measles outbreak...

[Sneezyone]

12 minutes ago, gardenmom5 said:

ime: the school district is pushier.

 

They should be. Given compulsory attendance laws, their responsibility to care for and protect the kids in their care is much greater.

[Bluegoat]

2 hours ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Coming from public health, I agree completely with this. There hasn't been enough transparency- but, and I hate to say but, it's because it's a pretty complicated issue that is probably above the average Joe's time and caring to take to understand. It's easier to surf the web and decide. What gets me, is the anti-vaxxer activists committed the same sin they accused the scientists of with over confidence and lack of hubris. They went all or nothing in on it, and then, when the idol, Wakefield, was toppled no one batted an eye. They just drummed up the rhetoric, and that's where the ignorance comes in. People banging the anti-vaxx drum the loudest (ahem, Jenny McCarthy and her ilk) don't understand how infectious disease works, they don't understand how immunity works, much less Pharma trials, or be able to interpret the statistics behind most research papers. They're mad, and they want to blame someone for it, and I get that, but the number of people they've damaged at this point is pretty terrifying through their screeds. Fear is a powerful motivator. 

But this is probably getting way too political on my part at this point, so I should probably shut up now. 🙂

 

Yes.  Though, I am not actually even thinking about people trying to understand vaccination, or even necessarily medical issues.

People have lost the sense that they can trust the scientific community as a whole.  They may not think most scientists or doctors are bad or even incompetent, but they know that there are all kinds of things at play in the scientific community generally.  People know there are issues around funding when it comes from corporations - they see scandals about this in all areas of business all the time.  They have seen major scandals where things were said to be safe, but aren't, be it pesticides or the more recent mesh scandal.  Wakefield himself is an example of this, because it suggests that there could be plenty of other people falsifying data.  I read an article yesterday about how agricultural research is being completely undermined at universities because of industry sticking its nose in.

If you are then trying to decide who to believe about a medical question, without the ability to really evaluate things... well, what do you do?  I think a lot of people are now reflexively suspicious of anything that comes out of major corporate entities, they consider them completely untrustworthy.  Vaccinations maybe stand in, as kind of a symbol for all of that, or an outlet.  Most people probably can't cope mentally with thinking its a crapshoot to make a decision on so many things.

[Sneezyone]

20 minutes ago, Bluegoat said:

 

Yes.  Though, I am not actually even thinking about people trying to understand vaccination, or even necessarily medical issues.

People have lost the sense that they can trust the scientific community as a whole.  They may not think most scientists or doctors are bad or even incompetent, but they know that there are all kinds of things at play in the scientific community generally.  People know there are issues around funding when it comes from corporations - they see scandals about this in all areas of business all the time.  They have seen major scandals where things were said to be safe, but aren't, be it pesticides or the more recent mesh scandal.  Wakefield himself is an example of this, because it suggests that there could be plenty of other people falsifying data.  I read an article yesterday about how agricultural research is being completely undermined at universities because of industry sticking its nose in.

If you are then trying to decide who to believe about a medical question, without the ability to really evaluate things... well, what do you do?  I think a lot of people are now reflexively suspicious of anything that comes out of major corporate entities, they consider them completely untrustworthy.  Vaccinations maybe stand in, as kind of a symbol for all of that, or an outlet.  Most people probably can't cope mentally with thinking its a crapshoot to make a decision on so many things.

i get skepticism. I look to see where studies come from, where they're published and who funded them...but most of the vaccines at issue were created long before these conflicts of interest were a major concern. These drugs aren't cash cows. This is not a crapshoot. This is not Russian roulette. I think we do people a disservice by entertaining the notion that they are. Are there risks to medications, absolutely, particularly for those with compromised immune systems.  Is it a crapshoot? No.

Edited February 4, 2019 by Sneezyone

[DesertBlossom]

27 minutes ago, Sneezyone said:

 

Darwin. It's a thing. I'm OK with that.

Here's the thing though-- a lot of the most vocal and knowledgeable "anti-vaxxers" are actually "ex-vaxxers." People who trusted the CDC's schedule, vaccinated according to their guidelines, and ended up with seriously injured kids.  One of the most knowledgeable people that I know regarding vaccines, who could run circles around most doctors with what she knows, lost her baby after his 2-month vaccines. He. DIED.  Your Darwin comment is completely out of line. 

We need to be able to have serious conversations about vaccine safety and right now that's just not happening. People don't realize that babies today get as many vaccines by 6 months of age that we adults got DURING OUR ENTIRE CHILDHOOD. We need to be able to have real conversations about vaccine safety and, for the love, we need to be able to acknowledge vaccine injury. This is obviously not the thread for that conversation, so I'm going to politely bow out here. 
 

[Sneezyone]

37 minutes ago, DesertBlossom said:

Here's the thing though-- a lot of the most vocal and knowledgeable "anti-vaxxers" are actually "ex-vaxxers." People who trusted the CDC's schedule, vaccinated according to their guidelines, and ended up with seriously injured kids.  One of the most knowledgeable people that I know regarding vaccines, who could run circles around most doctors with what she knows, lost her baby after his 2-month vaccines. He. DIED.  Your Darwin comment is completely out of line. 

We need to be able to have serious conversations about vaccine safety and right now that's just not happening. People don't realize that babies today get as many vaccines by 6 months of age that we adults got DURING OUR ENTIRE CHILDHOOD. We need to be able to have real conversations about vaccine safety and, for the love, we need to be able to acknowledge vaccine injury. This is obviously not the thread for that conversation, so I'm going to politely bow out here. 
 

 

I don't feel like it's out of line AT ALL. There are people who are weaker-- emotionally, intellectually, genetically or what have you-- who are not able to survive and thrive on planet earth and there are many more people who are literally dying for lack of access to vaccines. I'm not going to bend my knees praying for people who CHOOSE not to take advantage of the medical advances we've been given. There's no guarantee that people injured by vaccines wouldn't be killed off (if unvaccinated) by meningits, measles, polio, or even a car accident. All of those unhappy occurrences suck but they're not worth the risk of other people's lives IMO. I don't believe that saving a person from one peril means they're guaranteed life until old age. No one is guaranteed a long life. We've come to see that as our due. It's not. Maybe I'm not as old as the rest of you, but the vaccine schedule today (minus HPV and Hep A/B) is not substantively different than the one I followed in the late 70s/80s. Is there an addl. dose of polio? YES, because we now know two isn't enough. Meningitis, yes, you can save it for near-adulthood. I have too many nurses and third-world volunteers in my family to buy the first-world BS excuses for ignoring/refusing help when offered and then wanting sympathy when refusal bites you in the ass. I think there's a parable about this.

Edited February 4, 2019 by Sneezyone

[sassenach]

42 minutes ago, DesertBlossom said:

Here's the thing though-- a lot of the most vocal and knowledgeable "anti-vaxxers" are actually "ex-vaxxers." People who trusted the CDC's schedule, vaccinated according to their guidelines, and ended up with seriously injured kids.  One of the most knowledgeable people that I know regarding vaccines, who could run circles around most doctors with what she knows, lost her baby after his 2-month vaccines. He. DIED.  Your Darwin comment is completely out of line. 

