@californiaaa they are most at risk for infection, they are most at risk for death from infection, they do not know how to take proper sanitary precautions in their everyday life, and it has proven effective at eliminating the vast majority of these diseases in the US. refer to that sequence for further reference on why infants are a good target population.
Though I could be wrong, from your constant statements about why infants I would imagine you do not know why adults don’t get infected when infants do. To acquire an infection it usually takes exposure to a specific number of pathogenic particles. This number is larger for adults and smaller for infants. Adults are less likely to reach this threshold than infants are so if you had to prioritize who to vaccinate you would choose those who are most likely, not least likely, to become infected.
I think we are in agreement that not having everybody vaccinated is unfair; we disagree as to who it is unfair to. How is it unfair to be vaccinated? You don’t get the disease (or at least are far less likely to get it); imo that’s a huge plus, and greatly outweighs the extremely minute chance you experience side effects.
I think you’re just not aware of the extremely low rates of side effects. Has the autism-omnibus trial influenced you at all?
@californiaaa I would, ideally, immunize them too. I’d immunize every adult, and I’d also immunize every child (of course, paying attention to the few individuals not able to receive a vaccine due to other medical reasons). For reasons previously stated, we unfortunately can’t immunize every adult. But how does that make immunizing children a bad thing?
My child who is an immigrant was required to be vaccinated. By law. I agreed to it to get her visa. I was vaccinated as an adult for Hep A and B, and any other vaccinations I needed because I didn’t have them or the disease as a child. Most women are vaccinated before they get pregnant if they have a planned pregnancy. All the women and children who came across the boarder last year were vaccinated immediately (yep, in big long lines). All the ICE workers taking care of them were vaccinated, as adults, if they needed to be.
Adults are vaccinated as needed. Many occupations require proof - teachers, nurses, doctors, social workers, cops, firemen, military, ICE agents.
My kids started college last year. One school required all vaccinations be up to date, including meningitis. The other only required proof of MMR.
This is simply not true @californiaaa - you are free to not vaccinate your kids, as are all parents. In every single US state including California. Skip every single vaccine and homeschool, easy peasy done.
@californiaaa, your proposal to vaccinate only adults doesn’t work. Before we had vaccines, most people got those diseases as kids. If we don’t vaccinate them as kids, they will get the diseases as kids. I had chickenpox as a kid. Most people I know did. We didn’t get it from our parents–they had it when they were kids and they didn’t catch it when we were sick. We already know from this that immunizing adults doesn’t work, because the population used to consist of immune adults and non-immune kids, and chickenpox spread like wildfire among the kids. If you wait, there would be no one to immunize because they would have had the diseases as kids.
When would you vaccinate against rubella? What do you say to the teen mother who gets it during her pregnancy? Sorry, you weren’t old enough for that vaccine, tough luck for your baby.
@californiaaa, as someone who travels to Asia and Africa, I make sure I am immunized (am required by international laws, in fact) and that all my boosters are up to date.
You sound like someone beamed to the 21st century from the 18th. Science refutes most of your reasonable arguments. So does decades of experience in modern public health policies. Your unreasonable arguments are proof of the dumbing down of America by nutcases with an internet and media presence.
Some people just can’t be bothered with facts. Californiaaa has constructed her own reality ( not just about vaccines but about many things) and facts are completely ignored. I’m just saying this because some people are trying very hard, and I applaud you, but it’s fruitless.
California: You really have no idea what you are talking about.
I am a professional in the field. The reason we in the US still have polio vaccination is because the disease is not yet eradicated worldwide. Smallpox vaccination was still given in the US for quite some time after the last US case. Vaccination was not stopped until the disease was eradicated worldwide.
At this point, I am not really talking to Californiaaa. I am refuting the points so that nobody else referring to this thread becomes misinformed by reading his/her posts.
I have a smallpox scar even though it was no longer being given in the US it was still a concern where I was born in Asia. (aka the devil’s mark for those who read DG’s books…)
Actually, having done genealogy research on my family and seen how many of my great-aunts and great-uncles died in childhood, I’ll bet that if you transplanted someone here from the 18th century, they would be happy to be vaccinated against many things.
It’s also worth noting that even when vaccines fail to prevent infection, they still often confer a good deal of protection. When I had chickenpox, I was covered with the itchy rash and it was a miserable experience which I still remember from age 6. I missed a week of school and a special event I’d been looking forward to. And I was lucky that my case was fairly routine, as there are some kids who end up with serious complications. When my vaccinated daughter had chickenpox, no one even noticed. When I heard that there was an outbreak of chickenpox in her class at school, I checked her and discovered several already-crusted over lesions. That was it.
The chickenpox vaccine is a live attenuated vaccine. When my kids were young it was fairly new. At the time, I reasoned that if they were going to have a virus in them that might recur later in life and cause shingles, I would much rather have it be a weakened form. Now there appears to be some data on this, and according to the CDC " the risk of getting shingles from vaccine-strain VZV after chickenpox vaccination is much lower than getting shingles after natural infection with wild-type VZV."
As far as altered vaccine schedules go, I would guess the risk to your child of getting in an accident driving to the doctor and of potentially being exposed to more illnesses during those extra visits both greatly exceed whatever risk you are assuming is present in the usual schedule.
Anyone, anyplace could contract polio until it is eradicated worldwide. Someone visiting Pakistan can bring it back to the U.S. and start and outbreak.
http://www.cdc.gov/24-7/protectingpeople/polio/us_polio_free.html
“Scenarios for polio being introduced into the United States are easy to imagine, and the disease could get a foothold if we don’t maintain high vaccination rates,” explains CDC’s Dr. Greg Wallace, Team Lead, Measles, Mumps, Rubella, and Polio, Epidemiology Branch, Division of Viral Diseases, National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. “For example, an unvaccinated U.S. resident could travel abroad and become infected before returning home. Or, a visitor to the United States could travel here while infected. The point is that one person infected with polio is all it takes to start the spread of polio to others if they are not protected by vaccination.”
I skimmed the last 100 posts. You guys are very patient.
Unfortunately, I don’t think appealing to reason works for everybody. Friedrich Schiller said it well -
Immunize drug addicts. Personally, I would start with the prisons.