Can somebody please explain the anti-vax argument to me?!

[Discopanda]

I keep stumbling across vaccinating vs anti-vax arguments on FB parenting pages but I'm still not getting why people are choosing not to vaccinate their children. I thought the whole autism thing was discredited and that was only referring to the combined MMR. It's obviously a very sensitive subject among mums but I feel really ignorant not knowing the other side of the argument.

DS walked and talked at 11 months and had good motor skills.

We agonised over the decision (this was at the height of the MMR furore) to vaccinate or not.

He regressed massively after his MMR and several years later we have a diagnosis of autism.

I can see why others around us would see that and choose not to vaccinate. There's still a tiny doubt in my mind and it's heartbreaking to see him struggling on a daily basis and feel that maybe he wouldn't have ASD if we hadn't done it.

Younger DC has been vaccinated though as I'd rather not lose a child to measles or other serious disease.

I didn't give my kids MMR because my son was damaged by the pertussis (whooping cough )vaccine as a baby.
He had years of medical treatment to help rectify the problem.

We were advised not to go ahead with the MMR.

He has since had the MMR jab as a 14 year old however- a safer age to have the vaccine.

nothing to argue about
With the price like that how can you be anti-vax?

But if seriously - why would you want your children to die of preventable illness? I'm vaccinating my kids and think that everybody should be doing it.
Also, if scientists would find vaccine against HIV and ebola, would these people be against that as well? Doubt that.

I haven't read the whole thread.
There is loads of fear out there about vaccines because (IMO) there is a complete shutdown of any discussion between medics and parents who believe their dc have been damaged by vaccines.

On the whole parents in these cases are largely dismissed, minimised and made light of, anecdotal evidence means nothing etc etc.

Yet who knows the child best? Who has sat with their poorly dc following vaccination and viewed the regression?
I know several parents of dc with ASD who knew something was different abut their dc, but saw a massive regression - loss of words, babbling and eye contact - immediately following their MMR, yet they have been completely ignored.

IIRC Andrew Wakefield didn't say that vaccines caused autism, but said that for some children there was a link, a trigger.

My ds is (my Dh and I fully believe) damaged by an asthma drug he took when he was 6. He is now being assessed for ASD. No-one will listen to us at all, when it comes to trying to find answers (for my child and hundreds of others across the world), there is a complete shutdown. Which is shit.

We are expected to trust our instincts when it comes to parenting, and many drs respect this when it comes to common childhood illnesses, but as soon as anyone speaks "out of turn" saying something that goes against what the GP was told by the pharmaceutical rep, they are wrong, wrong, wrong.

I believe vaccines are safe for the vast majority of children, but there needs to be more research into the dc who are affected and parents, the people at the coal face when it comes to regressions and timescales, need to be listened to.

The trouble with this discussion for me is that anyone who does not vaccinate is (always) placed under the same category and is mocked, told they are stupid and accused of having no social conscience. Posts like 'why would you let your child die' are immensely cruel.

There are people who think vaccination is 100% safe and should be practically compulsory
There are people who think vaccines are astonishing safe and should be a major part of basic healthcare
There are people who are worried because of news reports and scary google info
There are people who are utter cranks who believe that crystal healing and keeping your chakra clear is enough.

But loads of us dutifully vaccinated even though we has challenging family medical histories. And then some seriously worrisome things happened to one of our children. And at that point vaccination becomes a dreadfullly hard decision, fraught with experience far removed from your peers and it is isolating and frightening.
Many of us would love the luxury of just being able to vaccinate.
But we cannot - we make the best choice we can, get what advice we can, and try to live with that.

Being called a nutter whilst coping with children with complex health issues is not great. It is often amazing to me how unpleasant other parents can be about something they are fortunate enough to not have to worry about.

If you can vaccinate without any concerns, if you have never had a child have an adverse reaction or had reason to doubt if a vaccine is the best option then you may well be unaware of how immensely lucky you are. I would swop in a heartbeat.

Pagwatch .

You always remain so calm, I wish I could. I haven't commented further on this thread until now because I know I wouldn't.

I wholeheartedly agree with everything you say.

Very interesting thread.