We need to be able to have serious conversations about vaccine safety and right now that's just not happening. People don't realize that babies today get as many vaccines by 6 months of age that we adults got DURING OUR ENTIRE CHILDHOOD. We need to be able to have real conversations about vaccine safety and, for the love, we need to be able to acknowledge vaccine injury. This is obviously not the thread for that conversation, so I'm going to politely bow out here. 
 

It’s so true. The ex-vaxxers in my life are intelligent, well-informed, reasonable, and level. The vocal opposition is much like what we see here- name callers, angry, and unwilling to have the actual conversations that should be had. I know who I’d rather talk to. 

[Sneezyone]

9 minutes ago, sassenach said:

It’s so true. The ex-vaxxers in my life are intelligent, well-informed, reasonable, and level. The vocal opposition is much like what we see here- name callers, angry, and unwilling to have the actual conversations that should be had. I know who I’d rather talk to. 

 

I’d love to know who’s ‘angry’ and unwilling to engage in ‘actual conversation’. You may disagree with what I said, but I’m not angry or unwilling to engage. I’m perfectly content to let nature play itself out, one outbreak at a time. I’m just not gonna pretend to be neutral when people complain about ostracism. Around the world,  people are dying to have access to the meds we take for granted.

Edited February 4, 2019 by Sneezyone

[sassenach]

1 minute ago, Sneezyone said:

 

I’d love to know who’s ‘angry’ and unwilling to engage in ‘actual conversation’. You may disagree with what I said, but I’m not angry or unwilling to engage. I’m perfectly content to let nature play itself out, one outbreak at a time. I’m just not gonna pretend to be neutral when people complain about ostracism. Around the world,  people are dying to have access to the meds we take for granted.

You. You’re part of the problem. 

[Sneezyone]

2 minutes ago, sassenach said:

You. You’re part of the problem. 

 

Ooohhhkay. Whatever you say. My kids are vaxxed and their titers are confirmed. When we visit family in Seattle they're at least free from measles. No anger here, just impatience with stupidity. What’s my ‘problem’ exactly? Do tell.

Edited February 4, 2019 by Sneezyone

[EmseB]

1 hour ago, DesertBlossom said:

People don't realize that babies today get as many vaccines by 6 months of age that we adults got DURING OUR ENTIRE CHILDHOOD. 
 

Do you know how amazing this is, though? Children being protected from more diseases at a younger age? I do realize it and I thank God, literally, that I live in a place and time where such amazing scientific advancement means I don't have to endure the almost inevitable infant deaths of just three, four generations ago. Anytime I see that side-by-side list of then and now vaccines posted to FB in order to fear-monger I want to comment how absolute glad I am that my kids get more shots.

What I think people don't realize is that our life expectancy has gone up in recent years, not primarily because people live so much longer, but because people don't get diseases and die when they are under 5yo anywhere near as much as it used to happen.

[Jean in Newcastle]

I have found doctors in all sorts of specialties, including pediatrics, who are willing to explain and listen. There is respect for the patient, me as a parent and of course respect back from me to them. I am in a large metropolitan area though and can easily shop for medical care. 

[Bluegoat]

7 hours ago, Sneezyone said:

i get skepticism. I look to see where studies come from, where they're published and who funded them...but most of the vaccines at issue were created long before these conflicts of interest were a major concern. These drugs aren't cash cows. This is not a crapshoot. This is not Russian roulette. I think we do people a disservice by entertaining the notion that they are. Are there risks to medications, absolutely, particularly for those with compromised immune systems.  Is it a crapshoot? No.

 

But it isn't entertaining a notion, it's understanding how trust in institutions works.  If you want people to regain that trust, you have to understand why they lost it, and look to rebuild it.

Ad I think it's important to remember with this specifically, it' snot usually that people think the vaccinations don't work.  They believe that.  It is that they think there are other negative effects - something that could potentially be more complicated and more difficult to see than whether it prevents the disease it is meant to - and these are what is being hidden.   

Regaining trust always depends on people being pretty open about the institutional limits, and problems.  And really, you see this all the time from individual scientists in other settings, many are extremely worried about the methods science uses to maintain quality and credibility - these processes are really one of the bedrocks of the whole scientific edifice, as much as observation and experimental method.  

It seems obvious to some that vaccinations don't fall into this category of things which are now in question, but for a lot of people, everything now falls there. Just like any other institution with scandals will become wholly untrustworthy for some people. 

[Bluegoat]

7 hours ago, DesertBlossom said:

Here's the thing though-- a lot of the most vocal and knowledgeable "anti-vaxxers" are actually "ex-vaxxers." People who trusted the CDC's schedule, vaccinated according to their guidelines, and ended up with seriously injured kids.  One of the most knowledgeable people that I know regarding vaccines, who could run circles around most doctors with what she knows, lost her baby after his 2-month vaccines. He. DIED.  Your Darwin comment is completely out of line. 

We need to be able to have serious conversations about vaccine safety and right now that's just not happening. People don't realize that babies today get as many vaccines by 6 months of age that we adults got DURING OUR ENTIRE CHILDHOOD. We need to be able to have real conversations about vaccine safety and, for the love, we need to be able to acknowledge vaccine injury. This is obviously not the thread for that conversation, so I'm going to politely bow out here. 
 

 

I find the two people I know who are most vocal on this are pretty equally irrational.  The thing is, one is a non-vaxxer/naturapathic/granola/homeopathy type.  The other thinks everything possible should be vaccinated for and it's just stupid to even question whether it is really advantageous to vaccinate for some things - obviously whatever "science" says is true and evidence based.

 

[Momto6inIN]

Standard disclaimer: My kids are all fully vaxxed on schedule because it's the smartest thing to do in my opinion. I have a difficult time understanding people who choose not to vax if their kids are not immuno-compromised, as it seems to be a decision based on very shaky unscientific fear.

However ... I will say that some of the opinions I've seen expressed (here in this thread and elsewhere) about what to do about the anti vaxxers are just as perplexing to me - namely that we should be finding ways to give shots to their kids anyway because they are too stupid to do it themselves. I guess the argument goes that they would be potentially saving lives by making sure everyone is protected so trampling on someone else's rights serves what they see as a greater good. But the anti vaxxers think the same exact same thing except in reverse - it's ok for them to not get a shot and trample on someone else's rights by potentially making someone sick in order to serve what they see as a greater good.

Do people actually think that giving the government the power to inject things into your kids without your consent is a perfectly reasonable response? I think getting vaccines is a good idea, but I came to that conclusion with my own thinking and decided with my own free will to accept that potentially life saving medical care on behalf of my kids. How can I deny that same privilege to others? They have the right to make their own decisions too, even if I think it's a poor one.

[brehon]

9 hours ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Curiosity question since I haven't launched a kid to college yet to know. 

Do Universities not require vaccines for students anymore? I don't think my undergrad did- I honestly don't remember-but I know I couldn't walk in the door to grad school without the full compliment, plus Hep B series I had to get, which hadn't been out when I was a child, and then some others because of working in infectious disease. That was in the 90's.

Has that changed recently? I would think especially in a dorm situation they'd want meningitis, MMR, etc.?

