Casaubon's Book

There’s this Onion Column - I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t want a bunch of dirt covered farming hicks being able to get their tetanus shots. I shoulda thought of that!

The only reason this is even being considered is because a majority of voters want it. Well, of course they do—they don’t have it! But you don’t see 33rd Degree Freemasons letting any old average citizen into their inner sanctum just because he’s curious. And you won’t catch me sharing my God-given right to affordable lifesaving medical procedures with every bum who’s got a jones for another hepatitis vaccination. It’s undignified.

After all, how do I know I’ve made it in this world if I’m not able to enjoy something others can’t?

Lack of access to health care is the seventh leading cause of death in the country, and that says something. It doesn’t get much more elite than being part of a club other people are literally dying to get into. So what incentive would there be if everyone were guaranteed equal health care, regardless of income, age, or employment status? Who would be left to proudly tell their grandchildren about the glory days of PPOs? That is a future I’d rather not imagine, thank you very much.

So why the constant desire to guarantee basic yearly screenings and vital operations for all, thus creating some kind of ridiculous, unrealistic safety net? How will people fully appreciate the excellence of the American health care system without the constant threat of it being yanked away at any moment?

You know I hadn’t even considered the exclusivity argument. Give us a nasty pandemic and my family and a few other lucky part-time farmers could be the only ones left alive to feed the entire US – and then think what I can charge for a turnip!

Ok, I changed my mind.

Sharon

Comments

#1 buckthetrend
June 28, 2012

Well access to healthcare is the number one, how come the health care system in the US is at both ends Sharon!

Oh and on the tetanus myth, I know a few pig farmers who have never had a shot and they are up to it every day, tetanus is treatable with a simple antibiotic so why would anyone want to risk the negative aspects of an out of date idea like a tetanus shot?
#2 buckthetrend
June 28, 2012

Well access to healthcare is the number one cause of death, how come the health care system in the US is at both ends Sharon!

Oh and on the tetanus myth, I know a few pig farmers who have never had a shot and they are up to it every day, tetanus is treatable with a simple antibiotic so why would anyone want to risk the negative aspects of an out of date idea like a tetanus shot?
#3 Greenpa
June 28, 2012

well- how about because Jenny McCarthy is not actually qualified to have an opinion on anything besides breast implants? And because everyone who dies of infections disease – was perfectly healthy last week? But that doesn’t prevent them from dying? And I’ll bet you buck the trend by wearing your hat sideways…
#4 buckthetrend
June 28, 2012

How medically scientific of you grandpa. What an interesting idea that someone can die of an infectious disease and be healthy!

Did you have something in mind or was it just a medical anecdote?
#5 Art
June 29, 2012

Okay … I get it … you’re an idiot. And proud of it. Don’t see too many of those round these parts.

No need to argue facts, or even common sense, because … well … you are an idiot. You will visit long enough to make cheap points but will always be conspicuously absent when your pathetic anti-science ways fail. If we just wait a few minutes you will get distracted by crystal power, glorified water, getting your chakras aligned, or any number of other stupid things that idiots get into, and wander off. In under an hour you won’t even remember posting anything. Because you have the attention span of a gnat.

I knew someone who died of tetanus. A fifteen dollar shot would have covered him for better than a decade but he was deep south rural and his mother didn’t put too much trust in doctors. He got a nice headstone out of it. But that’s just for people who are interested in facts, not drive-by trolls.
#6 Brad K.
Ponca City, OK
June 29, 2012

I am not sure we need to worry about ObamaCare.

Here in my little town, I have seen three doctor’s offices close in the last three years. Funny, that. Natonalize health care (remember, one of the prime, core focuses of ObamaCare is unionizing hospital workers) and you take the profit out of being a doctor — and the AMA will move offshore, along with a number of the doctors that don’t retire or change careers.
#7 Mountainmums
France
June 29, 2012

@Brad K. : yes of course… Because all countries that have a “nationalized” (I’m putting it in quotes because I’m pretty sure you and I don’t have the same definition for that word)) no longer have ANY doctors. Because the only reason ANYONE becomes a doctor is to make a boatload of money. Because the ONLY way healthcare can work is by making it a For Profit venture.
I’m afaraid I’m not being constructive, but please, look at what’s being done elsewhere before you write (and yes, healthcare in developped countries other than the US is just as state-of’-the-art and effective).
#8 buckthetrend
June 29, 2012

Well Arty, obviously touched a nerve. The problem with your facts basis is it is limited to peer reviewed medical/magical journals. As EBM does not allow clinical obs, even from very experienced practitioners to input we are left with the ‘guidance’ of a few ‘head patted’ experts. The ex editors of the BMJ and NEJM have both gone on the record as saying you can’t believe anything published in a medical peer reviewed journal due to funding bias so I am keen to know what kind of facts you believe without you eating your dummy.

