November 1-6 to be "Vaccine Awareness Week"? Not so fast, Barbara Loe Fisher and Joe Mercola!

Sounds good. I'll try to make time to write up some posts over at Silenced. Also remember antiantivax.flurf.net (linked in my name) as a resource for information.

Suggestion: alternate positive posts about the benefits of vaccination or the history of vaccination or whatever (the history is quite fascinating, after all, as is the science) with the rebuttals of dangerous misinformation. We don't have to have Vaccine Awareness Week on their terms, after all, and just have it be about the alleged dangers of vaccines.

[thumbs up graphic] Orange Lantern likes this.

I'll bet few of you know that Oct. 17-24 is "National Vaccine Voter Awareness Week"*, when we call out dumbass politicians who exploit their own or others' ignorance about vaccines.

Take Franklin County (Ohio) Commissioner (and Democratic candidate for Congress) Paula Brooks. Brooks is fighting a move by other commissioners to use the county's limited vaccine purchasing funds on multidose influenza vaccine (that contains thimerosal, OMG) instead of the more expensive thimerosal-free alternative. The county could use the $15,000 a year saved to immunize more uninsured/underinsured residents, but Paula says no, because she thinks thimerosal may cause autism.

"Both the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention dispute the link. But Commissioner Paula Brooks is dubious and, since 2006, has requested that the county buy thimerosal-free vaccine.

She said government should lead the push for vaccines without suspect substances, but people can make different choices in their private lives. "If people want to put mercury in their body, power to them," Brooks said last week."

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2010/10/17/coun…

Paula is unaware of or doesn't care about the fact that science is overwhelmingly against any "link" or that removal of thimerosal from virtually all childhood shots as of 2002 has not reduced the incidence of autism. Paula is also clueless about "toxins", including the concept that toxicity is related to dose.

Now that voters in her district are aware of how she puts ill-conceived beliefs about vaccines ahead of public health, they can act accordingly on Election Day.

*which is because I made it up. Hey, if Joe Mercola and Barb (How Loe Can You Go) Fisher can do it, why can't we?

**note that the linked article is typically poorly written in an apparent attempt to "tell both sides".

And then people wonder why vaccine-proponents end up getting thimerosal-free vaccines. It's because dumbkopfs like Commissioner Brooks work so hard to waste money on the thimerosal-free ones. (Note: it's not a waste to use the thimerosal-free injections for people who are allergic to thimerosal. That's what the expensive ones are *for*.)

More vax stuff at Huffington Post: "Vaccine Safety: Why Parents Are Concerned" by Kim Stagliano.

Sounds like fun. I managed to report a homeopath for health fraud last week (selling homeopathic vaccinations in Canada, when no licensed homeopathic vaccines exist*), so perhaps I'll spend the week of the 1-6th finding others and reporting them.

*Yes, it sucks that the issue is that the product isn't licensed, rather than the fact that homeopathy is fraudulent from top to bottom. Fortunately, since it isn't licensed, the claims are unsubstantiated, and thus can be termed fraud. For those in Canada wanting to take action about those cancer cures, weight-loss supplements and so other quackery, reports can be made through the Competition Bureau, as they target internet health fraud.

Suggestion: alternate positive posts about the benefits of vaccination or the history of vaccination or whatever (the history is quite fascinating, after all, as is the science) with the rebuttals of dangerous misinformation. We don't have to have Vaccine Awareness Week on their terms, after all, and just have it be about the alleged dangers of vaccines.

I agree! Make something positive out of it, as well as rebutting the nonsense.

Also, Orac managed to get SBM on board with his plan? I'm shocked, I tell you. Absolutely SHOCKED! *wink*

because investigators couldn't detect signs of cancer in Egyptian mummies there must not have been cancer in pre-industrial times

That's because they all died from polio.

As part of the activities that week, I plan on spending more time than usual--perhaps all my blog time and posts--emphasizing the dangers of the anti-vaccine movement and providing science-based rebuttals of the lies of the anti-vaccine movement intrepidly demonstrating my utter and total ignorance of vaccines and infectious agents

My town is doing a "Vote and Vax" that week. I can't be there because I have to be at ASHG that week. I hate missing election day.

Maybe I'll do a blog post on that positive effort.

Isn't the anti-vax cartel *already* celebrating Vaccine _Injury_ Awareness Month ( see Mike Adams, NaturalNews; "October is Vaccine Injury Awareness Month", 10/13/10)? I suppose a month just isn't enough when you're friggen vax *otaku*.

Why don't you guys dress up in needle costumes and have a parade?

Things like this must make pediatricians' blood boil...more wasted time countering anti-vax crap. While checking my kids' pediatrician's website for word on flu vaccines, I found their vaccine policy statement.

http://www.jdcpediatrics.com/FormsHandouts/VaccinePolicy.pdf

Does anyone know if this is boilerplate? Either way I like it, particularly:
"Finally, if you should absolutely refuse to vaccinate your
child despite all our efforts, we may ask you to leave this
practice to find another health care provider who shares
your views. We do not keep a list of such providers, nor
would we recommend any such physician."

"Finally, if you should absolutely refuse to vaccinate your
child despite all our efforts, we may ask you to leave this
practice to find another health care provider who shares
your views. We do not keep a list of such providers, nor
would we recommend any such physician."

I guess Jay Gordon will just have to continue to be a mediawhore to recruit new patients.

Why don't you guys dress up in needle costumes and have a parade?

Why don't you guys dress up as dead children and have a parade?

@Sid

As part of the activities that week, I plan on spending more time than usual--perhaps all my blog time and posts--emphasizing the dangers of the anti-vaccine movement and providing science-based rebuttals of the lies of the anti-vaccine movement intrepidly demonstrating my utter and total ignorance of vaccines and infectious agents

You'll be doing that even more than usual, Sid?

As to the costumes, well, we wouldn't want to scare you so bad you have a heart attack.

Todd's worked his tuchis off but now he has fellow travellers

http://www.historyofvaccines.org/

http://vaccinecentral.wordpress.com/

"As to the costumes, well, we wouldn't want to scare you so bad you have a heart attack."

augustine (our resident needle phobiac) would have major conniptions. It'd be like people dressing up in lizard costumes for Halloween and parading outside the apartment of David Icke.

And don't forget our fellow travelers across the pond

The Nightingale Collaboration

http://www.nightingale-collaboration.org/

Sense about Science

http://www.senseaboutscience.org.uk/index.php/site/project/143/

Why don't you guys dress up as dead children and have a parade?

*Fist bump*

This needle phobic, at least, is all for vaccines. Just let me lie down, whimper, and bite my thumb- as much as I fear the jab itself (not what's in it, the physical insertion of a needle scares the bejeezus out of me), the alternative (vaccine preventable diseases or being ill because of something not spotted on blood tests) is far worse. In fact last time I needed vaccinating, I let them do three in one go (MMR because I was moving to the UK and the university I was moving to had recommended a booster, tetanus because I was close enough to needing another one, and my final Gardasil shot).

Again, Sid with the ad hominem attacks, which is about par for him on the course.

And looking at that article on Paula Brooks, some of the comments on there are mind-bogglingly out there.

"Again, Sid with the ad hominem attacks, which is about par for him on the course."

That's what happens when you regard vaccines as a bogeyman.

My woo-loving sis in law just posted one of the "flu shots are evil baby killer" notes on FB. In the past I tried to show her statistics and reason but she will have neither and we had to agree to disagree on her medical postings. Can I just vent here, among mostly like-minded people, how furious it makes me to see her spread this propaganda crap? ...and I can't comment on it because it seriously turns into a comment war, where all her friends defend her and complain about how doctors aren't God. Oh, and of course she thinks Mercola's word is the be all end all. Suffice it to say her kids have had far more illnesses that mine, and guess whose kids are vaccinated?!

My woo-loving sis in law just posted one of the "flu shots are evil baby killer" notes on FB. In the past I tried to show her statistics and reason but she will have neither and we had to agree to disagree on her medical postings. Can I just vent here, among mostly like-minded people, how furious it makes me to see her spread this propaganda crap? ...and I can't comment on it because it seriously turns into a comment war, where all her friends defend her and complain about how doctors aren't God. Oh, and of course she thinks Mercola's word is the be all end all. Suffice it to say her kids have had far more illnesses that mine, and guess whose kids are vaccinated?!

SC, I feel for ya. I had to let go of an old friend who succumbed to all of this nonsense. I think Warren Zevon's Splendid Isolation is a great song to listen to after dealing with these people.

SC, sometimes, people are just set in their ways so much that no amount of reasoning or medical studies will convince them.

@ Sid:
"intrepidly demonstrating my utter and total ignorance of vaccines and infectious agents"

You don't need a week for that! You do it better than anyone I know all year round!

@SC:

That is terrible, I am sorry for those poor kids. Sadly, in my experience with such belief based lunacy there really is very little you can do. I am always torn between doing nothing and saving myself the grief and doing whatever I can to try and help these daffy people.

...because investigators couldn't detect signs of cancer in Egyptian mummies there must not have been cancer in pre-industrial times, the further implication being that all cancer is "man-made."

When I was in Egypt, I had a "backstage tour" of the Cairo museum and saw their stack of mummies. Given the stage of dessication, I'd have been amazed if the investigators had found cancer. Solid tumours would have been difficult to detect unless they were massive; leukemia and lymphoma would be - I imagine - impossible.

Besides, weren't their internal organs removed prior to mummification? I know that some mummies have their internal organ preserved in jars, but many of the ones I saw in Cairo had been separated from their "organ jars" for decades (if not centuries - many of the tombs were looted by the Romans). Also, the brain was removed in pieces and not preserved, so an absence of brain tumours can't be demonstrated.

Remember, too, that even the elite (those who would have been mummified) were much more likely to have died of disease or trauma before they were old enough to be at serious risk of cancer.

I'm reminded of the writings of a 18th century explorer in South America who noted that the people living along the Amazon River were almost all "young and healthy" and that he rarely if ever saw signs of infirmity, disability or old age. The explorer attributed this to the natives' "natural" lifestyle. I'd attribute it to "survival of the fittest".

Seriously, how much weight can you give to a survey of mummified remains from at least 2000 years ago? After all, they weren't buried with paraffin-embedded H&E slides of their organs. The investigators took pieces of the mummies, rehydrated them and then examined them under a microscope.

Before I give any credence to their conclusion, I'd like to see how often they correctly diagnose a modern case of cancer with tissue slides made from dried organs.

Prometheus

Why don't you guys dress up in needle costumes and have a parade?

We can call each other sid...'cause you know...we'd all be huge f*cking pricks

because investigators couldn't detect signs of cancer in Egyptian mummies there must not have been cancer in pre-industrial times, the further implication being that all cancer is "man-made."

I saw this story on CNN's web site, in all its full credulity. However, the bright spot was in the comments, where several well-informed posters made short work of this "study." In fact, I'd say they eviscerated it. I just wish everyone who read the story had also read the comments, but we should be so lucky.

I got my DTaP and flu shots today. I told everyone in the clinic waiting room what I was there for and none of them tried to warn me I was killing myself and some said "good idea". It was a refreshing change from the usual barrage of woo and negativity I hear all the time. Of course, probably the real phobics wouldn't be in a doctor's office at all.

I'm the guy that spends way too much time at Huffington-Post, under the username of sheldon101, fighting off, in my own humble way, the lies, distortion, ignorance hubris, confirmation bias and misleading and simple factual errors in comments of bloggers and other who comment at Huff-Po.

Sometimes that means I, violating rule 14 of the vaccination opponent handbook, correct those I agree with when it comes to our conclusions. For some reason, even though I follow Huff-Po policy, there are people who dislike me. However, they do dislike the mighty Orac more. And of course, Dr. Offit is the devil incarnate.

If there are any ongoing discussions on Huff-Po, I'll be sure to announce that why and how this week is special.

It was great to see you in person at the Symposium. Hopefully, you'll come again.

[I'm the guy that spends way too much time at Huffington-Post, under the username of sheldon101]

Another example of egotistical atheist science bloggers. "I am so and so the mighty blogger. Hear my wrath."

You're so cute sheldon. Keep up the good fight.

"Under the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act, such claims [for those injured by vaccines] typically proceed through an alternative legal system known as âvaccine court.â Under that system, a person is compensated if their injury is among those officially recognized as caused by a vaccine...Federal data shows that $154 million was paid in fiscal 2010 to 154 claimants involved in vaccine court proceedings...In the five preceding fiscal years, an average of $68 million in compensation was paid out on an annual basis, federal data indicates."
(http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/12/health/12vaccine.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=v…)

Yes, sounds completely safe to me.

Wonder how the supreme court case will work out...should be interesting.

"jab me", interesting you should ask. The parents are saying that there was a safer vaccine, the DTaP, available when their daughter got the dreaded DTP. The problem was it was not approved for children her age.

Also, it was determined through epidemiological study that the seizures she experienced were not correlated with that vaccine, so that particular table injury was removed prior to their first filing.

Actually, it is not so interesting when you have more facts at hand.

but, chris,

you conveniently ignore the fact that a minimum of over $60 million dollars/year are paid out by the decision of the âvaccine court,â where a person is compensated if their injury is among those officially recognized as caused by a vaccine, i.e., the needle and the damage done.

jab me, chris has a knack for cherry-picking his info.

Yes, oh illiterate one: Vaccines are known to cause injury. And those injuries are known. That is why they list them on a chart called a "table." Then if someone gets one of those known vaccine injuries (which occur much less often than injuries from the real disease) they get compensated.

Perhaps if you actually learned to read half as well as your write (snork, snicker... oh, my word!), you might understand the details. But you don't, and you won't.

Um, morphing troll... I am not one doing the cherry picking. I actually added details.

I mean, did you even know the DTaP was not approved for children under a certain age then? Did you think a vaccine not approved for use would have been used? Really, did you?

Did you know what a "table injury" was? Really, did you?

Some reading for the trolls.

Though who am I kidding? They will neither do the free registration, or understand the words. Especially these:

The harm, moreover, may not have been unavoidable, as the parents believe, because the alternative vaccine was not approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use on children as young as 6 months until years later.

chris, you missed jab me's point. he/she simply said:

"Yes, sounds completely safe to me."

thanks for all the additional details, butthead.

""Finally, if you should absolutely refuse to vaccinate your child despite all our efforts, we may ask you to leave this practice to find another health care provider who shares your views. We do not keep a list of such providers, nor would we recommend any such physician."

This violates the AAP's official recommendations. These doctors should be disciplined. (Throwing out the bait. Take it or leave it.)

Here are the goods for aspiring pharma shills. Not a single one in this crowd. I know that.

http://n.pr/aW1mXl

38 comments! C'mon friends. Even Pablo couldn't muster much of an insult here:

"I guess Jay Gordon will just have to continue to be a mediawhore to recruit new patients."

There are honest researchers and doctors who create, study and administer vaccines because they care deeply for children's health. But there are also unethical business people involved who don't give a rodent's posterior about kids.

Jay

I'm pretty sure the point they're making (one which I don't agree with) is that, if vaccines were as safe as claimed, much less than $60 million a year would be paid out by the vaccine court.

[Chris:Then if someone gets one of those known vaccine injuries (which occur much less often than injuries from the real disease) they get compensated.]

really? It's that simple and that easy?

This violates the AAP's official recommendations. These doctors should be disciplined. (Throwing out the bait. Take it or leave it.)

Encouraging parents to miss vaccinations also violates the AAP's official recommendations. What should we do with those doctors, Dr Gordon?

"Encouraging parents to miss vaccinations also violates the AAP's official recommendations. What should we do with those doctors, Dr Gordon?"

Bait taken!

Give them badges for the courage to speak out for individual parents' rights to do what they feel is best for their children!.

We work well together Jack. Thanks.

Jay

Sheldon - you your doing an awesome job on HuffPo - here is a virtual coffee, next time you feel tired from the whack-a-mole there (pushes some coffee and some Belgian chocolates into the middle...).

Prometheus - the "older" Amazonians were probably just dead if the explorers did not see any of them? Wild guess, I know, much more likely that the great outdoors made 80 year olds look like 12 year olds.

Orac - will promote "Vaccine Awareness Week" on Just the Vax

Catherina

Jay Gordon @42

Give them badges for the courage to speak out for individual parents' rights to do what they feel is best for their children!.

Does "individual parent's rights to do what they fell is best for their children" include treating their child with prior instead of insulin as the child dies of untreated diabetes. Just curious as to far this goes. The way I read you statement it sounds like you consider children to be the property of their parents.

I also do not consider pandering to the irrational anti-scientific "feelings" of parent's to be particularly courageous. I think lucrative is a more appropriate adjective.

Oh, Dr. Jay, so you also think the following is true:

1: Pharmaceutical companies did something bad.

2: So all of their products are bad.

3: There vaccines are bad.

Do you now tell your patients with cystic fibrosis to stop all their medications, or the ones with severe allergies to toss out their EpiPens, and the ones with seizures to stop their anti-convulsants and those with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy to stop taking their meds?

