Don't vaccinate? Doctors paying to hear views

The rise in Autism is certainly a major concern.  I think it would help if we can discover the cause of autism that would lay aside fears first.  Perhaps rates of autism from non-immunized children could be studied.

A neighbor of mine with a three year old had been vaccinated for whooping cough and in the new few months turned into a vegetable.  He can't speak, he can't walk and he can in no way communicate.  This little boy was fine until the immunization.  I think vaccinations are outdated and do more harm than good.

I'm convinced that the science doesn't support the autism link.  The rise in autism rates is easily attributed to other factors, like the rise of Ausperger's rates in the available gene pool.

I didn't vaccinate my kids (with the exception of polio) because I wanted them to have strong immune systems, and the only way for them to develop that is to exercise their immune systems early by fighting off childhood diseases.  The lifetime benefits of a strong immune system are vast, and vaccination clearly is not as effective as the real thing in terms of strengthening the immune system.

Vaccination has saved many lives, to be sure.  But it's also weakened the collective natural immunity of the human species to the point where the next Spanish Influenza could easily wipe out the majority of the developed world.  Is it worth the risk?  Not in my view.

Because vaccines have never been shown to be safe or effective.  The Federal government has paid out billions to vaccine damaged children.  There has been so much research that shows the damage that can occur, including Autism.  A like was shown with the MMR vaccine I believe. Children are used as guinea pigs.  They are so vulnerable and assaulted by dozens of vaccines by the time they are 3.  It is too much for them to stand and it has such a major impact on them.  Go to the NVIC site and read about some of the harm.  It is worth it.

My son recently died from leukemia which the doctors said he had since he was a child.  There was no incidence of cancer, particularly leukemia, in either of his parents' heritage.  I am not convinced that the vaccines he had as a child did not contribute to breaking down his immune system leading to his death.  There are also higher incidence of bipolar behavior and ADD in kids with vaccines.

Maybe people can't help but remain stupid and rely on rumor rather than data.

On the contrary, public officials are not working from the correct hypothesis regarding results from children diagnosed with autism after having their shots. They are starting with the idea that they don't cause autism. Also before a child is 6 years old if they receive every shot the doctor tells them is necessary they will get 48 separate shots. It can be checked on line. I am a grandparent of 11 including one grandson who is autistic. We can document that after the MMR he totally changed from a child who played with toys & mimicked others around him. Another grandson was scheduled for shots with the pediatrician & my daughter was told he would be getting 5 separate that day. She chose only 3. Even that is absurd to me. Our family is so aware of this issue. I had every known  childhood disease & I am a very healthy 66 year old today. My resistance is very high & my immune system is excellent. Maybe its because I had those dreaded childhood diseases. To me it's all about the MONEY. A few of those vaccines are very important especially the polio. My daughter who is now 34 never had the smalllpox vaccine because they quit giving them back in the 70's. What's up with that? As long as the powers that be make the decision I guess it's ok, but if a parent decides what goes into their child then it is wrong. Wake up parents & make decisions for yourself. Thanks for listening.

Barb

Before my sister had her oldest son vaccinated, he was a perfectly normal little boy. He was talking extremely well for his age. After she had him vaccinated, his speech is very distorted, among other things. He is now borderline autistic. I agree with RUKIDDING. Vaccinations are outdated and do more harm than good.

So you're saying don't vaccinate, so instead of the "next" Spanish influenza, your kid will "develop a strong immune system" and unfortunately die or get very sick from a preventable disease.  The rise in autism is due to people diagnosing virtually everything under the sun as autism (much like we did with ADHD a decade ago).  If you notice, the decrease in "mental retardation" correlates quite nicely with the increase in autism.  So essentially, we're just re-categorizing things, and the levels are not increasing as much as you think.

Science has proven that A) autism has no link to vaccines, B) vaccines help the general public stay safe from preventable disease, and C) the risk of not vaccinating is what we're seeing now, which is a rise in measles, whooping cough (i.e. stuff that we could have prevented).  Talk to the parents who've lost kids to these diseases because they didn't vaccinate.  That'll make you rethink your decision really quickly.

Vaccination not as effective?  A little pin prick here instead of the threat of multiple childhood diseases ravaging your child's body, then having them have immunity (if they survive).  Yeah, that's much better.  Get a life.  Vaccinate your child so that he can keep his own life.  Fears are just that: fears.  No scientific evidence, just fears.  So go on, be scared if you wish.  You'll wish you had vaccinated them the minute they come down with more than just a simple case of the sniffles.

Vaccinations for newborn infants??????  Just sounds plain crazy to me--runs agains all inherent, instinctual parental logic.  My daughter received ZERO vaccinations until she was six years old. Then just the basic ones were spread out. She has been a very healthy child with rare bouts of even the most common ailments.  I was even reluctant to have the later shots given to her considering how our health care system is so diseased with corruption by the special interests of the drug manufacturers and the hospitals and doctors that they pander to.  In big business the little guy usually gets squashed -- in this case it most applies to the literal sense of little--as in the children. If you don't think the drug companies have massive amounts of control over our health care system, then just watch TV any day of the week and notice all the pharmecutical ads--disgusting that they are even allowed on TV.