The thread is about tetanus shots, no one ‘needs’ one of these because the condition can be treated without the shot.

If the best you can do is call someone an idiot that is challenging the views here then perhaps you should move to Azerbaijan and join the Polit bureau, I am sure they would have a place for you there, or maybe start a new religious movement where everyone who points out your fly is down must be hung?

By the way the NHS in England is not famous for poor doctors Mountainmums, they are in charge of their budgets and what they do is tell you that you can’t have proceedures so that their income is not affected!

The NHS is a gravy train for doctors who want to abuse it, no interest in health promotion initiatives just handing out statins, BP pills, vaccine woo. When they go on strike the death rate goes down. The best part is that if you get run over in the road you don’t end up with the ambulance looking at your credit card like, A and E is quite good but the rest is comparible with the worst of witch doctor thinking.

If you have something chronic like arthritis you may as well pray as an alternative to the GP, personally I don’t believe in the idea that you can do nothing for yourself except see a medical ‘expert’ who thinks the only answer is chemicals having seen many people go down this route and fall to bits.

Seeing your doctor in the US is the no 1 killer stat, not seeing them is at 7. Perhaps you should take your finger out and ask why this is, or maybe that’s the only thing stopping your expression of thought from warming us?
#9 Mountainmums
June 29, 2012

“The thread is about tetanus shots, no one ‘needs’ one of these because the condition can be treated without the shot.”

Yeah, except for the estimated 10% to 15% infected people who die from Tetanus. And that’s in developped countries, when treated with the most effective “chemicals”. otherwise, reported fatality rates are usually above 50%.

” When they go on strike the death rate goes down.”.
Of course….

I’ll stop feeding the troll now.
#10 Rev.Enki
June 29, 2012

Hey, here’s a rightwinger health care talking point I hadn’t heard ain a while. Now doctors will all leave the country if the healthcare law reduces their net income. They’ll all go to one of those first-world developed nations that doesn’t have nationally mandated universal healthcare. I just had the brilliant idea to call this place ‘Utopia’ because in the greek it could be read as either ‘good place’ or ‘no place’. (I’m sure I’m the first to come up with this.)

So, in this Utopia where no one is ever in any way priced out of healthcare unless they deserve it (the filthy bastards) and doctors all make a fortune on their skills, I imagine the population of doctors will be approximately eleventy-billion to each possible paying client.

Or were you thinking they’ll all move to China? I’m sure they’d all strike it rich there. India too, I hear, has lots of potential clients. As does Africa. By all means, go east (or west, if that’s quicker for you).

Or maybe they could all pull what the American conservatives have been threatening and move to Canada and/or Costa Rica? I mean, other than that both of those have some form of nationally mandated universal healthcare coverage.

Oh, shit. This is hard. Maybe they could all just move to Doctor Island, a floating libertarian offshore paradise, where we all will be forced to go to purchase their services at whatever profit margins they can obtain. I hope they’re willing to pay a premium on food shipments though…
#11 buckthetrend
June 29, 2012

Well maybe I’d better spell it out. When one has a proper health care system based on good health education that is state funded, totally separate from private interests it works quite well.

When you sell it off to private/public contractors it goes tits up.

That’s because the Bill and Merange types with lots of case start promoting woo stuff like mass vaccine programmes and ruining the whole idea of disease prevention.

Next you get a load of A graders who think because they have lots of ‘education’ they can tell us that they know best and simple stuff like eating properly isn’t sexy enough to promote.

Two million Americans over 40 stone, and they are still telling us its a genetic medical surgical emergency.

Like I said A and E is quite good in the UK, the rest is based on anecdote, mythology and bent peer review.

Mountain revers I know it’s hard to stomach but this modern medical nirvana just aint happening, maybe if all those grossly fat Americans stopped eating and sent it all to Africa the problem would sort itself out.

A junior doctor can expect to receive a pension of £68k a year when they retire. Type doctors strike death rate falls into a web search and look at it for yourself, but that’s your problem you are so in awe of the modern medical myth you just can’t believe it’s true.

The American Medical Association explained why Americans are following the Japanese lead and have turned in massive numbers to the so-called Alternative Medicine. The surprising answer? People think it works better! The surprising study appeared in the May 20, 1998 JAMA entitled WHY PATIENTS USE ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE (p. 1548-1553). Stanford researchers, on the basis of a National study, estimate that Americans made 425 million visits to alternative health care providers in 1990, a figure that exceeded the number of visits to allopathic primary care physicians during the same period by almost 100 million visits! (Forty seven (47) percent of these physicians also reported using alternative therapies themselves, while 23% incorporated them into their practices.)