Just because their parents don't want to buy and give the meds?

Really? What kind of pediatrician are you?

Crud, too late at night... it should read:

3: Therefore vaccines are bad.

$50 - 60 million dollars a year in compensation? With an average of 50 - 60 awards per year ($1mil per case, it looks like)?

So, out of the millions of doses of vaccines given every year, less than 100 cases are deemed to be a "vaccine-injury."

Given the litigious society that we live in today (you can find a lawyer to sue about anything - just watch TV for the ads), you'd think there would be thousands, hundreds of thousands of claims, if the woo-meisters were even a little bit correct about the BS they spew about vaccines.

And Dr. Jay shows his double standard. Take a hard line stance on giving vaccines or giving the boot that violates AAP recommendations (according to him...haven't looked at the AAP's official recommendations yet) and the doctor should be punished. Actively dissuade parents from getting their kids vaccinated, which may also be against AAP recommendations, and the doc should be given an award?

Jay "Double Standard" Gordon in his own words, folks. They're right upthread, unedited, for all to read.

Damn, wish I would have known this was coming. I'd have delayed my flu vax until November in order to celebrate properly. Oh well....I guess I'll just kick a few bucks over to an organization that immunizes children so they don't keel over dead, in honor of Dr Mercola and Barbara. Maybe even Jenny, if I can scrape up an extra $20.

Anybody know of any organizations like that? The only one I know of is the Gates Foundation and you can't donate to that AFAIK.

I got my flu shot yesterday. No autism, fever anything but a little soreness in the arm. The nurse brought in a syringe all filled so I don't know whether it was thimerosol free or not. I didn't bother to ask because it wasn't important to me that it be thimerosol free. I don't have any allergies. Strange, now that I think of it, though...I didn't have to sign a consent for the shot. Maybe because I asked for it rather than them having to offer it.

@jabme, etc (why do I think this is one morphing troll?): So, the court is awarding about 60 $1,000,000 awards a year for vaccine injuries. Out of HOW many vaccines a year? And you think this proves your point? All it says to me is that the system is working. Kids with TRUE vaccine injuries are being compensated. Just like they should be. Exactly how the court was set up. This is bad why? (and once again I reiterate that NO ONE here claims that vaccine injuries never occur or that vaccines are 100% safe).

@Dr Jay: talk about a double standard.

ANY doctor can release a patient, as you well know. You cannot abandon a patient but you can certainly ask a patient to leave your practice. This isn't against any standards that I am aware of.

While the AAP may not want their practitioners to ask patients to leave because of vaccine beliefs, I think you would get more flack from them about the doctors who don't vaccinate (age 2? REALLY? FOR THE FIRST VACCINES? your own words, Dr Jay..)over those who ask anti-vax patients to find a new MD (and there is NOTHING in that statement that they would abandon the patient or refuse emergency care, only that they MAY ask the patient to find a new physician).

MI Dawn

Take a hard line stance on giving vaccines or giving the boot that violates AAP recommendations (according to him...haven't looked at the AAP's official recommendations yet) and the doctor should be punished. Actively dissuade parents from getting their kids vaccinated, which may also be against AAP recommendations, and the doc should be given an award?

The more I read from Dr. Jay the less likable he becomes. At first I thought he was just a clueless media-whore who lives life with distorted views of the world from a privileged life.

Now my view is not quite so favorable.

A doctor deserves an award for putting children at risk while pandering to the narcissistic 'Science? We don't need no steenking science' crowd? Wow...just wow.

Jay Gordon makes me happy I neither live in his city or have a young child for him to attempt to use for his PR campaign. My attitude towards vaccinations on my (now 17-year-old) son? As I told the doc:

"Like a dartboard Doc. Like a dartboard"

No autism. He is a smartass, but that's a given growing up in my house.

Ol' Doc Jay just can't handle that science keeps giving him the finger. I imagine in another decade, he'll be pushing homeopathy.

Also: WHO KEEPS LETTING SID GET LOOSE? I told you, you HAVE to attach his chain to the restraining hooks when you clean his cage. He may be dumb as a dumb stump, but he's a clever little monkey, and damned fast too.

Just how dishonest is Dr. Jay? Every time the integrity bar is lowered he seems able to squirm under it.

Give them badges for the courage to speak out for individual parents' rights to do what they feel is best for their children!.

Parents do NOT have a right to do what they "feel" is best for their children if they are demonstrably, factually, wrong and what they "feel" is best will actually harm the children.

The RIGHT answer, by the way, is to sue their asses off for malpractice and preferably lock them up for reckless endangerment.

Todd @53

And Dr. Jay shows his double standard. Take a hard line stance on giving vaccines or giving the boot that violates AAP recommendations (according to him...haven't looked at the AAP's official recommendations yet) and the doctor should be punished. Actively dissuade parents from getting their kids vaccinated, which may also be against AAP recommendations, and the doc should be given an award?

Can't you see the difference Todd? Pissing off your clients by taking a hard line stance on vaccines is bad for business while pandering to their woolly headed thinking is good for business.

dean@58

Just how dishonest is Dr. Jay? Every time the integrity bar is lowered he seems able to squirm under it.

It's limbo time - how low can Jay go?

Jay Gordon quotes a pediatric practice's policy regarding parents who refuse vaccines for their children and says:

"This violates the AAP's official recommendations. These doctors should be disciplined. (Throwing out the bait. Take it or leave it.)"

Gordon's comment is a distortion of the AAP's "official recommendations" on dealing with vaccine refusal. Here's an excerpt from a position statement by the AAP:

"Continued (vaccine) refusal after adequate discussion should be respected unless the child is put at significant risk of serious harm (as, for example, might be the case during an epidemic). Only then should state agencies be involved to override parental discretion on the basis of medical neglect. Physician concerns about liability should be addressed by good documentation of the discussion of the benefits of immunization and the risks associated with remaining unimmunized. Physicians also may wish to consider having the parents sign a refusal waiver (a sample refusal-to-immunize waiver can be found at www.cispimmunize.org/pro/pdf/RefusaltoVaccinate_2pageform.pdf). In general, pediatricians should avoid discharging patients from their practices solely because a parent refuses to immunize his or her child. However, when a substantial level of distrust develops, significant differences in the philosophy of care emerge, or poor quality of communication persists, the pediatrician may encourage the family to find another physician or practice. Although pediatricians have the option of terminating the physician-patient relationship, they cannot do so without giving sufficient advance notice to the patient or custodial parent or legal guardian to permit another health care professional to be secured." (bolding added)

So while the AAP encourages pediatricians to work with and keep trying to educate parents about the need for immunizing their children, it recognizes that there are situations where the pediatrician justifiably feels that alternative action must be taken, including potentially terminating the patient-physician relationship (with adequate notice).
What the AAP does not do is carve out an exception for Brave Maverick Pediatricians to ignore the recommended vaccine schedule or to create an "alternate" schedule in which virtually no vaccines are given to children under the age of 10 (the "vaccine schedule" that Dr. Gordon has admitted recommending). So Gordon's attempt at tu quoque falls flat.

Speaking of AAP recommendations, Jay, how about the recent one that calls for all health care workers to get immunized against influenza to protect vulnerable kids from getting infected? (the AAP calls the recommendation "ethically justified, necessary and long overdue to ensure patient safety"). Are you planning to comply? Or do you have an alternate ethics schedule that will serve your purposes?

So, just to clarify for those following along:

Violate Dr. Jay's reading of the AAP recommendations on vaccination in support of vaccines: the doc should be disciplined.

Violate the actual AAP recommendations on vaccines in opposition to vaccines: give the doc a reward.

Hypocrisy, thy name is Jay.

There are honest researchers and doctors who create, study and administer vaccines because they care deeply for children's health.

Thank you, Dr. Jay, you've just admitted that the antivax loons are flat-out wrong to attack the motives or the competence of doctors who administer vaccines. So...What kind of results do these caring doctors get with their patients?

But there are also unethical business people involved who don't give a rodent's posterior about kids.

Yes, but it's the doctors, not the business people, who decide which vaccines to administer and when. And you've just admitted those doctors are both competent and caring. So what's your argument against vaccines again?

PS: I also have to note that longtime trolls augustine and Sid et al don't even care enough to try to act like grownups anymore. If they don't care enough to address the substance of what's being said here, and don't even care about their own image or credibility, then why are they here at all? Their consistently empty and babyish conduct says a lot about the antivax mindset.

[Militant agnostic:The way I read you statement it sounds like you consider children to be the property of their parents.]

The way I read it, SBMer's believe that children are property of the state and are subject to the whims of the state. Not so much scientific, much more of a political vision for science control of everyday life. That's called scientism folks. You know, the word that SBMer's hate and deny. Science as a cult and religion.

""Finally, if you should absolutely refuse to vaccinate your child despite all our efforts, we may ask you to leave this practice to find another health care provider who shares your views. We do not keep a list of such providers, nor would we recommend any such physician."

This violates the AAP's official recommendations. These doctors should be disciplined. (Throwing out the bait. Take it or leave it.)

As per Dangerous Bacon's post (#61), I see that you have managed to warp the actual AAP's recommendation into something unrecognisable to validate your own wonky, evidence-free vaccine recommendations. Colour me surprised.

Here are the goods for aspiring pharma shills. Not a single one in this crowd. I know that.

http://n.pr/aW1mXl

Oh look:

But an investigation by ProPublica has uncovered hundreds of doctors receiving company payments who had been accused of professional misconduct, were disciplined by state boards or lacked credentials as researchers or specialists.

Sounds like the exact same type who takes up the DAN! mantle and take to the internet will alt-med sales. I don't know what type of point you are trying to make, tu quoque perhaps? They have been exposed, what could possibly be wrong with that?

There are honest researchers and doctors who create, study and administer vaccines because they care deeply for children's health. But there are also unethical business people involved who don't give a rodent's posterior about kids.

Spare us the platitudes Dr. Jay, when you don't even follow the honest researchers advice and practise medicine that is counter to the health and safety of some of your patients. You are more interested in being Dr. Feelgood than advising your clients appropriately.

CHRIS:

1: Pharmaceutical companies did something bad.

2: So all of their products are bad.

3: There vaccines are bad.
-------------------------------------
Let me ride your emotional wave and use the same logic.

1.Pharmaceutical companies did something good.

2. So All of their products are good.

3. All of their vaccines are good.

It's the old dangling carrot gambit. The "if you don't let me play the way I want to, then I'll take all of my toys home" and see where you'll be without them. The old either use ALL of the approved pharmaceuticals or none at all gambit.

The AAP is a trade organization. As a trade organization it is concerned about one thing above all else. It's paying members and their professional status. Everything else is secondary.

It is not a scientific body. Their word is merely the consensus of their leaders.

A note from one of us on the here in California: Pertussis is not "going around."

There is no more whooping cough than in a usual summer/fall season.

"Confirmed, probable and suspected cases?" You can't possibly hang your hat on that waste basket phrase.

There is not enough science in here to fill a thimble. Just perseveration and nastiness.

Yes, my job is to treat and protect one child at a time. I do it for a living and have for . . . guess how many years? :-)

Jay

@Dr. Jay

A note from one of us on the here in California: Pertussis is not "going around."

There is no more whooping cough than in a usual summer/fall season.

Uh, from what I've heard, there are more cases of pertussis this year than usual. From the California Department of Health:

* As of 10/12/2010, there have been 5,658 confirmed, probable and suspect cases of pertussis with onset from January 1 through October 12, 2010 reported to CDPH for a state rate of 14.5 cases/100,000.

*This is the most cases reported in 60 years when 6,613 cases were reported in 1950 and the highest incidence in 51 years when a rate of 16.1 cases/100,000 was reported in 1959. Previously, the peak was in 2005 when there were 3,182 cases reported (Figure 2).

So, you were saying, Dr.?

There is not enough science in here to fill a thimble. Just perseveration and nastiness.

I agree. There is not enough science in your office to fill a thimble. Just perseveration and nastiness.

Yes, my job is to treat and protect one child at a time. I do it for a living and have for . . . guess how many years? :-)

Treating children, for quite a while. Protecting them, umm...how long have parents forced you to give their child a vaccine?

Good bye again for a while.

I have a job.

@Science Mom, your post is weak. Please edit and repost when you have the time.

Jay

Oh, and Jay? You know what would have done a lot to keep those incidence numbers down? The DTaP for kids and Tdap for adults.

could someone please show a graph that correlates vaccine uptake with pertussis cases and death rates. Last few decades only please. I'm sure everyone has this scientific info on their roladex to draw their scientifically sound conclusions. Surely no one on here would speculate. This is an evidence based group, right?

Not a time table presuming vaccine uptake. Actual vaccine uptake so the ideologists can stop speculating in the name of evidence and science.

@Science Mom, your post is weak. Please edit and repost when you have the time.

Your post is weak Dr. Jay, normally when one chooses to rebut, specific criticisms are made. I'm sure that some of your patients will benefit from your absence.

Don't be to harsh on him, he just realized the crap he posted last night after the third glass of wine, and now he's trying to be witty before his third cup of coffee.

OK. Those doctors had been disciplined. Did you bother to read the reasons, Dr Jay? I'm not saying they didn't deserve the discipline for their mistakes, by the way. But (as an example), a doctor disciplined for inappropriate exams of women can still talk knowledgeably about a drug that he's trying to sell. Keep him away from patient contact, sure. But why would you say he can't do the job he's now doing? It has nothing to do with the reason the state board disciplined him.

Oh GASP! And some of the doctors arenât board certified! How horrible. Board certification is a good thing, but I know lots of doctors who havenât bothered to do it outside of their primary specialty. Yes, I think they are good doctors. Some doctors donât bother to get board certified in all the fields that they practice (subspecialties of their specialty). I canât find anywhere that they say the doctors are not board certified at all, or if they just are not board certified in the specialty they are identified with at this time. My old OB/Gyn started to specialize years ago in infertility. He is not board certified in infertility. Does that make him or any of the others bad doctors? No. (By the way, Dr Jay: what are you board certified in?)

Doctors are not perfect beings (except, as we all know, Dr Jay). They make mistakes. They make major lifestyle mistakes - abuse drugs, alcohol, steal money. They get disciplined. But I don't know why, if they have made amends, that they can't work for pay, even for the EBIL DRUG COMPANIES or EBIL HEALTH INSURANCE. Should everyone who does something stupid in life never be allowed to work again?

And finally, Dr Jay: if you want to rebut Science Mom's excellent post, it would behoove you to be specific about where you feel her errors are. This allows her to research and correct her errors (if any), or, on the other hand, gives her more information to rebut your errors.

Have you noticed the 'debate' is always about 'science deniers' and never about scaremongering to promote sales ?
Vaccination was always a hairy idea of minimized use to reduce real danger because wild life at miniscule size has a nasty habit of varying its composition : a protection from 'one size fits all' predators.
Vaccination is one of the oldest techniques...and still is based on primitive principles.

A few points, opit:

1) "Primitive" doesn't mean "wrong" or even "bad". It gets used as some sort of epithet, but it's not really much of a criticism. Take Archimedes' Screw. It's been used for thousands of years to raise water from one place to another. It's still used today, and works just as well as it did then. Primitve? Absolutely. Also highly effective.

2) The people who first used inoculation to prevent smallpox did not understand why it worked; they were working purely off of observation. It is only in the 20th Century that the principles of vaccination have been really understood. So it's not really based on primitive principles anymore, apart from the principle that many people only get various highly contagious diseases just once. And that observation is just as valid today, when we know what a lymphocyte is, as it was a thousand years ago in Asia.

3) Just because a discovery is old doesn't mean it's outdated. NASA is sending spacecraft around the solar system using basic principles established centuries ago. The SOHO spacecraft sits at the Sun-Earth Lagrange-1 point, named after the man who deduced its existence in 1772. (Note: the inverse is also true: just because a discovery is old doesn't mean it is right. Truthfully, the age has very little to do with it. It should stand or fall on its own merits.)

4) It is true that some microscopic organisms "vary their composition" but there isn't any intent to it. Also, the rate of evolution is variable, depending partly on selective pressures and partly on the rate of mutation in the species. Influenza mutates famously fast. Others are more stable; to date, there is no evidence that measles, for instance, has evolved to evade our antibodies against older strains. This can complicate making a vaccine, but it's not as bad as it might at first seem. Two strains of influenza are different, but may be similar enough that both will still be targeted by the same antibodies. 2009 H1N1, for instance, has a strong antigenic match with a strain that was circulating in the 1960s, which is believed to be why older folks weren't coming down with such bad cases -- they had some lingering immunity to it, even though it wasn't exactly the same strain. There is a lot of research going on trying to work out a vaccine for influenza which will target the stable portions of the virus -- not all of it mutates at the same rate, you see, and it has some basic equipment that it simply isn't infectious without. Target such a fundamental part of the virus, and it really has no more evolutionary options. This is obviously a good deal more sophisticated than what was done in the old days of variolation, but the basic premise is the same -- prepare a sample of something that resembles the pathogen in a critical way, and then provoke the body into mounting an immune response to it.

