to be worried about this consent form?

[LightShinesInTheDarkness]

DD (12) has brought home the NHS Consent form for the HPV Immunisation for Year 8s.

We have decided, in a discussion involving me, DD and DH, that we do not want her to have the vaccine.

However, I am upset that the form says : (quote) Please note that while your consent is important, if you refuse consent the vaccination may still be given

It also says, 'Reason consent refused (PTO for additional space to give us your reason for your decision' - do I really have to give details?

AIBU to feel concerned?

"For an individual who goes onto have a bad reaction to a vaccine - surely their individual risk from that vaccine might have been very much higher than 1 in 130 "

By that logic, no-one would ever take any drugs, on the grounds that there is always a non-zero risk (if not from the drug then from choking on the tablet, an embolism from the injection, a dosage error, contamination, etc) and once you've had a reaction, your risk is now 1. But this is like asking a bookie to take bets on the horses on the basis of the previous day's racing results: anyone can predict events if they know how they turn out.

Unless you have an a priori reason to know that your risk is not the lumped risk of the population, you simply can't know. Most people who drink moderately don't get cirrhosis, but retrospectively you can possibly argue that for those that do contract it their risk was higher than the general population from the outset. But how much of that was susceptibility and how much bad luck is hard to tell.

There's a very low rate of vaccine events, and in a sane world we would accept that, operate a compensation fund, and discuss the risk calculus rationally. All medicine, like all dinner parties, carries an intrinsic risk, however small it is, and insuring against that risk is sensible. Instead, we get frothing accusations of bad faith, in which lurid conspiracy theories about evil capitalists are trotted out, which presume that the entire chain of medical policy making is either sadistically rubbing its hands at causing suffering or counting its ill-gotten gains, plus people who demand assurances of 100% safety for vaccinations to protect against conditions that are not 0% fatal.

"Unless you have an a priori reason to know that your risk is not the lumped risk of the population, you simply can't know."

It is possible to find out but no one is interested.

I think of mitochondrial disorder and Hannah Poling. How many others would have gone on to live normal lives with a similar mitochondrial disorder were it not for vaccines?

"There's a very low rate of vaccine events." An article of faith. We do not know the true rate of adverse vaccine events. I don't claim to know: you do. But really, you don't know, and your entire argument is based on this.

Nobody is frothing but the anti-debate loons: no one is being lurid but the pro-vaccine scare-mongerers.

"Coincidence", and the "rate of adverse event is low". That's all it boils down to: both rubbish. You can't do a risk benefit analysis if you know neither the benefits nor the risks.

I take it then that the view of the anti-vax people is that we shouldn't give polio vaccine? Thanks to Muslim extremists, we have a test case of what happens. Should we stop vaccinating against it?

Just respond to the points Tokyo.

You don't know the benefits: you don't know how effective it is, and if you did it would be a miracle of projective and predictive analysis. You don't know how long it will last. You don't know what the adverse outcomes might be, as you dismiss the possibilities as coincidence without examination.

You don't know nuffink so you've moved onto something else.

In fact, you've moved on to our old friend, the straw man argument. Pshaw.

Well a compensation fund that worked would be good, agreed. It doesn't really exist at the moment though. Payouts on the rare occasions they occur are paltry. (And if your child dies before the age of 2 you won't get a vaccine compensation payout - not that compensation would make much difference, but always seems a bit like adding insult to injury)

I don't agree that you simply can't begin to assess your risk on a more individual level. I've done it with ds2 and ds3 (and could probably have had a bash with ds1 as well). There is enough information out there now to introduce simple screening measures. But it would require a complete rethink of the way the vaccination program is run.

Sorry, so polio - for which the understanding is as good, or as bad in your eyes, as anything else - is a straw man?

Is your objection to all vaccines, or just some?

Appletrees- there are some research groups (Kennedy Krieger in the States for example) who believe that nearly every case of truly regressive autism is due to mitochondrial disorder (not always triggered by vaccinations I should add - it's viruses- that seem to be the problem).

I am watching their research output over the next few years with interest.

Sorry, so HPV: finished with that have we? Shall we finish with that before moving onto polio? In your own time.

MrsTurnip: that is interesting. As vaccine adverse events do not strike everyone I suppose it might be inevitable that there must be "something wrong" with the children it does affect -- but that "something wrong" may merely be "something different" which would not prevent the person having an entirely normal life without the vaccine.

Research into the possibility of adverse event in the individual is shamefully low.

