Cecelia Wrote:The problem of Anti-vaxxers is exacerbated by quack doctors who proclaim things like Vaccines cause Autism. Then you have people like Jenny McCarthy (what is it with McCarthy's and their witch hunts?) who spread the word. And people start trusting Jenny McCarthy over their doctors.
As a High School teacher, I'm required to get my flu shot every year. (They offer it at our school, but I can't get it there because I have a severe latex allergy. And while they would accommodate me, I'd rather trust my pharmacist) If i were an Anti-Vaxxer, I'd potentially be putting many of my students in danger. Just as children who don't get vaccinated potentially put other children at risk. Particularly ones who cannot be vaccinated for reasons such as severe allergies and auto-immune defeciencies.
It's also in a way a form of child abuse not to get your children vaccinated. It makes them susceptible to easily preventable diseases.
Feel free to have sympathy for them. But they need to be educated on the dangers of not vaccinating their children, and shouldn't be allowed to just close their eyes and refuse to immunize their children.
Maybe part of the solution is to require publc school children to have their shots unless there is a good medical reason why they shouldn't, such as certain immunological disorders. If the parents feel so strongly about not getting their kids vaccinated that this is not acceptable, they can send their children to a private school that doesn't require vaccinations or homeschool them. That would also reduce their children's contact with public school children.
I'm not anti-Christian. I'm anti-stupid.
