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Lack of Vaccination Sends Babies In Oregon To the Hospital
First time accepted submitter dmr001 writes "In its fortnightly Communicable Disease newsletter (PDF), Oregon Public Health officials note increasing cases of pertussis (whooping cough) in infants, with 146 hospitalizations noted in the 2 year period ending March 2011, and at least 4 deaths since 2003. Most cases are attributed to lack of vaccination, with 86% of those due to parents declining the vaccine. 'Most of our cases are occurring in under- or unvaccinated children, so getting these kids vaccinated seems to the most obvious approach to reducing illness. In principle... pertussis could be eradicated; but we have a long way to go.'"
Today Vermont state will be voting today on taking away the philosophical exemption for vaccination.
You can show your support for this smart idea by contacting
Patti Komline (802) 867-4232,pkomline@leg.state.vt.us
Paul Poirier (802) 476-7870 paulpoirier33@gmail.com
There is a massive anti-vax push here, be sure to show your support if you live in Vermont.
Trolling is a art,
It's the children that died, not the fuck twads that listen to Jenny and watched Oprah.
What the parent deserve to get is prison time.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Wakefield
And he is a murderer. It was a fraud.
Being stupid is no defense, but preying on the stupid is something worse: it's evil.
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Actually the OP notes that 86% "opted out" of vaccination. That remaining 14% is going to include children who can't be vaccinated, or for whom the vaccine doesn't work (i.e. does not convey immunity, for whatever reason).
Both those two groups get no real choice in their vulnerability, but they are affected by the 86% who are being parented by idiots.
Read up on herd immunity. A large part of the effectiveness of vaccines is that beyond the individual protection they confer on most recipients, they also protect the unvaccinated and the ones that the vaccine wasn't effective for if the overall rate of vaccination is high enough.
That's why the people who choose not to vaccinate their kids are also increasing the risk for the kids that did get the vaccine but for whom it wasn't effective for some reason, the kids that haven't been vaccinated yet because they're too young, and the kids that for some reason - e.g. compromised immune system - can't get the vaccine at all.
You are 100% correct - the guy that did that study (autism linked to vaccinations) has been totally discredited - I guess some people didn't get the memo - but yea its really disturbing that some idiot parent that doesn't vaccinate their child put's my child at risk - its totally not cool
Thanks for the link. It's pretty clear:
Mod parent up.
People forget that not everyone can be immunized. The people who can't be immunized rely on herd immunity to prevent a disease from spreading to the point that it is dangerous. When you get large number of people opting out of immunization, the herd immunity becomes too weak to prevent a disease from taking hold and spreading. Once it starts spreading, the likelihood for a non-immunized person to catch it can shoot up dramatically.
There's a lot of Bordetella out there, but the only known reservoir of Bordetella pertussis (the causative organism of whooping cough) is in humans. It cannot live without humans. While pertussis is exceedingly contagious, it is a "fastidious" organism, and can survive only a few hours outside of human hosts. It can be eradicated, in theory, by universal vaccination. The fact that it's a bacteria and not a virus is not relevant. (See Lancet. 2006;367(9526):1926, and Hewlett E. Bordetella species. In: Principles and Practice of Infectious Diseases, 5th ed, Mandell GL, Bennett JE, Dolin R (Eds), Churchill Livingstone, Philadelphia 2000. p.2701.)
you forgot to add in the massively increased chances of getting the disease when herd immunity is removed. The increase would not be insignificant.
Nope, because immunizations aren't perfect. They *greatly* reduce the likelihood and severity of infection which stops contagious diseases from spreading, but it's not impossible for an immunized child to become infected and die. When you don't immunize your child, you are not just gambling with your child's life. You're gambling with the lives of the people your child comes in contact with.
Yes. For example a world-wide effort to eradicate polio is stymied by Islamic fundamentalists in Nigeria who spreading a rumor that the shots are really intended to sterilize male children.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15819797
Ignorance spread intentionally for political reasons has to be the most evil of all human activities.