There was a measles outbreak on my university’s campus during the fall semester of my freshman year. Everyone — including the law school students, staff, faculty, etc — had to show proof of a recent measles vaccine or proof that they’d had the measles. Most students had a bar on their spring registrations until they showed proof of disease or vaccine. This was almost 30 years ago. 

My eldest son participated in a week long residential program on a university campus and had to be fully vaccinated.

My feeling is that this requirement for proof of vax or proof of disease has been in place for a long time. In my day, most of the admin, faculty, and staff probably had memories of friends or family members contracting these diseases and either dying or having life-long health consequences. My uncle has post-polio syndrome because he contracted polio in 1946. 

[Pawz4me]

1 hour ago, Bluegoat said:

 

I find the two people I know who are most vocal on this are pretty equally irrational.  The thing is, one is a non-vaxxer/naturapathic/granola/homeopathy type.  The other thinks everything possible should be vaccinated for and it's just stupid to even question whether it is really advantageous to vaccinate for some things - obviously whatever "science" says is true and evidence based.

 

I wonder if this points more broadly to what to me seems an ever increasing inability to see the middle ground, the gray areas? The polarization that is so common in so many things. Too many people who believe their side of the political spectrum is absolutely right and the other side is absolutely wrong, too many people who think some foods are almost to be worshipped and others are unquestionably evil. The whole absolutely right/absolutely wrong, no middle ground way of thinking seems to be its own sort of terrible epidemic that affects so many things. It's not healthy.

Edited February 4, 2019 by Pawz4me

[gardenmom5]

here's an updated article from here.

"Before mass vaccination, 400 to 500 people in the U.S. died of the measles every year, 50,000 people were hospitalized and 4,000 people developed brain swelling that can cause deafness, Melnick said. One to three cases out of every 1,000 are fatal, he said."

those stats should probably be included with any vaccination campaign.

[gardenmom5]

1 hour ago, Bluegoat said:

 

I find the two people I know who are most vocal on this are pretty equally irrational.  The thing is, one is a non-vaxxer/naturapathic/granola/homeopathy type.  The other thinks everything possible should be vaccinated for and it's just stupid to even question whether it is really advantageous to vaccinate for some things - obviously whatever "science" says is true and evidence based.

 

 

I see naturopaths - they vaccinate

they give an option to do so on a reduced schedule, but they understand the importance of vaccination.

I find lumping them in with antivaxxer's uneducated.

[Faith-manor]

10 hours ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Your niece.....wow. Not sure even what to say to that. 

With the bolded, yes!! People watched their kids die and they were helpless, and now people brush that off like some old time ghost story that never really happened. Sometimes I wish that more people could be sent to work outside of any first world country and watch the lines that people will wait in for literally DAYS to get vaccinated because they've lost children or siblings to polio, measles, or other totally preventable illnesses. We have so much here to be grateful for and we piss on it with superiority and invincibility complexes. It just makes me angry. I can't even figure out where the disconnect came from, honestly, that it has reached this point. It's just sad. 

Agreed,

For my niece, the disconnect began with her mother. Her mother embraced some sort of anti-medicine, "natural" healing, essential oils cure everything, iridology, reflexology, Vitamin C and veggies will cure everything including cancer, nonsense and then discovered she could make huge money off it by calling hersel a naturopath and giving very dangerous advice to people in a "practice". She told her daughter that a month after being given her MMR vax, she contracted pneumonia so obviously the vax killed her immune system. REALLY???? She got it because her father had pneumonia first. (It was viral pneumonia.) So she grew up thinking this crap. 

But, I just can't give her a pass anymore. She's dangerous, and I think her children should be taken away from her because she is so incredibly extreme. I've seen them put in very real peril over lack of medical treatment. When they all came down with pertussis (which she did have confirmed by blood work because she wanted to brag that she and her kids had it and survived - staggers the imagination), she sent her very contagious eldest child to her ex husband's house to infect his pregnant wife as revenge and bragged about it. Wife was fully vaccinated, and pretty wise, told her husband that she could have no part in the insanity of his ex, and promptly sent her step daughter home to mommy until she was better. It was a huge fight because niece kept insisting they take my great niece back because she was doing them a favor by building their natural immunity! I couldn't believe it! Who uses a child as typhoid mary???? It was like that scene from Star Trek Voyager where the family deliberately bred a child to sacrifice to the Borg in order to infect the hive with a disease. For the record, my ex nephew in law has exactly NO SPINE.  He should be trying to get custody of his daughter, but he makes no effort at all.

Her child was horrifically ill for six weeks. I thought that child would bust her ribs from the coughing, and end up with a secondary infection that would kill her. All her mother would do was feed her high doses of vitamin C and veggies. After six weeks, symptoms began subsiding, and niece announced, "See! I'm curing it with nutrition and vitamin c!" No one could convince her that this was not true, and the virus had just run its course with her body finally able to form enough antibodies to attack it. Nope. Not in her head! How do you argue with someone so delusional? 

Yes, she has been turned in to CPS more than once for medical neglect. But nothing she does is bad enough, yet, for them to be willing to get off their asses and do anything. I guess she has to be allowed to kill a child before someone goes, 'Well darn. I guess we should have intervened."

And she works as a waitress at a very busy restaurant so the worst thing is she is in prime position to transmit a lot of disease to a lot of people. Makes my brain bleed.

 

[Valley Girl]

10 hours ago, Dotwithaperiod said:

I don’t think the medical community acts like reactions don’t exist. We’ve always known there are downsides and problems. Hell, we’ve lived thru decades of good and bad, yet we’ve been overall an informed population. It’s idiots, pure and simple, who are breeding  more idiots. It’s a willful ignorance, a mentality that the bad old gov’t is out to get them. It’s listening to people in power telling them lies, it’s being just stupid and gullible enough to be dangerous. I have no idea how to educate morons.

We vaccinate for everything except Gardasil. But I have had my fill of pediatricians who are hostile or condescending or vague when I ask vaccine-related quesitons. When I was a brand-new parent, one even told me he was tired of answering questions about vaccines. So the problem isn't just "morons" in the general population. People have legitimate questions. If providers want us to trust them, they damn well better be prepared to have helpful discussions.

[Faith-manor]

43 minutes ago, brehon said:

There was a measles outbreak on my university’s campus during the fall semester of my freshman year. Everyone — including the law school students, staff, faculty, etc — had to show proof of a recent measles vaccine or proof that they’d had the measles. Most students had a bar on their spring registrations until they showed proof of disease or vaccine. This was almost 30 years ago. 

My eldest son participated in a week long residential program on a university campus and had to be fully vaccinated.

My feeling is that this requirement for proof of vax or proof of disease has been in place for a long time. In my day, most of the admin, faculty, and staff probably had memories of friends or family members contracting these diseases and either dying or having life-long health consequences. My uncle has post-polio syndrome because he contracted polio in 1946. 

My boys all had to provide proof of MMR vax or titers in order to attend college. Maybe there are colleges that don't require it, but think a lot of the public universities in Michigan do, and especially so for dorm residents. I'm all for it.

