I just posted this on Facebook, but have
Measles, a potentially fatal and disfiguring disease, all but eradicated in the US, is making a comeback – yay!
In these United States, I do not believe the government has the right to forcibly vaccinate children. No, Mr. Government, there are limits on what you can do to my person and property, and those of my family. That is the price of freedom.
For those of you who do not vaccinate your children, out of some nutbag conspiracy theory about poison, links to autism, religious beliefs, or just plain negligence – I propose the following legislation:
If you have a child under your care who becomes infected by a disease, for which there is a vaccination (not the flu), you are criminally negligent. No second chances….both parents serve jail time. Maybe 10 years for an infection, and life with no parole for a death. It is your individual responsibility to see that your child is vaccinated when they are young, even if you married a nutjob who is against vaccination, and the topic never came up until someone was pregnant and another human was brought into the world.
Any remaining children are immediately vaccinated and placed in new homes with responsible parents who are more capable of handling the demands of making life or death decisions on behalf of others in their charge.
For anyone still reading, and unsure about vaccinating their kids, I beg you – please vaccinate. I am just a regular asshole, I am not on the side of big pharma or in the pocket of big medicine. I have 2 kids, whom I love dearly, and if I ever had to see either of them covered in painful sores, and even possibly dying because I failed to take action to prevent it – I’d throw myself off the first bridge I could find for being such a poor steward of my kid’s health and wellbeing. I feel the same way about people who only pray but do not seek medical attention, but that is outside of the scope of this comment – same logic applies though.
While there are plenty of theories about the possible negative side effects, please use the logical part of your brain if you have one. If not – find smarter friends, and rely on their judgment more often, and consider the following.
1. Vaccination, in its modern form and methodology, dates back to at least the revolutionary war. I think Washington was having issues with smallpox, and somebody got the harebrained idea of using a dilute version of the disease to build resistance. I’m a little hazy on the details, but you get the point – the practice has been around for 250 years+, and guess what, it worked then and it saves lives.
2. The mechanism of vaccination itself is fairly well understood by science. Our body’s immune system is remarkable. Once it sees and defeats a pathogen, the next time it sees that pathogen – it recognizes it more quickly and kills it before it can cause disease. If you put a weakened strain in there, it’s like training your immune system to recognize and destroy the real thing if it ever gets into your system.
3. Almost all doctors, people who dedicate their lives and swear an oath to try and do no harm and help people live better, healthier, and happier lives, would tell you to vaccinate. Ask yourself, is every doctor, who dedicated him or herself to this noble pursuit, suddenly so under the influence of big pharma and the medical establishment that they would willingly and universally sell out and put babies and small children at risk of deadly illnesses? Ask Doctors if they vaccinate their own children-I bet 99% say yes. These are Doctors…4 years college, 4 years medical school, residency…amazing people-really the best and brightest among us. Not all Doctors, but most. The rigorous training, by design, weeds out most of the incompetent.
4. If you believe there is a problem with the secret sauce in vaccinations – make it your life’s work to provide an evidence-based (studies in peer-reviewed medical journals) argument that links the secret sauce to some very predictable negative side effect and find a better way to achieve the same results.
Understand what those results are..ie – approximately how many vaccines have been delivered to how many people over the past 250 years, and correlate the number of negative, or even suspicious or possibly negative, outcomes to the positive outcomes (ie a life not affected by a preventable and devastating disease). Flu shots count for stats – not criminal negligence – it doesn’t always work as well as one would hope – it’s a quickly evolving, difficult virus to vaccinate for. But you would still need to consider their numbers with respect to negative outcomes or adverse side effects. I often get flu shots, and have not experienced any negative side effects – a 5-minute needle stab is preferable to a a 5-day illness any day.
If you did this, you would quickly understand the benefit to society in general, of an effective vaccination system.
Additionally, looking at that ratio, understand that it is also the idea of the universal application that makes vaccination so effective – these viruses never get a good toehold to spread. When you choose to not vaccinate, you are siding with the disease, in that you are making it easier for the disease to penetrate our society.
Thats my story and I’m sticking to it.