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

[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.

[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.

[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