What I love about my boys' schools is that the health center offers them for free, all kinds of vaccines, and freshmen who want to attend but who weren't vaccinated  prior, can start accessing shots a month before school begins. They can get a waiver on their MMR and tetanus in order to move into the dorms because they have started the process so it doesn't delay starting classes. They also offer some that we can't get at our rural health department, meningitis B is one of them. So all of my guys were able to get that vaccine for free. Meningitis scares me when it comes to college students living on campus. It is fatal so quickly, and everyone lives in such tight quarters.Meningitis has been known to make its rounds of college campuses with devastating results, so I was thrilled when they could get the second type.

[gardenmom5]

ime:  when someone's reason for thinking "ABC's bad" is disproven, they find another reason for ABC to be bad, so they can continue to say "ABC's bad".

[gardenmom5]

1 hour ago, Momto5inIN said:

Standard disclaimer: My kids are all fully vaxxed on schedule because it's the smartest thing to do in my opinion. I have a difficult time understanding people who choose not to vax if their kids are not immuno-compromised, as it seems to be a decision based on very shaky unscientific fear.

However ... I will say that some of the opinions I've seen expressed (here in this thread and elsewhere) about what to do about the anti vaxxers are just as perplexing to me - namely that we should be finding ways to give shots to their kids anyway because they are too stupid to do it themselves. I guess the argument goes that they would be potentially saving lives by making sure everyone is protected so trampling on someone else's rights serves what they see as a greater good. But the anti vaxxers think the same exact same thing except in reverse - it's ok for them to not get a shot and trample on someone else's rights by potentially making someone sick in order to serve what they see as a greater good.

Do people actually think that giving the government the power to inject things into your kids without your consent is a perfectly reasonable response? I think getting vaccines is a good idea, but I came to that conclusion with my own thinking and decided with my own free will to accept that potentially life saving medical care on behalf of my kids. How can I deny that same privilege to others? They have the right to make their own decisions too, even if I think it's a poor one.

- my state legislature is working on legislation that would force those "antivaxxer's" to get their kid vaccinated by taking away the personal exemption.

11 minutes ago, Faith-manor said:

Agreed,

For my niece, the disconnect began with her mother. Her mother embraced some sort of anti-medicine, "natural" healing, essential oils cure everything, iridology, reflexology, Vitamin C and veggies will cure everything including cancer, nonsense and then discovered she could make huge money off it by calling hersel a naturopath and giving very dangerous advice to people in a "practice". She told her daughter that a month after being given her MMR vax, she contracted pneumonia so obviously the vax killed her immune system. REALLY???? She got it because her father had pneumonia first. (It was viral pneumonia.) So she grew up thinking this crap. 

But, I just can't give her a pass anymore. She's dangerous, and I think her children should be taken away from her because she is so incredibly extreme. I've seen them put in very real peril over lack of medical treatment. When they all came down with pertussis (which she did have confirmed by blood work because she wanted to brag that she and her kids had it and survived - staggers the imagination), she sent her very contagious eldest child to her ex husband's house to infect his pregnant wife as revenge and bragged about it. Wife was fully vaccinated, and pretty wise, told her husband that she could have no part in the insanity of his ex, and promptly sent her step daughter home to mommy until she was better. It was a huge fight because niece kept insisting they take my great niece back because she was doing them a favor by building their natural immunity! I couldn't believe it! Who uses a child as typhoid mary???? It was like that scene from Star Trek Voyager where the family deliberately bred a child to sacrifice to the Borg in order to infect the hive with a disease. For the record, my ex nephew in law has exactly NO SPINE.  He should be trying to get custody of his daughter, but he makes no effort at all.

Her child was horrifically ill for six weeks. I thought that child would bust her ribs from the coughing, and end up with a secondary infection that would kill her. All her mother would do was feed her high doses of vitamin C and veggies. After six weeks, symptoms began subsiding, and niece announced, "See! I'm curing it with nutrition and vitamin c!" No one could convince her that this was not true, and the virus had just run its course with her body finally able to form enough antibodies to attack it. Nope. Not in her head! How do you argue with someone so delusional? 

Yes, she has been turned in to CPS more than once for medical neglect. But nothing she does is bad enough, yet, for them to be willing to get off their asses and do anything. I guess she has to be allowed to kill a child before someone goes, 'Well darn. I guess we should have intervened."

And she works as a waitress at a very busy restaurant so the worst thing is she is in prime position to transmit a lot of disease to a lot of people. Makes my brain bleed.

 

there are unviersities for naturopathy.  she'd be what with allopathic medicine would be called a "quack" (meaning, didn't actually attend/graduate from the school she's claiming to have training in.).   quackery - in the legit sense of the word, is illegal.

you're niece sounds like she has a great deal of contempt for everyone else. including her own children.   this isn't done out of love.

and typhoid mary worked as a cook.  they locked her up because she wouldn't stop.

[maize]

I've done modified schedules with most of my kids and never had a doctor give me grief over it. I've always approached it by asking the doctor their opinion of what vaccines were most critical to give at a particular visit. By school age my kids are usually caught up completely, though I think my 8 year old still needs his last Hep B.

My younger kids have followed the CDC schedule more closely than the older ones just because life is more complicated these days and I don't want to add extra appointments to get catch up shots.

With diseases like measles I do think we are seeing the effects of most parents in this generation having neither had the disease themself nor even having seen someone go through it. I remember an interaction I had some years ago with someone from my church who was upset that the church humanitarian arm was sponsoring measles vaccination programs in Africa; she was convinced that we were doing terrible harm by vaccinating all those children. I shared statistics about thousands of children dying every year from measles but I don't think she believed them.

Edited February 4, 2019 by maize

[TechWife]

11 hours ago, Ktgrok said:

Also, I'm not sure who benefits from keeping the conversation about autism and Wakefield,but NONE of the antivaxxers I know are worried that vaccines cause autism. They are concerned about other autoimmune issues like diabetes, or about reactions like encephalitis (a none possible vaccine reaction) or just general safety. To continue to try to convince them autism isn't caused by vaccines is wasted effort and accomplishes nothing - because they didn't think it did anyway. 

Except for the one couple that blames our son's ASD on me, because he is vaccinated. Sadly, that belief is still out there.

[Faith-manor]

21 minutes ago, gardenmom5 said:

 

I see naturopaths - they vaccinate

they give an option to do so on a reduced schedule, but they understand the importance of vaccination.

I find lumping them in with antivaxxer's uneducated.

In the case of my sister in law, she calls herself a naturopath but has ZERO training other than some Reiki certification, and some classes from a non-accredited, for profit, the degree isn't worth the paper it is printed on kind of organization. She's never even had an anatomy and physiology class!

It is a problem in Michigan. There isn't enough regulation or enforcement. There are some really great programs for this, one of which is in Arizona and was headed up by an MD, medical professor, Dr. Andrew Weil. Really good stuff. So I know there are very legitimate programs that help blend traditional western medicine with legitimate alternative methodologies. But my sister in law would never agree to study something like that because unless a person needs trauma surgery to save their life or a bone cast, or a prosthetic, she doesn't otherwise believe in traditional medicine. One of her "treatments" for cancer is to tell the patient to starve themselves with radically low blood sugars so they "starve their cancer". I am waiting for someone to die of this and their family to sue her. I would help them find an awesome attorney! She is just that dangerous.