I regard HPV as safe for practical purposes. I regard Polio as safe for practical purposes. I'm simply asking: which vaccines do you think have been proven as safe, so we can compare the evidence for them with the evidence for HPV.

Weren't some of the worst outbreaks of paralytic polio provocation cases though?

recentish paper on provocation polio. Doesn't of course mean that polio jabs shouldn't be used but does highlight how we need to think of the vaccination program as a whole and how various jabs might have an effect on a different jab. I l know in the paper above the culprit was antibiotic jabs - but I believe historically other jabs have provided the intramuscular injection that's caused such problems.

Thought this an interesting polio paper as well. It does make the point that polio isn't a great choice for bioterrorism :) I thought it was interesting though as it addresses all sorts of questions of side effects and efficacy and details some of the complexity of population versus individual health.

Yes but you and your anti-debate cronies have dismissed as lunatic, idiotic and moronic people who choose to question the safety of HPV. Those accusations have been robustly addressed: perhaps you would care to acknowledge that you may have been hasty and that there is in fact good cause for parents to air their concerns?

Appletrees - or even different timing. So a child with a mitochondrial disorder vaccinated at a different age might not have the same response.

Yes.. it would bear out the policy some parents have of delays, given reactions they've seen in their other children.

I believe there were some provocative polio cases: I'm also very doubtful of the benefits of mass multiple polio vaccination programmes of slum Third World populations with poor and non existent sanitation and rampant diarrhoeal disease, given the virus shedding associated with OPV, which is the cheap version normally given in such situations.

However, let's clear up the HPV response Tokyo. You are welcome to your view that it's safe: but really one ought to have the grace to respect the concerns of others and not resort to abuse and mockery.

Here is a doctor who believes Gardasil can cause sutoimmune diseases

and here is a CNN report on a girl who suffered from an autoimmune disease shortly after receiving an HPV Gardasil shot

autoimmune

Re: comparisons. Most (possibly all? MrsT do you know) vaccine testing is done on a watch the market basis with children, like swine flu, after limited clinical testing. As concerns that arise after the product is marketed are almost invariably dismissed, with accompanying smears of the complainants, I don't think a comparison is worthwhile.

See: Cochrane on MMR: inadequate clinical testing: once it's on the market, adverse events dismissed as coincidence. Again.

oh look at this very interesting blogpost relevant to this thread From University of Oxford Practical Ethics blog

I don't know appletrees. I know that cochrane did say that the MMR testing was inadequate and in big part that was because the study involved only a 6 week follow up period (I think - that's from memory so could be wrong- it was short anyway).

There are big problems with under reporting of vaccine adverse events - I do think that is a system that needs to be addressed. Any 'potential' adverse event is meant to be reported. Currently that definitely does not happen and without that information it's impossible to flag problems really. Especially if they're fairly rare events.

I don't suppose anyone is even remotely interested, but I have found some resolution to the issue which was concerning me.

According to the school nurse (and also some MNers, thanks Smidge et al) if neither we as parents nor my DD have given our consent to the vaccine, then she will not be given it. At least, not without further discussion with us and her.

I did say at the beginning of the thread that I believe that DD is still a bit too young to understand all the issues and I do not think she is sufficiently mature to give informed, consent, actually. She will be influenced by us, and school - once older, she will be better placed to make this important decision regarding her own health.

DD and I are aware, and talk about, the fact that sexual relationships are fun and will be an important part of her life. However, sex also carries some responsibilities. I do not expect her to come to me in 3 years time and say she plans to have sex next week (!) but I also do not believe we have to make the decision about the vaccination now, when she is 12.

The school nurse explained that it will make things 'difficult' for her administration if we decide to join the vaccination programme later. We may also have to arrange for DD to be vaccinated privately. I accept that. But I do not want to feel pushed into saying yes because it suits the system.

Good for you light. That sounds like a good compromise. I wouldn't be taking unknown risks with my children to satisfy someone's admin requirements -- hopefully that was a by comment by the nurse and not expected to be a forceful argument!

MrsT: that blog closed on me which was a shame as it looked good. I think eg thiomersal weight safe limits have never been tested on children and babies: merely pro rata-ed down from adult safe limits.

Where are the bullies now?

Have no objection to argument but that sort of ridicule and abuse pisses me off a very great deal indeed.

"Do they allow you sharp cutlery?"

Pathetic.

exactly why did the government think it was so important to override parents' wishes? they have done it on a few other things as well