5) Scaremongering to promote sales certainly happens, and you are wrong that the debate never turns to that. It's just that unlike the antivax movement, there's nobody mobilizing on blogs to defend Big Pharma and its excesses, so you don't see so much of a hullabaloo. (Mostly, I think, because Big Pharma doesn't tend to consider blogs much of a threat. I hope they are merely underestimating us.) Truthfully, the biggest money isn't in vaccines. Even ones like Gardasil. The big money is in basic care, because you need it again and again. Once you complete the MMR series, for instance, you will never need treatment for Measles, Mumps, or Rubella, and probably won't need another MMR. But if you don't get MMR, and later contract one of those diseases, you'll be spending money on doctor's visits, painkillers, fever reducers, antivirals or antibiotics, treatment for secondary infections, and, if you're really unlucky, hospital care. Big Pharma makes way more money off of sick people than well people. Just look at oseltamivir (Tamiflu) or zanamivir (Relenza).

Note: one interesting thing is that vaccination has not been shown to add much selective pressure. It probably does add some, but it's not any more than natural infection does. (Influenza didn't start dodging our immune systems because of vaccination. It's doubtless been doing it for millenia.) Antivirals are another story, and I am a little concerned about the push on some quarters to suggest prophylaxis with antivirals. The cynic in me wonders if Roche and others aren't pushing that as increased flu vaccination leads to a decline in cases of people needing Tamiflu.

[The big money is in basic care, because you need it again and again. Once you complete the MMR series, for instance, you will never need treatment for Measles, Mumps, or Rubella, and probably won't need another MMR.]

What you fail to take into consideration is allocation of that money and control of allocation.

When you can almost guarantee every citizen will take your product and the government backs you up with contracts then you're going to get some money.

The myth of vaccine manufacturers making vaccine out of philanthropy and losing money is no longer debatable. That's an old hat.

Quick note on vaccines as a money-maker. I added a new section to antiantivax.flurf.net on the costs of treating diseases. I've only completed diphtheria and pertussis, so far, and tetanus is almost ready to go up (just need to find time to finish researching), but it should give some indication of just how much the medical complex makes from vaccines vs. how much is makes from treating diseases.

Mu

Don't be to harsh on him, he just realized the crap he posted last night after the third glass of wine, and now he's trying to be witty before his third cup of coffee.

Mu - given the content of Dr. Jays post I am thinking it was more likely after the third rag rather than than the third glass.

There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge

- Hunter S. Thompson

Yes, my job is to treat and protect one child at a time. I do it for a living and have for . . . guess how many years? :-)

I would say ... you've never protected a child, just lied to parents.

Vaccination was always a hairy idea of minimized use to reduce real danger because wild life at miniscule size has a nasty habit of varying its composition : a protection from 'one size fits all' predators.

Oh look, another antivax troll with nothing to offer but incoherent word-salad. Why am I not surprised?

And Dr. Jay suddenly runs away, pretending he has important work to do, AFTER his fact-claims are flatly refuted by a citation of evidence. Again, why am I not surprised?

These antivax wankers are nothing but ankle-biting little shits who can't even muster up enough talking-points to gin up a fake controversy.

Scare mongering to promote sales? Perish the thought.

Signed:
Antivaccine authors selling books, adspace on their blogs and hood winking parents into their alt-med junk.

Todd W -- awesome. I just thought of another aspect. Next time somebody tells me that vaccines are just Big Pharma out to make money, I'll tell them how much an influenza vaccine costs and then ask them how much they've spent on decongestants this year.

augustine @ 78:

The myth of vaccine manufacturers making vaccine out of philanthropy and losing money is no longer debatable. That's an old hat.

I wouldn't say they do it out of philanthropy. These are commercial enterprises. While corporations are known to engage in philanthropy, it doesn't tend to be very much compared to the amount of money they make. Target donating to local schools; antimalarial manufacturers donating medicine.... It's good that they do it, and it's better than nothing, but as they are in business to make a profit, they'll make sure their philanthropic gestures do not threaten that goal.

They make vaccines mostly because for most vaccines, it's a low-risk business. They know they'll stay in the black on it. (Notably, this is only because of government mandates and, in some cases, subsidies. That's what makes it low-risk.) But it's not where they make their big profits.

It's like the difference between a savings account that earns a small amount of interest and day trading. You can make a hell of a lot more money the latter way, but the savings account is very nearly zero risk. So companies do stay in the vaccine business. Not out of philanthropy, exactly, but more out of a sort of corporate inertia.

I did look stuff up -- you can buy Fluzone for $11.19 a dose (if you buy a 10-dose vial, which would then cost $111.90). I can get 20 doses of 12-hour Sudafed (a 10-day supply) for ten bucks. If I believed in the Vitamin C stuff, I could get 30 doses of Airborne for $13.99. Tylenol Daytime Liquid runs $6.69 at the online pharmacy I use. Zicam's prices range from seven to twelve bucks, depending on the formulation. 28 Mucinex is on sale for just twenty bucks. (Yikes.) Those are a small sampling of the remedies people will buy when they have the flu. It's easy to spend a lot more than the vaccine costs. Plus, since it's you the consumer buying it rather than a clinic, the manufacturers are marketing directly to you -- which means they can pull out pretty much all the stops in their advertising, which of course they do.

I have no doubt that vaccines would either be more expensive or unavailable if the government did not sign contracts to ensure adequate production. It is not in the manufacturers' interest to keep the prices low and encourage herd immunity, except for the slight promotional value in saying "and we help with community health".

That's an old hat

15) Can't evem quote cliches properly [no indefintie article here].

16) Responds to great posts like Calli's with a wanky whine, semi-literate, as always.
17) Consitently adds negative intelligence to a subject where a positive IQ score would seem, if not mandatory, at least advisable.
And all this after a smarm-by post by the anti-paedritician to the spineless rich, Dr Jay. Big boys playing here, augie. Your mom's wondering where you are...

Ugh troll @ 66:

Kindly provide a link to Orac, Chris, or any prominent contributor on this blog making any statement as you insinuate.

Otherwise, the most rational conclusion to draw is that this 'gambit' you are suggesting exists is something you have pulled out from wherever you get most of your arguments.

Also, the '(agree with me/do what I say) or I'll take my toys away' shtick seems to be more of a Jay Gordon speciality. Maybe you haven't noticed?

Incidentally, speaking of Jay Gordon, did he not previously include one (or both) of the honorific Dr or the certification suffix MD in his identifier tag on previous comment threads at this blog?

Or am I falling prey to my bad memory?

I think that's a little unfair, composer99. We have no evidence to say that augie's ugly, physically speaking. But all that anonymous butt-sniffing has certainly deformed his mind....

My clinic still doesn't have its VFC influenza vaccines. It's getting annoying.

Todd, some information for you about immunizations and the revenues they generate. If I've read any of the following reports incorrectly, my apologies.

http://media.pfizer.com/files/annualreport/2009/financial/financial2009…

Pfizer's one vaccine listed made up 0.574% of their total revenue. In contrast, Lipitor made up about 22% of total revenue. Page 23 has the most relevant details.

http://www.astrazeneca-annualreports.com/2009/directors_report/therapy_…

AstraZeneca's immunizations, antibiotics, and anti-virals made up 4.98% of their total revenue, but one immunization, Synagis, accounted for more than half of that revenue. Synagis (in the US) is only given to former premature babies with known lung problems (stupidly expensive stuff-I like to call it liquid titanium). Of note, AstraZeneca is based in the UK. In further contrast, one antibiotic, Merrem, made $872 million in revenue last year (used for infections caused by highly resistant organisms like hospital-acquired MRSA) compared to $534 million total in Flumist and H1N1 vaccine revenue.

Merck's financial statement was giving me fits. I stopped. They are based in the UK I believe. If anyone wants to try to find any relevant information on them, knock yourselves out.

http://www.gsk.com/investors/reps09/GSK-Report-2009-full.pdf

GSK, another UK company, has 8 different vaccines (yeah Pediarix) which made up 16% of the company's total revenue (which they call "turnover"). Skip down to page 31 for the more relevant section.

Sanofi-Pasteur is the vaccine division of Sanofi-Aventis. They are a French company. My work computer won't let me get to their annual report. So it goes.

@Calli 84: Not to mention that in most states you now have to sign your life away to get any kind of decongestant that actually works. Stupid meth-heads interfering with my ability to breathe during a cold.

Incidentally, speaking of Jay Gordon, did he not previously include one (or both) of the honorific Dr or the certification suffix MD in his identifier tag on previous comment threads at this blog?

I think I remember on a previous thread a few months back that someone noticed Dr. Jay didn't sign off with his credential. He possibly goes back and forth on this? Either that or there is one real Dr. Jay and one impostor. I think they are one and the same (they "sound" the same) but only Orac knows for sure.

@Bacon and the AAP

Continued (vaccine) refusal after adequate discussion should be respected unless the child is put at significant risk of serious harm (as, for example, might be the case during an epidemic).

The fact that something is an "epidemic" has no bearing on whether or not the subject of the epidemic is dangerous. Therefore the statement is meaningless.

P.S.
If I get discharged from a practice whose going to weigh and measure my baby's head and over prescribe antibiotics?

http://www.gainesville.com/article/20091117/articles/911179870?Title=Va…
"Even if a small portion of everything that's going on now is successful in the next 10 years, you put that together with the last 10 years (and) it's going to be characterized as a golden era," says Emilio Emini, Pfizer Inc.'s head of vaccine research.
"Vaccines are now perhaps seen to be more attractive than drugs," says Dr. Stanley Plotkin,

@Calli

Once you complete the MMR series, for instance, you will never need treatment for Measles, Mumps, or Rubella...But if you don't get MMR, and later contract one of those diseases, you'll be spending money on doctor's visits, painkillers, fever reducers, antivirals or antibiotics, treatment for secondary infections,

What world are you living in? The vast majority of people contracting the above don't need medical treatment.

@93

Way to quote mine and place comments out of proportion, Sid....

@94

Even if those diseases do not require hospitalizations, the risks of complications from those diseases, especially for children, such as cataracts and congestive heart defects, can be devastating.

Besides, I think you miss the point. Getting vaccinated for the prevention of a disease, in the long run, is more cost effective in the long run than catching the disease and paying money for doctor's treatments and medicine,as well as time missed from work/school.

@9
just a short comment.
Synagis is not a vaccine, it consists monoclonal antibodies (passive immunization).

Getting back to the topic on hand, I will also be blogging about vaccination from 1 to 7 November (whoever heard of a 6-day week?). The problem is, a lot of people get a 403 error when trying to view my site, so I can't guarantee that you'll be able to readit.

@Silly Sid: Do you even HAVE children? Did you ever ask the doctor WHY he/she was measuring the baby's head circumference? Guess what? There's a perfectly logical reason that has to do with health and normal growth patterns.

And doctors don't usually overprescribe antibiotics. Unfortunately, they have patients who insist that they NEED them for every cough, cold, muscle ache, flu. And if they don't get them from Doctor A, they will go to Dr B-Z until they get what they want.

Doctors are, as I said before, human. They want to earn a living and losing patients means less income. So often they give in. (Can you HONESTLY tell me, Sid, that you haven't EVER asked for antibiotics for an illness?)

MI Dawn

Come offit, Sid, you can't expect anyone to believe that absolutely no costs of treatment are the rule for those contracting measles, mumps and rubella, even if we consider children only and ignore the financial resources strained in caring for them (do caregivers magically appear in Sid-world to take care of kids out of school in households where two parents work?).

And for those with lingering or permanent sequelae from those diseases, they'll undoubtedly be reassured by Sid's saying that they're just a minority.

"(Can you HONESTLY tell me, Sid, that you haven't EVER asked for antibiotics for an illness?)"

Of course he hasn't. He's never had an illness. And if he did, he'd be part of the "vast majority" who don't suffer complications or death from it, so he'd have no worries. If he has health insurance, he should opt out so that others who are weaklings could benefit from the savings.

No medical treatment, Sid?

In your world, if a kid has a fever and breaks out in spots, the parents won't think s/he needs to see a doctor? In your world, children with chicken pox don't even get anything to help them deal with the itching? Calamine lotion may not be much better than nothing, but it's there, and it isn't handed out free on street-corners by anti-vax charities. It costs money at the drugstore. Nor are fever reducers free.

You're also making a very middle-class mistake: you're assuming that there's no financial cost to having something like influenza or the measles, because you'll get enough paid sick leave. A lot of people get no paid sick leave; relatively few get enough to cover (for example) nursing a sick kid and then staying home when they catch whatever the kid was sick with.

That assumes that the work the person does while healthy is of no value, and that people rate their own comfort, and that of their children, as of no value. I'll pay for good chocolate, or to take the train instead of the bus because it's more comfortable: why is it odd that I'll pay to reduce my risks of days of fever and itching, even if I were confident that there was no risk of longer-term effects?

Wooohoo!! Just took care of the annual flu shot, complete with da eeeebul thimerosal, so I should be rendered incomprehensible any moment now...

*waiting* :-)

Sid:

What world are you living in? The vast majority of people contracting the above don't need medical treatment.

What, you prefer to tough out the symptoms? Well, that's up to you, I guess. Me, I'd rather try to keep my kids comfy if they get sick. And myself. I take decongestants and antipyretics when I get a nasty cold.

The point I was making was that most people will spend more money treating a disease, even a mild case, than they would spend on the vaccine against it, even confining oneself to just things spent on actual medicine. And moving from that to drug company profits, consider that the vaccine is only good for one thing, but the remedies are good for many things. They can profit better off of the remedies than the vaccines. I wasn't trying to fearmonger about the diseases; I was pointing out how much more money is spent treating even mild diseases than is spent preventing them, and how this may affect the business model of a pharmaceutical company.

I'm willing to bet that Johnson & Johnson makes more money off of cold season than any vaccine production line does. (Johnson & Johnson makes Tylenol, of course -- including behind-the-counter versions containing pseudephedrine and prescription-only versions containing codeine.) Of course, this is in large part because vaccines can only prevent a subset of cases, while Tylenol can be used in the treatment of all of them, and more besides.

gaiainc -- that's fascinating information. I should have clarified that the vaccines I was talking about were those routinely recommended for all patients by the CDC. The ones with a more limited audience have a different economic dynamic. Perhaps the most expensive vaccine of all, and one which is likely to turn a profit, is that new one to treat prostate cancer. (Treat, not prevent.) It's custom-made for each patient and can run into seven figures for a single person's treatment. Yikes! That's clearly a whole 'nother ballgame than, say, DTaP.

I'm in a different industry, but my industry also has a great deal of financial oversight and deals with the government. We have similarly low-profit low-risk lines of business. One of my colleagues has been on the same contract for 30 years. It's not flashy, it's not cool, it's not a huge chunk of our income. But taken collectively, long-term production contracts like that are our bread and butter. They keep the lights on while the business types work on attracting new contracts, and the engineers work on developing new stuff for the big expensive contracts. They can't be our whole business, though, because they don't tend to grow much (if at all). The customer will only ever need so many widgets. So we build widgets to sustain us, and try to develop new types of widgets to grow us.

Orac, are you going to include the new science based Mott's poll that shows vaccine safety to be parents' number one concern. That's right. Number one. Ahead of cancer and environmental causes, even. You people in children's health and research really have to open your eyes to the fact that people aren't buying your phoney pharma "science" with all its biases, omissions,and sleight of hand bullshit. I hope the pharma symposium is going well. I'm off to a Liberation procedure fundraiser soon, myself.

Jen, try to come up with something better. What you said could easily have been a sarcastic commentary on the desperation of the anti-vax movement. That poll result only proves one thing: That it's easy get people whipped up into a panic.

Jen:
You wouldn't happen to have a link, would you? I'd be interested to know what the question was -- parents' number one concern about *what*. Context is important.

As far as general worries go, I find that vaccines and other health-related concerns are actually not that high on the list. More pressing worries include bullying and whether or not their school has enough funding to do its job.

Calli -here's the link

http://www2med.umich.edu/prmc/media/newsroom/details.cfm

@ Calli, When jen posts, you need to look no further than AoA for the most recent drivel. This being the inflation of this poll's importance and how it reflects real world actions. You can also wager that jen hasn't even read the actual poll but rather relies upon AoA's interpretation of it for her.

The poll is here: http://www.med.umich.edu/mott/npch/pdf/101110report.pdf and what jen and her ilk fail to see is that the response rate was only 57%, and given the questions asked, will undoubtedly bias the poll results in favour of those who these topics are important to. Not only that but concern with vaccine safety and efficacy does not translate to 'I won't vaccinate', which is what jenbots need so desperately to believe. As 'bringing the U.S. vaccine programme to its knees' has been a rallying cry for the Age of Ignorance for quite some time.

