To ask why people don't vaccinate their DC even though we know that it doesn't cause Autism?

[TheHouseOnBellSt]

www.thespainreport.com/16953/six-year-old-boy-with-diphtheria-in-catalonia-dies/

A 6 year old boy in Catalonia has died of Diphtheria. Why are people still anti-vaccinations?

Why? My SIL has not and is not vaccinating her DS. He's 14 months now and MIL is so worried.

I have read the whole thread and I am aghast at the selfishness of posters such as Cote who seem unable to understand that what benefits society also benefits their own children.

I have sons, they have had their Rubella vacs as I don't want them unwittingly damaging another human being, even the unborn ones. Ds1 had an egg allergy but he still got all his vaccinations.

I don't know what's wrong with your DB 's immune system but you must have noticed that the rest of us get chicken pox only once.

Er, what the what now?

Chicken pox is famous for this! You havin' a laugh, mate?

I've had it twice, an' all. Once at five (diagnosed at the time by an NHS nurse) and once recently, caught off the blimming kids.

Are we now pretending that every stranger in the world matters to us just as much as our own children? Don't make me laugh.
No, of course not. Just that if a very low-risk vaccination for my children, as part of the usual schedule, raises herd immunity and reduces a really devastating risk for pregnant women, then why the hell not do it? The fewer children who catch rubella, the lower the risk of a pregnant woman for whom the vaccination has not worked, or for whom it is for some reason unsafe, catching rubella and having a child with CRS.

The nearest parallel I can think of is giving blood. You know, when they shove the needle into your arm, that you are taking a very small risk of something going wrong. But, like thousands of other people, I go ahead and let them do it anyway. I also hassle my DC to become donors. Why? Because
a) My DM lived the last few years of her life dependent on other people's donations: as a result of their actions, I had her for a few extra years and I hope that as the result of my boring O+, I can help to buy some extra years for someone else
b) I, or DH, or one of the DC, or someone else I care for might one day need to receive blood, and we can hardly rock up and expect to get it unless someone donates it

Don't get me wrong: I can be as selfish, ill-tempered and judgemental as anyone else. But I donate blood, and persuaded DD to become a donor, because for me the risk is hugely outweighed by the benefits to society.

<a class="break-all" href="http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140505192926/www.hpa.org.uk/web/HPAweb&HPAwebStandard/HPAweb_C/1195733752351" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"> La Volcon if you actually look at the data for Rubella in the UK by age most of the cases since 1996 are in older people

mehs good point regarding blood donation.
I'm a regular donor - it did go wrong on a few occasions, but I still give blood as the bit of discomfort I experienced is nothing compared to the benefit it can give to others.

(If we (nhs) did separate jabs for measles, mumps and rubella - my ds would definitely have his rubella jab).

Way back in 1981, in my mainstream history o level - industrial revolution - the topic of improved hygiene/living conditions, inoculations, fewer disease epidemics came up. If I remember correctly, there were question marks then as to whether improved health was related to vaccines or better living conditions. This seems to be forgotten now. I still don't think it can be proven either way.

Debates on the topic now seem to become polarised within the context of risk: the dangers of the illness versus the dangers of the vaccination. The fact that apparent initial success might actually be debatable is forgotten.

Today's intensive vaccination programme could be said to have been built on the assumed success of early vaccination experiments. To me, this is a very good reason to question the immunisation programme.

I think that there are other less risky ways to achieve the same objective of herd immunity and that these need to be explored.

If I remember correctly, there were question marks then as to whether improved health was related to vaccines or better living conditions. This seems to be forgotten now. I still don't think it can be proven either way
How do you explain the resurgence of previously rarely seen diseases within the unvaccinated population? Surely their level of sanitation and other 'living conditions' haven't deteriorated?
I can sort of understand the (albeit ill-informed or selfish arguments) against vaccinations, but to claim they don't work!? Unbelievable.

I can sort of understand the (albeit ill-informed or selfish arguments) against vaccinations, but to claim they don't work!? Unbelievable.

Not claim but question. It's a valid position.

As was mine. Which you haven't answered.

How do you explain the resurgence of previously rarely seen diseases within the unvaccinated population? Surely their level of sanitation and other 'living conditions' haven't deteriorated?

I don't attempt to explain anything. I'm making an observation about a missing area of debate.

With the NHS as stretched as it is, there would be no incentive to continue with vaccines if there were sufficient evidence that hand washing worked nearly as well, or that these diseases didn't cause real problems. Whether a vaccine is given or not comes down to its economic validity and/or how dangerous the disease is.

So, the UK doesn't give flu shots or chickenpox funded by the NHS as the cost of the vaccine is high compared to the suffering if someone gets the illness. Other illnesses are seen as a sufficiently high risk that the government is willing to foot the bill in order to protect people. I don't understand people who think that vaccination is some kind of conspiracy, when really the govt would love to give as few vaccines as possible, and if anything, conspires NOT to hand them out if they can possibly get away with it.

What I don't understand is why people behave as if information readily available and publicised is somehow secret. Everybody knows that there are side effects to vaccines- anything that actually works has side effects. Everyone knows that better hygiene and housing means fewer epidemics and that antibiotics have made some illnesses -for example, scarlet fever- less dangerous than they were. There is loads of research and stuff written about all this- but people bring it out as if it's all hidden by some great conspiracy.

