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Time To Remove 'Philosophical' Exemption From Vaccine Requirements?
An anonymous reader writes: Michigan has a problem. Over the past decade, the number of unvaccinated kindergartners has spiked. "Nearly half of the state's population lives in counties with kindergarten vaccination rates below the level needed for "herd immunity," the public health concept that when at least 93 percent of people are vaccinated, their immunity protects the vulnerable and prevents the most contagious diseases from spreading." Surprise, surprise, the state is now in the midst of a whooping cough outbreak. How do these kids get into public schools without being vaccinated? Well, Michigan is among the 19 U.S. states that allow "philosophical" objections to the vaccine requirements for schoolchildren. (And one of the 46 states allowing religious exemption.) A new editorial is now calling for an end to the "philosophical" exemption.
The article says, "Those who choose not to be vaccinated and who choose not to vaccinate their children allow a breeding ground for diseases to grow and spread to others. They put healthy, vaccinated adults at risk because no vaccine is 100 percent effective. They especially put the most vulnerable at risk — infants too young to be vaccinated, the elderly, people with medical conditions that prevent vaccination, and those undergoing cancer treatments or whose immune systems have been weakened." They also encourage tightening the restrictions on religious and medical waivers so that people don't just check a different box on the exemption form to get the same result. "They are free to continue believing vaccines are harmful, even as the entire medical and scientific communities try in vain to tell them otherwise. But they should not be free to endanger the lives of everyone else with their views."
The article says, "Those who choose not to be vaccinated and who choose not to vaccinate their children allow a breeding ground for diseases to grow and spread to others. They put healthy, vaccinated adults at risk because no vaccine is 100 percent effective. They especially put the most vulnerable at risk — infants too young to be vaccinated, the elderly, people with medical conditions that prevent vaccination, and those undergoing cancer treatments or whose immune systems have been weakened." They also encourage tightening the restrictions on religious and medical waivers so that people don't just check a different box on the exemption form to get the same result. "They are free to continue believing vaccines are harmful, even as the entire medical and scientific communities try in vain to tell them otherwise. But they should not be free to endanger the lives of everyone else with their views."
Stupidity and fear.
as a parent myself, i am sympathetic to parents' rights, but if someone refuses to vaccinate their children, schools should refuse to allow them in.
While I think not getting vaccinated is incredibly stupid, I also worry about setting a standard of the government being able to force things in to your body.
Government forcing medical procedures on anyone is really not something we want, especially since government won't take responsibility for the (admittedly unlikely) consequences of a bad result. We need better education to counteract the Jenny McCarthys. Slashdotters seem to be quick to berate the "thinkofthechildren" types, until it comes to medicine. I am sorry if this sounds callous to you, but maintaining our personal freedoms from government tyranny is more important than making sure a few children don't get sick.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
So if you don't want it because you have an invisible friend, then that's ok. If you don't want it because you have a supposedly reasoned and cogent objection, that's not ok?
That would never happen. How could you pass that rule? If you did, how would you ever enforce that?
Better to simply specify that people must be vaccinated to attend school, get a government job, and receive public benefits.
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
Yeah, I'm totally going to trust a naturalist with no formal training to give me advice on advanced medicine. Especially when they are selling herbal remedies at the same time.
Don't think vaccines are safe? Try polio, rubella, whooping cough, and measles. See how safe you feel when your kid might catch one of those at school.
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
Yeah, because litigation is the best social tool and we should be using more of it. How about, if you come down with something, it's your problem for not getting yourself vaccinated.
Free country, sure. You're free to be foolish and suffer the consequences. You aren't free to drive on the sidewalk, discharge your firearm at a Walmart for target practice, or take a shit on the president's desk.
Similarly, we should not be free to endanger public health with disease. If you want to remain unvaccinated, do so in your own backwoods shack, away from us. Thanks.
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
You'd be amazed what stupid people will agree to do for a tenner.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
How far are you willing to go to enforce this?
Before you suggest using the law to force anyone to do anything, ask yourself just how far you are willing to go, and if you're okay with the gruesome outcome when someone refuses.
In the case of forced vaccination, will you be okay with police officers breaking into someone's (possibly barricaded) house to make way for a paramedic squad from the local hospital to physically restrain the occupants (including, and probably especially, young children) and then, if they resist, inject them with sedatives to ensure nobody gets hurt (which may have already happened if the occupants are militant). At that point you can give them the vaccinations by force and exit.
If you feel comfortable with that (and the likely outcome of mentally scarred children, and likely to be in the future physically violent against authority adults), then the answer is yes. If you find that an uncomfortable scene to imagine, then the answer is no.
There is always someone who will take whatever law you have to its ultimate conclusion. In the case of certain laws, it ends at a fine (and whatever fallout comes from refusal to pay it out). In the case of something like this, the ultimate conclusion from forced vaccination is going to be physical violence from the government--there's no way around it.
Everyone else is free to bar you from THEIR offices schools stores transportation businesses hospitals etc
Unless you want to force them, regardless of whether they want it or not.
Except that often you need multiple doses and time for the immunizations to work. After an outbreak is too late.
