It does matter, Alijah should not have been in ICU
This story is precisely why I and other pro-science friends on G+ are relentless against anti-vaxxers and anti-science. You might ask why anti-science. This article clearly makes the case why I am against anti-vaxxers. From the article:
“If you google vaccines you get a lot of pros and a lot of cons, and you start to read all the cons and they start to weigh on you and you start to believe all the things that are said.”
“It looks like a fifty-fifty argument.”
Williams says that he was influenced by stories he read on the internet that the MMR (Measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine was linked to children developing autism; that they contain mercury and aluminium and that vaccines are promoted by drug companies purely for profit.
The reason that I’m against anti-science is many-fold. I’m a scientist and I have a passion for science and research. Anti-science people also tend to be conspiracy theorists. Herein lies the connection. The mentality that anti-science and conspiracy theorists spread can be the seed for doubt when it comes to important issues like vaccination. People think that it’s a personal decision, it’s not. Here’s a great article by Liza Gross, Doubt and Denialism: Vaccine Myths Persist in the Face of Science
Herd immunity, in addition to not seeing kids like Alijah suffer, is another reason to vaccinate. If you have a minute, really just 60 seconds, and you want to learn what herd immunity is Herd Immunity – One Minute Medical School
More on herd immunity:
http://www.health.harvard.edu/video/herd-immunity/
I often hear people claim that big pharma must be paying me off. Another real offensive comment that I often hear is that big pharma has a cure for cancer but they are sitting on it because it’s more profitable for people to be sick. I spend countless hours doing cancer research. The idea that my work and my colleagues work is futile because big pharma already has the answer is insulting, infuriation, and just stupid. I drive a VW, by the way. So I guess big pharma has been send my money to the wrong address.
h/t Kee Hinckley
I’m very serious and passionate about science and fighting anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists. If you want to read more.
Tussle with Pertussis – Whooping cough
Denialism
Still anti-medicine?
Chemophobia: irrational plague?
Don’t add fuel to the anti-science fire
the idea of the contradiction comes from what I see as the deepest misunderstanding about science, which is the idea that science is about certainty.
Logic with False Premises and Cherry Picking
Industry vs. academic/gov research
Originally shared by Ken D..
“Once you see one of these diseases, they are terrible. Children die from these diseases.”
“The mistake that we made was that we underestimated the diseases and we totally over-estimated the adverse reactions [to vaccines]”
June 11, 2013
Horrible to put a child through that.
June 11, 2013
Clearly, these parents had excellent access to all of the health provisions an advanced country can provide and still managed to avoid them while under the influence of anti-vaxxers. With horrible results for their own child.
But since we are scientists, it is well worth noting the following point in the very same article above, as to where the bulk of the disease incidence as a result of lack of the dtp vaccine or boosters actually is:
“Because of the effective immunisation, tetanus is now rare in Australia, but it still occurs in adults who have never been immunised against the disease or who have not had their booster vaccines.”
And despite quite a bit of effort on the part of the Australian Health Department, the vaccination rates for indigeinous infants is still lagging; only 76% of indigenous infants in South Wales receive their dtp immunizations by their first birthday:
http://www.aihw.gov.au/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=6442458481 page 16
Worldwide, the elimination of tetnus is very dependent on the instigation of hygenic delivery practices: http://www.who.int/immunization_monitoring/diseases/MNTE_initiative/en/
There were an estimated 61,000 tetnus deaths worldwide in 2008. http://www.who.int/immunization_monitoring/diseases/tetanus/en/
So while there seems to be something innately satisfying about going off on rants about antivaxxers, and the forces of anti-science, the fact remains that providing public health for all depends largely on the hard work of providing public health for all.
A few highly visible middle class idiots here and there not withstanding.
June 11, 2013
Gaythia Weis I just don’t understand your position. You said on my previous anti-vaxxer post that you are pro-vaccine but it was laden with racist undertones. Now you might find it satisfying to ramble on about Australia when the article is about New Zealand but the facts about New Zealand don’t fit with what you say about Australia.
All publically-funded vaccines are now listed on PHARMAC’s Pharmaceutical Schedule and the District Health Boards are responsible for funding these once PHARMAC has listed them. PHARMAC will be responsible for considering any changes to the National Immunisation Schedule vaccines, including the eligibility criteria, funding of new vaccines and managing the supply of vaccines needed for localised and national disease outbreaks.
http://goo.gl/EAuum
DIPHTHERIA, TETANUS, PERTUSSIS, POLIO, HEPATITIS B AND HAEMOPHILUS INFLUENZAE TYPE B VACCINE
http://www.pharmac.govt.nz/2013/06/01/Schedule.pdf
The reason for this post is to point out that people make the wrong decision about vaccination because of crap on the Internet. You are just adding to the noise which makes it harder for people to see the facts and make the right choice about immunizing their children as this article demonstrates. This article is about the direct consequence of not immunizing one child based on anti-vaxxer crap on the Internet.
The director of Auckland University’s immunisation advisory centre, Dr Nikki Turner, said 10 per cent of tetanus cases were fatal.
“Patients often end up in intensive care and they need to be on a ventilator because they go into paralysis and can’t breathe. It’s a very nasty, very painful disease.
People often did not realise the seriousness of the disease and made their own assumptions about vaccines from reading incorrect information on the internet, she said.
“We hear stories from parents who say ‘I wouldn’t have taken the internet story so seriously if I’d known’.”
New Zealand Herald.
http://goo.gl/JIoAH
Keep on topic or get lost. Don’t even think about starting your racist comments again.
