You're Still An Asshole, Lady

[Heywood]

One of my conclusion is this:  There can exist situations where the parents behave optimally by not vaccinating their kids.  Vaccinations do convey some risk to those that receive them.  Its small but it is real.

I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you mean something like sever allergic reactions (in which case you might be right) and aren't implying that vaccines pose a meaningful risk to the general population.

That was my intent. However I understand that there are some good, peer reviewed, studies which suggest a link between vaccinations and autism. There are more studies which suggest there are no links.

As you can see, some of the state vaccination rates are dangerously close to, or have already, dropped below the minimum required to maintain herd immunity from certain highly contagious diseases. Unless there is a serious medical reason that an individual should not be vaccinated, to forgo vaccination is not only stupid by socially irresponsible.

Most people are not very good at making risk assessments. I believe individuals have the right to be stupid. It is the rights of the herd I haven't settle on.

[Pyrrho]

....  However I understand that there are some good, peer reviewed, studies which suggest a link between vaccinations and autism.  ....

Your understanding is completely wrong. There are no good peer-reviewed studies that suggest that. (Notice, there are two adjectives for the word "studies" in the previous sentence.) There was a study that suggested that some years back, but it was not a good study, and it was retracted. Yet the anti-vaccine idiots still refer to it, even though it has been totally discredited.

There is NO good evidence that vaccines affect autism.

[Heywood]

....  However I understand that there are some good, peer reviewed, studies which suggest a link between vaccinations and autism.  ....

Your understanding is completely wrong.  There are no good peer-reviewed studies that suggest that.  (Notice, there are two adjectives for the word "studies" in the previous sentence.)  There was a study that suggested that some years back, but it was not a good study, and it was retracted.  Yet the anti-vaccine idiots still refer to it, even though it has been totally discredited.

There is NO good evidence that vaccines affect autism.

Here is a study from 2011.  

http://omsj.org/reports/tomljenovic%202011.pdf

Is this the one you are talking about?  If not this must not be a good study.  Why isn't it any good?

I doubt that vaccines cause autism.  I would recommend that all parents get their kids vaccinated so I am not arguing against vaccines.  I am arguing that just because a parent does not get their kids vaccinated does not automatically mean they are idiots....as suggested by Sionnach  Suppose the woman relied upon the above study and concluded that because everyone else around her is vaccinated, it is unlikely her kids will contract a contagious disease.  Why risk, the allergic reaction, the small possibility it causes autism, etc when you can just free roll off everyone else?

[LastPoet]

People are required to take a drivers license, people are not required to take a license to drive a young life.

Man, this is one of those things...

[Heywood]

Darkstar, I think you are being overly generous in your "benefit of the doubt."

But you are quite right to emphasize the herd immunity aspect of this, as selfish assholes view this as an individual rights sort of thing, when what they do is something that very significantly affects others.  If you don't want to vaccinate, you need to fucking move to an island and never interact with others.  If you are a part of society, you need to not be endangering others.  Other people absolutely have a right to object to you endangering them.

Unfortunately, quite a few people with shit for brains have children, and make decisions that one would expect of people with shit for brains.  Vaccinations need to be required for everyone who does not have a legitimate medical exemption.

Again, I haven't made up my mind on this issue.  But here is something I have thought about that you may not have considered.  A vaccination is a body modification.  It modifies a human being's immune system.  Does the state have the right to require anyone to modify their bodies?  Could the state for instance, randomly select 10 percent of all males and force-ably sterilize them in order to control population?  Some would say no, that a person's body is sacrosanct and no one else has any business over it.  If a terrorist release small pox virus, would you want to force everyone to get the vaccine or would you accept the "my body my choice" argument?

[LastPoet]

The state? Fuck them, I don't need to have mine or anyone else's health at risk because of some fucking woo bullshitters. Also, those anti vaxxers could move into a country more suitable to them, one without vaccines. Let their god welcome them to its kingdom or watever. We don't need them anyway.

[Heywood]

The state? Fuck them, I don't need to have mine or anyone else's health at risk because of some fucking woo bullshitters.  Also, those anti vaxxers could move into a country more suitable to them, one without vaccines. Let their god welcome them to its kingdom or watever. We don't need them anyway.

If you don't want to be around un-vaccinated people why don't you move?

I have never accepted the, "My body my choice" argument so I am actually leaning toward forced vaccinations.  Society has some control over your body as far as I am concerned.