[gardenmom5]

1 minute ago, TechWife said:

Except for the one couple that blames our son's ASD on me, because he is vaccinated. Sadly, that belief is still out there.

I've been blamed for dudeling's asd - but not because of being vaccinated..  some people need to just not talk, as they continually prove what snots they are...

[ktgrok]

9 hours ago, EmseB said:

IME, some practices are refusing to see people who won't vax or people who want to delay for two reasons.

One is liability and a doctor not being able to not vax a kid in good conscience. 

Two is because if a parent thinks the practice is doing something dangerous or wrong by vaxxing on the CDC schedule then that parent should not trust those doctors with anything.  IOW, why would a doctor want to have a patient that thinks said doctor is putting all his patients at risk by vaccinating them? 

How can doctors treat patients who refuse their advice because the patient thinks the advice is harmful? And then the patient does something that, in the doctor's view, actively puts the patient (and his other patients) at risk?

Because that is how informed consent works? You discuss risk versus benefit for that individual's particular case and then the patient/client makes their decision. If we don't have that anymore, we have a problem. One can feel that their particular child would benefit from a slightly different schedule without thinking the doctor is purposely harming other kids by sticking to the CDC schedule. For instance, my kids were not in daycare or outside activities, and I preferred one injection per visit, and I was more concerned about certain diseases than others and discussed what my doctor was seeing locally regarding disease, and ended up using combo vaccinations to cover DTaP/Hib/Polio but postponing Hep B until later. Hep B was not a large risk to my child at the time. My doctor was fine with that, did not feel it put my child at high risk, did not feel it put the public at risk, and I didn't think he was being harmful to his other patients that did get Hep B as an infant. We all had a mature discussion and came up with a modified schedule which is in my chart. 

 

9 hours ago, Sneezyone said:

 

That's just it. I don't feel for these people at all. 

 

8 hours ago, Sneezyone said:

 

I don't feel like it's out of line AT ALL. There are people who are weaker-- emotionally, intellectually, genetically or what have you-- who are not able to survive and thrive on planet earth and there are many more people who are literally dying for lack of access to vaccines. I'm not going to bend my knees praying for people who CHOOSE not to take advantage of the medical advances we've been given. There's no guarantee that people injured by vaccines wouldn't be killed off (if unvaccinated) by meningits, measles, polio, or even a car accident. All of those unhappy occurrences suck but they're not worth the risk of other people's lives IMO. I don't believe that saving a person from one peril means they're guaranteed life until old age. No one is guaranteed a long life.

Wow. How incredibly awful that post is. "Your kid probably just was a weakling who didn't deserve to live" is your response to people concerned about vaccine injury? And yet people wonder why these parents don't trust others with their kids. Maybe because people really don't care about their kids, just herd immunity. 

7 hours ago, Sneezyone said:

 

Ooohhhkay. Whatever you say. My kids are vaxxed and their titers are confirmed. When we visit family in Seattle they're at least free from measles. No anger here, just impatience with stupidity. What’s my ‘problem’ exactly? Do tell.

your lack of empathy and human decency would be the problem. 

10 minutes ago, Valley Girl said:

We vaccinate for everything except Gardasil. But I have had my fill of pediatricians who are hostile or condescending or vague when I ask vaccine-related quesitons. When I was a brand-new parent, one even told me he was tired of answering questions about vaccines. So the problem isn't just "morons" in the general population. People have legitimate questions. If providers want us to trust them, they damn well better be prepared to have helpful discussions.

Exactly, that's part of medicine. 

And for the record, I did the math. My kid was statistically more likely to have a serious vaccine reaction to DTaP than to catch the diseases it vaccinated for, at the time we were vaccinating. (we did/do vaccinate)Yes, that's relying on herd immunity, but a lot of these parents are making the decision at the time, based on current risk/reward. It's not illogical for them to think, "my kid already has some other issues, and he's unlikely to be the first kid in the western hemisphere to catch wild Polio in however many years". One can use CDC statistics and reach valid conclusions that do not involve vaccinating according to the CDC schedule. And then be called a moron by people who don't even know what the word hemisphere means, and everyone applaud. 

[gardenmom5]

1 minute ago, Faith-manor said:

In the case of my sister in law, she calls herself a naturopath but has ZERO training other than some Reiki certification, and some classes from a non-accredited, for profit, the degree isn't worth the paper it is printed on kind of organization. She's never even had an anatomy and physiology class!

It is a problem in Michigan. There isn't enough regulation or enforcement. There are some really great programs for this, one of which is in Arizona and was headed up by an MD, medical professor, Dr. Andrew Weil. Really good stuff. So I know there are very legitimate programs that help blend traditional western medicine with legitimate alternative methodologies. But my sister in law would never agree to study something like that because unless a person needs trauma surgery to save their life or a bone cast, or a prosthetic, she doesn't otherwise believe in traditional medicine. One of her "treatments" for cancer is to tell the patient to starve themselves with radically low blood sugars so they "starve their cancer". I am waiting for someone to die of this and their family to sue her. I would help them find an awesome attorney! She is just that dangerous.

there are universities for naturopathy.  Bastyr is near me (it's catholic btw...)  they receive medical training.  they can prescribe drugs. (not all classes, and dudelings ND has had things she was uncomfortable prescribing for him, but she felt he would benefit from them so she sent him to a neurologist who could prescribe them.).  they vaccinate.

people should go after her over "what naturopathic university" did she attend?/  then give her literature from some of them to let her know, what she's doing is dishonest and she needs to at least call herself something else...

steve jobs didn't think he needed to do the traditional oncology route either.  he died from what is a highly treatable form of cancer. while he did switch his treatment to something more "traditional", it was too late.

 

[gardenmom5]

14 minutes ago, OKBud said:

 

I don't think it's all that deep, nor illogical. Wrong, perhaps, but not illogical.

The same person may need the drugs now because their kid needs help right now...any harm done would be a down-the-road problem. They may question the vaccine because they are worried about hurting their child right now....any benefit from it is purely theoretical and is a down-the-road problem. 

makes it sound like this is an issue with critical thinking skills.  tbh: I have seen a decrease in those over the decades.

[SKL]

Do we know how many of the non-vaxxed children were just really young and had not had their shot "yet"?

Personally I think age 12mos is too young for the MMR shot, so I would not fault anyone for waiting until preschool age, or older if there were health concerns.

[lailasmum]

I've been listening to a podcast called This Podcast will Kill You and it's made me very grateful to have vaccinated kids and for that option to be available so widely. Diptheria sticks in my head as being particularly nasty. 

 

 

[SKL]

19 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Edited, to clarify-- 

Wait, are you meaning in the article outbreak, or on vax rate studies in general?

In the article about the outbreak.  They said most of the people infected were 10 & under.