As a parent, I have concerns about the safety of vaccination.  I think it's rediculous to administer the chicken pox vaccine to children because chicken pox is not a deadly plague, it is a childhood disease that is mostly an inconvenience.  Why prevent this disease in children, when catching the disease in most cases prevents people from catching it in their teenage or adult years.  I also have a moral objection to giving kids a vaccine that was developed using aborted fetuses (I usually call them babies, not fetuses).  To kill one child to prevent another from getting what amounts to a rash is rediculous. 

Diseases that have long since been dead are now back.  That's because parents refuse to vaccinate.  Where is the proof that vaccines are causing these issues?  Perhaps it's the overuse of cleaning, too many sanitizers and lack of germs.  I agree to let kids get sick and build an immunity, but there are some things I just don't want my kids to get! And I definitely don't want chicken pox, which can cause horrible scarring, in a teen or adult.  Until the proof is there, not rumors, proof, then I will continue to vaccinate!

After the whooping cough vaccination my infant daughter became rigid and screamed for the better part of a day.  Our pediatrician advised that we never give her another and we didn't.  At 7  (in 1994) she was given her Hep B series, after the 2nd shot she developed Guillian-Barre Syndrome..  We were assured  that there was no connection, however GBS is now listed as an adverse reaction. Last year she had a Hep A shot so that she could go to Honduras and developed an irregular heartbeat for which she took medication for several months. 

My son-in- law developed severe tachycardia and arrythmia after receiving the vaccinations for deployment.   He now is disabled although he had no previous heart problems.

Is this all coincidental?  It's possible, but I think there is plenty of cause for concern.

My children are now beyond the age of most vaccines, but recently I was asked if I wanted to have my 14 year old daughter vaccinated with Gardasil.  My answer was an absolute NO!  This vaccine was developed by the same company that lied to us all about VIOXX.  I have completely lost my confidence in drug companies to be forthcoming regarding the dangers and risks of their products.  I explained my concerns to the doctor and then went home and dicsussed it the risks at length with my daughter regarding the vaccine and why it is used.  The bottom line is more money for the drug companies and our children are paying the price.

I would suggest that the reason that most people don't vacinate their children is because the vast majority of parents do vacinate their children people have been able to forget how horrible many of these diseases are. Very few parents today have ever seen a child with polio or a young teenage boy who has become infertile because mumps. Parents feel that it is safe not to vacinate their children because of herd immunity (since almost all kids are vacinated unvacinated children are protected by the fact that a disease cannot get a foothold in a population). Once there are enough parents who don't vacinate their children the diseases will come back and they everybody will run as fast as they can to their pediatricians office to protect their children since it will become readily aparrent that all the effort that was put into developing these vacines derived from the desire to protect children from horrible diseases. While it is true that many of these diseases can be dealt with by the immune system of a child they are infact much much worse when contracted by an unvacinated adult. When that happens to your children it's on your head what you have done to your child.

When I was a wee lad, my mom had a habit of doing "pox parties", where children were intentionally exposed to Chicken Pox just so they would develop a natural immunity to the diseases.  I have two younger brothers, but my mom only got away with doing the pox parties on me before the doctors tried to nail her for child neglect solely because she would not vaccinate my brothers.  Unfortunately, at the time, the doctors won their case and my mom was ordered to get them vaccinated.  The only shots I had at the time were the MMR vaccine and a tetanus shot.  The downside to the "pox parties" in childhood is the chicken pox virus is not killed, it instead goes dormant and takes up residence in the nervous system and re-awakens as Shingles.  Also, I was diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome at age 7, but nobody in my family has had Autism.  I do not believe autism is caused by vaccines; instead, I believe it is caused by genetic mutations (or in this case, deletions), where sections of code in a particular gene were erased completely, with the severity of autism being solely dependant on the amount of deleted code.

Here is what scientific studies have shown about the possible cause of autism, taken from UCLA research studies: For the first time, a team of UCLA geneticists have isolated the likely region of an autism gene on chromosome 17 and then successfully duplicated their efforts in a separate population. In an earlier discovery, the scientists were surprised to find that the gene contributes to autism only in boys, perhaps explaining why girls have a dramatically lower risk of developing the disease. After twice linking the risk gene to band 17Q21, the UCLA team is now conducting DNA testing to identify the precise site on the chromosome, which will bring them closer to finding the gene mutation. This is the first step to providing better screening and potential treatments for autism.

Anyway, ever since I was knee high to a grasshopper, my mom has had a habit of intentionally exposing me to various diseases to strengthen my immune system.  I am 25 years old now, and I cannot even remember the last time I got the flu.  Heck, I cannot even remember the last time I had a flu shot.  Everyone in my family gets the flu every year, but it seems to pass me like I do not exist.  The worst I get from the flu outbreaks is itchy, watery eyes, a sneezing fit, and sometimes a dry, raspy throat.  Nothing that would stop me from continuing with work or school.

