Anti-Vaxxer Sympathy

[Aractus]

And yet the anti-vaxxers here have this for your perusal:

http://www.vaclib.org/basic/basicfct.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephanie_....27s_death
http://naturematters.info/


... and so on. I could link you to scores more sites demonstrating a positive antipathy to the medical establishment, in many cases (as in Messenger's child's death, linked above) driven by personal pain. Now, if you think they will respond to outreach from the medical community, I'd suggest you lack insight into a significant proportion of the antivaxxer community here in America. Your comments may well be pertinent for Australia; I don't know, and because I don't live there, I'm not really interested.

All that "Nature Matters" and Wikipedia links prove is what I already told you - which is that most so-called "anti-" people have a mistrust or fear of healthcare based on past negative experience. The only way to get through to people who have mistrust in the healthcare system is to rebuild it. All you achieve by yelling, labelling, and patient-blaming is to drive these patients further away from receiving the medical services that they need.

The latter first: it's very easy to tell the difference in motive between someone who says, "I didn't vaccinate my child because I can't afford the cost" versus "I didn't vaccinate my child because vaccines are filled with poisons which cause autism."

Now, I don't have exact numbers as to how many people who haven't vaccinated their kids have decided upon inaction based on their pseudoscience, but here in America, their media presence is large, featuring Jenny McCarthy, Joe Scarborough, and Rob Schneider, amongst others, and as the websites linked above (and the many more that I frankly don't have the time to hunt up simply so you won't read them) demonstrate, there is a sizable proportion of people who are expounding this claptrap that, as you yourself have noted already, has been discarded as unsupported claims.  Those people are the antivaxxers to whom I refer -- the term "anti" should have been your clue, because a parent too poor to vaccinate their child is not necessarily against the procedure, obviously.  This is why I am specifically using the terms I have, and your continual muddying of the waters by insinuating that I am railing at all parents for holding these dopey views is irritating, yet you insist on not reading what terms I'm using.

You just lost all credibility with me by misquoting the Wakefield et al. 1998 (ret.) paper - which I already talked about earlier. There is an established positive link between Autism and autoimmune disease. In the future it may even be possible to prevent the onset of Autism in at-risk patients, if there is indeed a cause-and-effect relationship (something that has not yet been fully established). The MMR vaccine has since been vetted by 15 years of researching following Wakefield et al. (ret.).

The fact that you don't even know this, despite the fact that I already told you much earlier in the thread, shows wilful ignorance on your behalf.

You keep on saying "these are the 'ant-' people I'm talking about" - but you already labelled the lady discussed in the OP link an 'anti-'. So you're being inconsistent. You have your own biases that you refuse to move on from.

The fact that these websites are able to persuade people and that the healthcare system is not re-persuading them of the need for a healthcare service is not an indication that health practitioners "can't".

You clearly are ignorant of matters here in America.  I suggest you read more about the movement, loud as it is here, before you take me to task for anything further. This subgroup needs to be shown wrong, because they are harming others by their obdurate ignorance. This is not to say that all unvaccinated children have irrational parents. As you can see from the sites above and elsewhere, they are not interested in what the medical community has to say because they do not trust it -- and that is because of things like the death of a child to a genetic disease that the medical community couldn't prevent. That sort of irrationality cannot be reached by an outreach program in most cases.  You may as well be an atheist in a religious forum, for all the good your outreach will do.

You have once again lost all credibility with me by suggesting people either do or should make healthcare decisions based on "rationality".

That is an entirely different subject and quite irrelevant to the point that antivaxxers are deliberately ignoring the science of vaccinations. If you as a doctor tell a patient that they stand a chance of dying of overdose if they don't stop shooting smack, and that patient goes on ahead shooting smack, whose fault is it? The doctor has spoken in plain simple English; the patient has ignored him in plain simple English.

People who deliberately ignore the information about vaccinations aren't reachable.

Once again you've used that term without defining its parameters. Once again you loose credibility by suggesting that people should be aware of science before making healthcare choices (if that was the case the vaccination rate would go way down, not up).

Furthermore I've already clearly explained that patients who "ignore" information can be reached and I can give you plenty of literature that demonstrates that. I suggest you look on WHO.INT as it has plenty material which demonstrates this. All your contributing is your own biased uninformed conclusions based on the worst type of evidence there is - anecdotal.

Her "negative experience" was simply a feeling that her doctor was treating drug use with drug prescriptions. Now, that could have been the doctor's fault, it could have been hers, but automatically assuming that it's the doctor's fault has no basis in evidence.

It doesn't matter. A negative experience with a patient accessing one health service creates a barrier which can prevent them from accessing other health services. I already provided literature on this, and I can provide plenty more, and you can easily find as much as you need on WHO.INT. I didn't assume it was anyone's fault - she had a negative experience which is an indication that the healthcare service is inadequate or otherwise failed in its delivery - that's what I said, yes? I didn't put any personal blame on any one practitioner. You fix these problems by addressing the system and reforming it in a direction the provides an environment where patients feel safe, and that they are receiving the service and level of care and respect that they expect.

She was the drug-using child of an abusive home environment, and she felt alienated? And somehow the doctor must connect to someone who is alienated, despite the fact that he isn't a psychologist?

This does not demonstrate  your point.

That isn't what I said. Read what I said. You could have a pharmacist, or a nurse clinic, or a community health worker follow up with a patient who is alienated. I've provided plenty of avenues that can be pursued - you haven't any ideas about one.

Actually, in America, poor parents can receive vaccinations for their children, free of charge. You assume knowledge that you don't have in your possession, and this is one reason why we seem to be talking past each other.

I notice that you still haven't answered my point about that 5% uninoculated providing a substantial reservoir to allow for microbial evolution. At this point, I don't honestly expect an answer from you on it, so I'm going to leave this conversation, with this being my last post. You have a nice day, now.

You don't seem to be listening to what I'm saying. I am not specifically talking just about vaccines. If you provide a tiered health service model where poor patients have lower access to healthcare that they feel is important for their health then there is a positive association between them also not accessing the health services that you have made available. You cannot say "oh we're giving the poor people this so they should access it".

As to your last point - it's irrelevant. We're discussing a health service, not the "what if's" to do with what happens if someone choose not to participate in a particular service. The fact that you can't move past that tells me you're incapable of critical thought in this area - all you're doing is parroting the patient-blaming viewpoint.