Celebrity Mommy Wars Over Vaccines Rages On
Move over, Jenny McCarthy. The former Playboy playmate-turned vaccine basher has competition from a Hollywood newcomer, Amanda Peet. In a profile featured on the cover of this month's Cookie magazine, Peet discloses that Dr. Paul Offit, inventor of an important rotavirus vaccine and public enemy-number one of the anti-vaccination crowd, assuaged her anxieties over vaccination after the birth of her baby in 2007. She has fully vaccinated the tot, is quite happy about it, and says that parents who don't vaccinate are "parasites." Peet's comment, and her decision to do a pro-vaccine promotional ad infuriated the vaccine skeptics, some of whom wrote menacing letters to Peet and her retinue. Has the public zeitgeist turned on the activists who, blaming vaccines for autism, urge parents to delay or avoid vaccinating their kids?
Recent reports indicating that we're in the midst of the worst measles outbreak since at least 1997 haven't helped. Some recent commentators (including me, in an upcoming issue of Mother Jones magazine) note that the decision not to vaccinate your kid has implications beyond the health of your own family. Also, while Handley and others are apoplectic at Offit for daring to stand up for vaccines while owning a patent on one (I'm shocked--shocked!--that someone is allowed to own their intellectual property!), fact is that Offit's Rotateq vaccine seems to be doing some wonderful things for public health. A recent Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report shows that Rotateq, which Offit and his colleagues developed, and Merck produces, has prevented tens of thousands of cases of the painful and sometimes dangerous gastrointestinal disease. As a further annoyance to his critics, Offit has a book coming out in September that lays bare the legal, scientific and public relations campaigns behind the vaccines-cause-autism theory (full disclosure: I'm quoted in it).
Comments:
Posted 07/16/2008 04:26pm with
I am a parent of children with autism and I have chosen to be in the middle – I have spread apart the vaccines because I believe that there are too many too soon. Also, many of them contain ingredients like ether, anti-freeze, and more (just look at the inserts of the vaccines for more on their ingredients) things that I never thought should belong in a body, especially that of a child.
I belive that everyone has a right to their own opinion and all sides of the table should have a voice but going as far as criticizing those parents who choose not to vaccinate and call them parasites is just plain rude.
These parents are going off of scientific evidence that has been gathered that there is a link between vaccines and autism (I am not saying causation here just a link) because there are those individuals that have immune systems that are susceptible to illnesses and allergies triggered by some ingredients. That is why some people that have certain allergies to egg products and are cancer patients cannot have some vaccines.
Yes vaccines do have some good to them, I personally have seen negatives – especially to the Rotavirus vaccine which did not prevent my child from getting the virus and it almost killing him.
The important thing to remember is that we all have a right to our opinions and we all want what is best for the future of our children but we need to remain civil and have respect for each other.
Name calling just makes things worse and deters people from hearing your real side of things and then outcast you entirely.
Posted 07/16/2008 07:51pm with
We all have our right to our opinions. With rights come responsibilities.
Just like the fact that in many states people have the right to not vaccinate. With that comes a great responsibility. Avoiding vaccines due to the idea (it shouldn’t even be called a hypothesis anymore), that vaccines cause autism is irresponsible. There is no good science behind the idea. I’m sure people can and will jump in with a lot of scientific sounding reasons, perhaps even citing Bernadine Healy, the Geier’s, Boyd Haley, and the other few people who are keeping this concept alive. It doesn’t add up to actual science, just scare tactics.
Posted 07/17/2008 01:42pm with
I’m parent of an autistic child, and i second giantrobot’s comment wholeheartedly. I’d also like to note that besides endangering public health, the idea that vaccines can cause autism leads to rhetoric that is an affront to the dignity of autistic people, who are constantly being described as “damaged,” “poisoned” and the like. I think the “rudeness” of calling non-vaccinating families parasites is pretty mild by comparison.
Krystal: Perhaps you could show us where antifreeze or ether appear on this official listing of all additives in vaccines, or substances used in vaccine manufacturing?
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appen…
As you say, you have a right to your own opinions. Your own facts? Not so much. (And just because Jenny McCarthy or Generation Rescue says something doesn’t make it true.)
Posted 07/18/2008 12:53am with
Your dislike and disapproval of people who chose not to vaccinate is unfounded. The theory being played out in the media is that if parents choose not to vaccinate, epidemics will return. That parents who are informed and believe based on the best information available currently, that the benefits of the vaccine does not out-way the risks, are somehow irresponsible and endanger public health. The basic premise of vaccination; inject a toxoid that generates antibodies against said disease is flawed: adjuvanticity is more often evaluated in terms of antigen-specific antibody titers induced after immunization. It is known that, in many instances, antigen-specific antibody titers do not correlate with protection.” Vaccine. 2001 Oct 15;20 Suppl 1:S38-41. PMID: 11587808
Furthermore, herd immunity levels, even in the latest outbreak of Measles in San Diego, are well above what the CDC deems as tolerable. It was stated that 10% of the residents in the area of the outbreak were not sufficiently immunized or had a religious exemption. A.C. Hentrik is responsible for the definition of herd immunity and he found that if 69% of a population was immune to a disease process than the rest of the herd would be immune by virtue of the majority. The problem with how our federal system uses the term is that Hentrik based his definition on natural aquired immunity, i.e. the population got the disease and became immune. It did not apply to artificial immunity (vaccination).
Both of these premises have been refuted by the same peer reviews that state that there is no link between vaccination and asd’s. For example, Measles outbreaks have occurred in the past in 100% immunized populations Outbreaks continuing to occur when adequate herd immunity exists.
Gustafson TL, Lievens AW, Brunell PA et al. Measles outbreak in a fully immunized secondary-school population. NEJM. 1987;316:771-774
Outbreaks have occurred in 100% vaccinated populations. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. US Gov’t. 12/29/89;38(s-9):1-18.
Outbreaks have cyclically occurred on average about every 4 years according to the CDC’s own database. This is nothing new. Measles is a self-limiting childhood disease which goes away on it’s own and confers life-long immunity in it’s host.
So if we know for a fact that constituents in vaccines like Aluminum cross the blood brain barrier and cause encephalitis, which liberates glutamate and kills glial cells. And we now know that children were being injected with levels of inorganic mercury that far exceeded the CDC’s poison tolerance levels. How are we to know definitively if what is in vaccines does not accumulate in our childrens brain tissue, GI systems, etc. and cause cognitive dysfunction? The jury is still out on this one. We can’t continue to take the drug companies word for it, nor our federal agencies that still believe that it’s our childrens genetics that have failed them. I respectfully hope that we find these answers and our federal health agencies take full responsibility for what they have caused to this generation.