My son has never had a vaccination.  Now he is six years old and has never really been sick other then the usual runny nose, caught, and once he said that he did not feel well and crawled in to bed and slept off 'something'.  The latest argument I heard was that children should get vaccinations to protect other children.  What?  And, in this article there is talk about rising measles.  I have yet seen statistics as to who is getting the measles or other "preventable" llnesses - I want to know if the sick have been vaccinated against whatever they caught among other data.  As a note concerning my son's health, we have never been concerned about him catching anything and have never been the sterilizing, germ-Phobs.

All the evidence points toward no connection. Yet parents continue to believe in what people such as Jenny McCarthy has to say. Personally I would listen to a medical doctor, whom has dedicated a large part of their life to such matters than to some one such as McCarthy (an Actress) or even myself (an Artist).

I have been living in Sweden for the last 2 1/2 yrs. When I told my Swedish wife and her family about this issue in the US, they just reacted as if I was telling them that this must not be a current issue, but one from the early 1900's or something. Quite sad to see American sciencist not given the respect and gratitude for all the major advances that they have made.

I would also recommend listening to The Skeptics Guide to the Universe podcast if you are interested hearing more about this subject, or a recent NPR: This American Life

Until real, scientifically valid proof is put forth that  vaccines do in fact do more harm than good, I will support vaccines as sound, good medicine. 

I believe that Mr. Darwin got it right, the most fit of we animals are the survivors.  Maybe those not vaccinating are the animals that natural selection will weed out over the long run. 

You people are idiots.  Vaccines prevent diseases that could kill your children (and yes, children have died of chicken pox).  The autism-vaccine link has been disproven in study after study after study.  Children get the MMR vaccine and then develop autism?  How about they get the MMR at 18 months and autism is not demonstrated until 18-24 months?  Correllation does not equal causation.  My cousin has autism, he and his three other siblings were all vaccinated.  Autism is genetic, more research is done every day.  And it is not increasing, it is just being diagnosed at a more accurate rate.

People like you idiots are making other kids whose responsible parent DID vaccinate them sick.  You shouldn't be allowed to have children.

Luckily, I was sick constantly up to age 10.  I'm now 30 years old and in that 20 year span, the only sicknesses I've gotten are brief(only lasting a few hours each) bouts of the cold with sneezing and runny nose.  It was worth being sick constantly my 1st 10 years of life in order to be healthy the next 20 years on.

I am very disappointed in this author. I work in neonatal nursing. I give about 300 Hepatitis B Vaccines (HBV) every year. Many times, other nurses ask me to administer their babies' vaccines because I am not sqeamish about it.

I am also a parent. Neither of my sons has ever had Prevnar, Hepatitis C or Measles Vaccines. I have delayed the administration of these vaccines because I have questions about their efficacy and safety.

This author failed to contradict the mother who says HBV is only transmitted by sex. HBV is transmitted by blood, body fluids and contact with same. Sometimes using someone elses personal item (even a toothbrush) that comes in contact with blood can cause transmission.

The author should have contradicted this poorly misinformed woman. I do understand parents who choose not to get HBV vaccine. Usually, they take the info home and agree to think about getting the baby vaccinated at a later date.

Please, to those of you who are pregnant or planning a pregnancy. Learn about HBV vaccine, erythromycin eye ointment, vitamin K and commercial formulas. Take baby care classes right after your childbirth class is over.

Jim, RN BSN

I am now a grandmother rather than a mom...But someone has to listen to these mothers that know for a fact that their babies were normal, making normal progress right up until their MMR shots...Or what ever shots....Im sure their are lots of children who got their shots and didn't have problem one.....But not everyones immune system is the same, some peoples are very strong, some are not....No one knows how every childs system is going to respond.... The results of a bad reaction are in many cases life long...Robbing the child of any hope of a normal life....Really listen to the mothers who's childrens lives have been altered ....They know of what they speak....!

I had a beautiful 4 1/2 yr little girl with long brown ringlet curls, olive skin and beautiful spirit.  After being immunized and being on antibiotics as well as being told to rotate Tylenol and Motrin for and little "reaction" from the shots.  I watched my daughter become gray, ashy, dark circles under her eyes and now completely bald. Now I have a beautiful little girl with no eyelashes, eyebrows or hair anywhere.  We were told that she now has alopecia universalis.  I watched this happen before my eyes and couldn't find one peditrician to listen to me or validate my feelings as a mother watching my daughter go through this.  I did not vaccinate my youngest and she has never had a problem or missed school.  We do alternative medicines and supplements and a very healthy and clean diet.  I am not saying don't vaccinate, but even when you take your dog to the vet he asks how much the dog weighs and medicates according to the weight, we don't even give our perfect little babies that same respect.  It can't be a one size fits all.  Please visit our foundation and help raise awareness