What's western medicine done for you lately? Well, did you die of measles yet?

[urbpan]

I know there are a lot of people out there who aren't sure about vaccinations, especially for kids. I always wondered where the idea that they cause autism came from. From a fraudulent study, as it turns out.

I think this one had so much traction because people like to distrust doctors.

Thanks to drhoz for the link.

Comments

[wirrrn.livejournal.com]

Unrelated: Can you point me in the way of any articles/examples of learning behaviour in insects?

[kryptyd.livejournal.com]

I never heard of that and it sounds like nonsense to me. Surely autism is something one is born with?

I never had any vaccinations (except for rubella when I was 11) so I've had measels, mumps and the works.

[donnad.livejournal.com]

Well, did you die of measles yet?

Or die from influenza or cholera or contract Polio...
(I have a cousin with polio and I had an uncle die from cholera.)

[slamonella.livejournal.com]

The big tie-in between autism and vaccinations usually has to do with thimerosal.

http://www.nationalautismassociation.org/thimerosal.php

[drhoz.livejournal.com]

except the autism 'epidemic' is happening in countrys that never used thimerosal, in kids never got vaccinated, and it continues despite thimerosal use being discontinued. Now they're blaming it on "oh,. maybe it's because the MOTHER was vaccinated as a kid...."

[slamonella.livejournal.com]

Exactly. There must be some other conspiracy at work!

[hai-kah-uhk.livejournal.com]

My child, and all other internationally adopted children, are subject by law and circumstance to more than the usual number of vaccinations - sometimes twice as many as children born in the US. And yet there isn't an autism epidemic among them (beyond something called 'acquired autism', which is a set of behaviors learned in the orphanage that they grow out of after a year or so).

[badnoodles.livejournal.com]

I have a couple of crunchy hippie mom "friends". Every time I hear them talk about how they aren't getting their kids vaccinated, I just want to smack them so hard.

[cottonmanifesto.livejournal.com]

seriously. there is just a serious lack of understanding about the whole concept.

[propaddict.livejournal.com]

These are usually the same people who refuse to drink fluoridated water, on account of it's just a gubmint mind control ploy.

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

When I read comments on a news article there are always comments by people who say their kids were fine before a series of vaccinations, and developed autistic symptoms following them, often following a vaccine reaction. Has this ever been documented? I had no idea that that study was so flawed.

[shellasaurusrex.livejournal.com]

i have a close friend whose first born son had his vaccs and soon after developed the symptoms for autistic symptoms. he was three. she has this all well documented and her two other children have had no vaccines and remain fine.

[drhoz.livejournal.com]

hardly surprising - autism is rare, and the symptoms are only obvious *after* the kids have reached the age they should be getting vaccinated. Video evidence of the kids when they were younger still shows the earliest signs of autism tho, even before they ever got the vaccine.

[nutmeg.livejournal.com]

This correlation is often seen, probably because children receive the MMR and several other vaccines at 18 months, an age at which it is common for the symptoms of autism to begin to be apparent.

While autism is certainly a difficult row to hoe for the families, anecdotes do not scientific proof make. And while an anecdote might be the entire universe to parents of autistic kids who believe that their children were harmed by a vaccination, it isn't evidence.

This study was more than flawed. If everything he said was true, the study was flawed. It's becoming clear that the information in the study was actually falsified.

While the newest bugaboo in vaccinations is Thimerasol, this study IS at the beginning of people believing vaccinations cause autism (despite many, many more studies showing this study was incorrect). This researcher went on to spend years trying to support his claims to no avail.

autism/doctors

[ryebaby0.livejournal.com]

Just a comment from someone with entirely too much experience -- the spectrum of autism is wide, our knowledge of its causes is spit-shallow. Many studies are flawed or outright dishonest, but a growing body of good evidence does suggest that for some people, vaccinations do cause problems. (And I am in NO way advocating skipping them). The question is why? Autoimmune malfunction --and autism---is a gun loaded by genetics with environment pulling the trigger. The task is to figure out how to tell who is walking around with a "loaded gun".

[hissilliness.livejournal.com]

I was visiting a friend who is a great Alternative Medicine believer a couple years after chemotherapy cured my leukemia and eventually I had to ask her to let up with the sneering at western medicine for a bit.

[barbmg.livejournal.com]

Well, western medicine should have figured out my dad was dying of cancer a little sooner than five days before he died, especially when he kept asking his GP for several months: "Why do I not have an appetite? Why do I have these bouts of fatigue? Why have my kidneys shut down?" and many other symptoms too personal to share here.

I don't LIKE to distrust doctors, but they do keep giving me reason to do so. These were only the latest and greatest.

Do vaccines actually work?

[(Anonymous)]

Try and answer this question you can be sure that the vaccine producers, doctors, medical organisations etc cannot tell you that they actually work.

In fact vaccines are still being tested through the vaccination programmes of the world - its just that the patients need to report symptoms of adverse reactions - do they protect you from the disease they are meant to protect from....who knows?

In the UK we have the yellow card reporting system - I dont believe that many of these are filled in.

Personally I don't believe in vaccination - I havent had any jabs for over 15 years and I haven't contracted these killer diseases!

It may be due to the higher standards of living, hygiene standards rather than these wonderful jabs

J

Effectiveness of disease control - vaccines or social reforms?

[(Anonymous)]

You can use the argument that diseases were reducing in occurence at the same time that vaccines were being introduced to the general population - though this was at the same time as major social reforms like clean drinking water, sewer systems, washing facilities, and healthier lifestyles. It was just the vaccines have major PR which convinces people that they work when in fact they have never been proven to work in humans.....

Unless you can point to the gold standard test of a double blind randomised trial....

J

Re: Effectiveness of disease control - vaccines or social reforms?

[propaddict.livejournal.com]

Many of us have occasion to travel to parts of the world where sewers are a luxury and hygiene is non existent. An ounce of prevention's worth MANY pounds of cure there.

Just ask my buddy who didn't have time to get his malaria shot before he had to go to the Horn of Africa. He was the only one on his crew who didn't get it, and he was then the only one who got the disease.

With just a quick Google, I found no less than a dozen published, peer-reviewed double blind studies demonstrating increased resistance to infectious disease through the use of vaccines. Please, get the facts before you start trolling.

Looks like the gene pool could use a bit more chlorine. . .

Re: Effectiveness of disease control - vaccines or social reforms?

[drhoz.livejournal.com]

vaccines don't work? Then why is smallpox extinct? why didn't all the people vaccinated against rabies die? and why are all these diseases coming back, as soon as vaccination rates drop?

Re: Effectiveness of disease control - vaccines or social reforms?

[cottonmanifesto.livejournal.com]

when's the last time you saw someone with polio?

Re: Effectiveness of disease control - vaccines or social reforms?

[weofodthignen]

Safe drinking water and indoor toilets predate vaccination programs by one or two generations.

Yes, vaccinations are now required against diseases I had as a child and survived--thanks in part to antibiotics, another innovation of western medicine. But you can still see the effectiveness of vaccinations when something like scarlet fever gets loose in a city where most people have never been exposed. Happens every year.

M