Wednesday, November 30, 2011

I found this very interesting...

I couldn't agree more with this woman!  What are your thoughts?

Are ’opt-out’ parents and unvaxxed kids a health threat?

7 comments:

Jason said...

This is a soap box of mine. Parents who do not vaccinate their children are being negligent. Their children should not be allowed to attend public schools where they may be putting others at risk.

The fact of the matter is that parents who aren't vaccinating their children are indeed uneducated. Oh, they may have a degree in something but they are obviously not intelligent enough to understand the very basic biology behind vaccinations. There is no scientific evidence linking vaccinations to autism as many supposed (the Lancet published a retraction of that study when the researchers admitted they fudged their results).

In short, unvaccinated children are a public health threat and their parents should be held accountable.

Jess and Jen said...

I am all for vaccines and wish everyone else was too! There was a measles outbreak when Austin was a few months old. There was an unimmunized teen who had gone with his family out of the country and contracted measles, then came back to school and spread it to other kids at his school that weren't immunized. It totally scared me and I wouldn't take Austin out to stores or anything for awhile because I was so afraid of him getting it since he wasn't old enough to get the vaccine. -Jen

gillian said...

I will be vaccinating my baby for sure. I got the flu shot every year and then when I Got married I Stopped getting it. The last two years I have had the worst flu of my LIFE in January with a bad fever and throwing up and cold for a week. So, this year, I got a flu shot and I am sure it will work! I am going to be weird about bringing my baby around any sort of cough because you never know! The fact that 25 people in CA died last year of whooping cough freaks me out!

Mike and Adrianne said...

Well, here are my two thoughts. The first one is my opinion for my family: we get vaccinated. I just feel like the risks of not being vaccinated are more than the risks of being vaccinated. There are those people that have reactions to vaccines. It happens. I'm not talking about autism or whatever but real reactions. One little boy I worked for ended up having a rare reaction and ended up being blind and death and had a bunch of other problems. Also, my friend in Ohio had some reactions to them as well. But, over all, I think it is rare so we get vaccinated.

However, the second thought I have is, we all make choices regarding our families that we feel are the right ones. You would hope that each parent looks at all the facts and prays about their choices. If that's the case, which I think we should just give them the benefit of the doubt that it is the case, then we can't really say that not getting their kid vaccinated is the wrong choice. It is for me, but maybe not for them.

Those are my two thoughts on the matter.

Jason said...

I am fine with someone not vaccinating their children - just keep them away from mine. The decision whether or not to vaccinate your children affects more than just your family. You do not have the right to endanger mine. Even John Stuart Mill, the ultra-liberal essayist, believed that individuals should be free to make any decisions they wished unless those decisions impinged on the rights, safety, or security of others.
As with anything in medicine, there may be side effects (some of which may be dreadful) to vaccines but the good far out weighs the bad.

Lokodi said...

I totally agree with Jason's last comment. Another one of my pet peeves is when someone (especially a mormon) uses religion as an excuse not to vaccinate. That's how they can get their kids to still attend public schools, by saying its for religious purposes. It says no where in the church doctrine that we discourage vaccinating our kids. In fact, we believe in modern medicine.

Lindsey

The Duke said...

Don't bring any kids around our household if they are old enough to be vaccinated but aren't. Chicken pox would kill Ammon. The doctors at PCMC put him in isolation one year to keep him away from some kids that were in the hospital from bad cases of chicken pox.
I had every childhood disease but whooping cough because they didn't have vaccinations at that point. I agree with Jason -- don't endanger my kid or my family because you choose not to take care of yours. We could possibly irradicate some diseases altogether if everyone would vaccinate their children. Believe me, those diseases are not fun.