One of the most inaptly named groups I've ever seen is called Thinking Moms' Revolution (henceforth abbreviated as TMR). Given the reality of what TMR really is, the word "thinking" applied to TMR is, as they say, so wrong it's not even wrong. As for a "revolution," what TMR really represents is nothing revolutionary at all, unless you consider antivaccinationism, run-of-the-mill antiscience paranoia, and big pharma conspiracy theories to be "revolutionary." I don't know about you, but I do not. I've followed such activities for well over a decade now, and in light of that experience, perusing the TMR website, I am struck less by anything resembling "thinking" or "revolution" than by a smug sense of self-congratulation at how its members are allegedly not "brainwashed" like everyone else.
Don't believe me? Then look at the web page in which the "Thinking Moms" introduce themselves. I mean, gag me with the proverbial spoon (as they used to say in the 1980s). We have members going by the handles of Dragon Slayer, Goddess, The Booty Kicker, Killah, Savage, Saint, Princess, Mountain Momma, The Professor, and several others that are equally nauseatingly self-congratulatory. How edgy. How "revolutionary."
How tiresome. (Yes, I know I use a 'nym, but my little affectation is so obscure that very few readers know its significance. Come to think of it, few readers care about its significance even after I explain where it comes from. Maybe I should rename myself "Quack Killah." Yeah, that's the ticket...)
Not surprisingly, there's a lot of cross-pollination between TMR and the antivaccine crank blog Age of Autism. In fact, AoA is where I saw the most hilarious bit of arrogance yet from TMR, as it was published on AoA first. Apparently the "Thinking Moms'" opinion of themselves goes beyond thinking that they understand immunology, vaccine science, pharmacology, toxicology, and drug development better than...oh, you know...actual scientists. Apparently the "Thinking Moms" view themselves as revolutionaries on par with the Founding Fathers, so much so that they have posted their very own Declaration of Independence from Medical Tyranny. I was going to say that "words fail me," but you know that would be a lie. If that were the case, this would post would be just a brief link with a suggestion that you all point and laugh. Instead, however, I see a great deal that reveals the mindset not just of antivaccinationists but of quacks and cranks in general.
First, it's hard not to note that when the "Thinking Moms" say "declaration of independence," they mean "Declaration of Independence," as in the real Declaration of Independence in which colonists dissolved their ties with Great Britain and its king and declared the colonies independent. The TMR "declaration" apes the form of the real Declaration very closely:
When in the course of human healthcare it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Science entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of educated parents requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
See what I mean? One can imagine Thomas Jefferson's bones doing backflips in his grave. In fact, a clearer statement of the arrogance of ignorance is hard to find. "Laws of science"? Really? Science has a lot of theories but precious few "laws," and those laws have nothing do to with the causes the TMR seems to be about. Of course, what really compels these moms is that they think that science doesn't respect their "educated" opinions as much as they think it should. I would counter that scientists probably give antivaccinationists like TMR far more "respect" than they deserve. After all, their understanding of science, as can be demonstrated very easily, is abominable. They insist that they know that vaccines cause autism against all medical evidence.
In fact, this attitude can easily be generalized not just to antivaccinationists, but to cranks of all stripes. For instance, how often have we heard "intelligent design" creationists demand "respect" for their views? Quacks do it as well, as do anthropogenic global warming denialists. They all endlessly repeat canards that science has considered and rejected based on evidence and experimentation as though they were new and still in dispute. To support their arguments, they cherry pick data, distort science, exaggerate risks and downplay benefits, and in general seek data to confirm their preexisting biases rather than consider data that might falsify their beliefs. We can see the same sort of conpsiracy-mongering thinking among promoters of "health freedom" who advocate all manner of quackery under the banner of a "freedom" that in reality means the freedom of quacks to practice their quackery without the pesky interference of laws and regulations designed to protect the public from them.
Given that this "declaration" is patterned on the real Declaration of Independence, you know what's coming next. That's right, TMR wants you to know which "truths" it holds to be "self-evident":
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all children are created equal, that they are endowed by virtue of their birth certain unalienable Rights, that among these are the right to a healthy life free from the tyranny of untested preventative medicine and a life free from chronic inflammatory illness caused by an unaffected and apathetic pharmaceutical oligarchy that receives government endorsement and protection. To secure these rights, Governments and Institutions are created deriving their just powers from THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED. Whenever any form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying it's foundation on such principles and organizing it's power in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to preserve the Safety and Health of their children.