It’s remarkable that this site gives the marketing impression that it is something to do with science, it’s like some Randi con all over.
#12 kermit
June 29, 2012

Hi, buckthetrend.
“When one has a proper health care system based on good health education that is state funded”
You mean, of course, a nationalized health care system.

“When you sell it off to private/public contractors it goes tits up.”
Switzerland’s system works quite well, and it uses strong government regulation and provides universal coverage, but the health care is provided by private companies.

And yes, as sad as it seems to you, people who spend years studying a subject and then applying it or continuing research, often know more than those who don’t.

Most doctors understand that obesity is a matter of lifestyle for the vast majority of people. Why do you think otherwise?

It derives from inactivity and poor nutrition, which combine to produce several chronic ill effects, of which obesity is only the most visible. Part of the problems these people face is poor information.

Of course the death rates in hospital go down when doctors go on strike. The serious problems which can be put off are postponed, and those that can’t be are sent to other hospitals.

And vaccines are the most cost effective and natural medicine in use, with the arguable exception of nutrition and exercise advice. Of course most US and UK patients won’t follow those.

Practice your voodoo and magic wishes all you want, but don’t expect me to willingly support them with my taxes.
#13 buckthetrend
June 29, 2012

The frog said “And vaccines are the most cost effective and natural medicine in use”

Nut bollocks of the highest order, if you looked beyond your pubmed and looked at what the latest mass vaccine crank initiative is doing in India you would revise this sentence, unless that is you are a medical researcher.

Here is a hint, yes it is more cost effective to con politicians into thinking you can mass vaccinate instead of sorting out the sewage system and when the vaccine causes an identical disease it was supposed to prevent you just rename it.

Revision only takes place in vaccine research when it shows that they don’t work, see recent law suit against Merck and MMR for doing exactly that.

Vaccine success mythology is doing more harm to the planet than smoking, mandating outdated practices like vaccine is criminal, making the public purse pay too and granting the companies making it immunity from prosecution is obscene.

Calling a vaccine “natural” is a trade description issue, some medical scientists even liken cross pollination of fruit with genetically making strawberries and whales fuck in order to try and sell it to the public, well no ones buying.

I have no choice but to support government ‘health initiatives’ with no EBM and you are not supporting me at all, apart from providing LOL entertainment and for that I am eternally grateful.

“people who spend years studying a subject and then applying it or continuing research, often know more than those who don’t. ” Shame is what they are studying and what they know rarely produces anything of use with regard to vaccine voodoo.
#14 BROOK
July 1, 2012

I realize this may be beside the point but you do know that the Onion is satire, right? “The Onion is a satirical weekly publication published 52 times a year on Thursdays.” http://www.theonion.com/faq/
#15 wow
July 1, 2012

Yes, brook. Unfortunately buckthetrend isn’t satire, it’s an arsehole.

An incoherent one at that. What does ‘since USA healthcare is at both ends’ mean?
#16 buckthetrend
July 1, 2012

Mouth and arse are interchangable WOW.

I know it’s hard to see the Titanic of vaccination going down but soon it will all be over and we can get on with proper health care programmes.

Let’s send all the Americans over 40 stone, apparently there are 2 million to Africa, perhaps they can share something cultural, how do they do it.

You gotta eat 26000 calories a day to maintain the half ton so who is funding this and why?

And yes I realise all vaccination is satire masquerading as preventative medicine but hey ho you started it.
#17 buckthetrend
July 1, 2012

Perhaps this whole site is a satire of common sense and misunderstanding, I still can’t believe there is a whole site of flat earth dwellers and coco pond fantasists who think that fucking around with microscopes and ‘creating’ myths about flu has anything to do with health!

Gold into lead
#18 wow
July 2, 2012

Your caricature indicates your problem here isn’t rationally derived, buckthetrend.

Maybe you’re merely being contrarian and grabbing straw.

But your use of “flat earthers” indicates you’ve not actually done any reading of the site and are moreover are extremely confused about what science is about.
#19 Liz
Clydesdale, Vic, Australia
July 2, 2012

Just popping in to say national health care is valuable. Even at my most cynical, I can see that it gives our government incentive to fund health promotion strategies, like exercise. They cost less. Our current government has even stood up to the tobacco lobby and passed plain packaging laws. Those who advocate for dental care to be included can make a solid economic argument.

At my least cynical, I watched my pensioner mum finish her cancer treatment and wave ta-ta to the best specialists in the state, who had treated her.

It’s not perfect here, where the mix of public and private hospitals and incentives for private health insurance has started to erode Medicare. But I on the other hand I can pay the modest gap between the Medicare rate and the rate my private doctor charges. And I can go through life with no other hospital cover than the government affords with my taxes. I still have an incentive to keep fit and healthy – we all do – the incentive for good health despite national health care is something only an American could fail to understand.