[DesertBlossom]

9 hours ago, Sneezyone said:

 

I don't feel like it's out of line AT ALL. There are people who are weaker-- emotionally, intellectually, genetically or what have you-- who are not able to survive and thrive on planet earth and there are many more people who are literally dying for lack of access to vaccines. I'm not going to bend my knees praying for people who CHOOSE not to take advantage of the medical advances we've been given. There's no guarantee that people injured by vaccines wouldn't be killed off (if unvaccinated) by meningits, measles, polio, or even a car accident. All of those unhappy occurrences suck but they're not worth the risk of other people's lives IMO. I don't believe that saving a person from one peril means they're guaranteed life until old age. No one is guaranteed a long life. We've come to see that as our due. It's not. Maybe I'm not as old as the rest of you, but the vaccine schedule today (minus HPV and Hep A/B) is not substantively different than the one I followed in the late 70s/80s. Is there an addl. dose of polio? YES, because we now know two isn't enough. Meningitis, yes, you can save it for near-adulthood. I have too many nurses and third-world volunteers in my family to buy the first-world BS excuses for ignoring/refusing help when offered and then wanting sympathy when refusal bites you in the ass. I think there's a parable about this.

And this is exactly why it's not worth having a conversation with you. A healthy baby died because of his vaccines but "whatever" because "no one is guaranteed a long life." But you believe that everyone should be vaccinated to protect the immunocompromised and weak. How is that not hypocritical?

There is a middle ground. We can make vaccines safer. We can adjust the schedule for those who are most vulnerable to vaccine injury. We should be doing more to identify those babies who are at increased risk of vaccine injury. And we need to be able to have real conversations about the real risks of vaccines. Because telling people to sit down, shut up, trust the government and take your shots is only going to alienate people who would be willing to compromise for a safer alternative. 

Edited February 4, 2019 by DesertBlossom

[ktgrok]

35 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

I do get the immediate in a crisis situation- the my child has this behavioral or mental issue now, versus my child may contract Polio at some unknown date. Without having any life experience with a fatal childhood disease in particular, its easier to kick the can down the road. I get that. 

But I think people in general, for whatever reason, tend to see Adverse Events, which are listed on every RX drug package now, as happening to someone else. There is a definite disconnect that Americans have in particular, because your relative risk for an AE in general to any of the psychotropic drug list is substantially higher than the relative risk of a debilitating reaction to a vaccine.  But people do not generally push back on Rx's in these cases like they do for some of the vaccines, and you would think logic would dictate that they all fall under the same category and you would expect the same level of scrutiny when not in a crisis level experience, like a psychotic break or something. But you don't see that play out really on a scrutiny level on things like ADD, ODD, etc. in general. Obviously statistics aren't going to tell you what research or angst someone went through on a decision, but just as far as behaviors, it is an interesting intersection. 

The non vaxxers I know of don't use much in the way of prescription drugs either - the hard core never vaccinate (who are people I know peripherally, not close friends) are more anti everything. The selective or delayed vaccine people (more my core group of friends) are wary of pharmaceuticals and but not fully against them. They certainly research adverse events, etc. They tend to use a risk/benefit analysis. 

Also, people dealing with say, mental illness or autism or ADHD or whatnot may just be freaking wary of adding any new thing to a precarious situation. Honestly, my 6 yr old is due some boosters and I want to give them, but on the other hand, we are in the middle of an acute mental and physical health situation, and I'm not real sure I want to add another variable into that mix. These are things he's already had vaccines for, so has some immunity, which makes me feel a bit better about delaying a little longer as we clear up other things,  but the measles outbreak has again shifted that balance. I'm at this point planning to discuss it with a specialist we are seeing in March, which is what his pediatrician is comfortable with as well. If we see cases of measles pop up in my state I'll take him in immediately for the booster. But I don't think that makes me a "moron" for considering various things and coming up with a plan, nor does it mean I'm anti science, hate my kid, hate other people's kid, etc. 

No, I'm willing to say that those who think you can say, cure scoliosis with the right brand of MLM essential oils ARE lacking in scientific knowledge, but I'm not going to say their kids deserve to die either. I'm going to be polite and try to figure out their thought process and get the right information across to them, because I am going to assume their fears are due to loving their kids the way I love mine, and misunderstandings. 

But hey, it's easier to just totally vilify those that disagree with you these days, right? Let them and their babies die, and treat them like crap, "other" them. That will help. Sigh. 

Edited February 4, 2019 by Ktgrok

[DesertBlossom]

I said I wasn't coming back to this thread, but ugh.

As for the current CDC schedule being a good thing-- I'd like to see studies that show that kids who follow the CDC's schedule are healthier. They've added new vaccines to the schedule under the assumption that our babies' bodies will handle it, but meanwhile our kids are sicker than ever. Nearly half of kids today suffer from a chronic illness. 

I've seen some very reasonable adjusted vaccine schedules, but even those are receiving pushback. Like others have commented, doctors aren't even willing to have the conversation with parents. And it is utterly ridiculous that parents can't talk to their doctor about their child's personal and family health history when creating a vaccine plan for them. What else in medicine is so one-size-fits-all? 

It just absolutely boggles my mind that there are people who applaud the governments' attempts to remove vaccine choice from the people. How many fully-vaccinating people in this thread have admitted to doing adjusted schedules for their kids? There are a lot of people who get almost all the vaccines, minus one or two they have personal issues with. But if you remove vaccine choice from parents you are giving the CDC a blank check. Any vaccine they add, you're going to have to get for your child, regardless of how you feel about it. 

[Valley Girl]

10 minutes ago, Ktgrok said:

The non vaxxers I know of don't use much in the way of prescription drugs either - the hard core never vaccinate (who are people I know peripherally, not close friends) are more anti everything. The selective or delayed vaccine people (more my core group of friends) are wary of pharmaceuticals and but not fully against them. They certainly research adverse events, etc. They tend to use a risk/benefit analysis. 

Also, people dealing with say, mental illness or autism or ADHD or whatnot may just be freaking wary of adding any new thing to a precarious situation. Honestly, my 6 yr old is due some boosters and I want to give them, but on the other hand, we are in the middle of an acute mental and physical health situation, and I'm not real sure I want to add another variable into that mix. These are things he's already had vaccines for, so has some immunity, which makes me feel a bit better about delaying a little longer as we clear up other things,  but the measles outbreak has again shifted that balance. I'm at this point planning to discuss it with a specialist we are seeing in March, which is what his pediatrician is comfortable with as well. If we see cases of measles pop up in my state I'll take him in immediately for the booster. But I don't think that makes me a "moron" for considering various things and coming up with a plan, nor does it mean I'm anti science, hate my kid, hate other people's kid, etc. 

No, I'm willing to say that those who think you can say, cure scoliosis with the right brand of MLM essential oils ARE lacking in scientific knowledge, but I'm not going to say their kids deserve to die either. I'm going to be polite and try to figure out their thought process and get the right information across to them, because I am going to assume their fears are due to loving their kids the way I love mine, and misunderstandings. 

But hey, it's easier to just totally vilify those that disagree with you these days, right? Let them and their babies die, and treat them like crap, "other" them. That will help. Sigh. 

Yep. It's quite sad. I'm becoming more and more convinced that while the "us" and "them" may change depending on the topic, the basic human tendency to "other" people remains the same. Doesn't matter how enlightened or informed people may or may not be.

[ktgrok]

6 minutes ago, DesertBlossom said:

I said I wasn't coming back to this thread, but ugh.