Won't someone think of the children?
Of course, those of us who support vaccine science and widespread vaccination programs are thinking of the children. We're thinking of real consequences of not vaccinating, such as the return of serious vaccine-preventable diseases that will cause suffering, morbidity, and mortality. The TMR is thinking of fantasy consequences of vaccinating, namely all the conditions and diseases antivaccinationists falsely attribute to vaccines, such as autism, "chronic inflammatory diseases," and the like. I don't know about you, but I'll take reality-based thinking over fantasy-based thinking when it comes to health care any day. In fact, I'd retort that children are endowed by virtue of their birth with the right to medical means of preventing unnecessary suffering from diseases.
That means vaccines. It's also utter nonsense that vaccines and pharmaceuticals are "untested." They are, in fact, tested very extensively. TMR thinks vaccines to be "untested" because the testing that has been done hasn't found what these mothers believe it should find, namely that vaccines cause all sorts of chronic health problems. No one has ever said that vaccines are 100% safe, but they are among the safest and most efficacious of medical interventions. In essence, by calling them "untested," to paraphrase Adam Savage, TMR is rejecting scientific reality and substituting its own, in the process going completely off the deep end:
The Pharmaceutical Industry, Medical Institutions, and the American Government have repeatedly discredited organizations, research studies, physicians, and citizens opposing the notion that they, and they alone, know what is best for the people they claim to protect, repeatedly citing the science they themselves perform, promote, and proliferate. Science that lacks a fundamental component: A control group. All science currently published in support of the current vaccine schedule lacks a placebo/control group. Thereby nullifying its validity and bringing the motives of its promoters and defenders into question. Such science, brought under the scrutiny of the Thinking Moms is without merit and shall be denounced publicly.
Excuse me. I need to do something about the smell here. The rotting zombie of this hoary old antivaccine argument is stinking up the place. Do I really have to address this brain dead argument again? I suppose I do. Let's see. Let's go to PubMed where a quick search of "Clinical trial," "vaccine," and "placebo" brought up 2,171 articles. Now, of course, many of those articles will not be in support of the current vaccine schedule, but many of them are. It's utter lunacy to claim that "all science currently published in support of the current vaccine schedule lacks a placebo/control group." Clearly, TMR is confused. When we say that it would be unethical to do a placebo-controlled RCT of vaccinated versus unvaccinated children (and it would be), we don't mean that it's never ethical to use placebo controls. For instance, here's a placebo-controlled double-blind RCT of the Hib vaccine.
I guess that means that at least one trial in support of the current vaccine schedule was a double-blind, placebo-controlled RCT. Not "none." It is rather amusing, however, to see TMR's arrogance of ignorance on display.
But TMR is just getting warmed up:
The Pharmaceutical Industry, Medical Institutions, and the American Government have repeatedly usurped and controlled the media message, presenting half truths and falsehoods about the thinking parents, and by extension, Thinking Moms, and other reputable consumer safety advocacy groups and individuals, professing our message is unsound and without scientific merit. At present, over 55 studies exist demonstrating a strong link between vaccines and autism (also known as vaccine encephalopathy). They are not permitted publication in medical journals or scientific periodicals because those journals are funded by the very industry those studies indict. Studies formerly published on PubMed and other scientific publications have been removed without proper and formal discourse between those displacing said studies and the American public. The censorship of intellectual property that pertains directly to the health and welfare of all children is a crime against humanity.
Andrew Wakefield. They're talking about Andrew Wakefield here. This argument is the height of silliness. As I've described before and extensively documented by Brian Deer, Wakefield's work was profit-driven and fraudulent, but even more importantly it was wrong. His study has not been replicated, and multiple large studies have failed to find a link between autism and the MMR vaccine. Also amusing is the bit about how Wakefield's studies have been retracted by journals "without proper and formal discourse between those displacing said studies and the American public." Here's a hint: Peer review does not involve the American "public" because the American public doesn't have the knowledge and background to evaluate the science. Neither does TMR, apparently.
I do like the "counting studies" gambit, though. Here's a hint to TMR: I can easily find 55 studies that demonstrate that homeopathy works. I really could if I put my mind to it! In fact, I could find hundreds of studies if I really wanted to. Does that mean that homeopathy does, in fact, work? Of course not! Quality counts, as does the preponderance of evidence, not to mention the fact that homeopathy violates the laws of physics. I have to wonder, though. Did it ever occur to TMR that maybe--just maybe--the reason these studies can't get published in the medical literature is not because of some vast pharma conspiracy (which is, of course, the same excuse that alt-med quacks use for why they don't publish their results) but rather because their science is crap?