"Parent Views on Medical Research: Safety of Vaccines & Medicines Top Priorities", a report by the C.S. Mott Children's Hospital at the University of Michigan Health System. The report says:

In this Poll, parents overwhelmingly endorse the need for research on the safety of vaccines and medications given to children. Parental concerns about the safety of vaccines has increased markedly over the last decade, due to alleged (but later disproven) links between vaccines and autism and related concerns about mercury and other preservatives used in vaccines. For parents, assurances from health care providers and government officials that âvaccines are safeâ have been insufficient. Rather, parents want more research about the safety of vaccines for their young children and adolescents.

I'd add follow-up questions: "Vaccine safety has been and continues to be thoroughly investigated. Would you support reducing funding for other higher priority pediatric research areas to increase the investigation efforts being made into vaccines? For which research areas would you reduce funding?" Questions must spell out the consequences in follow-up.

i know this off topic but

wtf the Egyptian's didn't get cancer. OMG they a world for it and descibe it. so did the greeks the romans and everybody else that had a freaking writing system that came down to us. great now i will have the bozo's telling me life was so much better in the good old days. oh and sid pollio didn't kill egyptains it is a product on clean water oh the irony.

Sorry, the wording of one of the questions should be more precise: "Would you support reducing funding for other higher priority pediatric research areas to increase the investigation efforts being made into vaccine safety?

@jen

Your link does not appear to work. At least not for me. Got another one?

thanks, sciencemom for posting your link. Mine didn't seem to work. Whatever the response rate, the results are the results.
Art, you are so missing the point. Most parents actually aren't stupid and realize that the research thus far on vaccine safety has been minimal at best. It hasn't been "thoroughly investigated." Don't make me laugh. You pose some fair follow-up questions about research monies and allocation but the whole premise that vaccines have been thoroughly investigated? Nice try. Now go get your kids their Gardasil and Rota shots.

Uh, Jen: The rotavirus vaccines are ORAL vaccines. Not shots. And my kids are too old for them anyway. But they both elected to get Gardasil vaccines.

As for most parents aren't stupid...sometimes, yes, they are. Parents who fall for AOA's line of fearmongering are stupid. Parents who listen to your lies are stupid. Parents who talk to their doctors about their concerns and read the research aren't stupid.

Again, the results of the poll simply indicate that what people believe the issue is, no more. Remember the "Red Scare" of the 1950's? Or how so many panicked about the "Domino Effect" that would occur if Vietnam fell to Communism? Reality is not determined by popular vote.

@jen:

Most parents actually aren't stupid and realize that the research thus far on vaccine safety has been minimal at best.

So, vaccines receive less research then other FDA approved drugs? Or are all FDA approved drugs minimally researched?

@Gray Falcon (#114):Actually, I think jen is too young to remember a lot of those things. I can well remember hiding under desks for atom bombs and the fear of Communism that was instilled int '60s and '70s. But I think jen is too young. She obviously doesn't recall mumps, measles, rubella as active disease (I had them all...).

Whatever the response rate, the results are the results.

Oh why does this ring so familiar? It does matter what the response rate was and it also matters what and how the questions were asked. As I explained, that low of a response rate is going to skew the results because parents who are concerned with the questions posited, will be more likely to respond. The poll questions were leading and should have been more open-ended.

Most parents actually aren't stupid and realize that the research thus far on vaccine safety has been minimal at best.

Yes, parents can be quite stupid, even while patting themselves on the backs for their 'educational status' and the 'research' they have done. You are a prime example of how far down the rabbit hole one can go when you limit yourself to biased sources of information.

@jen

Here is the question that was asked as far as rating the topics.

Please note the wording of the question. Important to notice is that respondents are not asked why they rate each topic the way they do.

Even I would probably rate med and vaccine safety as "Very Important". Why? Because I think that products should be properly tested. So, as new vaccines and meds are developed, they should be properly tested for safety and efficacy. My answer, however, does not reflect concern about the safety of approved vaccines or meds. The survey was not designed to capture that, and I think the authors err when they use the term "concern".

In the end, the survey does not say what you, or the folks at AoA who feed you your thoughts, think it says. Instead of just swallowing AoA's tripe whole, why not try actually thinking for yourself a little.

Most parents actually aren't stupid

They soon become so once they read the drivel at AoA. I mean, you haven't always been prey to those dumb ideas, right?

but the whole premise that vaccines have been thoroughly investigated?

They have, but for the anti-vax, pro-disease crowd, no investigation will ever be enough, since properly done studies will never confirm the nonsense you believe in.

Now go get your kids their Gardasil and Rota shots

You do realise that science mom, and all the other posters on the rational side, will do just that? Or do you actually think that we don't practise the common sense we preach? Oh but we're all pharma shills, I keep forgetting...

I'm bored with our anti-vax visitors. They never say anything new and they never seem to take in any reasonable arguments against their points.

I can only conclude that they're chiropractors, naturopaths, or are closely related to one of those groups, imagining that by injecting a contrary view here, casual readers might believe a controversy exists.

Sad.

The nice thing about being science based: if some treatment I use is found to be crap, I just drop it. I'm not defined by any particular intervention.

Chiropractors and naturopaths, on the other hand, are defined by their favored procedures. It's a terrible trap for young people who don't know any better.

Whatever the response rate, the results are the results.

Saith the statistically-ignorant.

@triskelethecat(116): I probably should have added "from history class", which is where I learned about those. Maybe I should have mentioned some of the fear going around about the Cordoba Center?

[Gray Falcon: Reality is not determined by popular vote.]

Or scientific consensus.

gaiainc's excellent comment

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2010/10/november_1-6_to_be_vaccine_aw…

needs to be developed into a blog post for the week.

One of the constant themes in the anti-vax artillery is that Big Pharma pushes vaccines because they are so profitable, both for the producing company and to the physician-provider.

I am hoping to write at least one post debunking those paired assertions.

@Baconator

Of course he (Sid Offit) hasn't. He's never had an illness....If he (Sid Offit) has health insurance, he should opt out so that others who are weaklings could benefit from the savings.

But I'm paying premiums without using services. Therefore my dropping out would actually harm the weaklings

MI Dawn:

@Silly Sid: Do you even HAVE children?

It was revealed a while ago that Sid does not have any children, and has never been around young children when he claimed that "his children" do not throw food on the floor. He lives in the same fantasy world as Th1Th2 on SBM does, where toddlers can walk perfectly well plus they know to stay on sidewalks and away from dirt!

Speaking of costs of vaccines versus diseases, CNN has this article about a family that did not vaccinate. It has a picture of the child when he was:

... hospitalized for nearly a week and spending time in a coma in the intensive care unit.

Now that we all know Sid lives in fantasy la-la land, the rest of us can ignore him while we deal with reality:

Measles outbreak in a highly vaccinated population, San Diego, 2008: role of the intentionally undervaccinated.:

Although 75% of the cases were of persons who were intentionally unvaccinated, 48 children too young to be vaccinated were quarantined, at an average family cost of $775 per child.

Economic Evaluation of the 7-Vaccine Routine Childhood Immunization Schedule in the United States, 2001
Zhou F, Santoli J, Messonnier ML, Yusuf HR, Shefer A, Chu SY, Rodewald L, Harpaz R.
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2005;159:1136-1144.

An economic analysis of the current universal 2-dose measles-mumps-rubella vaccination program in the United States.
Zhou F, Reef S, Massoudi M, Papania MJ, Yusuf HR, Bardenheier B, Zimmerman L, McCauley MM.
J Infect Dis. 2004 May 1;189 Suppl 1:S131-45.

Impact of universal Haemophilus influenzae type b vaccination starting at 2 months of age in the United States: an economic analysis.
Zhou F, Bisgard KM, Yusuf HR, Deuson RR, Bath SK, Murphy TV.
Pediatrics. 2002 Oct;110(4):653-61.

Pediatric hospital admissions for measles. Lessons from the 1990 epidemic.
Chavez GF, Ellis AA.
West J Med. 1996 Jul-Aug;165(1-2):20-5.

Read the new information about MD Pharma Shills.

It will answer all your questions.

Science Based Medicine my ass. It's dollar-based medicine and you all know it.

Liz, look up the data on PCV7 revenue. Billions. Pure profit at some point.

Jay

What's next flu quarantines?

@Dr. Jay

And what are the costs to treat pneumococcus infection? I haven't researched it, yet, but if it is anything like pertussis, lots more money to be made treating the disease than preventing it.

@Dr Jay: and you just see patients out of the goodness of your heart, not charging them and making a profit? How nice of you.

@Sid: actually, my employer DID enforce a flu quarantine last year; if you were exposed to the flu, you were sent home from work until either cleared by your MD, you had the flu and got over it, or you didn't get it and were home for the incubation period. People didn't like it, because sometimes they didn't get paid for those days, but the outbreaks in the office were well contained that way.

Employers can impose such things; I have worked in hospitals where you had to stay home for the 21 days incubation of chicken pox if you had never had it and your titers were low. Can YOU afford to stay home from work for 21+ days (if you broke out on the 21st day, you can add 7 or so days to that)? I can't afford that much time off work.

Jen--

The question "What do you think the largest dangers are?" is a useful snapshot of public opinion, but useless otherwise.

People worry a lot more about terrorism than about car crashes, for example. Ten times as many Americans died from vehicle crashes in 2001 as from terrorism. (Yes, that year is carefully selected: take any other year, and the ratio is more extreme.)

This isn't because people are stupid. It's because "dog bits man" isn't news, and neither is "teenager killed in single-car crash." Terrorist attacks and plane crashes are news precisely because they are unusual: vehicle crashes aren't, because so many of them happen. They get mentioned on the traffic report, if that particular death also delays enough other people's trips.

But we think more about the dangers we hear about.

That's before we get into the skewing by people who want you to be afraid of specific things: vaccines, or terrorist attacks, or immigrants, or communists.

lots more money to be made treating the disease than preventing it.

But the vaccine manufacturer doesn't make any money from a hospital stay so your point eludes me. It's like saying Sanofi wouldn't produce a flu vaccine because Bayer would lose aspirin sales.

@Chris:

He lives in the same fantasy world as Th1Th2 on SBM does, where toddlers can walk perfectly well plus they know to stay on sidewalks and away from dirt!

That sounds entertaining. Do you remember which post it was under?

@Jay:

Read the new information about MD Pharma Shills.

If you want us to read it, it would be useful for you to provide some sort of link.

[Gray Falcon: Reality is not determined by popular vote.]

Or scientific consensus.

That's because reality is supposed to define scientific consensus. If you have any evidence otherwise, please present it. Vague statements about nihilism or reductionism are meaningless, please give us specific examples. Not that we expect much from you. So far, all you've given us are accusations without evidence, and anyone can do that.

AnthonyK @ 88:

My nickname for augustine is not based on any impression I have of his physical appearance.

It's more to do with, whenever I see him lay down some new eye-searing stupid or outright bizarre BS (the whole trans thing, for example), the fact that my typical reaction is to take off my glasses, gently massage my forehead to ease the pain, and mutter 'ugh'.

Hence: ugh troll. I think it ascribes less juvenile qualities than, say, Augie, while still capturing the essence of his contributions at this blog.

@triskelethecat

I'm thinking more about the house arrest type quarantine. Anyway your company has every right to set their policy and if the risk of missing work is too great you'd have to get the flu shot or another job.

@Sid

But the vaccine manufacturer doesn't make any money from a hospital stay so your point eludes me.

Notice that hospitalization is not the only cost. Antibiotics (like Zithromax, made by Pfizer) are also prescribed to kill off the infecting bacteria. In the case of pertussis, there is also the likely outcome of asthma, which will likely require some manner of meds (such as Alvesco, made by Sanofi-Aventis, which also makes a pertussis vaccine) to control.

And if people in the medical field are only interested in money, then wouldn't hospitals advocate against vaccines so they could have more admissions?

Read the new information about MD Pharma Shills.

It will answer all your questions.

Answer me this, Jay: Who is NOT on that list, hmmmmm?

Science Based Medicine my ass. It's dollar-based medicine and you all know it.

Yep, when you don't have the science behind you, start spouting the pharma shill gambit. Even lamer than usual, Dr. Jay.

But what the heck? Let's play. If you're going to play that game, one wonders how much of your practice income would disappear if you stopped being the crunchy, antivaccine-sympathetic pediatrician of Santa Monica and started recommending to your patients' parents that all your patients undergo the CDC/AAP-recommended immunization schedule. My guess is that you'd lose half your practice overnight, if not more.

Yes, Dr. Jay. You play the pharma shill gambit, and it can always be turned around back at you.

@Matt

He lives in the same fantasy world as Th1Th2 on SBM does, where toddlers can walk perfectly well plus they know to stay on sidewalks and away from dirt!

That statement is actually an urban myth. Here's what Sid actually said:

@Jenn

I don't know what your feeding your kids but mine don't eat dirt

Posted by: Sid Offit | August 1, 2009 1:51 PM

Neither playing in dirt nor putting things in ones mouth equate to "eating dirt"

Matthew Cline, it was in the "Some Flu Updates" article. SBM is taking a while to load up, I should have the link for you soon... ah, here it is. It is highly entertaining. An example:

Playing in dirt? I know a place where it is even more âdirtyâ. Why donât you let them play in a landfill or sewage. Which brings me back to your previous question, âwhich is betterâ?

Scrapping knees? They donât use their knees to walk, do they? If that can be prevented, why canât you? It seems though the more children scraped their knees, the happier are you.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/10/20/why.not.vaccinate/

an interesting story to consider for the upcoming vaccination awareness week. It tells the story of a family that decided not to vaccinate and their child ended up in the hospital from hib.

@Chris: Tsk, tsk. You should know that any links that go to Th1Th2 need a "NO DRINKING WHILE READING" warning.

@Matthew Cline: Th1Th2 writes on almost all of SBM's vaccine posts. He/She/It is definitely interesting to read, but don't eat or drink while doing so. Aspiration (either from laughter or your jaw hitting the floor while you read) isn't fun.

@Sid: putting dirt in one's mouth and swallowing it is eating dirt, isn't it? Of course, sand isn't dirt, but my kids ate it quite often for some reason.

And, Chris was not saying YOU said that statement. Chris was saying you live in the same type of fantasy world as Th1Th2. Please read more carefully.

In the case of pertussis, there is also the likely outcome of asthma, which will likely require some manner of meds

PEDIATRICS Vol. 102 No. 6 December 1998, pp. 1496-1497
Pertussis in Infancy Does Not Increase the Risk of Asthma

[The association between pertussis during infancy and childhood asthma]
[Article in Hebrew]
CONCLUSIONS: Our study did not show that pertussis during infancy significantly increases the prevalence of childhood asthma.

Liz @124 - I look forward to your post on this. I tried to look at this a couple of years ago, but most companies' reports will only tell you revenues by drug or line of business, not net profit or loss. Making some assumptions, I found that vaccine margins were lower than other drugs and therefore probably serve as a solid, reliable way to contribute to fixed corporate costs rather than providing blockbuster ROI.

Dr. Jay @127, are you suggesting that PCV7 can be manufactured, stored and distributed at no cost? Revenue does not equal profit, unless you're selling woo. I guess even with that you have to advertise and that costs something.

Sid, further down that comment thread is this: "There's nothing edible on my floor"

Guess what, childless Sid, kids don't particularly care if it is edible or not. Hence the choke warnings on toys.

@Sid

From Potential association between allergic diseases and pertussis infection in schoolchildren: results of two cross-sectional studies seven years apart, 2009, emphasis added:

RESULTS: We found that allergic diseases prevalence was significantly higher in the children suffering from pertussis infections (22.3 % first and 8.8 % second survey) compared to children who did not suffer from pertussis infections (6.6 % first and 4.5 % second survey) (p = 0.001 and p = 0.035, respectively). Asthma prevalence was also significantly higher in children suffering from pertussis infection (37.6 % first and 26.2 % second survey) compared to children who did not suffer from pertussis (7.4 % first and 5.0 % second survey) (p = 0.001 and p = 0.001, respectively). However, the mean serum levels of anti-pertussis IgG were similar in allergic and non-allergic groups (p > 0.05).

I thought that Jay Gordon wasn't going to come back here....

And sid again with the quote mining.

RE: CNN Hib article

Sad thing is, the anti-vaxers will just say that the Hib vaccine is not 100% guaranteed to work, so the child might have caught it anyway even if he was vaccinated. It's no skin off their nose that that child was in a coma and almost died due to anti-vax preachings.

*sigh* I argue with them so much, I'm starting to think like them. Frightening.

@Sid

Do you have a link for the paper you cited? I would like to see what was said in context, considering your penchant for quote mining things to suit your needs.

In honor of vaccine awareness the latest report...

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/10/20/why.not.vaccinate/index.html?hpt=C2

Sorry cbe posted this already. ADHD
My apologies...

@Chris:

Holy crap! And I thought Th1Th2 couldn't get any stupider. (Assuming, of course, that s/he isn't just a contrarian troll)

Matthew Cline, I plan to post a link to those series of comments anytime I see Th1Th2 at SBM. I am highly amused by the "parental" advice from people who live in fantasy la-la land and have no clue on how children behave (like Sid thinking kids only eat food, and whose floors have never had a kid throw food on to the floor)!