And by the way, your neonatal birth rate is an international disgrace. That alone should end the argument. If those arguing against weren’t distracted by other things.
#20 buckthetrend
July 2, 2012

Just read some of the bollocks that Abbie has written about flu vaccine guessing! It is straight out of kool aid acid test, I mean some of the bloggers actually thought this was sexy science, not sure if they were referring to Abbie’s smouldering look or the test tube?

Considering the NHI, CDC and WHO have been consistently totally 180 degrees wrong about pandemic flu for some time yes perhaps you are right maybe they predate flat earth thinking, maybe Runes is closer, I’ll give it some thought.
#21 buckthetrend
July 2, 2012

Liz

“And by the way, your neonatal birth rate is an international disgrace”

What is the rate, I would be interested to know.

I agree that health care should be about teaching people to stay well not just disease management.
#22 Peterpan
Dining room
July 2, 2012

If lack of access to health care is the 7th leading cause of death, access must be about third on the list.
#23 Peterpan
July 2, 2012

I think I remember seeing the USA as around 30th on infant mortality rate as a nation, an absolute disgrace for a nation who spends the most on health care. Doesn’t that tell you there is something wrong somewhere?
#24 buckthetrend
July 2, 2012

Actually the leading cause of death in the USA ie number one is ‘access to health care’.
#25 wow
July 2, 2012

I think you’ll find 100% of people who die were born.

Birth is the primary cause of death in the world.
#26 buckthetrend
July 2, 2012

Wow that’s the best you can do, total denial that the US healthcare system with the ‘best health medics’ in the world are the number one killers of the population.

Suddenly wow your pathetic attempts to diss alt med seem laughable.

You don’t even know basic biology, since when does birth cause death! Dork

You know we don’t have stats for deaths from alt med that even get on the radar and people like you have wasted a lot of energy making chocolate T pots.

Orac is priceless, fancy trying to make a case for ‘dangerous vitamins’, where are the bodies guys?
#27 Liz
Clydesdale, Vic Australia
July 2, 2012

The stuff about national health care driving people out of medicine also flies contrary to my experience of it.

I live in a country area. To give you an idea, I’m about about 10 minutes drive from the nearest shop of any kind – so, I’m not in the outback, but there are dirt roads and no electricity. There is a small hospital in each of the two nearest towns (Daylesford, Castlemaine), about 20 mins drive, and major regional hospitals about an hour away in each direction (Ballarat, Bendigo). Plus medical clinics, of course.

People still want to be doctors. They live comfortably in big houses. It’s a good job. There is definitely a problem getting general practitioners to country areas, but the government also lends a hand with training (because country practices are different to city ones) and incentives.

When I said “international disgrace”, I meant not only that it was disgraceful, but also that it is known around the world. Everyone knows the health system in the USA has outcomes like a developing nation. Only people in the USA are somehow under the impression their system could possibly get worse if the government helped people who are presently cut out from health care.

I guess we have as warped a vision of the USA as the USA has of countries with national health care, but what I can see from here is one lot of people in the USA trying to arrange a system whereby people don’t have to choose between medical treatment and bankruptcy, and another lot squealing “it might be used for abortion! Or gays! it’s my freedom! It’s a moral issue!”. Meanwhile newborn children are dying in the USA at extraordinary rates (neonatal mortality being an indicator of a health system working for the mother as well as the child, prevention and intervention, as well as of course being a moral issue), with shamefully higher rates amongst some ethnic groups – double in fact – a clear indicator of people being locked out of preventive and other medical care.
#28 buckthetrend
July 3, 2012

Thank you Liz for posting something real, it is a shame there is no acknowledgement from the medical scientist lot who are more concerned with high tech advance rather than access to basic health care.

Considering the near total compliance of childhood vaccination in the US it is not a good advert for its efficacy in preventing infant mortality but of course the vaxx must go on and on.
#29 Liz
July 3, 2012

We also have near total compliance of childhood vaccination, thank goodness, though recent poor uptake has led to some children suffering terribly from whooping cough, and even a couple of deaths, and an outbreak in the adult population.

No treatment is as good as prevention. Vaccines are basic health care that prevents disease. I’m not a medical scientist sort, but as far as I can tell, they work with the body’s own immune system so when a real greeblie comes along, your body is ready to fight it off. To me, that beats being treated after the illness has started to do damage.

The well-meaning people who profess – wrongly – that vaccines cause autism have had a bad impact here – scaring people away. People have become very ill and died because of it – including a couple of newborns in (I think) Queensland who got whooping cough from their unvaccinated grandparents visiting and kissing them in the two weeks after they were born (it takes 2 weeks for the kids to get immunity after their vaccine they get when they are newborns). So very sad. Must have been awful for the parents and grandparents to watch as whooping cough is incurable.
#30 Richard Eis
July 3, 2012

A and E is quite good but the rest is comparible with the worst of witch doctor thinking.