There are several countries that you cant set foot in unless you've proof that you've had vaccinations. That isn't the case for the UK. Given that the makeup of the UK is entirely different now I feel its wiser to vaccinate..although I do believe there are some risks, its the same with any medicine.

At the time I had my 2nd DD I lived in East London. Shortly after she was born my Health Visitor "quietly" told me there was a huge increase in TB in the borough and I should get DD vaccinated against it ASAP, but it wasn't info routinely given out to mothers. At that stage we all as a family had TB vaccinations

It might seem that way because the bad stuff gets deleted...

I do believe most people honestly honestly just see it as a black and white issue. I don't think most people mean to be cruel. And I think it's because we are all so desperate to keep our children safe.

Sorry I thought this was about the vax vacuum cleaner! {shallow}

My eldest is 16 and is on the autistic spectrum. He was a baby when Wakefield published his findings, although I didn't read of them until after he had had his vaccinations. However, understandably it made me wary of vaccinating my younger two according to the usual schedule and I decided to delay their vaccinations. When ds2 has his first vaccination he had an allergic reaction, which of course made me even warier. They have now been fully vaccinated though.

So I think it is easy today to criticise people for being anti vaccine, but when you are in a situation when you feel like you are balancing risks (and remember Wakefields report was only formally discredited in 2010) then the choice can be less obvious.

MistressDeeCee - I don't think there are countries you can't set foot in unless you've proof you've had vaccinations?

If that were the case, dc with auto-immune illnesses would all need to have special medical certificates to allow them to travel.

I don't have time to write what I want to in full....

But briefly, I am pro-vaccine BUT I don't agree with the multitude that are given at one time to very young babies. The immune system still has to process a response to each vaccinated disease. So, in the case of MMR, you are asking a 12 month old immune system to respond to three diseases at once. This wouldn't happen in "real life" and I think in certain individuals, this could be too much and cause some of the vaccine damage. For example, there was a study showing that children who suffered rubella and mumps at the same time were more likely to experience immune issues later on (very bad summary - I will try to dig out a link).

Because rarely, vaccines do cause damage (not autism perhaps, but other issues).

So I have basically spread my kids' vaccines out a bit and have given the MMR separately.

I couldn't give a shit about people thinking this is quirky or odd. This is about my own instincts as a parent.

Interestingly, I appreciate Wakefeild has been discredited completely due to the way his research was conducted. But has anyone tried to replicate his gut theory in a properly controlled study? I am not sure they have...

to the people who have experienced problems with vaccines. I understand. And I think maybe parents need to be better informed - we tend to do it automatically without thinking - and it is actually huge you are being asked for permission to do something to your child that could have lifetime consequences. Definitely need to balance up the risks. And not be so judgmental. Not all are in Pagwatch's 3rd and 4th categories.
(I dithered over MMR for DD1 being at the height of the scare - I also had DD2 done slightly later - her booster iirc - it was supposed to be at the same time as two other booster vaccines, one another multiple one. Vaccinated against 7 diseases at once I think is too much...(happens at 16 weeks as well - different vaccines) - in nature we are unlikely to be exposed to so many new diseases in one go)
The other thing that has been mentioned in this thread is that vaccination isn't 100% effective...(the BGC/TB is approx 80% effective IIRC).
That isn't a valid reason not to vaccinate.
My children, if they come into close contact with a carrier, now have a 20% risk of getting TB rather than a more or less 100% risk of getting it. Most other vaccines are much more effective. And it could happen after exposure to a disease. Not the vaccines 'fault'.
I know someone who had recurrent chicken pox - when they got it naturally as a child their body fluffed making the template for the antibody. So every time they were exposed to the virus their body made ineffective antibodies to it. Similar could have happened to a vaccine.

OP, whilst it's good to canvass opinions, it's a tricky subject that I think anybody in two minds should research thoroughly and independently.

One of the things that is so odd about vaccination is that, unlikely any other medical procedure, it is not presented in a way that invites choice and consideration. All the government health information heavily promotes vaccination. Here's an example from Public Health Wales:

www.wales.nhs.uk/sitesplus/888/page/66907

I think to truly understand the subject, you do have to look at vaccinations in the context of the pharmaceuticals industry and the way it works, including the processes in place before, during and after the vaccine comes to market. It's important to take into account your personal family history, since the vaccinations are given at a time when you may be unaware of your child's medical profile.