The rest of the "declaration" exhumes even more rotting corpses of anti-vaccine canards. TMR complains about Simpsonwood being embargoed. Simpsonwood? That's so...2005. Hannah Poling? That's so...2008. The whole thing reads like a self-congratulatory declaration of the arrogance of ignorance salted with the antivaccine movement's greatest hits. I mean, really. Get a load of this:
For the support of this Declaration, we, The Thinking Moms, and by extension, representatives of a THINKING POPULATION, with full reliance on Real Science, shall take it upon ourselves to educate, investigate, and rigorously pursue any and all treatments for our children who suffer iatrogenic illness. We promise to share the fruits of our labors with others, to honor one another and all our children. We uphold among ourselves a conduct and spirit consistent with a Divine Purpose that focuses exclusively on two fundamental goals: the restored health of our children and the restoration of our nation. We will no longer be ignored. When the Pharmaceutical Industry, Medical Institutions, and the American Government prove themselves to be of an openly investigative, non-political mindset that focuses on the health of children rather than the distribution and allocation of profits they may petition us for involvement and inclusion in our community.
Got that, you sheeple? The "Thinking Moms" are the representatives of a THINKING POPULATION (all caps faithfully reproduced) who represent Real Science. I swear, I would have capitalized "Real Science" as a means of mocking the "Thinking Moms'" pretensions that they have even the slightest understanding of science, but TMR did it for me--and did it utterly without any irony whatsoever. And for that, we thank you.
When I read something like this manifesto, I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Yes, it's easy to laugh at the hugely inflated egos behind the arrogance of ignorance so richly on display here. We see it not just in antivaccine activists, but quacks, creationists, and anthropogenic global warming denialists. We also see the same sense of grievance because their crank ideas are not taken seriously by scientists because the scientific evidence doesn't support them. It's easy to laugh at it. But then I see this part:
In practical real world application over half of our precious children will become ill and several will die, for the fallacious notion of the good of all. These are the principles of a corrupt, immoral, and bankrupt nation.
Yes, TMR really appears to believe that half of our precious children will become ill from vaccines and that several will die. That is the antivaccine mindset. That is what we're up against: an irrational belief not founded in science that vaccines are harming children and that there is a huge pharmaceutical industry plot to cover it up. That's the part that makes me want to cry. We see the same sort of thinking (if you can call it that) in Gary Null's "health freedom" attacks on science and the pharmaceutical company, augmented by Mike Adams' lunacy and Joe Mercola's more calculated commerce-driven attacks on science.
In the end, TMR's Declaration of Independence from Medical Tyranny reads like the tantrum of a child who, when gently told time and time again by his parents, that there is no monster under his bed, screams, "There is, too!" and insists that his parents not only just protect them from it but hunt it down and kill it. Science gently (perhaps too gently) tries to tell people like this that there is no vaccine boogeyman or thimerosal boogeyman, and moms like TMR demand against all reason the government cater to their non-science-based fears.
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Careful here, let's not get sidetracked on a critic of people's creativity re:nickname. A bit of ego showing up is to be expected.
On the other hand, that does read like the people connected on a World of Warcraft game, doesn't it?
More seriously:
"American Government"? And us in Old Europe (not to mention the rest of the world where vaccine programs are set up), we smell funny?
The Thinking Moms obviously think that our own (mostly positive) experience with vaccines doesn't count.
Or that the Illuminati are behind the vaccine program.
How does that placebo controlled study get by the ethics issues with not vaccinating? I'd be more than a little pissed to discover my son had received saline solution instead of a vaccine... So how do they go actually running a study like that, ethically? Is it just sign-off from the parents needed, or something more?
@kevinL - they don't understand "selection bias" because they believe there are enough of their own, unvaccinated kids to do that type of study, not realizing what the actual make-up of a "double-blind, placebo-controlled) study would entail.
There will always be a minority who will trust their gut instinct over any science, logic, or reason.
For millions of years, our ancestors would not have had the benefit of modern scientific medicine so they did the best they can and learnt to make the temporal association between stings and sickness. We learnt to avoid stings, and we learnt to connect stings with toxicity.