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/extract/102/6/1496

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19627033

jen @ 106 & Science Mom @ 107: thank you for the link. As I suspected, it was specifically about health concerns, so more pressing concerns such as the quality of the child's education would not be relevant. But it wasn't just health concerns in general, and it wasn't an open-form question. They were asking parents to rate the importance of different types of medical research.

This is a different question than what you were suggesting, jen. You said this showed that the number one concern for parents is the safety of vaccination; instead, the research shows that of the different areas of research that they asked parents to rate, the one most commonly marked as most important was vaccine safety. Some of this may be explained by the current anti-vaccination trend, which the study speculates about, referring to the "alleged (but later disproven) links between vaccines and autism". I think some of it also explained by the fact that this is the intervention which parents are most likely to observe in their children, since even healthy children will be vaccinated. So of course it will be high on their lists.

You can't really draw a conclusion about antivaccination tendencies from it, and so I disagree with the study's suggestion that this is because of the alleged vaccine-autism link and concerns about mercury and other preservatives. Honestly, a person who is highly pro-vaccine is also likely to mark "safety of vaccines" high on the list, because that is something which absolutely needs to be studied in new vaccines, and a pro-vaccine person would want more vaccines to be developed.

jen, you are incorrect that the response rate is unimportant. It does matter. But there were enough respondents to draw some inferences, I think. One thing that stood out for me was that it was pretty much a dead heat between "safety of vaccines" and "effectiveness and safety of medicines". The public (or at least the portion which was polled) evidently considers drug safety to be the highest priority for research.

Truthfully, I'm inclined to agree, at least out of these eight options. I'd rate treatments for common childhood diseases higher than the poll did, though, and I'd prefer to group "safety of vaccines" and "safety of medicines" as a single category.

Sid @ 132:

But the vaccine manufacturer doesn't make any money from a hospital stay so your point eludes me. It's like saying Sanofi wouldn't produce a flu vaccine because Bayer would lose aspirin sales.

Of course that statement is silly. But there are far more things out there than just Sanofi and Bayer. Also, note how many companies make vaccines. Now note how many pharmaceutical companies there are altogether. No company is exclusively in the vaccine business, and many companies stay entirely out of the vaccine business.

Vaccine manufacturers do make money off of hospital stays.

BTW, on the eating dirt thing, more people eat dirt than they realize. That includes adults. In fact, the number of people who ingest soil particles is pretty darn close to the number of people on the planet. (The ones who don't are the ones on feeding tubes who are in comas, and even then it can happen.) It is basically impossible to avoid dirt. You can avoid swallowing a large enough amount to taste, but it doesn't need to be that much for any pathogens in it to be contagious. Same with poo. It's everywhere. You can reduce your exposure, which is a very good idea, but it will never ever be zero.

Oooh, 1998. From the CDC Appendix G says there were only 6279 cases and five deaths from pertussis. And in 2005 there were over 25000 cases and 31 deaths. It looks like this year that record will be broken. Sid must be so proud.

@Sid

Ah, I see now. Their study was unable to show a causal connection between pertussis and asthma with statistical significance. There was, however, twice the rate of asthma in the pertussis group compared to the control group, but, because the study was pretty small and insufficiently powered, this did not reach the level of significance.

But then there's this bit:

However, the rate of the combination of asthma and/or atopy in hospitalized infants was significantly higher in the SG (33% vs. 8.3%. p=0.03).

So there is, according to this study, a connection between pertussis in infancy and increased asthma and/or atopic illness.

Once again, we see Sid quote mining to mislead. Thanks for providing the links, though.

I also note from Sid's citation that only 96 out of 393 completed the study. That low a completion ratio raises some red flags, as well, about the quality of the study.

Quoth Jen:

Most parents actually aren't stupid and realize that the research thus far on vaccine safety has been minimal at best. It hasn't been "thoroughly investigated." Don't make me laugh. You pose some fair follow-up questions about research monies and allocation but the whole premise that vaccines have been thoroughly investigated? Nice try. Now go get your kids their Gardasil and Rota shots.

Quoth PubMed: 8704 hits on "vaccine safety". Yes, obviously "minimal."

@Scott

[antivax hat]But those are all funded by Big Pharma!!one!!! You can't believe any of those studies cuz they don't tell the truth. Vaccines cause teh autismz!!1eleventy!!1![/antivax hat]

Todd, you're the one claiming that which appears nowhere in the medical literature and using a single study to justify it. Additionally your study makes no mention of the fact that the pertussis risk factor of second hand smoke and the pertussis treatment of antibiotics are both acknowledged risk factors for the development of asthma. The failure to account for these possible confounders makes your study's conclusion tenuous at best.

I knew Jay Gordon must've dropped back in, seeing that the number of comments suddenly jumped (and continuing my suspicion that Jay spouts inanities deliberately to drive up forum traffic and increase Orac's vast income from ScienceBlogs).

It's puzzling though.

Jay (post 68): Goodbye for a while.

I have a job.

Uh-oh, this can't be a good sign - Jay's returning to post in the middle of the day. Lost your job, Jay? Maybe you can sign on with AoA or NVIC as a high-priced antivax consultant.

While you still have free time, Jay, it'd be nice if you responded to your distortion of the American Academy of Pediatrics' position on pediatricians dropping patients from their practices in the event of irreconcilable differences over vaccination. And I'm sure others would like to hear if, as a proud FAAP you're planning on following the AAP's recommendation that all health care workers get vaccinated against influenza, as part of an ethical and practical imperative to protect patients.

Jay: "There is not enough science in here to fill a thimble."

C'mon, Jay. Fill our thimbles with the science that guides your views on immunization.

Actually, all we need is one communal thimble, which Jay won't be able to fill for quite some time, if ever.

Note to Sid: Wow. Aside from never being sick, you've never had a checkup or taken any prescription meds ever while on a health insurance plan? Really? (As Sid the Superman, you don't need either of those things). You should donate your body to science. As soon as possible so that frail, lesser mortals can benefit.

@Sid

Todd, you're the one claiming that which appears nowhere in the medical literature and using a single study to justify it. Additionally your study makes no mention of the fact that the pertussis risk factor of second hand smoke and the pertussis treatment of antibiotics are both acknowledged risk factors for the development of asthma. The failure to account for these possible confounders makes your study's conclusion tenuous at best.

First off, "pertussis risk factor of second hand smoke"...huh? What do you mean?

As to smoking as a risk factor, the survey included (emphasis added):

questions on age, gender, socioeconomic status, type of residence, environmental factors such as dampness in the house, smoking exposure, and current pet ownership

Finally, I provided at least one bit of evidence that pertussis results in an increased risk of asthma. If I had more time, I could do a bit more digging and find some more for you, if you like. You, on the other hand, have not provided evidence that pertussis does not cause or lead to an increased risk of asthma, which I assume is your position, based on your earlier comment.

http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/302460-overview
Other risk factors for URIs

Smoking and exposure to second-hand smoke: These may alter mucosal resistance to URI.

http://pediatrics.about.com/cs/pediatricadvice/a/second_hand_smk.htm
Being exposed to someone that smokes, even if they just smoke outside the home, is thought to increase a child's chance of having ear infections, allergies, asthma, wheezing, pneumonia and frequent upper respiratory tract infections.

Sid:

How can Todd, on the one hand, claim something "which appears nowhere in the medical literature" and on the other hand use "a single study to justify it"?

From Jay Gordon @68

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2010/10/november_1-6_to_be_vaccine_aw…

A note from one of us on the here in California: Pertussis is not "going around." There is no more whooping cough than in a usual summer/fall season.

This is classic Dr. Jay. What he sees is true for everyone, everywhere. In fact, Los Angeles and Ventura counties are not seeing particularly high numbers of cases (3.1-10.0 / thousand)

Here's the link for the California Department Of Public Health page on the current pertussis epidemic:

http://www.cdph.ca.gov/programs/immunize/Pages/PertussisSummaryReports…

Back to Dr. Jay:

"Confirmed, probable and suspected cases?" You can't possibly hang your hat on that waste basket phrase.

Well, he is a busy practicing physician and probably doesn't have the time to download the reports at the link above. I'll quote from yesterday's report, available at the above link:

As of 10/19/2010, there have been 5,978 confirmed, probable and suspect cases of pertussis with onset from January 1 through October 19, 2010 reported to CDPH for a
state rate of 15.3 cases/100,000.
o 320 new cases have been reported to CDPH this week Case Classification:
Confirmed: ~67%
Probable: ~16%
Suspect: ~17%

What does "confirmed" mean? The California Department of Public Health's PDF on pertussis laboratory testing:

The preferred methods for the laboratory diagnosis of pertussis are culture and polymerase chain reaction and it is recommended in most cases that both tests be performed. These tests are the basis for the CDC definition of a confirmed case of pertussis.

Culture of B. pertussis is the gold standard and the preferred laboratory test for pertussis; however, the organism can be difficult to isolate. Culture is less sensitive than PCR, but is 100% specific (no false positives). A negative culture result does not rule out pertussis infection. Confirm outbreaks with >1 culture- confirmed case. B. pertussis is most frequently recovered in the catarrhal or early paroxysmal stage of illness. Once cough has been present for >3 weeks, recovering the organism is unlikely.

B. pertussis usually grows after 3-4 days, however cultures cannot be considered negative for pertussis until after 10 days. The primary reasons for failure to isolate B. pertussis are bacterial or fungal contamination, lack of fresh media, and specimen collection too late in illness. Cultures can also be negative if taken from a previously immunized person or if antimicrobial therapy has been started.

[snip]

Specimen collection Specimensfor culture or PCR must be obtained from a nasal aspirate or nasopharyngeal swab. A nasal aspirate is the preferred specimen; however, a nasopharyngeal swab is acceptable. A video demonstrating nasal aspiration and nasopharyngeal swab collection is available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFwSefezIHU

So "confirmed" means a sample has been taken from a person suspected of having pertussis and the sample has been tested by two different methods.

So contrary to Dr. Jay's assertion

There is not enough science in here to fill a thimble.

There appears to be plenty of science.

@ Calli: "Same with poo. It's everywhere."

Ugh. I just had a huge argument with some anti-vaxers on a parenting site, who were claiming that polio isn't very contagious because we "don't drink poo water" in the USA in the year 2010. Apparently, poo water was all the rage back in the 1940s and 1950s when polio was endemic. And in their fantasy world, viruses like rotavirus (also spread by fecal-oral route) aren't currently circulating.

@Enkidu

I wonder how they'd feel about all the poo on their toothbrush.

@ Todd W.: LOL they should know, what with all the crap coming out of their mouths. :)

@Composer99

Good point. ;)

@Todd
Study looks even weaker than I thought

Asthma was defned as the occurrence of wheezing and/or a doctorâs diagnosis of asthma and/or use of asthma medication but as we all know not all that wheezes is asthma. Additionally the questionnaire depends on one's memories over time to determine smoking conditions concurrent with pertussis illness. The questionnaire method of diagnosis also raises questions regarding diagnostic accuracy. Finally children already having asthma would have been more likely to receive a pertussis diagnosis since is the illness is more severe in asthmatics

Enkidu, about poo being everywhere -- there was a Mythbuster's episode which addressed that, and found that, horror of horrors, fecal bacteria can be found on pretty much everything. Tied in to that was the experiment in dispersal of nasal secretions, which they did in their "Flu Myths" episode. That stuff gets around a lot more than you'd think. Or want to think, anyway. It was kinda gross, but it explained a lot. Avoiding exposure turns out to be very difficult -- but interestingly, avoiding exposing others turns out to be doable. Which means that all of us with colds have a responsibility to uphold.

I just realized I didn't finish my comment to Sid Offit before hitting submit.

Vaccine manufacturers do make money off of hospital stays.

I meant to go into more detail on this. When you are in the hospital with, for instance, influenza, a lot of supplies will be expended on you. Needles. Tubing. IV bags. Tape. Single-use tests (such as those for various strains of influenza). Antivirals. Antibiotics (possibly). Saline solution (very likely). Glucose solution, if you're very ill and can't eat adequately. Brochodialators (e.g. albuterol). Steroids (inhaled, oral, or IV). Single-use covers for thermometer probes. Electrodes for a monitor. Painkillers, possibly. Antipyretics. There's more too, but that's a taste. Just going to the ER ends up consuming a fair bit of stuff; this is why medical waste is such a problem for hospitals. They produce such a damn lot of it.

Now, GlaxoSmithKline is an interesting one to look at. Among their rather large portfolio of products are influenza vaccines. They also make Ventolin, a brand-name formulation of albuterol, a very widely used bronchodialator. They are the leading supplier of albuterol. They also make Advair, which they are heavily advertising at present, and which can also be used to treat the symptoms resulting from a respiratory insult like influenza or pertussis (but which is justifiably controversial -- I won't get into that at present, as it would probably sidetrack us; suffice to say, I have grave concerns about its widespread marketing as an asthma controller considering it is only studied for short-term use).

Calli Arcale:

Enkidu, about poo being everywhere -- there was a Mythbuster's episode which addressed that, and found that, horror of horrors, fecal bacteria can be found on pretty much everything.

I am cutting up apples from my trees to make applesauce. Many of them have little black bits on them, which I rinse off. It is rodent poop, likely from squirrels and mice. Some may get into the applesauce, but it will be cooked and then frozen (used for eating and in baking).

Party at Chris' house!

I'll put you to work!

May I come over?

If Chris is making apple pie or apple cake next, I'm there.

LOL... now it is time to get child to the orthodontist.

@ Calli:

This is nothing new. Sir William Osler, the father of modern medicine, once famously stated, "the world is covered in a patina of shit."

(I think Orac is still recharging his batteries, or whatever powers das blinkenlights, from his wild skeptical weekend, so I'm making this post sans URLs)

Jay Gordon @127
In which Dr. Jay reveals his economic naïveté

It's dollar-based medicine and you all know it. Liz, look up the data on PCV7 revenue. Billions. Pure profit at some point.

Let's have a brief review on income statements, or profit & loss statements :

Gross sales (all the money you take in from that product) MINUS (cost of goods sold) = net revenue. Net revenue is notprofit. You still have to account for things like the costs of developing the product, the cost of marketing the product, and so forth.

So right away you can see the hole in Dr. Jay's thinking: gross sales of a product, like a vaccine, that has an manufacturing process can never turn into "pure profit", even after research and development costs are covered.

Dr. Jay is correct on one point: PCV7 (Prevnar)'s gross sales over the last ten years, worldwide, have been in the billions. I found one estimate at Bloomburg that indicated that for FYI 2006, world-wide sales (gross revenue) were about $1.5 billion, and that sales had been increasing steadily.

So why has has Prevnar sold so well? The vaccine is effective in preventing serious disease..

In Sustained reductions in invasive pneumococcal disease in the era of conjugate vaccine Pilishvili et al. (2010) reported that the incidence of invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) caused by the seven strains in the vaccine declined 94% (from 15.5 to 1.0 cases per 100,000 population). Other reports have cited an associated reduction in ear infections by 10% and an invasive procedure, myringotomy (ear tubes) by about 20%.

Here's Jay's argument in a nutshell:

1. Medicine has been corrupted by the evils of money and profit
2. Vaccines provide revenue to the companies that manufacture them
3. Therefore vaccines are evil.

Chris - have you considered Paradontics?
Bad teeth are considered to be caused by a misalignment of the denta the mystical force that keeps teeth pointing North and South, in attunement to the natural magnetic lines of the earth.
Paradontics reject the metallicism of traditional orthodontacy.
Yes, just a few short sessions with our fully-trained operatives will provide your child with organically parallel dentition and the certain knowledge that the natural orientation of his teeth will not change in any way.
Down with Big Orthodoncy!

@todd "Quick note on vaccines as a money-maker. I added a new section to antiantivax.flurf.net on the costs of treating diseases. I've only completed diphtheria and pertussis, so far, and tetanus is almost ready to go up."

Going to need a time machine Todd.

@triskelethecat "@Dr Jay: and you just see patients out of the goodness of your heart, not charging them and making a profit? How nice of you."

Well, yes, like most honest doctors and good people, I do see many patients for free or reduced fees. And yes, I do have a niche as a pediatrician who encourages parents to actively participate in the children's health care decisions. Because I work so hard and have delivered care to the community for so long, I think that I would still have a nice full practice even with a different medical philosophy.

@Liz Ditz "So why has has Prevnar sold so well? The vaccine is effective in preventing serious disease."

Liz! You know the truth: I could most a dozen links, but this one's good enough. The PCV7 increased the risk of dangerous illness as well as decreasing the risk of (some) non-dangerous pneumococcal illness.
http://jcm.asm.org/cgi/reprint/JCM.01200-09v1.pdf

I swear, listening to you non-pediatricians discuss pediatrics is like watching plumbers debate molecular biology. Actually, I think that more genuine wisdom and experience might be exchanged in that debate than above. You just don't know what you're talking about. ORAC, would you have any interest in my opinions or my version of the facts about your particular surgical subspecialty? No, and I wouldn't think to offer them. Stop pretending you know so much about my specialty.

