To think that anti-vaxers may actually being onto something?

[viiz]

I don't have children myself yet but I don't know what I would chose when the time comes. Most of pro vax/anti vax threads turns nasty with people not even willing to try and look at things with others side perspective. Not willing to even consider points of view different than their own and that's a very silly approach. People believed a lot of things that turned out to be false over the years and centuries. Why not to doubt a little?

I was born in early '80s and not in UK. Myself, my siblings and friends were all vaccinated at the time. I don't even remember what I was vaccinated against but had to be pretty basic. Just a few jabs throughout my whole childhood/teen years and nothing 3in1 or 10in1 or whatever they'll bring next.

Now to the point. Reading through hundreds of threads it jumps at me how many children have neurological, behavioural or emotional disorders. No one else sees it really?? I don't know even one person from my childhood including friends, extended family , neighbours etc who would have ADS or ADHD or any other issues like that. I see their children to have it though.

AIBU to consider there could be a link here??

Please be gentle. I hope to have a discussion here. I don't disrespect anyone's views and I only ask to try and ask yourself 'what if'.

I think anti-vaxxers know vaccines work but, after having a bit of a google, would rather risk a life threatening disease for their children than something such as autism, on the basis of a completely made-up and disproven link.

Some anti-vaxxers are genuinely deluded and do believe in conspiracy theories and other batshit bollocks. But there are very few of them.

Most anti-vaxxers know perfectly well that vaccines work and are far, far, far safer than contracting even the least dangerous of the diseases. This big majority are just posing freeloaders who rely on herd immunity to keep their children safe. They know that what they’re avoiding isn’t any appreciable health risk, but the discomfort of injections.

Some extremely clever people have come up with a way to protect our children from lethal diseases which have killed and damaged us for thousands of years. That is AWESOME.

Some other very clever people have worked with people with autism, found new and better methods of diagnosis, and strategies to help them cope with everyday life. As such, people who would previously been ostracized, institutionalized or simply gone through life feeling at odds with the world are now given the help they need. That is AWESOME.

How are there always people who look at the most extraordinary, amazing things that human beings have discovered and achieved and reject it out of hand due to fear and wilful ignorance?

The anti vaxxer I know was genuinely frightened. It was at the height of the mmr propaganda around 13 years ago. She just got scared by what she’d read.

Professor Walker Smith was certainly not against vaccines. He told me to get my son vaccinated with the mmr at the time of the scandal. The other doctor a the royal free also implicated (Simon murch) was the best dr I have ever met and he was devastated by what happened and the horrific increase in measles. So even the main doctors there at the time (not Wakefield) were not saying that the mmr caused autism and thought the mmr was life saving.

To the posted who posted the picture of the two 13 yos.
What's the disease?

I think agree with the poster who said it will take a massive outbreak of measles or something to wake some people up.

There's no link. The reason why people think there are more children with autism, adhd etc is because we've become much better at recognising and diagnosing neurological disorders. Years ago children were labelled "naughty" or "disruptive" when the chances are that some of them would have autism/adhd/ocd/add etc. Just because more people are vaccinated and more people are diagnosed with neurological disorders it's not as easy as making up a correlation/causation.
Regardless of any of that, even if there was a chance that vaccines cause autism (they don't) I'd rather have an autistic child than a dead one!

There is probably a lot less stigma pursuing an autism diagnosis in 2019 compared to 1980. I read on MN that in 2019 there's like a day or two of studying about Special Needs during Teacher Training. I suspect that there was even less back then. Without the Internet how would parents or teachers know that the child had a condition that needed support? How would they know where to get help? Most parents only know their child so their sense of normal is based on that. Schools weren't obliged to support Special Needs so I suspect that those kids were just labelled slow, weird etc

No they aren't. If you don't vaccinate your children for preventable diseases that might kill or disable them then you're a fucking idiot.

I repeat. You're a fucking idiot. Happy to help!

I’m in my late forties and no measles wasn’t considered a big deal back then

That's nice. I am also in my late forties and my aunt died of measles.

There was nothing about SEN on my pgce in 2002!

