Mandatory vaccinations vs. right to choose

POSTED BY: canttakesky
UPDATED: Thursday, December 7, 2006 07:56
VIEWED: 21145
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RUE

Saturday, November 25, 2006 5:07 PM

"The dilemma is, do they have the right to question authority and have those doubts?"

Then there are two questions - one is, are those doubts reasonable? And that's a question that can't be avoided. because if simply claiming doubt is enough to confer rights, I could claim all sorts of doubts and put others at risk. For example, I doubt it makes sense for everyone to drive the same way on the road. I doubt that shooting someone will cause harm.

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Saturday, November 25, 2006 5:24 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by canttakesky:
The dilemma is, do they have the right to question authority and have those doubts? Do they have a right to disagree with authority that said vaccine is both effective and safe? Do they have the right to informed consent?

Certainly, I think that people should have those rights. But when society is dealing with plague clear minds should prevail. If the prevailing medical understanding and scientific knowledge demonstrates that the vaccine is preferable to the plague, as in the case of smallpox, then one must wonder about the wisdom of allowing a minority of ill-informed individuals to decide the fate of the majority. Certainly society has a right to informed consent and a right to question the authority of the medical community and the government on the issue of compulsory vaccination, but I think that society will ultimately regret allowing the issue of personal freedom and privacy to become so fanatic that it results in widespread plague and the death of millions.

Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.

Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.

-- Cicero

RUE

Saturday, November 25, 2006 5:33 PM

So, I'm looking for the anti- side to provide some perspective. You are obviously tapping into assumptions and information the pro- side doesn't share. I'd really like to find out what you all are thinking.

CANTTAKESKY

Saturday, November 25, 2006 5:49 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
If the prevailing medical understanding and scientific knowledge demonstrates that the vaccine is preferable to the plague, as in the case of smallpox, then one must wonder about the wisdom of allowing a minority of ill-informed individuals to decide the fate of the majority.

Who decides what prevailing scientific knowledge "demonstrates" and who decides that dissidents are "ill-informed"? By those standards, people like Rue say that prevailing scientific knowledge demonstrates manmade global warming caused by fossil fuel emissions, and that it is entirely unwise to let ill-informed persons such as yourself to decide the fate of the majoritiy.

And how exactly does a few individuals decide the fate of the majority simply by not being vaccinated? If vaccines work, and the majority is immunized, they should have nothing to fear. Isn't that the point of vaccines, to protect in event of exposure? Why should protected people be afraid of exposure then?

Can't Take My Gorram Sky

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The mystery of government is not how Washington works but how to make it stop.
--P. J. O'Rourke (1947 - )

CANTTAKESKY

Saturday, November 25, 2006 5:52 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by rue:
But you young'uns here seem to think differently. So, if you all don't mind, could you post information and / or links explaining your areas of concern ?

God bless you for calling me a young'un!

Ethical Reasons:

1. Principle of informed consent. Informed consent is a cardinal tenet of medical ethics (or at least they say it is). No medical intervention, including vaccination, is effective for everyone. No medical intervention, including vaccination, is safe for everyone. You pay trusted health consultants the big bucks to see if X medicine "is right for you." You then evaluated the potential benefits and risks, and give your informed consent or not for the treatment. Vaccines should be no different.

2. Right to one's body trumps public interest. Bioethicist Arthur Caplan argues, "The Nuremberg Code explicitly rejects the moral argument that the creation of benefits for many justifies the sacrifice of the few. Every experiment, no matter how important or valuable, requires the express voluntary consent of the individual. The right of individuals to control their bodies trumps the interest of others in obtaining knowledge or benefits from them."

3. Vaccination as a one-size-fits-all solution is flawed. The US government is in effect practicing medicine without a license, preempting the tailoring of treatment to each individual. As a result the one-size-fits-all policies, people are unnecessarily injured and killed every year. The US government implicitly condones these injuries and deaths as necessary sacrifices for the public good, and compensates them from the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. If these people are to make such a sacrifice for the public good, they should be volunteers, not draftees, in the war against disease.

More to come when I have time. I will discuss doubts about vaccine effectiveness, vaccine safety, integrity of public policy, and public health threat of the unvaccinated.

Can't Take My Gorram Sky

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The word 'politics' is derived from the word 'poly', meaning 'many', and the word 'ticks', meaning 'blood sucking parasites'.
--Larry Hardiman

CHRISISALL

Saturday, November 25, 2006 5:58 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by canttakesky:
Who decides what prevailing scientific knowledge "demonstrates" and who decides that dissidents are "ill-informed"?

It's got something to do with gold, I think...