Jay

David, I know we agreed on 250 comments, but could you send the money to my Paypal account when we hit 240 instead? Business has been a little slow this month because of the darned measles vaccine preventing measles.

I promise to make at least two more data-free, science-free posts in the next few hours. That should generate at least 50 inane, repetitive, occasionally unpleasant responses.

OK?

Thanks.

My Best,

Jay

http://www.naturalnews.com/030074_Happy_Meal_decompose.html

Comic Relief from this heaviness.

Jay

"Stop pretending you know so much about my specialty."

jay, you should stop pretending you know anything about medicine or statistics - your comments already give your ignorance away.

Jen - your parody of antivaxxers is a bit too subtle. Sure, it's obvious that no one who really believed that this was a pharma shill blog would bother posting such an accusation here, since a pharma shill blog would of course never permit any such posts to stay up (like the AoA blog redacts posts that question the benefits of the products that they support). But, while it may seem obvious to you that your accusation must obviously be tongue-in-cheek, you'll find that a lot of people will take your accusation at face value (hard as that is to believe) and think that you're being foolish.

Liz:

So right away you can see the hole in Dr. Jay's thinking: gross sales of a product, like a vaccine, that has an manufacturing process can never turn into "pure profit", even after research and development costs are covered.

Yep. One of the closest things to pure profit that I've seen is fountain drinks at restaurants. McDonald's has been making a big deal (at participating restaurants) over their "any size for a buck" soft drinks. But it's really no skin off their back. The most expensive part of the beverage is the cup, and that's a fraction of a cent. Well, strictly speaking the most expensive part is probably the person filling it up. But even that is small, leaving nearly 100% profit off the drink. Which will go a long way to explaining why McDonald's puts so much salt on the french fries.

Chris -- fresh homemade applesauce? WANT!!!

Oo, three successive posts from Jay "I've got a job" Gordon, none of which address his misinterpretation of/questionable compliance with American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations (see post #162 if you've forgotten, Jay).

Instead, Jay has made a feeble attack on the Pneumococcal vaccine Prevnar, citing it as making money for the manufacturer (can't have that) and claiming it's made the problem worse:

Jay: "The PCV7 increased the risk of dangerous illness as well as decreasing the risk of (some) non-dangerous pneumococcal illness."

At the risk of being yet another non-pediatrician to debunk Jay, I will note that a recent (2009) Cochrane review found that Prevnar (PCV7) was indeed effective in diminishing the incidence of invasive pneumococcal disease and pneumonia. Perhaps Jay does not consider these "dangerous illnesses", though they are a huge part of the pneumococcal disease that is responsible for 11% of mortality in children around the world between the ages of 1 and 59 months. You could look it up.

And while Jay is fussing over a study showing that Streptococcal empyema incidence increased in Utah after PCV7 went into use, he neglects to tell us that as of 2010
there is a new Pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV13) that covers additional serotypes and should offer children even more protection against dangerous illness. According to the evil CDC:

"There are 91 strains (serotypes) of pneumococcal bacteria and the first pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV7) protects against 7 of them. Before PCV7 was introduced, these 7 serotypes were responsible for over 80% of severe pneumococcal infections among children. Now that PCV7 has been in use since 2000, there is significantly less pneumococcal disease. Even though there is less disease, other strains of pneumococcal bacteria have become more common â particularly one serotype, 19A. PCV13 includes the original 7 serotypes in PCV7 plus the 6 additional serotypes, including 19A. This gives us a vaccine that protects against the most common strains of pneumococcal bacteria responsible for severe pneumococcal infections among children."

Possibly Jay failed to mention PCV13 because he is simply unaware of it. After all, Jay has admitted to us that he recommends no vaccine in children under the age of 10 except for "maybe a DPT".

Jay: "Stop pretending you know so much about my specialty."

Somebody's got to make up for what you don't know.

Funny coincidence and interesting story: It really is a slow day here. A couple cancellations left me time to post here.

But, I just saw a 14 year old girl with a bad spasmodic cough. She has been sick for fifteen days. She and her mother were pretty precise about that. She received the Adacel vaccine from one of my partners in August, was seen for bronchitis and given azithromycin and albuteral by the same partner a week or so ago and was seen in the UCLA ER Monday night. They were busy, kept her waiting for four hours, did no blood work and no chest film but gave her Vicodin (!!) to stop the cough.

Today, she's smiling but coughing hard. Not long paroxysms as we see with pertussis, but a lot of short spasms. She's been sick for long enough to be too weak to make it through the school day. She is not terribly ill looking or appearing.

I could write this visit up as pertussis and submit it to the state but I don't really believe she meets the criteria nor do I really think she has the disease. I'm going to try adding a steroid inhaler, getting a chest film and see what shows up. I think that some offices might have reported this out as whooping cough. The data being gathered and published are misleading.

I just thought it was fascinating that she showed up in the middle of this conversation of ours.

Jay

I promise to make at least two more data-free, science-free posts in the next few hours.

Who would notice?

Seriously, though, Dr. Jay. Please restrain yourself. I'm embarrassed for you. Really.

Jay: "Stop pretending you know so much about my specialty."

Somebody's got to make up for what you don't know.

Heh.

@Jay's paper on PCV7:

The study is of a situation that might be unique to Utah, as noted by the authors that "in spite of vaccine uptake that was similar to the rest of the US, children in Utah did not realize the same degree of decrease in invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) reported in other parts of the US (27, 47)." The authors also note that IPD in Utah pre-vaccine was caused by non-vaccine strains ~60% of the time, higher than other parts of the USA. Once the vaccine was licenced, this trend continued, as the vaccine-strains were wiped out and non-vaccine strains continued to take over: "The limited effectiveness of the PCV-7 in Utah was in part a result of the rapid emergence of IPD, particularly empyema, due to non-vaccine serotypes (11, 12)."

So, Jay is taking a situation where Utah differs from the rest of the US, and using it to make a blanket statement about PCV-7.

Let me put it another way, Dr. Jay. You had a patient, with pertussis-like symptoms, during a pertussis outbreak. And you did not test for it. So, if this pt does have pertussis, you've just shown that it is often under reported. The fact that she was immunized definitely decreases the chances, but a bad cough for 2 weeks, during a pertussis outbreak is definitely worth testing for. By the way, for future reference, teenage and adult patients don't typically get the paroxysms that younger kids get, they just get a horrible cough for 2-4 weeks. And Vicodin is about as valid a anti-tussive as anything else we give. At least she can get some rest at night.

The PCV13 may help to prevent more strains for a while but then some of the others will take up the slack. We appear to be chasing our tails with this particular bacterium. It's not as amenable to vaccine prevention as HIB or viruses like measles and polio. The PCV7 really may have caused more harm than good, though.

Bacon, if you have a chance, please pull the other articles that show that the PCV7 set kids up for infection with 19A. (The PCV13 covers for 19A.) If you don't to that over the next couple hours I'll see what I can do. Thanks.

http://www.urmc.rochester.edu/news/story/index.cfm?id=1695

Jay

I'm sorry, but does anyone out there have the original JAMA article?

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6873U420100908

Jay

OK, how about this one? @Enkidu, Alaska, Utah, elsewhere.

ORAC. Heh? (You may subtract the astounding number of comments I've made from the total.)

http://www.nationalreviewofmedicine.com/issue/2007/05_15/4_patients_pra…

Gone for a few hours. Talk amongst yourselves, please.

Jay

I could write this visit up as pertussis and submit it to the state but I don't really believe she meets the criteria nor do I really think she has the disease. I'm going to try adding a steroid inhaler, getting a chest film and see what shows up. I think that some offices might have reported this out as whooping cough. The data being gathered and published are misleading.

Or you could have tested the poor girl, I do believe that the state of CA has recommendations for that: http://www.kernpublichealth.com/departments/cdc/pdfs/2_CDPH_Pertussis%2…

And they even have instructions for how to collect samples for you Dr. Jay. Pertussis is a notoriously under-reported disease due to atypical presentation and/or simply not seeking medical care. Your attempt to present it as being over-reported to save face in light of your wonky, evidence-free pertussis vaccine recommendations, is pathetic and demonstrates your utter lack of experience in infectious disease.

@Dr. Jay

Your view is that the PCV vaccine is bad because preventing infection with the 7 (or 13) strains covered by the vaccine allows non-vaccine strains to gain a foothold and cause illness.

This implies that in order to prevent that occurring, we should not use the vaccine. What you seem to fail to grasp is that if the vaccine is not used, then the more common strains will cause illness. The result is roughly the same, except that your implied course of action is rather sad and regrettable, in that the illnesses could be prevented.

So, which is better, pneumococcal disease caused by one of the rarer strains not covered by the vaccine or pneumococcal disease caused by the more common strains covered by the disease?

I, too, am curious as to Dr. Jay's response to his misrepresentation of AAP recommendations, his incorrect assertion that the number of cases of pertussis in California is "usual", and that, as shown, more can be made treating a disease than preventing it.

AnthonyK:

Chris - have you considered Paradontics?

Ah, gee... it was the absolutely last orthodontics appointment we would ever have. Yay!

(oh, and very funny, thanks)

Dr. Jay seems to be skipping the fact, even pointed out in the Utah paper, that IPD has gone down in the USA as a whole since PCV-7 has been used.

And now he's complaining because antibiotic-resistant strain 19A (whose resisitance to antibiotics was not due to PCV-7) has emerged as a replacement, but.... we have a vaccine to combat that now with PCV-13. So his point is... ?

@Science Mom

When I read that account from Dr. Jay, I was speechless. I thought that perhaps it was an imposter posing as him, he couldn't really be that stupid (for lack of a better word).

@Sid

Asthma was defned as the occurrence of wheezing and/or a doctorâs diagnosis of asthma and/or use of asthma medication

Which is entirely in line with the general clinical definition of asthma.

Additionally the questionnaire depends on one's memories over time to determine smoking conditions concurrent with pertussis illness. The questionnaire method of diagnosis also raises questions regarding diagnostic accuracy. Finally children already having asthma would have been more likely to receive a pertussis diagnosis since is the illness is more severe in asthmatics

The study I linked to used the International study of asthma and allergies in childhood (ISAAC [PDF]) core questions, which have been validated for assessing prevalence and severity of asthma and allergies. So, those questions, at least, are valid. As to any other questions that were on the questionnaires, yes, memory may be a limiting factor.

Regarding pertussis, the researchers, in addition to the questions, took blood samples and checked for pertussis-specific IgG levels. So, they did not rely solely on questionnaires for pertussis diagnosis.

As to smoking, I find it interesting that first you said the study was bad because you thought it didn't take smoking into account, but when it was pointed out that it did, indeed, take it into account, that somehow the study is "even worse"?

Truly, Sid, your mind works in mysterious ways.

While the study I posted does have limitations, it seems reasonably sound. Would anyone else with a science background care to take a look at it and let me know what you think? The link is up at post 163.

Dr Jay @ 192:

The PCV13 may help to prevent more strains for a while but then some of the others will take up the slack. We appear to be chasing our tails with this particular bacterium.

So because it does not prevent all forms of pneumococcal disease, we should surrender? As I see it, the fact that the ecology of this bacterium is changing shows that we're on the right track -- the vaccinations can only be applying a selective pressure on it if they really do work as designed. The next step, then, is clearly to improve the vaccine's coverage. That's obviously the idea behind the new 13-valent version, but long-term we'd want a more vaccine that attacks the bacterium in a more generic way. in the meantime, I see no reason to let the disease run unfettered merely because the current vaccines are imperfect.

You had a patient, with pertussis-like symptoms, during a pertussis outbreak. And you did not test for it.

Indeed. Considering Jay's very public opposition to vaccination is a major draw card for his anti-vaxx customers,let's sincerely hope this girl doesn't have pertussis and that none of his unprotected patients have contracted it.

I wonder, does Jay actually read the articles he links to? If he had, he would have found that no one is quoted as doubting the effectiveness of anti-pneumococcal vaccines or calling for non-vaccination. Instead, they note the difficulty of eradicating pneumococcal disease because of the emergence of new serotypes, which while not typically causing life-threatening disease do cause problems like persistent ear infections.

From Jay's National Review of Medicine link:

"Dr Singleton and her Active Bacterial Core Surveillance program have been monitoring the impact of the vaccine on overall IPD prevalence in children, as well as antibiotic resistance. "We looked specifically at pneumococcal serotypes to track what happened in children after vaccination," says Dr Singleton. "The strains covered by Prevnar were the ones that had the highest antibiotic resistance." The good news is Prevnar significantly decreased IPD incidence and antibiotic resistance, and even indirectly decreased IPD in adults by reducing contact infections, notes Dr Singleton."

Now that we have the new PCV13 vaccine, more coverage will be achieved and hopefully physicians will not contribute to the emergence of new strains by overprescribing antibiotics, which has been deemed partially responsible for proliferation of S. pneumoniae 19A.

Dr. Jay's eagerness to forego vaccination overlooks the problem of antibiotic resistance, which is speeded up when more kids get sick and parents expect antibiotics to be prescribed for them. There's also the problem of side effects from antibiotics, which knowledgeable physicians would be far more concerned about than vaccine reactions.

Take the case Jay cites of the 14-year-old with the bad cough whom Jay doesn't really think has pertussis, but who was given azithromycin (an antibiotic) among other drugs. Due to lack of testing I guess we'll never know if she had pertussis and might have avoided her illness, ER visit and need for antibiotic therapy had more parents (including the vaccine refusers encouraged in Jay's practice) gotten their kids immunized against the disease.

oh my God, Calli, per your post 202. "improve the vaccine's coverage." "we should surrender?"...I mean, really, how many vaccines do you think an infant or child can handle? Is it endless? Apparently.

@jen

Pull your blinders off for a moment as I try to explain this for you. The pneumococcal vaccine is a single vaccine. PCV7 contains 7 strains of pneumococcal bacteria. PCV13 contains 13 strains of pneumococcal bacteria. This is similar to how the flu vaccine usually contains three strains of influenza virus.

So, when Calli says that the vaccine's coverage should be improved, she means that it should be improved so that it protects against even more strains of pneumococcal bacteria. One vaccine, though.

Okay. Hopefully you were able to understand that.

how many vaccines do you think an infant or child can handle?

As many as real pathogens he/she can already handle on a daily basis.

jen @ 205:

oh my God, Calli, per your post 202. "improve the vaccine's coverage." "we should surrender?"...I mean, really, how many vaccines do you think an infant or child can handle? Is it endless? Apparently.

What I think would be ideal is if somebody could isolate a commonality between all strains of the pneumococcal bacterium which the bacterium requires for survival and then device a vaccine which targets that. One antigen, all strains. I don't think this will happen anytime soon, but it would be awesome. In the meantime, more antigens is probably the only way to address the problem.

Endless? Not at all. They should be given the antigens which are most likely to be useful to them, and not waste effort on the others. This would be ones which are commonly circulating and/or are particularly virulent and/or particularly contagious. If we end up driving pneumococcal bacteria to evolve to be not very serious and not very contagious, that would be a good outcome in my opinion.

As far as "surrender", what I meant by that was that just because the vaccine isn't perfect doesn't mean we should surrender and accept the inevitability of disease, as many of our ancestors had to. I believe the best course is to keep fighting, and by many angles -- not just vaccination. I also believe vaccines should constantly be improved. They will never be perfect, but they can certainly be better, and that's something the manufacturers and scientists should strive for.

"Are you going to include the new science based Mott's poll that shows vaccine safety to be parents' number one concern"

Jen, as others have pointed out, that's not a scientific survey, and even my sophomore stat students could see that - they actually understand basic statistics and are learning more. That explains why sid, jay, augie, all incredibly stupid and even more dishonest, push it: they can't, or won't, put forth the work to distinguish good work from bad.

I don't have any problems with the survey - the result is exactly what I would expect. Every kid (ok, the overwhelming majority, not including Sid's) gets vaccines, more then any of the other item on the list. So of course the safety of said vaccines is of prime importance to parents.
Only people like AoA Kim would make the non-sequitur that being concerned over vaccine safety means buying into their scaremongering in regards to vaccines and autism.

Since this post isn't that old, I don't think it counts as thread necromancy to post here (where it's on topic) and mention I hope to write up blog posts to share with my family/friend social network each day of Mercola/Fisher's 'Vaccine Awareness Week' pointing out the logical/moral/economic/scientific failures of the anti-vaccine movement.

I'll be sure to link to here and to Science-Based Medicine as often as I can.

@Composer99

Don't forget Prometheus' Photon in the Darkness and my antiantivax.flurf.net page (I'll also be blogging at Silenced).