I’m in my late forties and no measles wasn’t considered a big deal back then

I'm in my early 50s and it certainly fucking was considered a big deal. Children still died of it in the 1960s. I was incredibly ill with measles and it took me months to recover. I still remember it. I don't remember any measles vaccine in the 1960s or any effective treatment. I had to just wait it out.

I was born in the 80s and I have ASD and very mild ADHD but when I was little I was just considered to be a bit of a weird kid. The numbers of diagnoses are on the rise because the numbers of people are on the rise and we are better at recognising and identifying neurological differences. Also, when I was in my late teens and early 20s you used to hear a lot of parents talking about how their kids changed overnight after their vaccinations, that they had regressed or withdrawn. I never hear that anymore because we document our kids lives on our phones and we can see that kids don't regress whereas before it was all after the fact and parents couldn't look back and see that there had been no change.

As a mum with a D'S with autism I vaccinated him with the mmr and would do so all over again because the medics have disproved the link between MMR and autism and actually struck him off because he was practicing unethically. Also I could not live with myself if my child got measles and died, or was affected by blindness or deafness braindamaged from a completely preventable illness.

I wasn't allowed any vaccinations in the 1970s- it wasn't my choice and it wasn't worth it

My DCs have had everything on offer and I don't regret having them vaccinated

Sorry to hear that littlebillie, I had mumps it was miserable.

Yes it’s small pox. I looked it up when I saw the Mary Queen of Scots film and saw that Elizabeth I had contracted it.

To antivaxxers, maybe you could have a quick google of those images too and you will see that it is a far far worse outcome than ADHD. It’s harrowing to see, even worse than the “vaccine damage” photographs.

Thanks for the Small Pox explaining. I'd never heard of the virus that was stated on the photo.
Am i right in thinking the blisters eventually burst leaving people open to secondary infection?

Re measles I'm sure my parents have spoken about a child who lived near us who died in the 70's of it.

I wasn’t vaccinated in 70s either. No idea why not. I got hooping cough and measles. Luckily there was no lasting damage.

I always wonder if anti-vaxxers will be so adamant against vaccination when something like Ebola comes to the UK, with it's 90% kill rate....

It will get here eventually, it's fairly persistent in Africa, and only a plane ride away. Matter of time.

Those registered as anti-vaxx should be last on the line for any vaccinations.....

Well according to this thread, including the story of 3 neighbours with autistic children in each house, generational undiagnosed adults etc etc, the incidence of autism is huge. Therefore chances are it’s not a syndrome in the minority it could just be a normal part of human life. It could be as high as 25% or up to 50% of the population, so fairly average of the population.

If there is supposed to be some level of support for all these people how on earth is that to be funded?

So we are all absolutely certain that the rise in autoimmunity and cancer in children is flat zero to do with the current vaccination schedule? That these diseases, which relate to a malfunction of the immune system, are nothing to do with a multiple stimulation of the immature immune system?

That the research is all perfect and comprehensive and against fully unvaccinated controls? That the golden “peer reviewed” research is a perfect system of a check?

Whilst I agree some anti-vaxxers sound a bit crazy, the utter naivety if this blind faith in “science” sounds equally crazy to me. When did we stop questioning anything?!

I really would like to know why our children are sicker and yes, I would rather risk measles or mumps than type 1 diabetes or leukaemia. And in the 80s, measles really wasn’t a huge deal for the vast majority of healthy children.

Whilst I agree some anti-vaxxers sound a bit crazy, the utter naivety if this blind faith in “science” sounds equally crazy to me. When did we stop questioning anything?!

Have you ever heard of the scientific method? Peer review? Oh, but you put science in scare quotes. I guess that's a no then.

So we are all absolutely certain that the rise in autoimmunity and cancer in children is flat zero to do with the current vaccination schedule? That these diseases, which relate to a malfunction of the immune system, are nothing to do with a multiple stimulation of the immature immune system?

Studies have indicated that exposure to the hib vaccine may actually lower the risk of childhood leukaemia.

Vaccines work. They don't cause cancer or autism or diabetes. That's not blindly following science, it's believing in facts.