât: Study: You Canât Change an Anti-Vaxxerâs Mind â Mother Jones
(link chosen for layperson readability; I can provide academic references if necessary)
Most of the antivax psych research shows that theyâre largely immune to reasoned persuasion. The problem isnât a lack of exposure to the facts; itâs wilful ignorance, selfishness and arrogance.
Youâll never get through to the committed woomeisters. But massed public scorn can be helpful in dissuading the woo-curious from joining the lemmings.
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Seriously. I had varicella at an early age, and got shingles in my abdomen some years ago. I didnât get the worst kind, it was pretty basic, without complications - but the pain, oh the pain! It was excruciating, on par with the worst tooth ache I ever had.
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Ok, so everything backfired, according to that study? 
Whatâs left to do? Call names? Spit them in the face? Witchhunt?
I donât think that they mentioned âinvesting in better educationâ in that article.
But massed public scorn can be helpful in dissuading the woo-curious from joining the lemmings.
Ok, whereâs the citation that helps support that hypothesis?
Well, Iâd put it that you have a responsibility to ensure your child is well-educated, fed healthy nutritious food, and, and, and⌠The actual mechanics of that are open to interpretation obviously, but making sure that they donât die of easily preventable illnesses, or cause others to do so is a non-negotiable plank of the platform IMO.
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Legal enforcement (e.g. âno shots, no schoolâ) and social pressure to contain the problem (e.g. the aforementioned mass public scorn).
You donât need to eliminate antivax idiocy entirely; you just need to keep it unfashionable enough that herd immunity can continue to function.
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My mom - and almost all my 12 aunts and uncles got shingles - one lost most of her vision in one of her eyes. They had horribly bad cases. I had chicken pox.
Itâs scary. Iâm getting that vaccine at the recommended age. Itâs a shame itâs not 100% effective after being infected. But Iâm happy to take what it can provide. Even just minimizing the severity should I get shingles.
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Hey, itâs not so bad. Iâve only had the one attack on the scrotum.
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No one questions the effectiveness of vaccines in the prevention of disease, do they? However, some people for whatever reason have perceived that there might be unwanted side effects. In the UK I got the impression that an otherwise well informed minority wanted the right to opt out of vaccinating their precious little darlings while shifting all the risk onto the majority of other peopleâs children. Not quite so ignorant or woo-driven, really. They were well aware of herd immunity. But they didnât plan for too many people following suit. We have now had outbreaks here in the UK.
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Unfortunately, yes, they do. Dig deep enough into Wooville and youâll find people claiming that vaccines are nothing more than a medical conspiracy to give your children autism. Because reasons.
For the history of UK antivax, see Ben Goldacreâs work. http://www.badscience.net/category/mmr/ is a decent place to start.
https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org is also a useful resource for these sorts of things.
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Itâs an irrational fear. Severe allergic reactions are extremely rare. Ones that cause death are even more so.
What wasnât rare is how many kids got sick and died or were crippled from childhood diseases we can now prevent.
The reward definitely outweighs the risk.
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They are correct in this idea.
Funny, I hadnât seen that opinion anywhere near this BB post.
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You donât say how old he is now, but my daughterâs sensitivity to citrus fruits gradually went away as she entered her teenage years. Your son may be lucky.
I also had chicken pox (and everything else) before vaccines were available. Last year I got the shingles shot, so combining that with crossed fingers I should be fine.[quote=âsmut_clyde, post:30, topic:77181â]
Iâve only had the one attack on the scrotum.
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My like is a sympathy like, not an expression of delight at your experience.
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I donât know if it is a factor here, but that part of Tennessee has a large population of immigrants from Central and South America. Someone traveling back to the Old Country could be a factor. There is also more than a few Christian missionary types who travel to various risky parts of the world. I donât mention these to assign blame, but rather to emphasize that the sort of physical isolation that we have been used to is just not practical any more. We should begin basing preventative medicine on the reality of the current ease of global travel.
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Just FYI - Shelby County, TN is Memphis. There is still a lot of poverty and associated ignorance in this part of the country. There could easily be no political agendas involved, other than the Tennessee legislature.
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Next week, I have to go get a cardiac MRI to see if I need a pulmonary valve replacement. Iâm only 43, but my mom got rubella while she was pregnant with me. For my second Christmas, I got open-heart surgery. Before that, I turned blue and stopped breathing when I cried. When I was 4, I got to stay in the hospital again for an angiogram and a bunch of other tests. Iâve been on heart medication since my early 30âs. If Iâm lucky, Iâll live to see 60.
All for want of one little vaccine (to be fair to my mother, it had only been in existence for a few years before she conceived me.) I donât know about you, but I think Iâd take the eczema. As far as I know, that doesnât shorten your lifespan by 20 years.
I had it in my eye too. That is some incredible pain. To add insult to injury, until I came down with shingles I had believed I was naturally immune to chicken pox (way too old to have had the vaccine, but managed to be exposed half a dozen times without getting it). Apparently, I have an anomalous reaction to the virus where I simply donât get a rash. So at some point, when my brother had it or one of my preschool classes came down with it, I got what I thought was a bit of flu but was actually rashless chicken pox.
I donât get the shingles rash either. Just the pain. It is not less painful without the rash, but it does make getting a diagnosis harder!
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So much so that they routinely find patterns where they donât exist.
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Yes, but
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