Boy do I need help. My wife's mother stayed with us for 10 weeks or so last fall and over the winter, and she has obviously dumped much of this nonsense on my wife. I started noticing some odd behavior and then the absolute refusal to consider getting any vaccines for any of our 3 children (4,3 and 18months). Then I saw the Mercola website on the home PC and the email updates from the same. I did some web searches and thankfully came upon this site, where I can now see that my plight is not very promising. I can't believe how many of these same arguments that are discussed here that I had to counter in a rather frustrating argument/discussion that pitted me against my wife and her mother. Their daily phone conversations--while I'm at work--are simply driving this whole topic further over the cliff.
Thanks to all who post the detailed rebuttals. My degree is in Computer Science, not statistics or medicine, so the details really help. Frankly, I don't know how this is going to play out, but I fear the confrontations are not going to go well. If anyone wants to add any comments or thoughts, or make some further reading recommendations, please do.
Steve.
Cincinnati

@ Steve S.: Hang with us here- you're amongst friends!
Go to recent posts ( today's, yesterday's) and comments - you'll find a lively discussion relevant to your concerns.

The educated people are the ones who are NOT vaccinating their children. They see thru the "junk science" of vaccines. You have to go to school a long time to become stupid enough to think you can inject toxins like mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde, antifreeze & human fetus cells into the body & think that the person will be ok as a result of it. Don't think those toxins are in there? Go to the CDCs website & do a search for vaccine ingredients you will see that I'm correct. Mary Tocco is a 30+ year independent researcher on the dangers of vaccines. I have over 20 years under my belt. Vaccines did NOT save us. Better food, better water & better sanitation is what brought disease under control. The deaths from childhood illnesses came down at the same time for diseases that vaccines were produced for as diseases that didn't have vaccines. Scarlet fever & TB are 2 such examples. http://genesgreenbook.com/content/proof-vaccines-didnt-save-us

Vit. D3 has been proven to be 800% more effective in preventing the flu than the flu shot. (naturalnews.com) How is injecting 25 mcg of mercury making you healthy? Using the exposure levels on the EPAs own website, a person would have to weigh 600 lbs. to receive that much mercury at one sitting.

Wake up people!! Big pharma is NOT out for our health, the sicker we are, the more money they make. They expect their income from vaccines to be at $34 BILLION per year by the year 2015.

Ms. Harvey, is there any reason that you needed to comment on a year old thread? Perhaps you should wander around this blog a bit, especially this article. Though before you do I have a couple of questions for you:

1. You said "Better food, better water & better sanitation is what brought disease under control."

Can you explain why measles returned to Japan and the UK? Was there some kind of change in their sanitation practices? Did they give up on sewers and treated water?

2. You said "Scarlet fever & TB are 2 such examples."

But why do kids still get strep throat? It is the caused by group A Streptococcus bacteria, which is the same thing that causes Scarlet fever. Oh, and TB is returning, the antibiotic resistant type.

They expect their income from vaccines to be at $34 BILLION per year by the year 2015.

Lori's also a twoofer, just by the by. Seriously, toots, you might want to reconsider marketing as a career if this the best you can manage.

Good to know. Not only is she trotting blatantly erroneous tropes we have all heard before, she is using the old, boring and totally unoriginal Pharma Shill Gambit.

It would be nice if these people would post something new and novel like real evidence, and actually know that Scarlet Fever happens when you don't treat strep throat.

I should probably note that that's just from the Blogger profile that she herself essentially spamvertised.

The educated people are the ones who are NOT vaccinating their children. They see thru the "junk science" of vaccines.

"Educated" I do not think it means what you think it means. Fact is, your so-called "educated" parents merely pick and choose what they want to believe because real science is hard.

You have to go to school a long time to become stupid enough to think you can inject toxins like mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde, antifreeze & human fetus cells into the body & think that the person will be ok as a result of it. Don't think those toxins are in there? Go to the CDCs website & do a search for vaccine ingredients you will see that I'm correct.

No, you're not correct. You see for those of us who have gone to school a long time to get stupid manage to know that there is no anti-freeze in vaccines, no or only trace mercury in paediatric vaccines, know that there are toxic doses and safe doses and also know that there are no 'human fetus cells' injected into the body.

Mary Tocco is a 30+ year independent researcher on the dangers of vaccines. I have over 20 years under my belt.

Mary Tocco is no independent researcher and neither are you. She's no more than a former chiropractor office assistant. You both can call yourselves Duchesses for all I care, doesn't make you so.

Vaccines did NOT save us. Better food, better water & better sanitation is what brought disease under control. The deaths from childhood illnesses came down at the same time for diseases that vaccines were produced for as diseases that didn't have vaccines. Scarlet fever & TB are 2 such examples.

Oh what a tired old trope, not like something called a-n-t-i-b-i-o-t-i-c-s was discovered to help reduce the mortality of Scarlet fever and TB.

Vit. D3 has been proven to be 800% more effective in preventing the flu than the flu shot. (naturalnews.com) How is injecting 25 mcg of mercury making you healthy? Using the exposure levels on the EPAs own website, a person would have to weigh 600 lbs. to receive that much mercury at one sitting.

Twenty years of "research" under your belt and you don't even know to post a proper citation? You know from reputable, indexed medical journals? Furthermore, your abuse of the EPA mercury information doesn't exactly demonstrate your "research" prowess either.

Wake up people!! Big pharma is NOT out for our health, the sicker we are, the more money they make. They expect their income from vaccines to be at $34 BILLION per year by the year 2015.

Right, and the Little Supplement industry is churning out effective and safe products for free. Pharma makes a whole lot more on VPD treatments than prevention so go ahead, make your contribution to Big Pharma Einstein. Oh yes, your little fact-free blog is quite entertaining.

The educated people are the ones who are NOT vaccinating their children. They see thru the "junk science" of vaccines.

That's the Dunning-Kruger effect talking, there; the people who know the least on a subject think they are the "educated" ones on the subject, and that everyone who follows the real science has been duped by "junk science."

You have to go to school a long time to become stupid enough to think you can inject toxins like mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde, antifreeze & human fetus cells into the body & think that the person will be ok as a result of it.

Out of the five "toxins" on your list, the last two are not even in vaccines.  Some vaccines contain polyethylene glycol; some people mistakenly assume that this is the same chemical as ethylene glycol, which is one of multiple components of antifreeze, but it is not, and anyone who did their research honestly would soon discover that it is not.  Some vaccines were developed by being cultured in fetal cells; some people mistakenly assume that this means that fetal cells are in the vaccines, but anyone who did their research honestly would soon discover that this is as ridiculous an assumption as claiming "Carrots are grown in the dirt, therefore, carrots contain dirt!"  Of the three remaining toxins, what an honest researcher would discover is that a can of tuna has more mercury in it than any vaccine does, and eating a pear puts more formaldehyde in your body than any vaccine.

Don't think those toxins are in there? Go to the CDCs website & do a search for vaccine ingredients you will see that I'm correct.

Except of course anyone who does so will see that you're not.

Mary Tocco is a 30+ year independent researcher on the dangers of vaccines. I have over 20 years under my belt.

So fifty years of "research" between the two of you and neither of you actually checked whether polyethylene glycol and ethylene glycol were the same thing?

Vaccines did NOT save us. Better food, better water & better sanitation is what brought disease under control. The deaths from childhood illnesses came down at the same time for diseases that vaccines were produced for as diseases that didn't have vaccines. Scarlet fever & TB are 2 such examples.

Yes, we've heard that claim before.  We also know why that claim falls apart under real examination.  Did the iron lung "save us" from polio?  No, it did not, and neither did better food, better water and better sanitation; they reduced the deaths from the disease, but they did not reduce its incidence.  Vaccines reduce the incidence of disease.  An honest researcher would grasp that that, and not reducing the number of deaths, is truly bringing the disease "under control."

Vit. D3 has been proven to be 800% more effective in preventing the flu than the flu shot (naturalnews.com)

Hate to tell you this, but Mike Adams and his website do not always purvey the truth.

Eh, screw it, she's also a fake-ass "Torah keeper."

Science Mom:

Oh yes, your little fact-free blog is quite entertaining.

Oh, wow, it is hilarious! On May 25th, 2011 she posted a website for Washington State parents to find vaccine friendly doctors to sign the new vaccine exemption form. So I went to the very poorly designed http://novaxdoctors.webs.com/doctorlist.htm and saw there were no entries for that particular state.

I guess her research did not even include reading the page.

Oh, wow, it is hilarious! On May 25th, 2011 she posted a website for Washington State parents to find vaccine friendly doctors to sign the new vaccine exemption form.

I wonder how many of those "doctors" are naturopaths, chiropractors and "brave maverick doctors"?

Some more on her research, on March 11, 2011 she wrote: "Mark Adams at NaturalNews.com." Along with not knowing how to use HTML, she has issues with reading.

You guys hooked a real live crazy troll here...and I missed it because I was away from my laptop.

I also read Lori Harvey's blog and her "profile".

So Lori, tell us about your "other" career (marketing/merchandising) and why you think you are an expert in immunology and vaccine-preventable diseases...and mammography...and birth control pills...and radiation exposure from the Japanese nuclear plant fire.

Do you have a degree from any university in any subject or work experience outside of your brilliant "merchandising career". (We like to know who is blogging here with "expert" advice.)

Unfortunately, I am called away from my laptop again...but I will be watching for your comments...they are so enlightening.

I have one with a link hung up, but she's also a "super-admin" at paltalk-dot-com by way of "Health for a Greater Exodus" by way of "Take Hold the Tzitzit." This would be amusing if it weren't a hair's breadth away from Christian Identity.

@lori harvey

Thanks for the utter lulz. Haven't had a laugh at the total stupidity of a person like you in a while.

Lori is apparently also a fan of Michael Rood, who was forced out of his own organization in a rather tawdry affair.

(Not marital, lest I be misconstrued.)

TB went away? Guess no one told the people around here, or I wouldn't be getting those mandated TB tests.

@ Narad: Torah keeper, take hold the Tzitzit and Michael Rood follower all wrapped up in this loony Lori...is that like "Jews for Jesus"?

Lori posted on June 30, 2011 about how she and her husband look so young by "following the dietary laws in Lev. 11". Michael Rood the messianic rabbi isn't even a Jew and was brought up in a traditional Christian faith.

If she comes back to post again, ask her about her self-diagnosed Meniere's Disease...the disorder she claims to have that was caused by vaccines and exposure to nickel. Ask her if she ever had the chelation that "cured" Desiree Jennings. (June 13, 2011 posting on her blog).

she and her husband look so young by "following the dietary laws in Lev. 11".

I personally preserve my youthful good looks by following the no-mixed-fibres parts of Leviticus. People are so aghast at the ugliness of my clothes that they never notice my face.

is that like "Jews for Jesus"?

There's overlap, but I get the impression that the Jews for Jesus party line, at least, is about putting Jesus into Judaism, while as one inches closer to the Black Hebrew mentality, it becomes more about simply taking the Jews out of Judaism.

(If you go to Lori's main site--which hews to HaShem's Web design advice of autoplaying little MIDI tunes on nearly every page--she's also into the Georgia Guidestones and the usual assortment of NWO/Illuminati kookery, which almost invariably finds its way back to serious anti-Semitism.)

@ herr doktor bimler: So I located my King James Version of the bible and it discusses "what is unclean to you". Apparently God spoke to Moses and Aaron and directed them to instruct their following about "whatsoever parteth the hoof, and is clovenfooted and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that shall ye eat". Camels, pigs and hares are verboten as are any creatures that creepeth, crawleth and slithereth. Fish with scales are okay, shellfish are a no-no. Fowl that hunt and eat carrion taboo. Further along in Leviticus I suppose are the prohibitions against mixing meat and dairy and prohibiting the eating of the hindquarters of the animals with cloven hoofs that chew their cud. Perhaps separate fibers are parve and mixed fibers are not

I read somewhere about "Jews for Jesus" and they are all Christians who snare unsuspecting Jews into believing in a mixing of the faiths. JFJ have an agenda to convert "non-believers" into accepting Jesus as the messiah. As Narad states, they are wrapped up in the illuminati and are sneakily antisemitic.

As Narad states, [JFJ] are wrapped up in the illuminati and are sneakily antisemitic.

I certainly didn't mean to give that impression. One can obviously point to JFJ's prosyletization itself as claiming some sort of grievous flaw, but that's not the same as the "no, we're the real chosen people" routine that can be found further on the fringe.

@ Narad: I've seen some of them "at work" in predominantly Jewish neighborhoods...perhaps they are among the fringe groups. I also know some very devout Jews and they are upset about the blatant proselytizing by evangelical Christians.

(A lot more evangelical Christians than "non" as of late in American society.)

I debated long & hard about posting again after attacks on my faith, character, etc. But, I have decided these attacks can't be answered. You want to continue to believe in the Big Pharma, fine. Medical mistakes are the 8th leading cause of death. I know of many children that were injured by vaccines. This is why I spend countless hours every week helping parents opt out of these toxic substances being injected into their kids.
There are MANY doctors who believe that vaccines are wrong too. Here is just a small sampling of them -

Dr. Mayer Eisenstein - homefirst.com

Dr. Sherry Tenpenny - drtenpenny.com

Dr. Todd Elsner - exemptmychild.com

Dr. Gary Gordon - gordonresearch.com

Robert Scott Bell (naturalpath) - robertscottbell.com

There are many more out there.

So, go to their websites & then try to find a reason to continue your attacks.

I offer no apologies as to what is posted on my blog. The info is out there if you choose to find it.

Good day......

@ Narad-
Since we're talking "fringe", how about "British Israelism"?

Ms. Harvey:

I debated long & hard about posting again after attacks on my faith, character, etc.

Which I don't care about. I only care about your "fact."

Why do you refuse to answer my two simple questions? Did you not know that measles returned to Japan, the UK and now the USA? Did you not know that Scarlet Fever is actually untreated strep throat?

Also, did you not check the page on doctors who will not vaccinate children to see that there were actually in the state of Washington (which, I assume you know is not the same as the city)? And did you not know the first name of NaturalNews' Mr. Adams?

Also, if you search this webpage you will find plenty of evidence those "experts" do not have a clue. Just like you don't have a clue.

mall sampling of them -

Dr. Mayer Eisenstein - homefirst.com

Dr. Sherry Tenpenny - drtenpenny.com

Dr. Todd Elsner - exemptmychild.com

Dr. Gary Gordon - gordonresearch.com

Robert Scott Bell (naturalpath) - robertscottbell.com

There are many more out there.

And I've written about some of them, in particular Dr. Eisenstein and Tenpenny, two of the worst. Search this blog.

Lori - I, for one, am happy that my kids won't have to experience mumps, pertussis, chickpox, measles, or the host of other diseases that are now vaccine-preventable.

Go ahead & take a walk through an older cemetary or research your family tree - I think you'll find a number of younger children that didn't survive to adulthood.

Enjoy the freedom to question vaccines, because the programs have been so successful. If you and your ilk have their way, we'll return to the days when it becomes normal again for kids to die before the age of 5.

So thanks a lot.

Medical mistakes are the 8th leading cause of death.

We've heard this one before. Citation needed, or you're lying.

I know of many children that were injured by vaccines. This is why I spend countless hours every week helping parents opt out of these toxic substances being injected into their kids.

Have any of these parents gone to Vaccine Court? If not, why not?
Thanks for posting the names of Meyer Eisenstein and Sherri Tenpenny. They've been dismantled by Orac before.

I offer no apologies as to what is posted on my blog. The info is out there if you choose to find it.

Thanks, but we prefer not to listen to antivaxx liars.

Good day.

Buh-bye, and don't let the door hit you in the arse on the way out.

Dr. Mayer Eisenstein - homefirst.com

The subject of this blog on numerous occasions and also a crackpot physician who has been sued for malpractice on numerous occasions for neonatal deaths. Also, not a researcher.

Dr. Sherry Tenpenny - drtenpenny.com

Dismissed from Vaccine Court for well, not being a vaccine expert. Thinks rabies can be cured with sodium ascorbate. Also, not a researcher.

Dr. Todd Elsner - exemptmychild.com

A chiropractor, not an MD nor PhD. Also, not a researcher.

Dr. Gary Gordon - gordonresearch.com

Gary "chelatum" Gordon has a padded CV and oh look, his own "institute" to cure what ails ya, with chelation of course. Nope, no conflicts of interest there. Also, not a researcher.

Robert Scott Bell (naturalpath) - robertscottbell.com

Another conspiracy nutter who's not a doctor. Also, not a researcher.

You know Lori, if you're going to appeal to authority, you might want to make sure that you are actually making an appeal with authorities, not just some whackjobs who are as daft as you.

I just went to the website of doctors who don't push vaccinations. There are 11 doctors in the State of Washington that anti-vax friendly.

http://novaxdoctors.webs.com/doctorlist.htm#Washington

So who doesn't have a clue now?

I'll look into the measles thing later on today. I'm headed over to the college campus now to work on article for the health section of the college newspaper. (yes, I'm their health writer & have been getting compliments from the professors on my articles, including the one on Thermography)

BUT I will say this about Japan, Japan stopped giving vaccines to kids under the age of 2, their incidence of kids dying before the age of 2 dropped dramatically but skyrocketed once they started vaccinating kids at the age of 2 years. (confirmed by 4 students from Japan in one of my classes this past Spring semester)

The US is the most vaccinated country in the world but yet we are the sickest. We have the highest mortality rate for kids under the age of 5. Look at the vaccine schedule, enough said.

