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Mississippi - the Nation's Leader In Vaccination Rates
HughPickens.com writes The NYT reports that Mississippi — which ranks as one of the worst states for smoking, obesity and physical inactivity — seldom is viewed as a leader on health issues. But it is one of two states that permit neither religious nor philosophical exemptions to its vaccination program. Only children with medical conditions that would be exacerbated by vaccines may enroll in Mississippi schools without completing the immunization schedule, which calls for five vaccines. With a vaccination rate of greater than 99.7%, Mississippi leads the national median by five percentage points and has the country's highest immunization rate among kindergarten students.
However, in recent weeks, the nearly unbending nature of Mississippi's law requiring students to be vaccinated has been in jeopardy, with two dozen lawmakers publicly supporting an exemption for "conscientious beliefs" turning Mississippi into one more battleground between medical experts who champion vaccinations and parents who fear the government's role in medical decision-making. "We have been a victim of our success, and people don't realize how bad these diseases are," said Mississippi state epidemiologist, Dr. Thomas E. Dobbs III, before lawmakers met to consider a bill that would have expanded exceptions to the vaccine requirement. Members of the education committee for the House of Representatives, in effect, endorsed the state's current approach. By a voice vote, they advanced a heavily amended version of the bill that now calls for only technical changes to Mississippi's law, which has been largely untouched since the late 1970s. The amended version of House Bill 130 puts into law the state's existing practice of granting medical waivers to children whose physicians request them, and in doing so, removes the Mississippi Department of Health's ability to deny such requests. "If a medical professional thinks it's wise not to vaccinate, then that will be the gospel," said House Education Committee Chairman John Moore, R-Brandon.
However, in recent weeks, the nearly unbending nature of Mississippi's law requiring students to be vaccinated has been in jeopardy, with two dozen lawmakers publicly supporting an exemption for "conscientious beliefs" turning Mississippi into one more battleground between medical experts who champion vaccinations and parents who fear the government's role in medical decision-making. "We have been a victim of our success, and people don't realize how bad these diseases are," said Mississippi state epidemiologist, Dr. Thomas E. Dobbs III, before lawmakers met to consider a bill that would have expanded exceptions to the vaccine requirement. Members of the education committee for the House of Representatives, in effect, endorsed the state's current approach. By a voice vote, they advanced a heavily amended version of the bill that now calls for only technical changes to Mississippi's law, which has been largely untouched since the late 1970s. The amended version of House Bill 130 puts into law the state's existing practice of granting medical waivers to children whose physicians request them, and in doing so, removes the Mississippi Department of Health's ability to deny such requests. "If a medical professional thinks it's wise not to vaccinate, then that will be the gospel," said House Education Committee Chairman John Moore, R-Brandon.
Does Mississippi have more Autistic children than other states with lower vaccination rates? I think that should be looked at so maybe we can show that this is not the cause of Autism.
I guess the only question is, how far do you take it when determining that somebody is harming their children. I definitely think that everybody except the tiny percentage of individuals who have a medical condition should be vaccinated against things like measles. But I'm not so sure about things like chicken pox or the flu vaccine. While these vaccines are good and safe, I wouldn't think that somebody choosing not to give those to their children should be charged with endangering their life or well being. Where I live, it's illegal to smoke in your car if you have kids under 16 with you. That's probably a good thing as cars are very enclosed, and kids would inhale quite a bit of second hand smoke. However, there is no similar law for now smoking in a private residence, even though kids spend a lot of time at home, and if their parent smokes inside, they are much more likely to inhale second hand smoke in the house than the short amount of time they might be in the car.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Parents are granted a tremendous amount of leeway over what to do with their children. But at the end of the day, children are not "things" for parents to do with as they wish. They're people. A parent may have a sincere and deeply held belief that children don't actually need to eat, that if they meditate enough they can gather the energy they need from the sun. But that doesn't mean that Child Protective Services aren't going to get involved if the parents refuse to feed their child. No, there's no easy definition for where the line between parental rights / belief dominate and where child abuse begins should be. But there must be a line.
At one point our country felt there must be a line between Church and State.
Ironically, the dissolving of that line led to the issues we now face today.
The problem is not that we don't feel there should be a line. The problem is enforcing the damn thing with some science and common sense.
You're right, parents are granted a lot of leeway. The problem these days is they come armed with a lawyer to defend that leeway, and we allow it rather than override for the common good.
So parents can't treat their kids like "property", but the government can?
Not vaccinating your kids is stupid. But forcing people to do it to send their kids to public school, then forcing them to attend said public school unless they're rich enough to pay for a private school, is class warfare. I hope these states have charter schools and/or a voucher program.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
I can see waiting on Varicella until around age 9 or 10, as pre-puberty symptoms of chicken pox are generally pretty mild.
It's pretty stupid to NOT get the Varicella vaccine after the onset of puberty if you haven't had chicken pox yet, as symptoms increase significantly as you age. IIRC, symptoms post-puberty can include permanent debilitation and/or death depending on person and age.
For the other vaccines listed, you'd have to be pretty stupid to not get them as early as you can, as all of those diseases have a high risk of debilitation and/or death regardless of age.
The anti-vaccine people are the most selfishly stupid people on this planet. Citing a discredited report linking vaccines to autism, taking medical advice from a media whore that appeared on Oprah over that of scientists and doctors, quoting conspiracy theory websites, and claiming "special knowledge" that is being "kept hidden", they put the very young who have not been immunized at risk of completely preventable diseases.
They also put those who are on anti-rejection drugs after a transplant at risk. And those who are chemotherapy. And those who are on retroviral drugs.
All they think about is their own paranoid delusions of a grand conspiracy "out to get them."
John Cleese describes them better than I can:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvVPdyYeaQU
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
I have a friend who, in her thirties, just got measles from one of her son's friends, and now she's lost her hearing -- a fairly common, and often permanent, complication of measles. She's trying to sue the parents, on the basis of one of them posting about how they didn't vaccinate their child because they didn't believe in it. She figures that if a person who has AIDS and has unprotected sex with people can be charged with murder -- a criminal act -- she should be able to win a civil judgment for at least negligence.
If it works, it could be an interesting new chapter in the vaccination story, and does raise the question of why AIDS is handled differently than measles.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.