Funny, when I have used the NHS for multiple, quite serious ailments the wait times were hardly terrible, the staff professional, the medical drugs worked and the aftercare was thorough… and not a witch doctor in sight.

We have excellent statistics on vaccines and their effect on disease from multiple countries. You can crow until the cows come home BuckThe Trend, but it won’t change reality. And so the old saying still rings true. Prevention is better than cure.
#31 Wow
July 3, 2012

“total denial that the US healthcare system with the ‘best health medics’ in the world are the number one killers of the population.”

Total denial is the correct response to something that is totally wrong.

Are you denying that every single person who died in hospital was born???
#32 Wow
July 3, 2012

“You know we don’t have stats for deaths from alt med”

Well, not taking medication leads to the death by the illness being non-treated, therefore doesn’t count as an alt-med death, does it.

And, despite your admittance that you have nothing to prove your ludicrous statements, you still make them.

Where are your stats for your statement about healthcare being the #1 killer? Or don’t we have stats on medical procedures just like we don’t have them on alternative medical procedures, therefore your statements are merely your beliefs?
#33 buckthetrend
July 3, 2012

Oh dear Liz, looks like I misunderstood your position. Your lack of knowledge on vaccination is shining through. The big outbreaks of whooping cough have been in vaccinated populations and has been widely reported as such.

The myths about priming immune systems are sadly still being hawked around by the few sites left like this. The infant mortality in the US is due to issues like vaccine overload and poor nutrition, they certainly can’t pin it on alternatives as most alternatives are banned in the US so the blame lay firmly at the feet of orthodox practice, I can’t call it health care because that it is not.

Wow there is so much data on medicine killing more people than road traffic accidents I got bored reminding myself what a fucked up system it is:

In 1995, a JAMA report noted, “Over a million patients are injured in US hospitals each year, and approximately 280,000 die annually as a result of these injuries. Therefore, the iatrogenic death rate dwarfs the annual automobile accident mortality rate of 45,000 and accounts for more deaths than all other accidents combined.”(23)

Standard medical pharmacology texts admit that relatively few doctors ever report adverse drug reactions to the FDA.(28) The reasons range from not knowing such a reporting system exists to fear of being sued.(29) Yet the public depends on this tremendously flawed system of voluntary reporting by doctors to know whether a drug or a medical intervention is harmful.

A survey of a 1992 national pharmacy database found a total of 429,827 medication errors from 1,081 hospitals. Medication errors occurred in 5.22% of patients admitted to these hospitals each year. The authors concluded that at least 90,895 patients annually were harmed by medication errors in the US as a whole.(37)

A 2002 study shows that 20% of hospital medications for patients had dosage errors. Nearly 40% of these errors were considered potentially harmful to the patient. In a typical 300-patient hospital, the number of errors per day was 40.(38)

Problems involving patients’ medications were even higher the following year. The error rate intercepted by pharmacists in this study was 24%, making the potential minimum number of patients harmed by prescription drugs 417,908.(39)

In a New England Journal of Medicine study, an alarming one in four patients suffered observable side effects from the more than 3.34 billion prescription drugs filled in 2002.(41) One of the doctors who produced the study was interviewed by Reuters and commented, “With these 10-minute appointments, it’s hard for the doctor to get into whether the symptoms are bothering the patients.”(42) William Tierney, who editorialized on the New England Journal study, said “… given the increasing number of powerful drugs available to care for the aging population, the problem will only get worse.” The drugs with the worst record of side effects were selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors ( SSRIs), nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), and calcium-channel blockers. Reuters also reported that prior research has suggested that nearly 5% of hospital admissions (over 1 million per year) are the result of drug side effects. But most of the cases are not documented as such. The study found that one of the reasons for this failure is that in nearly two-thirds of the cases, doctors could not diagnose drug side effects or the side effects persisted because the doctor failed to heed the warning signs.
#34 buckthetrend
July 3, 2012

Shame you can’t produce a single stat about how dangerous alt med is, only a few anecdotes or bloggers whose father in law hates septics like Optimus, you need therapy not blog space.
#35 Richard Eis
July 3, 2012

The big outbreaks of whooping cough have been in vaccinated populations and has been widely reported as such.

Well, natural news (a site that is painfully idiotic) has carried such a story. Had you bothered to read the original article you would have got the true takeaway from the study “The longer you went from your last vaccine, the greater your risk of disease,” Witt told Reuters Health.”
#36 wow
July 3, 2012

You said we can’t get any stats for alt-med.