As for the current CDC schedule being a good thing-- I'd like to see studies that show that kids who follow the CDC's schedule are healthier. They've added new vaccines to the schedule under the assumption that our babies' bodies will handle it, but meanwhile our kids are sicker than ever. Nearly half of kids today suffer from a chronic illness. 

I've seen some very reasonable adjusted vaccine schedules, but even those are receiving pushback. Like others have commented, doctors aren't even willing to have the conversation with parents. And it is utterly ridiculous that parents can't talk to their doctor about their child's personal and family health history when creating a vaccine plan for them. What else in medicine is so one-size-fits-all? 

It just absolutely boggles my mind that there are people who applaud the governments' attempts to remove vaccine choice from the people. How many fully-vaccinating people in this thread have admitted to doing adjusted schedules for their kids? There are a lot of people who get almost all the vaccines, minus one or two they have personal issues with. But if you remove vaccine choice from parents you are giving the CDC a blank check. Any vaccine they add, you're going to have to get for your child, regardless of how you feel about it. 

Well, my issue is that with the pushback now (and this is in maybe the last 3 years, mores in the last year) forcing parents to choose fully compliant with CDC schedule or no care at all, that we will have LESS vaccination in the population, not more. AND those kids are now without proper regular care, so if they do get sick with a vaccine preventable illness it may be not be diagnosed at all, or if it is later than otherwise, which means MORe spreading of illness. 

A lot of the pushback by the way seems to be caused, at least here, but the switch from small private practices to large corporate practices. The doctors lose the ability to tailor their treatment to the individual patient even if they want to. Their hands are tied. Here, dozens of pediatric practices are owned by only 3 parent companies - two are hospitals and one is just a giant group that consists of everything from pediatricians to obstetricians to dermatologists to family practice etc etc. So HUGE company. I am have some issues with my son's pediatric clinic, mainly that they don't have separate sick and well waiting areas, play stupid christian music as their hold music, and if you see the doctor rather than the ARNP you wait forever, but I am VERY grateful that the owner/doctor refuses to sell his practice to the local hospital group that keeps trying to buy it. He is constantly being pressured to sell but his father was a pediatrician so he grew up seeing old fashioned, personalized care and won't do anything different for his patients. (that and he is also probably a bit too egotistical to deal with not being his own boss, lol). 

I don't want a board at a corporation determining micromanaging my kid's care or telling my doctor what they can and can't do for their patients. 

(This are the same reasons I won't go to a corporation based veterinary clinic actually - partly related to vaccine issues in fact - I worked at one and saw the issues from the inside). 

[DesertBlossom]

2 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

I don't think I've come even close to saying anything of this sort. Ever. 

Sneezyone did though.

[Sneezyone]

1 hour ago, Ktgrok said:

Wow. How incredibly awful that post is. "Your kid probably just was a weakling who didn't deserve to live" is your response to people concerned about vaccine injury? And yet people wonder why these parents don't trust others with their kids. Maybe because people really don't care about their kids, just herd immunity. 

your lack of empathy and human decency would be the problem. 

You’re taking this very personally. I’m not. I said I cannot sympathize with people who choose not to vaccinate healthy, non-immunocomprpmised kids and then complain about how that choice affects them. Everything else you wrote is a straw man.

Varying levels of health and strength within the human population is a fact. I never said anything about whether those frailties are deserved, in fact, I said that sucks. I don’t believe any of us knows the time or hour of our death and I don’t believe I have control over that. My point was simply that you could  save a child from vaccine injury only to lose them in a car accident or to the very disease the vaccine might have prevented. Feel free to argue with the scarecrow tho.

[Sneezyone]

34 minutes ago, DesertBlossom said:

And this is exactly why it's not worth having a conversation with you. A healthy baby died because of his vaccines but "whatever" because "no one is guaranteed a long life." But you believe that everyone should be vaccinated to protect the immunocompromised and weak. How is that not hypocritical?

There is a middle ground. We can make vaccines safer. We can adjust the schedule for those who are most vulnerable to vaccine injury. We should be doing more to identify those babies who are at increased risk of vaccine injury. And we need to be able to have real conversations about the real risks of vaccines. Because telling people to sit down, shut up, trust the government and take your shots is only going to alienate people who would be willing to compromise for a safer alternative. 

 

Yep, b/c that’s exactly what I said. Not.

[SKL]

26 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

The thing with measles is it's so contagious and lingers so long in the air, it's not necessarily something that kids are only at risk for once they are preschool age, or school age. Almost everyone got it before the vaccine- sort of like HPV. It's that prevalent in pre-vaccine communities. So non-immune people are at risk if they go to a grocery store, a church, or anything else really out in public from the moment they're born. And planes. Oh man, planes and measles is not fun to contemplate. So to me MMR is not the same playing field as say Hep B or even chicken pox. Those have a much more arguable basis imo for delay or exclusion, in the the risk levels are totally different. Measels is a total crap shoot. 

 

But on the other hand, the MMR has proven to cause a significant incidence of neurological injuries in babies.  That coupled with the very low incidence of the disease and low death rate means it is not a black and white question - especially for those who have a family history of vaccine injury or who have other concerns related to their kids' specific health situation.  I agree with the person who said we need to put more effort into identifying which kids are at risk from vaccinations, as well as when children outgrow certain risks.

My experience has been that almost nobody who claims to know more than me is willing to have an actual respectful conversation about this.  To me, when someone refuses to discuss a thing he is supposed to know about, that tells me he actually doesn't know enough to explain it to others.  His own ignorance annoys him so he shuts the conversation down.

As for doctors feeling like they get too many questions and don't have time for that, they should find a helpful resource to which they can respectfully refer parents.  Maybe print it up on a business card.  And if there is no clear answer, then researchers need to keep looking, because parents aren't going to stop questioning.

Edited February 4, 2019 by SKL

[DesertBlossom]

17 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Just to clarify a couple of things. The CDC doesn't set anything. They provide a recommendation.That's it.  Vaccines are really local issues. School districts in particular, hold the most control/power by saying they can keep people out. Of course you have state compulsory attendance laws, but now that most states allow homeschooling and private schools, good luck enforcing that on any level. If you saw how lousy vaccine rate reporting are as a whole, its pretty mind boggling. Many states have zero accessible data recording systems. So this isn't something being pushed down from above. It's local. It's a rec. But again, the schools are who usually push people into compliance short of coordinated local efforts by public health workers. And the schools don't even have to release their vaccine data. It's kind of nuts if you thing about it. But if you think things are disconnected on a state level, just imagine that this is all local. 

I understand that. But when states work to take away personal and religious exemptions, the vaccines they require pretty closely follow the CDC's recommendation. I don't think there are as many, but they still require ones that I personally, don't think should be required for kids, like Hep B. From what I understand, Washington is using this "outbreak" to push legislation to remove personal exemptions as well.  

[gardenmom5]

1 hour ago, SKL said:

Do we know how many of the non-vaxxed children were just really young and had not had their shot "yet"?

Personally I think age 12mos is too young for the MMR shot, so I would not fault anyone for waiting until preschool age, or older if there were health concerns.

I've seen other articles do more referring to ages, some were definitely old enough to have had the shot.

only one had had one shot (indicated younger than 4/5 when the second shot is administered.)