And a rule of some kind Chrisisall

RUE

Saturday, November 25, 2006 6:21 PM

Hey ChrisIsAll,

I was wondering what you know about this. :big shit eating grin:

SIGMANUNKI

Saturday, November 25, 2006 6:21 PM

This whole, vaccinations are harmful to kids, argument IMO is complete BS. If this were so, given the torrent of kids that get said vaccinations, there'd be a hell of a lot of damaged kids to get taken care of. This obviously isn't the case.

For those that have not gotten vaccinated and cite that they haven't gotten seriously ill, try going a place where you'd actually be exposed to the illness!.

That being said, how about immigration? There are people that come over from 3rd world nations that might have been just exposed to an illness, but b/c of this, pass the medical, and then said illness would enter the general population. No vaccination means MUCH higher contraction rate (please note that this wouldn't exactly help people's health nor the economy) and have a possible high mortality rate as well (depending on the illness).

There's also going on vacation. Anyone here want to go to Mexico, NOT get vaccinated and drink there water?

For those "not so lethal" illnesses, there is still many many good reasons for having vaccinations. For instance, Rubella. This may not really hurt the person that gets it, but what about if the person that got it was a pregnant woman? Then you got problems for the unborn child. This is the reason why everyone should get a Rubella vaccination and the reason why women get a booster later on in life. Similarly for other illnesses.

In fact, there are several vaccinations that require a booster. Tetanus being one more of them.

Also, to say that the vaccination should be 100% effective for 100% of the persons life after said vaccination with 0 potential side-effects ignores the reality of biology.

Basically, IMO for people to be able to say no to vaccinations, I believe that they would have to show that there is a significant chance of serious negative side effect with a disproportionally small positive value. But, this just isn't the case. In fact, our largely good health and our increasing life expectancy is a testament to the value of vaccinations.

IMO matters of public health should not and cannot be made irrationally. Whether by religion, philosophy or otherwise. It must be based on fact, NOT opinion. This is NOT about you not getting sick, it's about avoiding an epidemic.

----
I am on The List. We are The Forsaken and we aim to burn!
"We don't fear the reaper"

PHOENIXROSE

Saturday, November 25, 2006 6:21 PM

http://www.wnho.net/vaccinationnews.htm
http://www.vaccinationdebate.com/index.htm
http://www.nexusmagazine.com/articles/VaccineResearcher.html

If you want still more, you can google 'vaccine dangers'

[]

CANTTAKESKY

Saturday, November 25, 2006 6:21 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by cartoon:
BTW, my parents ... had virtually every common childhood disease ...: measles, chicken pox, scarlet fever, mumps, etc.... Going to school in the 1960's, I didn't know one kid in my class who got measles, rubela, scarlet fever, etc. They'd all been vaccinated.

There was never a vaccine for scarlet fever. Scarlet fever disappeared on its own, without the help of vaccinations--at the same time all the other childhood diseases disappear. Could some other factor have played a role in the disappearance of these diseases, either instead of or in addition to vaccinations? Maybe the credit claimed by vaccines in eradicating diseases is exaggerated?

Quote:
As Kaneman has pointed out, chicken pox is even worse the older you are when you contract it. ... I had shingles at the age of 39, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. I know people who've had it much later in life, who nearly died.

Interestingly, the chickenpox vaccine has been linked to shingles later on in life. Now the link is not conclusive, but it does cast reasonable doubt on chickenpox vaxes preventing shingles as a benefit.

Quote:
CHILDHOOD CHICKENPOX vaccinations could be encouraging the spread of shingles, scientists said yesterday. Shingles, a painful rash that afflicts older people, and can cause fatal complications, marks the re-emergence of the dormant chickenpox virus in later life, when immunity falls. It strikes a quarter of people who have had chickenpox. The Public Health Laboratory Service in London has shown that adults living with children were less likely to develop shingles. But if all children were vaccinated against chickenpox, adults with a history of the disease would not be exposed to enough of the virus to prevent full-blown shingles later.

[From: Chickenpox vaccine `encourages shingles'
The Independent - United Kingdom; May 2, 2002] (Sorry no link.)

Quote:
On the other hand, recent evidence suggests that an increase in zoster incidence appears likely, and the more effective vaccination is at preventing varicella, the larger the increase in zoster incidence.

J Infect. 2002 May;44(4):211-9
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&d
opt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=12099726&query_hl=3&itool=pubmed_DocSum

There are more studies where that came from, but you get the idea. There is enough reasonable doubt about benefits and risks that people deserve the right to informed consent.

Can't Take My Gorram Sky

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A government is a body of people, usually notably ungoverned.
--Shepherd Book, from TV show Firefly

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