And I asked how you can get to a conclusion about its value despite this.

Apparently this is because I can’t produce any statistics on alt-med.

Tell me, did any cognition occur whilst you composed that excuse?
#37 buckthetrend
July 3, 2012

So that means the vaccination doesn’t work, it never has Richard, the largest outbreaks always occur after the biggest vaccine campaigns, who gives a toss who reports it, plenty of other media do, if your sources choose not to report facts don’t you question why that is?

This septic science is a backwards forwards train, the idea of pro and anti anything is by definition unscientific.

If the only RCT over 40 years on flu virus showed you can’t catch it and the last pile of fake pandemics have not materialised why do you cling onto myth Richard?

So tell us the source for the origional article then.
#38 Richard Eis
July 3, 2012

It seems most of the hospital “preventable” deaths are surgery after care related. Infections, complications etc…

You should probably realise that Alt-med (being wishful thinking and magic) hasn’t got much to do with bad aftercare at hospitals. Something that is fairly fixable without changing the “hospital” concept. The problem is that people make mistakes. Not that the medicines don’t work.

Alt-med is fairly uncommon in the scheme of things so they don’t have problems of scale that plague large medical institutions. If alt-med did take the place of properly tested medicine and procedures the result would simply be bad hospitals giving out inneffective placebos. Hardly an improvement. In fact it would be a good deal worse given alt-med’s slapdash and fanciful approach to medical testing.
#39 Richard Eis
July 3, 2012

So tell us the source for the original article then.

Well, I quoted the important takeaway point. the article was from Reuters and as i said, the link to the article is available from Natural News.

This might shock you but immunity doesn’t last forever and it can fade over time. Just like …erm…pretty much every other thing in the universe. Shockingly (like everything else in the universe) it’s not 100% effective. Which is why you need the herd immunity from everyone being vaccinated.

the largest outbreaks always occur after the biggest vaccine campaigns

I would need to see some proof of that, you can’t just randomly state facts and expect me to believe them.
However since it’s a fall/winter disease primarily i’m guessing that vaccine campaigns occur before then each year, because vaccinating “after” would be a bit pointless.

Fake pandemics? You mean the pandemics that were dealt with and contained while the media completely over-hyped every little detail and gruesome possibility?
#40 wow
July 4, 2012

And the reason immunity fades is because the organism we protected against is evolving.
#41 Richard Eis
July 4, 2012

Long term that will happen “as well”. In the case of booster shots being needed it’s just an effect of the immune system forgetting.
#42 Wow
July 4, 2012

It may become a little slower to react, Richard, but I don’t think your immune system every forgets an antibody. It just stops producing them and pushing them round their body.

Booster shots are there to prime your body with antibodies so that your infection doesn’t get past the beachhead stage.
#43 buckthetrend
July 4, 2012

Sorry Richard I can’t remember the last ‘booster campaign’ for scarlet fever or the plague and they don’t bother us any more, lots of myths in your posts really.

As for ‘herd immunity’ that’s another modern medical myth that has never been studied in vaccinated populations, if you are Merck you can change the numbers needed to suit research anyway.

Oh on the random quoting of myths, how about ‘we all know vaccines have saved millions of lives’, that’s the biggest anecdote known apart from putting butter on a burn.
#44 buckthetrend
July 4, 2012

Antibodies and their correlation with immuniity has been shown to be irrelevant, another modern medical myth.
#45 Wow
July 4, 2012

So the immune system is one big scam?

Tell us you’re merely trolling.
#46 buckthetrend
July 4, 2012

“Antibodies Are Not Required for Immunity Against Some Viruses, ScienceDaily (Mar. 1, 2012) — A new study turns the well established theory that antibodies are required for antiviral immunity upside down and reveals that an unexpected partnership between the specific and non-specific divisions of the immune system is critical for fighting some types of viral infections.”

Looks like you are out of date Wow, common man stop reading from the bible and get with the programme, dork!
#47 buckthetrend
July 4, 2012

Looks like Richard has just puked on his bible/pubmed, silence.
#48 buckthetreind
July 4, 2012

“The U.K. General Medical Council’s (GMC) rash and unfounded decision to strike Professor John Walker-Smith, who had helped Dr. Andrew Wakefield in treating desperately-ill children with regressive autism symptoms and severe gastrointestinal problems, off the medical register for alleged “professional misconduct” has been exposed as a fraud. During a recent High Court appeal, Mr. Justice Mitting ruled that Prof. Walker-Smith’s striking “cannot stand” because of serious misconduct in the way “GMC handled the case against him, and that the entire council needs to be reformed”.

So how about an apology boys.
#49 Eric
KC, MO
July 5, 2012

My father had polio, his brother had polio, his father had polio – my brothers and I have not contracted polio and I firmly believe it’s due to the vaccinations that we received as children.