June 11, 2013
Chad Haney The patient in this case is in New Zealand, but the news outlet is in Perth, Australia. Which is why they gave the message regarding Australia I quoted above and why I gave statistics for vaccination rates in Australia, not New Zealand.
It was my hope that we could, as scientists, actually have a broader based discussion of vaccination rates and ways to improve the immunity that vaccinations can effectively provide that would take into account the actual groups that are most in need of being vaccinated. Recognizing the important role that all adults need to play in getting boosters, is a very important part of creating the herd immunity that is needed. As is recognizing that there are people to whom greater out reach efforts need to be made, efforts that would need to be supported and sometimes funded by the public at large. I see nothing racist in that.
In my opinion, Google + offers an opportunity to expand a conversation beyond the newspaper headlines and to examine a topic in depth.
But I certainly don’t mean to simply annoy you and will not comment on one of your posts regarding vaccinations again.
June 11, 2013
I’ve been struck by the racist tone in your posts more than once, myself. So maybe you ought to stop and think about why so many people are having that reaction to your posts.
June 11, 2013
I confess to genuine confusion in that regard.
As I’ve posted here: https://plus.google.com/u/0/100946817944952712900/posts/jEtqqFwC7vp
about 160 infants per day are dying of tetnus.
So why are we focusing on one middle class white kid in New Zealand with idiot parents but who is, while seriously ill, likely to recover? And why does trying to point out that that is not really where the public health problem lies seem racist to some of you?
June 11, 2013
I think I understand what you are saying, Gaythia Weis (correct me if I’m wrong). You agree that “middle class idiots” like the Williams family had access to vaccines and chose to decline them. But you are pointing out that there still need to be inroads made into fully vaccinating some areas of indigenous people who do not yet have access to vaccines. Your point is that most tetanus deaths are due to lack of access to vaccines for the poor although it is people like the Williams family who end up in the news. I appreciate your comments in the spirit of going beyond the headlines, although characterizing this post as a rant against anti-vaxxers is not fair because it trivializes an important outreach effort to those (many on Google+) that refuse vaccinations and jeopardize public health. Hope that made sense.
June 11, 2013
I agree with your assessment, Rajini Rao and also regret the use of the word, “rant”. Thanks for stepping in.
Although I’d add that frequently, as with a recent whooping cough epidemic here in Washington State, the problem is adults needing boosters. So I’d like to see a little more introspection as to the extent that the problem is us, either as people needing boosters or funders of public health outreach programs than limiting ourselves to blaming others (the anti-vaxxers).
June 11, 2013
Robyn Miller ? That doesn’t make sense to me.
It’s a non-white kid that is pictured in the UNICEF information I just posted.
Adults in need of boosters are frequently white and middle class.
I am acknowledging the exsitance of anti-vaxxers. Those publicized seem to me to be most frequently white and middle class, although there are other groups that are sometimes reluctant to access mainstream public health facilities.
The statistics I gave in a comment on a previous post regarding the fact that 9 out of 10 whooping cough deaths were were Hispanic were directly copied out of a document posted on the website of the California Department of Public Health.
June 11, 2013
I thought that I was trying to say that evaluating health care services by demographic groups is not necessarily racist, but could, in fact be seen as a desire to see where public health needs, (vaccinations in this case), are really falling short and where efforts need to be directed.
I like Rajini Rao ‘s comment above and think I will leave it at that and retire from this thread.
June 12, 2013
ohai all. Popping up because, well, Perth’s my home town, and stats are fun. I was really interested in the firs report Gaythia linked to, and her stat about dpt.
Because, the table I think the number came from was for self reporting (no records available), non-remote indigenous families.
The report actually starts with:
Of Indigenous children aged 0–6 years in non-remote areas who had immunisation records available, approximately 94% were fully immunised in 2001 and 93% were fully immunised in 2004–05. Around 4% of Indigenous children aged 0–6 years were partially immunised in 2001 and 7% were partially immunised in 2004–05 (Table 3.02.1).
Which is, to use the vernacular, pretty bloody good.
And actually, digging in to the numbers (the non-indigenous comparison figure was 85%, so I wonder why, as a whole, we are shy of this particular vax?) it looks like our remote indigenous populations are better vaccinated than the city kids. Which makes me think we’re doing something right in public health in remote Australia.
As a final thought, though. These numbers stop at 2005 and are based on an annual survey, so I might go dig up some more recent figures.
To stir, just a little bit, though – if we’re going to generalise, remote indigenous populations in Australia are some of the most impoverished communities we have. Clearly then, if their vaccinations are more up to date than the relatively well off city populations, do you think the anti-vaxxers are having an influence?
btw all of the first year vaccinations are free to all Australians.
June 12, 2013
Keep up the good fight Chad Haney – I am with you.
June 12, 2013
Well that’s interesting, Kristin Milton and I’m really glad you dug into that report. Looking through it, her tendency to cherry pick the data is crystal clear.
June 12, 2013
Looks like New Zealand and Australia are making vaccines readily available.
June 12, 2013
Chad Haney as far as I’m aware, all childhood vaccines (everything in our standard schedule) are available free of charge to all Australian and NZ kids.
In fact, Australia has some punitive welfare rules around it (as in, you don’t get all your welfare entitlements unless your kid is vaccinated, or the dr says there’s a good reason not to).
We opted out of the newest one (Hep B immunisation at birth) but followed up with the six month and yearly ones.
June 12, 2013
Thanks William Carter for the vote of confidence. Thanks Kristin Milton for digging into the stats.