1 hour ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

A similar comparison would be people who won't take prescription meds of any type, and only believe in natural healing, but will take a boatload of unregulated herbal supplements every day. I don't quite get that cross-over group either, and it's not like supplements not being regulated is a new thing. That happened back when Clinton was president, so people have literally had decades to discover that fact. I do get why people have skepticism in areas- I have some myself- but it doesn't make a lot of the behaviors of people any less logical. I guess that's a whole other thread though, because humans as a whole are pretty illogical in general I guess, no matter how hard we try to think we're not. 

I'm a supporter of sups - however, I will am right up there that many on the market are complete junk and nothing but a money maker for the manufacturer (and others don't even contain what they say they contain.)

during 2dd's first year of grad school, she heard every single week in at least one class 'what a rip off the supplement industry is".  this was at the exact same time I had taken dudeling off the few sups his ND had put him on the previous summer.  he was being eval'd at the children's dev center at the university - I wanted them to see him for who he is.  she was one of the first to start "when are you putting him back on his sups???"  because she could see the difference in his behavior and function.

 

eta: I think it's vitamin water (might be a different brand) I think it a complete waste of money, but their labels are entertaining.

46 minutes ago, Valley Girl said:

Yep. It's quite sad. I'm becoming more and more convinced that while the "us" and "them" may change depending on the topic, the basic human tendency to "other" people remains the same. Doesn't matter how enlightened or informed people may or may not be.

I recently read (do not remember where) of a class studying the salem witch trials.  the teacher let everyone know if they were a witch or not.  then, they were to gather into as large a group as possible that didn't contain a witch.  they had one largish group, and a number of smaller ones.   then she had the witches raise their hands.   there weren't any.  the students complained - and the teacher pointed out, there weren't any witches in salem either.

36 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

The article definitely doesn't clarify- since it's reportable though, the CDC is/should going to have information on whether or not they were of vaccine age or not, along with other data. And this is only those who have sought medical attention. So the number of cases is likely higher as you then have your group who does not seek medical attention for whatever reason, be it income, beliefs, or access, etc. The CDC surveillance data published has a huge lag, so it's hard to look up too.

The thing with measles is it's so contagious and lingers so long in the air, it's not necessarily something that kids are only at risk for once they are preschool age, or school age. Almost everyone got it before the vaccine- sort of like HPV. It's that prevalent in pre-vaccine communities. So non-immune people are at risk if they go to a grocery store, a church, or anything else really out in public from the moment they're born. And planes. Oh man, planes and measles is not fun to contemplate. So to me MMR is not the same playing field as say Hep B or even chicken pox. Those have a much more arguable basis imo for delay or exclusion, in the the risk levels are totally different. Measels is a total crap shoot. 

 

one of the articles we saw said you can go in the same room two hours after a person with measles has left - and get sick.  and, they're contagious when they look like they only have a cold and will still go places.

Edited February 4, 2019 by gardenmom5

[SKL]

What about the fact that most other countries don't require the measles vax and so any person traveling into the US could have it?  What's the plan to deal with that risk?

[Jean in Newcastle]

Delayed vaxxers does  not equal non-vaxxers. 

The bill introduced in WA is not trying to take away the personal exemption for all vaccines. Just the MMR. http://mynorthwest.com/1257646/measles-vaccine-washington-state-bill/?

[Jean in Newcastle]

3 minutes ago, SKL said:

What about the fact that most other countries don't require the measles vax and so any person traveling into the US could have it?  What's the plan to deal with that risk?

The point isn’t to eradicate all risk. Even when measles was pretty much gone in the US (a few years ago) there were still people traveling into the country. 

[Frances]

26 minutes ago, Æthelthryth the Texan said:

Just to clarify a couple of things. The CDC doesn't set anything. They provide a recommendation.That's it.  Vaccines are really local issues. School districts in particular, hold the most control/power by saying they can keep people out. Of course you have state compulsory attendance laws, but now that most states allow homeschooling and private schools, good luck enforcing that on any level. If you saw how lousy vaccine rate reporting are as a whole, its pretty mind boggling. Many states have zero accessible data recording systems. So this isn't something being pushed down from above. It's local. It's a rec. But again, the schools are who usually push people into compliance short of coordinated local efforts by public health workers. And the schools don't even have to release their vaccine data. It's kind of nuts if you thing about it. But if you think things are disconnected on a state level, just imagine that this is all local. 

And it would seem very easy to fake vaccination records if you didn’t want to comply, but needed proof. The state my son was born in had an official booklet and in the state where we moved next, his pediatric practice had an official form where they transferred everything. But here, where he’s lived most of his life, the small family practice just randomly wrote stuff at the bottom of a photocopy of a photocopy. It’s been accepted everytime he’s needed to provide proof. I could easily have made something like that up completely by myself. It’s always amazed me that the proof can be so flimsy and easily faked.

[DesertBlossom]

5 minutes ago, SKL said:

But on the other hand, the MMR has proven to cause a significant incidence of neurological injuries in babies.  That coupled with the very low incidence of the disease and low death rate means it is not a black and white question - especially for those who have a family history of vaccine injury or who have other concerns related to their kids' specific health situation.  I agree with the person who said we need to put more effort into identifying which kids are at risk from vaccinations, as well as when children outgrow certain risks.

My experience has been that almost nobody who claims to know more than me is willing to have an actual respectful conversation about this.  To me, when someone refuses to discuss a thing he is supposed to know about, that tells me he actually doesn't know enough to explain it to others.  His own ignorance annoys him so he shuts the conversation down.

As for doctors feeling like they get too many questions and don't have time for that, they should find a helpful resource to which they can respectfully refer parents.  Maybe print it up on a business card.  And if there is no clear answer, then researchers need to keep looking, because parents aren't going to stop questioning.

 

I have found this to be true as well. And I don't think most people have any idea exactly how many vaccines are on the CDC's recommended schedule today. People talk about measles, mumps, polio and whooping cough and then talk about "requiring vaccination" without realizing just how many more vaccines are on the schedule. If we're going to have an honest discussion about vaccines, you really have to talk about them individually. The diseases they prevent aren't all equal, the risks vs benefits isn't going to be identical for each one, they each have unique ingredients, etc. 

For example, Hep B is not easily spread to others. It's an STD, sometimes transmitted via drug needles. A recent study came out and suggested the Hep B vaccine could cause neurological damage in infants. Why aren't we talking about this? The Hep B is easily postponed until later in life, or used only in high-risk populations. But people are too busy yelling "vaccinate your damn kids" to have a real conversation about the concerns and issues that parents have.

[gardenmom5]

1 minute ago, Frances said:

And it would seem very easy to fake vaccination records if you didn’t want to comply, but needed proof. The state my son was born in had an official booklet and in the state where we moved next, his pediatric practice had an official form where they transferred everything. But here, where he’s lived most of his life, the small family practice just randomly wrote stuff at the bottom of a photocopy of a photocopy. It’s been accepted everytime he’s needed to provide proof. I could easily have made something like that up completely by myself. It’s always amazed me that the proof can be so flimsy and easily faked.

not as easy as you think.    those who provide the vaccination must send their records to the state, they give the "booklet/form" to the parent for the parents record- the state has it's own.