And what about smallpox? That virus was killed by vaccinations.

“Herd immunity” is about infectious vectors; if a disease is x% effective (say 50%) in infecting a new host, but the potential host pool is reduced by y% (say 90%) because of immunizations, the disease is unable to spread effectively and dies out. If, however, the potential host pool is not reduced by immunizations, then the disease can effectively spread.

Lastly – proper sanitation can stop many diseases from spreading. So – get your shots, pay for clean water and remember to wash your hands frequently!
#50 buckthetrend
July 5, 2012

Eric it is an incorrect belief, there are many reported studies that show the vaccine campaigns were responsible for spreading disease, as is now happening in India with the current futile attempts to vaccinate for Polio sometimes up to 20x. They now have a new disease indistinguisable from polio that is twice as deadly and the vaccine has done this.

The campaigns in the 1950s were no exception either and Sabin after many years of observation admitted that his vaccine was a failure.
http://www.thinktwice.com/Polio.pdf

‘Herd immunity’ has only been studied with natural ‘infection’, there are no studies that show vaccinated populations have the same protection, this is in effect a borrowed assumption and is a good example of how unscientific the whole vaccine myth is and propped up with incorrect assumptions.

Your last sentence makes no sense, yes proper sanitation stops diseases spreading so there is no need for systemic poisoning and mythology like vaccination, why clean up and then inject a cocktail of crap into someone?
#51 buckthetrend
July 5, 2012

Come on, don’t cry in your milk boys, how about a comment on half of the Wakefield team being exhonerated, re instated as medical practioners and the GMC being accused of fraudulent prosecution in the high court.

Only one or two steps away from Wakefield following on, I can smell the fear in the Orac, imagine the mighty one, the holy one having to report that Wakefield was right!

“The U.K. General Medical Council’s (GMC) rash and unfounded decision to strike Professor John Walker-Smith, who had helped Dr. Andrew Wakefield in treating desperately-ill children with regressive autism symptoms and severe gastrointestinal problems, off the medical register for alleged “professional misconduct” has been exposed as a fraud. During a recent High Court appeal, Mr. Justice Mitting ruled that Prof. Walker-Smith’s striking “cannot stand” because of serious misconduct in the way “GMC handled the case against him, and that the entire council needs to be reformed”.

So how about an apology boys.
#52 wow
July 5, 2012

Bucket, there are plenty of cases where some antivaxxer refused treatment for their child and they died.
#53 Richard Eis
July 5, 2012

Dear me, I don’t sit by my computer waiting for more unsubstantiated facts from our friend Buck and I get insulted terribly and accused of running away.

Actually I was simply bored of dealing with you and your vomitous torrent.

Are Not Required for Immunity Against Some Viruses

Interesting how “not needed for some viruses” becomes “we don’t need no stinkin immune system.

Yes, Wow, he is a troll. I am merely making sure no one accidently takes him seriously… and yes the immune system “forgetting” was an over simplification.
#54 Richard Eis
July 5, 2012

As for Professor John Walker-Smith, the case against him was about whether his treatments for the children in the study were ethically handled.

I’m not sure what that has to do with Wakefields stance on vaccines nor the “findings” from his fraudulent study.

A further problem with your assumption that Wakefield will be exonerated is that Wakefield himself does not appear to be challenging the original decision. Funny that.

So, no. No apology is needed… and Wakefield will remain without his license.
#55 Wow
July 5, 2012

Got banned as bucker?
#56 buckthetrendi
July 5, 2012

“As for Professor John Walker-Smith, the case against him was about whether his treatments for the children in the study were ethically handled.” Richy said

Well Richard I think the key here is that the GMC (general medical council) were found in the high court in the Uk to have been fraudulent in their judgement against Walker-Smith. That means they committed purgery in court, they lied for any septics watching.

For those of you suffering “septic myopia” a pathological condition brought on by reading too much Randi, this means that considering Walker-Smith was being tried at the same time as Wakefield as part of the pathway to Wakefield being struck off that the GMC are now at risk of being found guilty of being fraudulent in their actions against Wakefield. This means tits up for MMR support, period.

I know that’s hard for you all to stomach here at the Holy See Oracus but some day judgement will push an express train right up your arse and don’t expect help to have it removed.
#57 buckthetrendi
July 5, 2012

Just noticed that all the coloured pics have been reduced to grey, is this medical peer review in action, soon all answers will be the same. Yes vaccines work, even though the data says no…………………………..
#58 Richard Eis
July 5, 2012

You’re clearly more than a little delirious, as this is actually Causabon’s Book. Not Respectful Insolence (Orac). Now that you have been shown to be completely barking, my job here is done.