We *need* the ability to object to government intrusion on philosophical (or any) grounds in the general case. Attacking that premise just because of these anti-vaccine nutjobs is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The problem isn't actually "philosophical objection", it's ignorance. If the government needs to take a stand on something here, how about taking a stand for improving the public state of scientific understanding and reducing ignorance? Let's start with not letting FDA-regulated things put words like "Homeopathy" on the label as if homeopathy were a real thing. Let's call the Chiropractics out for the fact that their field (and its exemption from most Medical regulation) is based on whacked-out semi-spiritual anti-science voodoo stuff that denies that Viruses actually exist as a real physical thing, instead of endorsing them and paying for them with state-mandated health programs. I could go on. You reap what you sow, and we allow a lot of bullshit to pervade our society that we could be preventing. It's no wonder at the end of the day that a bunch of people are confused and just believe whatever counterfactual pseudo-science bullshit some popular personality told them to believe.
11*43+456^2
I recognize that vaccinations save tens of thousands of lives every year: 100 deaths prevented from chicken pox; 400-500 deaths from measles; 1,000 from polio; over 15,000 from diphtheria. And let's not forget the millions of others who suffered from these diseases without dying. Without a doubt, vaccines have been one of the most brilliant inventions that have made an incredible positive improvement to the quality of life in our society.
But our body is our own. Period. We cannot cross this line. If someone conscientiously objects to a treatment, it is their natural right to decline it.
And if we violate this tenant even in the name of vaccinations, it can be violated any other way "for the greater good." And that's a very, very dangerous precedent to make.
I think the biggest weakness of vaccines is that they were/are so effective. Do you think the anti-vaccine movement would have the strength it has now if polio, whooping cough, measles, etc were as prevalent today as they were pre-vaccines? Of course not. If there was a big threat that your kid could get these diseases at any moment and wind up dead or seriously injured, there would be lines to get vaccinated.
Right now, we're dealing with small outbreaks of disease thanks to the anti-vaccine movement. Sadly, I think it will take a major epidemic before some people accept that vaccines not only prevent disease but that the disease is worse than any imagined "toxins" in the vaccines. I fear that many kids will need to die before the anti-vaccine movement goes away.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
How about, if you come down with something, it's your problem for not getting yourself vaccinated.
FFS, the problem isn't the unvaccinated getting sick.
It's the unvaccinated getting those who cannot be vaccinated, have compromised immune systems, or whose vaccination was less than100% effective sick.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Most people who object to vaccination are either 1) wealthy and well educated or 2) members of certain non-mainstream cults/religions. Let's just say that Mississippi is not particularly well known for having a high concentration of people in either of those groups.
Non-vaccinated kids kill and cripple other kids. Do the children of others have less value than yours? You have a problem with your child. Deal with it. But don't be a monster and endanger the lives of others because of it. You should have the right to send a vaccinated child to public school. What you do with a child that is not vaccinated is your problem.
People used to die from smallpox. Now they don't. That's good enough evidence for me.
How many deformed kids did you grow up with due to polio? Zero? Oh, me too. I wonder why that is.
"Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his spirit"
Yes, such as violating this tenant by allowing the unvaccinated to infect those too young or too ill to receive the vaccine.
If this was a situation where only those refusing the vaccine could be harmed, I'd agree with you. But it isn't. The unvaccinated are killing other people by destroying herd immunity.
Your right to refuse a vaccine does not give you the right to harm others.
there are most likely strong positive benefits to vaccinations in general (although to be fair, and probably to the surprise of many people, if you look at the multi-decade trend data, in theory, the declines in infection could easily be attributable to simple things like generically better hygiene. the statistical significance is far from absolute.)
the larger problem though is not with all vaccinnes per se', but with what vaccines have become NOW, versus even 10-15 years ago. there are BIG changes that have dirty fingerprints all over them.
only real solution (or at least the beginning of one) would be to have truly independent studies done on the linkages between vaccinnes and any number of disease/disorders that have been very strongly linked. the more you learn about the FDA, USDA, big pharmaceutical companies, and their legal exemptions from prosecution, the money's involved.. etc, the more you realize how obvious it is that there are real dangers and risks being passed along to the unwitting public in the interests of $.
before a study like that could happen, awareness needs to be raised, which is difficult in the face of such a full-on propoganda assault. the fact that my comment got downmodded to troll SO quickly, is telling. never mind the fact that i have a gazillion + points here and was not an AC. (although, i was admittedly abrasive, so that part is definitely my bad). i would definitely recommend the documentary i mentioned as a starting point, but simply point out that there are PLENTY of highly-intelligent people raising the issues i am, which the media/general-public are only too quick to slap with a demeaning label in what are effectively little more than ad-hominem attacks.
If what you do with your body starts to affect my body, you better believe that I'll request a say in what you do with your body.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
If a rule really is a good idea, then it should apply to everyone. If we can get by with some people not complying, then it doesn't need to be mandatory. Religion has nothing to do with it.
In terms of vaccines, we just need to arrange for consequences. Your kids not vaccinated, and can't demonstrate a medical reason why not? Fine. No public school for them, sorry. Quite probably other benefits are now off-limits, too.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!