[dyresand]

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/04/anti-...ing-cough/

Anti-vaxx mom abandons movement — after all seven her of her kids get whooping cough

Now Hills says that years spent “frozen” out of fear of vaccinating her kids has the whole family frozen: confined to their home by a quarantine.

She said she hopes her mea culpa will make other families who have held back from getting their children vaccinated rethink what they are doing.
“Right now my family is living the consequences of misinformation and fear.  I understand that families in our community may be mad at us for putting their kids at risk.

She is still a fucking asshole and a fucking idiot. It's the same with dumb fuck faith healers god/jesus isn't gonna do shit because they aren't real.
Get your child fucking vaccinated and get him/her to a fucking doctor. 

[Pyrrho]

Your understanding is completely wrong.  There are no good peer-reviewed studies that suggest that.  (Notice, there are two adjectives for the word "studies" in the previous sentence.)  There was a study that suggested that some years back, but it was not a good study, and it was retracted.  Yet the anti-vaccine idiots still refer to it, even though it has been totally discredited.

There is NO good evidence that vaccines affect autism.

Here is a study from 2011.  

http://omsj.org/reports/tomljenovic%202011.pdf

Is this the one you are talking about?  If not this must not be a good study.  Why isn't it any good?

I doubt that vaccines cause autism.  I would recommend that all parents get their kids vaccinated so I am not arguing against vaccines.  I am arguing that just because a parent does not get their kids vaccinated does not automatically mean they are idiots....as suggested by Sionnach  Suppose the woman relied upon the above study and concluded that because everyone else around her is vaccinated, it is unlikely her kids will contract a contagious disease.  Why risk, the allergic reaction, the small possibility it causes autism, etc when you can just free roll off everyone else?

No, that is not the one to which I was referring.  Regarding that one, you might want to research the journal in which it is published, as there are many bogus journals these days that will publish pretty much anything for a price.  (You can also buy a Ph.D. from bogus schools.)

Here are some links with recommended material:

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/autism/

http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/48/4/456.full

http://www.webmd.com/brain/autism/search...nes-autism

http://www.autismsciencefoundation.org/a...cines.html


This is a link to an article mentioning the study to which I was referring that was published in The Lancet that got a lot of people worked up:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMR_vaccine_controversy

Here is a relevant quote:

• The MMR vaccine controversy started with the 1998 publication of a fraudulent research paper in the medical journal The Lancet that lent support to the later discredited claim that colitis and autism spectrum disorders are linked to the combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine.[1] The media have been criticized for their naïve reporting and for lending undue credibility to the architect of the fraud, Andrew Wakefield.

• Investigations by Sunday Times journalist Brian Deer reported that Andrew Wakefield, the author of the original research paper, had multiple undeclared conflicts of interest,[2][3] had manipulated evidence,[4] and had broken other ethical codes. The Lancet paper was partially retracted in 2004, and fully retracted in 2010, when The Lancet's editor-in-chief Richard Horton described it as "utterly false" and said that the journal had been "deceived."[5] Wakefield was found guilty by the General Medical Council of serious professional misconduct in May 2010 and was struck off the Medical Register, meaning he could no longer practice as a doctor in the UK.[6] In 2011, Deer provided further information on Wakefield's improper research practices to the British medical journal, BMJ, which in a signed editorial described the original paper as fraudulent.[7][8] The scientific consensus is that no evidence links the MMR vaccine to the development of autism, and that this vaccine's benefits greatly outweigh its risks.

The matter has been thoroughly researched at this point, because people originally took that article seriously (as The Lancet does not normally publish such worthless junk; or, rather, in this case, something worse than worthless), and so scientists investigated the matter.  Governments did not wait for the new studies, and took action to have possibly objectionable materials removed from vaccines (which, as it turns out, were not problematic).  They were, in fact, being extremely cautious and very responsible in doing that, but being extra careful got more people to believe that those materials were really a problem, but, as I have already stated, it has been thoroughly investigated and it was unnecessary to remove the materials from the vaccines (see links above).

At this point, believing that vaccines cause autism is akin to believing the earth is flat.

[Ravenshire]

When I first got enrolled in school (mid 70's), I could not attend class until it was proven that I was current on all vaccinations, period. There were a few allowable exemptions to that policy but they were hard to get and had to be backed up with documentation. That the states backed off on that policy is a huge failing.

What's that? You don't want to vaccinate your kids? Do you have a sound medical reason? No, christer scientism doesn't count. Neither does the bullshit autism claim. So, no sound medical reason then? Right. There a couple private schools that will still take your kids. What's that? Can't afford a private school? So sorry, but you're not putting your kids here.