You will of course be completely unaware that your comments are that of a raving lunatic… but I like to think of that as part of your charm.
#59 wow
July 5, 2012

Yes banned bucker.

Because you’re insane and wasting everyone’s time.
#60 wowfucker
July 5, 2012

Oh dear, the high priest has spoken and you have avoided engaging in anything that questions your good book.

respectful shitfuck is an interesting concept.
#61 wowfucker
July 5, 2012

Still not banned what a shame, well I suppose no one else is posting on this bloggy.

Please can you ban me so I don’t have to log in and point out how crap this site is and how unscientific you all are.

You need an L Ron Hubbard section so you can all home in on the woo.

Apparently I am posting too quickly, I love the idea that the Oroc has to read it all and then decide what to do.
#62 wow
July 6, 2012

Despite this troll’s desire to fornicate with someone as genetically superior to themselves as I am, they have no chance.

Personality matters, and this troll’s personality sucks.
#63 Richard Eis
July 6, 2012

Frankly as a troll… He’s lacking. Pharyngula picks out bigger trolls from their teeth every morning.
#64 Wow
July 6, 2012

He/she is over on ERV too. Just as insane. Just as tiresome.
#65 bucket
July 6, 2012

It’s amazing, when evidence of vaccine failure is shoved up your arse you smile and carry on as normal. So here it is again: ouch! Lap dog

Official data have shown that the large-scale vaccinations undertaken in the US have failed to obtain any significant improvement of the diseases against which they were supposed to provide protection” Dr A Sabin – developer of the Polio vaccine (lecture to Italian doctors in Piacenza, Italy, Decemebr 7th 1985)

“The only wholly safe vaccine is a vaccine that is never used”
Dr James A. Shannon, National Institute of Health, USA

“Immunisation against smallpox is more hazardous than the disease itself.” Professor Ari Zuckerman, World Health Organisation.

“Live virus vaccines against influenza and paralytic polio, for example, may in each instance cause the disease it is intended to prevent…”
Dr Jonas Salk, developer of first polio vaccine (Science 4/4/77 Abstracts)

Abstract

In 1988, the World Health Assembly passed resolution WHA 41.28, which committed the World Health Organization (WHO) to the global eradication of poliomyelitis by the year 2000. In spite of the combined efforts by UNICEF, National Polio Surveillance Project (NPSP), Indian Academy of Pediatrics (IAP) and Rotary International, Polio Free India is still a distant dream.

Though oral polio vaccine has succeeded in polio eradication from many countries but there is high incidence of vaccine failure in India. Oral polio vaccine (OPV) has failed to provide full protection to many children who have developed paralytic polio even after taking 10 or more doses of OPV. In some children, OPV has caused paralysis-vaccine associated paralytic polio (VAPP). Number of children developing polio due to vaccine is high and on increase. Reasons for this could be that even immunocompromised children are being administered OPV because IPV is not available. Vaccine failure has exaggerated the problem of VAPP. No efforts have been made to find the causes for high incidence of vaccine failure and VAPP.
Keywords

Paralytic poliomyelitis;
Immunization;
Vaccine failure;
Vaccine associated paralytic poliomyelitis

Corresponding author contact information
Corresponding author. Tel.: +91 141 2

And it’s still going on boys, wakey wakey!

Oh and half of the Wakefield saga has now been re instated on the medical register and the orgional charges dropped over the MMR/autism event and the other half is taking a two bit journalist to court in Texas, Merck currently is being sued by scientists it employed to fiddle stats on mumps vaccine, virtually the whole data stat base on swine flu was anecdotal.
#66 bucket
July 6, 2012

I can’t wait for Merck to go down over lying that the mumps vaccine worked, then we will see maybe if you are capable of admiting defeat, meanwhile septic science slides on and on, like a pus filled bag of righiousness (sic) Orac/david is a bit dull at the moment, you would think the high lord of the holey septicicus was running out of diss ideas but maybe it’s just his personality shinning through.

Peace of pipe, pipe of peace
#67 Sharon Astyk
July 6, 2012

You know most of us science bloggers don’t hang out and drink beer after a day’s posting. I had no idea who Orac really is (nor would I take Bucket’s word for the color of beer, so I still don’t), could care less, and you can find Abby’s opinion of me on her blog. The things we agree on are far smaller than the ones we don’t. So I don’t really understand the inane ranting about other SB authors – want to talk to them? Go visit their blogs and find an identity they haven’t already banned.

As for me, I’m invoking the total irrelevance clause and all future posts from twit above will be removed, because he’s boring the shit out of me, and this is my blog.

Ho hum.
#68 Orac
July 8, 2012

Now Now, I have a cream for that.
#69 wowisme
July 19, 2012

Still moderating then?