Oh, and everybody knows that vaccination is not always 100% effective.

improved hygiene/living conditions, inoculations, fewer disease epidemics came up.If I remember correctly, there were question marks then as to whether improved health was related to vaccines or better living conditions. This seems to be forgotten now. I still don't think it can be proven either way

Vaccinations reduced infections of some diseases, but better living conditions reduced others; it isn't a simple one or other. Better hygiene/living conditions mean that disease is less likely to be passed on as people wash their hands etc, there's less communal living (running water to house rather than street pumps), population density is lower etc etc. However, even in the 19thC typhoid was no respecter of living conditions (Prince Albert died of it), it wasn't until there were better living conditions throughout society that some diseases took a back seat, and for other diseases such as polio, it wasn't until there was widespread vaccination that the disease all but disappeared from our shores.

Just because more hygienic living conditions are more importance in the pathology of some diseases, it does not follow that you can negate the importance of the introduction of vaccinations in the eradication of other diseases.

there were question marks then as to whether improved health was related to vaccines or better living conditions. This seems to be forgotten now. I still don't think it can be proven either way

This has been proven. Both in terms of an observable immune response to vaccines testable by blood sampling and in terms of exposing vaccinated individuals to diseases that they then don't get.

It's science, innit.

"Cote who seem unable to understand that what benefits society also benefits their own children"

"Unable to understand", no less

It is you who can't understand the issues if you are still banging on about "Ooh so selfish" etc. Yes, it is in society's interest for everyone to be vaccinated for every disease. And no, that does not mean that it is necessarily in every individual's interest for every vaccine.

The entire field of Game Theory is built on the difference between the best interests of the individual and those referred to as "common good". There are Game Theory analyses that specifically go over vaccination questions, such as this one which concludes:

For any perceived relative risk r > 0, the expected vaccine uptake is less than the eradication threshold, i.e., P * < p crit (Fig. 1). This finding formalizes an argument that has previously been made qualitatively (8, 14); namely, it is impossible to eradicate a disease through voluntary vaccination when individuals act according to their own interests. In situations where vaccination is perceived to be more risky than contracting the disease (r > 1), one would expect, even without the aid of a model, that no parents would vaccinate their children.

"Everybody knows that there are side effects to vaccines"

You're right - they are publicly declared in the boxes that the vaccines come in.

Knowing this, you should understand that parents would be OK with taking this small risk for vaccines that protect against high-risk diseases but not so much for vaccines against a very mild and short-lived illness like rubella.

Rubella is mild?

No, not always.

Why don't you argue that vaccination effects are mild and short lived???

"The nearest parallel I can think of is giving blood. You know, when they shove the needle into your arm, that you are taking a very small risk of something going wrong"

Good example. I give blood regularly, despite the small risk of infection and the fact that I feel feeble like a kitten for the rest of the day. It doesn't bother me to pay this price to help others.

What I am not going to do, in this life or next, is let someone stick a needle into my children as infants to get their blood. Or their bone marrow. Or whatever else. When they grow up and can consent to such procedures, I hope they will donate blood like I do. I'm not laying them on the table for it as babies for "the common good", though.

Yes, rubella is very mild. It's also often asymptomatic and goes away so quickly that many parents don't know that their children have had it.

Unless the child catching the rubella happens to be unborn, Cote.

my children are vaccinated before anybody mocks and berates me but I question the ''we know'' part of your statement.

Epigenetics is still in its infancy. It's still being determined which environmental factors switch on genes for autism, we know that we don't know, but we know it's not mmr? I'm afraid I for one am not 100% I can accept that. That doesn't matter. No need for posters to race to call me ignorant or a conspiracist etc.. My chidlren are vaccinated but I understand those who don't want to vaccinate.

I read Dr AW's book years ago. I think his career was destroyed by journalists not doctors, if anybody actually cares. His sample was too small. Having read his book ''callous disregard'' I don't buy in to him being a demon. I don't have 100% trust in any government and I don't like to see anybody mocked and trashed and destroyed for speaking out against a government health practice.

Yes, post the link to The Lancet article and I'll read it! It is a peer reviewed scienfic journal.

gnushoes, surely an unborn child, one who can be legally aborted at up to 24 weeks, can not carry the same right as a living breathing child.

I also have a massive problem with the consent issue. I am expected to consent to someone sticking a needle in my child,, which carries a risk, however small, to protect someone else. I will have no problem with a sane adult who has made a conscious decision doing it, indeed I might well do it myself to protect my child or a family member. But, it's different consenting to my child doing this to protect someone else.

That's why these debates always seem to come back to rubella, rubella is done for someone else's benefit, people feel uneasy injecting their child for someone else's benefit.

I also have a massive problem with the consent issue. I am expected to consent to someone sticking a needle in my child,, which carries a risk, however small, to protect someone else. I will have no problem with a sane adult who has made a conscious decision doing it, indeed I might well do it myself to protect my child or a family member. But, it's different consenting to my child doing this to protect someone else.

I have a problem with this too.