The US is the most vaccinated country in the world but yet we are the sickest. We have the highest mortality rate for kids under the age of 5. Look at the vaccine schedule, enough said.

Because vaccination is a woo. Enough said.

Did you actually read that website? It may have the pull down menu listing Washington, but absolutely no doctors in the state lists? Yes, you still do not have a clue.

BUT I will say this about Japan, Japan stopped giving vaccines to kids under the age of 2, their incidence of kids dying before the age of 2 dropped dramatically but skyrocketed once they started vaccinating kids at the age of 2 years. (confirmed by 4 students from Japan in one of my classes this past Spring semester)

That is a lie. What actually happened is that after they stopped giving DTP to children under age 2, the numbers of babies who died from pertussis went up to 41. Because they were not vaccinated for pertussis, they could not claim they had SIDS due to a vaccine.

A couple of things to read: Impact of anti-vaccine movements on pertussis control: the untold story:

They later allowed it only for children older than 2 years. Pertussis coverage for infants fell from nearly 80% in 1974 to 10% in 1976.13 A pertussis
epidemic occurred in 1979 with more than 13 000 cases and 41 deaths. Japan began replacing whole-cell with acellular pertussis vaccines in 1981, and a striking fall in pertussis incidence followed (figure 2).

And as about measles in Japan: Measles vaccine coverage and factors related to uncompleted vaccination among 18-month-old and 36-month-old children in Kyoto, Japan:

In Japan, measles vaccine coverage has remained low, and either small or moderate outbreaks have occurred repeatedly in communities. According to an infectious disease surveillance (2000), total measles cases were estimated to be from 180,000 to 210,000, and total deaths were estimated to be 88 [11,12]. Measles cases are most frequently observed among non-immunized children, particularly between 12 to 24 months.

I have a comment in moderation.

Ms. Harvey, actually read the website and list one doctor in that list that lives in the state of Washington.

More on the Japanese lie:

Expert Rev Vaccines. 2005 Apr;4(2):173-84.
Acellular pertussis vaccines in Japan: past, present and future.
Watanabe M, Nagai M.

After two infants died within 24 h of the vaccination from 1974 to 1975, the Japanese government temporarily suspended vaccinations. Subsequently, the public and the government witnessed the re-emergence of whooping cough, with 41 deaths in 1979. This series of unfortunate events revealed to the public that the vaccine had, in fact, been beneficial.

BMC Health Serv Res. 2011 Oct 7;11(1):254. [Epub ahead of print]
The economic disease burden of measles in Japan and a benefit cost analysis of vaccination, a retrospective study.
Takahashi K, Ohkusa Y, Kim JY.

BACKGROUND:

During 1999-2003, Japan experienced a series of measles epidemics, and in Action Plans to Control Measles and the Future Problems, it was proposed that infants be immunized soon after their one-year birthday. In this study, we attempted to estimate the nationwide economic disease burden of measles based on clinical data and the economic effectiveness of this proposal using the benefit cost ratio.

Environ Health Prev Med. 2011 May 7. [Epub ahead of print]
Effectiveness assessment of vaccination policy against measles epidemic in Japan using an age-time two-dimensional mathematical model.
Maitani Y, Ishikawa H.

OBJECTIVES:

In 2007, measles prevailed among the youth and young adult population in Japan, creating in a serious social problem. Among the developed countries, Japan has a relatively high incidence of measles. The objective of this study was to assess the effect of improvements in the vaccination policy against measles through simulations.

I'll look into the measles thing later on today. I'm headed over to the college campus now to work on article for the health section of the college newspaper. (yes, I'm their health writer & have been getting compliments from the professors on my articles, including the one on Thermography)

The Des Moines Area Community College's Boone Banner, just by the by. Sadly, the search function is broken.

I now have two comments in moderation!

Ms. Harvey, actually read the website and list one doctor and the city he/she is in on that list that lives in the state of Washington.

Because vaccination is a woo. Enough said.

Balefully and repetitively insisting upon being the May Queen is pretty embarrassing, Th1Th2. Especially in October.

Lori - we have a measles outbreak here in New Zealand (that's the small country to the right of Australia in the southern hemisphere). We are a first world country, with first world sanitary standards and healthcare. The reason why we have an outbreak here is due to a recent slump in vaccine uptake. Here's a quote from the Health Ministry's Director of Public Health: "The vast majority of children in Auckland who have caught measles, including the ones who have been hospitalised because they have become so sick, are not immunised. This is testament to the vaccine's effectiveness."

Eight people in Auckland were in quarantine and five had required hospitalisation. Almost all cases were people who were not immunised."

That was taken from this article dated 1st August this year. The outbreak has since spread to the whole of the North Island (our country is made up of two major islands) and will no doubt spread to the South Island too.

Lori, I don't doubt that you fully believe in your stance against vaccines, but that is what makes people like you more dangerous. You are actually harming the vulnerable members of society by propagating your beliefs. Please open your mind to the fact that you might be wrong and educate yourself. You can start by having a good look around this blog, where Orac has countered every assertion you've made. You could then dedicate all this time to a cause that actually benefits our world.

BUT I will say this about Japan, Japan stopped giving vaccines to kids under the age of 2, their incidence of kids dying before the age of 2 dropped dramatically but skyrocketed once they started vaccinating kids at the age of 2 years. (confirmed by 4 students from Japan in one of my classes this past Spring semester)

This smells a lot like the old "SIDS incidence in Japan dropped dramatically after they stopped giving vaccines under the age of 2" story, which is a load of crap (warning: PDF):

In Japan during the period concerned there was in place a Vaccine Compensation System, and the data presented by Noble and Cherry relate to claims made through this system.28,44 Compensation was commonly awarded for events considered possibly due to immunisation, unless there was clear evidence that this was not the case. Approximately two thirds of claims submitted were accepted.
Noble and Cherry both report that when the minimum immunisation age was moved from three months to two years there were no claims made through the compensation system for vaccine related sudden death.28,44 They do not claim, as Dr Scheibner suggests, that there were no deaths from SIDS in Japan following the change in immunisation age.
Claims for vaccine related sudden death stopped, not because children were no longer dying, but because their deaths no longer occurred during a period when they were also receiving immunisation. How can you claim for a vaccine-related death if no vaccine was given?

This is actually one of my favorite canards, since it's one that I managed to debunk with minimal research before getting at all involved in skeptical circles like here at RI. (It's also almost incredible to me that Stephen Basser debunked that in 1997. How anyone can continue to spout off that idiotic claim is beyond me.)

Comment in moderation about LH's bogus Japan statistics, which are probably cribbed from Viera Scheibner.

Lori,

I spend countless hours every week helping parents opt out of these toxic substances being injected into their kids.

That's appalling. Your misguided actions may very well result in the serious illness or death of a child.

Lori, here's a project for you. Please find out how much formaldehyde is in the blood of a normal, healthy child, and how it got there, and compare that with the maximum amount in any vaccine. Then have a long hard think about how much of the other "information" you have read on Natural News and similar sites is equally inaccurate, and what damage you are doing spreading this dangerous nonsense.

The Christian Cynic, the lie about Japan has been around for years. I first read about it about fifteen years ago in an early version of The Anti-Immunization Activists: A Pattern of Deception. It was in the "vaccination myths" list made by Allan Phillips when he was in law school.

I also posted a link about it. Essentially due to a couple of babies dying possibly from SIDS less than a day after their DTP vaccine Japan suspended use of that vaccine. Though a few years later pertussis came back big time and killed 41 infants. Then there was no reason to blame the death on a vaccine the children had not received. Also the rate of SIDS remained the same. From the link above:

The rate of SIDS in Japan did not change, but because the immunization schedule was changed, people stopped blaming the vaccine.

I'll look into the measles thing later on today. I'm headed over to the college campus now to work on article for the health section of the college newspaper. (yes, I'm their health writer & have been getting compliments from the professors on my articles, including the one on Thermography)

I see Narad has posted what I suspected. I'm sure the pats on the head you are getting are either figments of your imagination or indicative of the stellar quality of "professors" who are employed by your quaint little college.

BUT I will say this about Japan, Japan stopped giving vaccines to kids under the age of 2, their incidence of kids dying before the age of 2 dropped dramatically but skyrocketed once they started vaccinating kids at the age of 2 years. (confirmed by 4 students from Japan in one of my classes this past Spring semester)

BUT you would be wrong yet again; instead of parroting a micropaleontologist from the Jurassic era, try looking for original sources. Or is that too hard for Ms. "Health" writer?

Japan has a vaccine injury compensation scheme that is even more facile with regards to evidence than the U.S. system. They compensated for alleged DTP "cot deaths" in infants (that's less than 12 months by the way). When they switched to the two year-old recommendation, parents couldn't file for compensation for DTP cot deaths so it's an artefact of the compensation scheme and vaccine recommendation change. And no, child deaths did not increase at two years old; you just made that up. What did happen was that morbidity and mortality due to pertussis disease increased in children less than two years old Braintrust.

The US is the most vaccinated country in the world but yet we are the sickest. We have the highest mortality rate for kids under the age of 5. Look at the vaccine schedule, enough said.

Oh if only you could actually support this with some evidence. Oh wait, you can't.

Aw, our comments have been approved. I will be interested in Ms. Harvey's excuses. But now off to making and dying costumes. I actually found orange dye in my stash!

I'm their health writer & have been getting compliments from the professors on my articles, including the one on Thermography

I have been receiving compliments from the staff at my institution on the quality of my basket-weaving.

I know you really shouldn't judge people by the company they keep but we ofttimes can cull useful information when shared beliefs/agendi are involved:

Dr Eisenstein has a show on the ProgressiveRadioNetwork; Dr Tenpenny has been featured on the aforementioned *and* on NaturalNews- more than once. Scott Bell showcases Mike ( a/k/a Mark) Adams as a "thought leader" or suchlike.

And I would be cautious about taking advice from either of these guys and their surrogates- not the best judgment I venture: an example of Adams'- he chided people about living in the US- pollution, corruption, decay- while he rhapsodised about his paradisal digs in Ecuador ( inviting his adherents to stick with him there)- which- btw- he had to _leave_ for unexplained reasons ( perhaps too much fame?), returning to the US ( first AZ, now TX). And the other idiot**: have you ever seen his taste in clothes? I rest my case.

** And you thought I'd go for the vitamin OD!

"I'm their health writer & have been getting compliments from the professors on my articles, including the one on Thermography".

Gee Lori, I asked you about your University degree and your work history and you didn't reply.

You are a 41 year old student at DMACC (Des Moines Area Community College)-Boone Campus and you are the "health writer" for the student newspaper "The Banner News". I saw the September, 2011 issue and two pictures of you. Your article "Raising Awareness and Promoting Safety"...an innocuous piece of fluff about preventing rape, had nothing to do with the health sciences that you claim expertise about.

Now on your blog (August 20, 2011) you touted Norman Marvin and the benefits of "Protandim" an anti-aging, anti oxidant supplement...manufactured by Life Vantage Corp., which is a MLM company. Is this the marketing/merchandising "career" that you made reference to.

Why don't you check into that "measles thing" and come back to post here?

BTW, Get another picture for your column for the student newspaper, because in spite of following the dietary restrictions contained in Lev. 11 and promoting Protandim, you appear older than your years. (meow)

Lori, as you can see, others here have been checking out your "things", so do us a favour and check out the "measles thing" along with the other "things" such as evidence refuting the erroneous statement you made linking vaccines to deaths in Japan.

You will find lots of other interesting "things" here if you have a look through the archives (menu bar under the banner).

lilady, it gets worse. She wrote an article for Breast Cancer Month in the October 12th issue which is a blatant advertisement for the "The Thermography Center" in Urbandale. She quotes retired neurosurgeon and supplement shill Russell Blaylock.

She wrote an article for Breast Cancer Month in the October 12th issue which is a blatant advertisement for the "The Thermography Center" in Urbandale. She quotes retired neurosurgeon and supplement shill Russell Blaylock.

Oh FSM, who in the hell put her in charge of "health news" for this rag? They should have their head examined too. I hope no one is listening to this woman, what a nutbar.

@ Chris: Good for you for "catching" Lori "shilling" for the "therm" in lieu of mammogram.

Kudos to all the "regulars" here (not you Thingy)...for taking her apart. I missed all the fun; my usual Sunday visit to my "other" son and then a hospital visit with a close friend who thankfully did not have a stroke. She had a grand mal seizure, was in status epilepticus for several hours which led to left-sided Todd's (postictal) paralysis. She's recovering now and hopefully additional medication will relieve her symptoms (inoperable arterio-venous malformation).

I debated long & hard about posting again after attacks on my faith, character, etc.

Lori, I assure you that I thought quite a bit about how much to unreel of your simple triangulation. There are two parts to this: First, your "character," as it were, has been wholly self-defined. You spend "countless hours every week helping parents opt out of these toxic substances," viz., being a menace to public health.

Allow me to turn to your "faith." It's fraudulent from top to bottom. I'm sorry to be blunt, but I simply have no patience with this shit. My best friend was orthodox and didn't live to see his second son. And I took that fucking shovel over and over and over again. So you'll have to excuse my lack of respect for cutesy, fake attempts at usurpation of Judaism by some latch-hooking corn-country shitbrain with an eye-of-providence background on her page of links to Prison Planet et al.

@ Narad: I'm a Christian and I take great offense at the activities of these fringe evangelicals. My Jewish buddy thinks they are nuts and believes but for the coming "rapture"...these evangelicals would despise Jews.

Lori, where are you? Did you check out that "measles thing"?

#215

Wake up people!! Big pharma is NOT out for our health, the sicker we are, the more money they make. They expect their income from vaccines to be at $34 BILLION per year by the year 2015

Wake up Lori Harvey!! Big Snake Oil is NOT out for your health, the more gullible you are, the more money they make.

The Dietary Supplement Industry is expected to be worth $250 Billion worldwide by 2016.
(Scource Wiki: Alternative_medicine)

I should also add: Wake up Lori!

You should actually use ctrl-f to find things in a website before you claim it is in there. Still waiting for you to list one name and city of a doctor in that webpage that is in the State of Washington.

And perhaps should take a few biology courses at your community college, and then actually find qualified medical personnel for information. Like an actual breast cancer specialist, and not a retired surgeon or the person whose business your are advertising.

Psst guys, did we come on too strong for Lori and scare her away? Perhaps we should go easy on the next troll that comes posting here.

It's fun to string them along a bit, then nail their asses to the wall.

Chris, are you dressing for Halloween as a pumpkin?

(No, it was to be a costume for my daughter, some game character that has an orange hood, and she was sewing much of it herself. Unfortunately it turned into a "wadder", the term used by those who sew as failures. I helped all I could, but it was a lost cause. Though she did create a very nice pair of tights, and learned some nice skills. Though I am still trying to deal with the odors from the "dying with onions" experiment.)

By the way, Ms. Harvey, I applaud you taking classes at a community college. I am a big fan of them. That is where I took courses in biology, statistics, physics and even learned how to use HTML for webpages. Two of my children are attending the community college. One of them is my oldest who gets disability services, and my daughter who is spending her senior year of high school at the community college.

But please take some science courses with an open mind. I would also suggest a class in statistics. And I am still waiting for you to actually read the webpage which you claimed listed doctors in the State of Washington.

@ Chris: My mom used to use yellow onion skins layered atop eggs to dye Easter eggs, which produced a mottled "marbled" type of Easter egg. For Greek Easter, (no Greek heritage at all in our family), I think the yellow onion skins are slowly simmered, liquid strained, to produce solid orange-colored Easter eggs.

@ Lori: I too, give you credit for returning to school. I began taking courses in a community college as an "older" student, transferred to a university, "scored" a partial academic scholarship and graduated with a BSc-Nursing, Magna Cum Laude.

Lori, here is an opportunity to prove your mettle. Take some serious courses in a community college that include some science courses to learn critical thinking.

So will Ms. Harvey come back and answer some questions?

@ Chris: I don't think Ms. Harvey will be back...too bad.

Wow, I see now that one thing is very clear. Since I don't subscribe to modern medicine, I get attacked.

And to those of you who are question why I haven't come back. My net has been offline all week at home.

So, go ahead & take your big pharma drugs & enjoy them.

So sad that people can't read. Good riddance to all of you!

Lori, you might be taken more seriously if you noticed that there are more recent articles to post on. If you aren't able to figure that out, how can you be observant enough to understand medicine?

Oh, Ms. Harvey, when you do join the fun on the more recent thread, show us you actually read the following web page:
http://novaxdoctors.webs.com/doctorlist.htm#Washington

Now list one in that list that is in Washington State, and which city.

By the way, have you read up on Japan yet?

In case you get lost, Ms. Harvey, the more recent article is:
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2011/11/vaccine_injury_awareness_week…

Okay, I found out there were Washington doctors on that list. It is just that the HTML is so lame on that page it did not load properly in Firefox. So I admit I was wrong.

So, Ms. Harvey when will you come back to clarify the lie about pertussis vaccines in Japan?