There are views on this thread from people who get cross with those who choose not to vaccinate, believing them to be misguided and selfish. In my opinion, such views are grossly ignorant. Anbody who has thoroughly researched the question of vaccinations will understand that there are many question marks and that it is not black and white.

I'm originally from the US, where they take the anti-vax campaign to levels you could not even imagine, but the few that I've encountered are definitely playing the religion card.

Apparently "some" vax contain stem cells or other discarded products of conception and that does not sit well with their conscience. Or something. They cannot explain it with any level of competence, so I don't even pretend to act like I understand.

I saw Australian 60 minutes interview with a self-proclaimed vaccination "expert" Viera Scheibner. it was horrific. They were discussing a couple who lost their baby to whooping cough, and she basically said they were lying and blamed it on Hep B vaccination. Also claimed that no unvaxxed kids have autism. She's massively active on internet/FB and has a scary number of followers who hang onto her every word like it's gospel.

Fascicle is right - for any other drug there is always great emphasis placed on potential side effects and costs, along with constant demands for more and more evidence of benefit. With vaccines it seems to be the opposite.

Everything hackmum said.

All vaccines carry a risk (hence the existence of the governments vaccine damage compensation scheme) but most of us accept that the benefits of vaccines outweigh the risks.

However some don't and from what I've read, many who choose not to vaccinate aren't 'anti-vax' but selectively choose which vaccines to take.

To be honest, if mumps was offered singly, would anyone really take it? If you knew that there was a risk of significant, long term consequences? And its not even a very effective vaccine.

Obvs, mumps doesn't compare to smallpox I'm just trying to demonstrate that this isn't a black and white issue for many people, just a weighing up of risk/benefit.

Also agree with dishwasher and someone else. There is a huge shutdown on discussion of this on both sides with lots of inflammatory but unhelpful comments thrown about.

But briefly, I am pro-vaccine BUT I don't agree with the multitude that are given at one time to very young babies. The immune system still has to process a response to each vaccinated disease. So, in the case of MMR, you are asking a 12 month old immune system to respond to three diseases at once. This wouldn't happen in "real life" and I think in certain individuals, this could be too much and cause some of the vaccine damage.

I hear the "overloading the poor baby's immune system" argument a lot, but that's just not how immunology works. And let's be realistic here: if there was evidence to suggest that giving multiple vaccines to babies caused harm, then babies would not be given multiple vaccines. Evidence based medicine.

But of course we can't trust the vaccination schedule, can we? Big Pharma is out to get us. The government wants to kill off the weak as population control. Fluoride. Chem trails. Colloidal silver fixes everything!

Sorry, I think I spent too much time on the "What Anti-Vaxers Say" FB page...

I'm sorry you had problems post measles QuietsBatMobile.

I was waving at ionacat because she doesn't know anyone who had it. I'm 53. I had it. And mumps. And scarlett fever. Not least because there were 8 of us children living in one 'two up, two down' house. Plus it was a time when parents were often relieved when these illnesses passed through families and were seen as being something it was best to get over with.
My mothers fear was our getting the illnesses later, when we were older.

It was a different time, different attitude. it seems extraordinary now.

I said way way way back on page one that, for me anyway, this was a thread about people who don't vaccinate for no valid reason except hoodoo

not people like you Pag

But I am sure you would vaccinate if you could - which is the difference

try not to be offended - you are far to sensible to ever fall into the 'vaccines are invented by lizard people to enslave us all' camp

I was pretty much a pro vaxer and my babies were offered a range of jabs against Men c, TB, as well as the MMR of course among others.
But when I saw my poor thin daughter puking her guts up and then not eating for two weeks after the pre school booster, which btw even my HV said was like 'taking a sledgehammer to crack a nut', then I did say no to the last one for my son.
Does that make me a loony anti vaxer or a normal parent?

The preschool booster is diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough and polio, and the booster dose of MMR. Nothing they haven't had already by that age (assuming you immunised to schedule) so I don't understand the "taking a sledgehammer to crack a nut" comment your HV made Sunny?