In that 'thinking' minority, base instinct will always be dominant. That's life.
let's not get sidetracked on a critic of people's creativity re:nickname. A bit of ego showing up is to be expected.
NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!
Wait. Did they just unintentionally make an argument in favor of a one-size-fits-all vaccination schedule?
Interesting declaration. I think it would be called plagarism in academia.
And when I read about groups and blogs like the one in your post, it's head line like this one that I see:
http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wqub/news.newsmain/article/0/2/192689…
A 9 week old baby girl died of whooping cough in Idaho this past week...
"Thinking" Moms ?? really? Talk about unintentional irony.
Heliantus @1 -- "And us in Old Europe (not to mention the rest of the world where vaccine programs are set up), we smell funny?"
Well, yes, but that's beside the point.
I kid, I kid!
About the "respect for their views" issue -- I've long been in the trenches over at the Wretched Hive battling global warming deniers. Recently I had a concern-troll type saying that it would be better if BOTH sides of the "debate" didn't try to "marginalize opposing views". I replied by pointing out that the "debate" was created out of the whole cloth by the denial-o-sphere, in an effort to legitimize their otherwise unsupportable position.
Over in their "healthy living" (sic) section, there's a whole Greek chorus of anti-vax and pro-homeopathy folks who chime in, though there's something of an informal truth squad as well.
over 55 studies [...] are not permitted publication in medical journals or scientific periodicals because those journals are funded by the very industry those studies indict.
Scientific journals are funded by the pharmaceutical industry? That will come as a surprise to the university libraries who are paying all that money for their journal subscriptions. Knowing that the publishers have this extra source of income, perhaps my university can ask for a rebate on the subscriptions next time the librarians are negotiating with Elsevier and Springer.
I have to agree, picking on the 'nyms isn't really a good idea. I can think right off the top of my head of a regular contributor here, rightfully respected, whose six-word nym would certainly cause derision if someone were to incorrectly guess that he wanted to be judged by his nym rather than his contributions.
That's the real crux of the TMR problem: not that the contributors there have chosen bad nyms, but that they have signed on to a preposterous proposition that vaccines devastate over 50% of children and somehow no one except them can see it. The choice of a nym, even if the choice seems ludicrous, doesn't really make a good surrogate for the choice of a ludicrous, blatantly counterfactual version of reality.
It always amazes me that the "Pharmaceutical Industry, Medical Institutions, and the American Government" that TMR is railing against never seem to have any health problems themselves or children to protect from disease.
They're just an amorphous blob of Evil to demonize, not human at all.
When I see this sort of garbage posted online by "They Don't Want You To Know" cranks, I generally ask why They wouldn't want to use 100% effective and safe Natural Remedies to protect themselves and their loved ones, rather than covering them up and outlawing them, as the cranks believe. Usually there is just sullen silence in response.
It's too much effort to fire up those few remaining functional neurons and think about the irrationality and nastiness of one's core beliefs.
Orac writes, "Here's a hint to TMR: I can easily find 55 studies that demonstrate that homeopathy works. I really could if I put my mind to it! In fact, I could find hundreds of studies if I really wanted to. Does that mean that homeopathy does, in fact, work?"
I'm certain that at this point the "Thinking" Moms are nodding enthusiastically: of course homeopathy works! Orac just admitted the truth is out there!
"I was going to say that "words fail me," but you know that would be a lie."
Coworkers looking at me now, wondering why I could be laughing so early in the morning.
I saw "Mummies" in that link,and I thought maybe it was these guys.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVea2hDIvlA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hM_zyIh7Y8
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mummies
One wonders if this is their sad attempt at countering the "Thinking Person's Guide to Autism" h_ttp://thinkingautismguide.blogspot.com/ or just getting people all sorts of confused with the whole "Thinking" part. HINT: Only one group is thinking, and that group edited a heck of a book on autism.
My opinion, of course.
We have members going by the handles of Dragon Slayer, Goddess, The Booty Kicker, Killah, Savage, Saint, Princess, Mountain Momma, The Professor, and several others that are equally nauseatingly self-congratulatory.
That's almost as silly as the reich-wing "Ankle-Biting Pundits" blog, where the heading banner was a snarling dog and commenters had 'nyms like "H-Bomb" and "Bombtruck."
Adn yes, when a bunch of people spread nonsense and lies, and pretend to be more knowledgeable and mature than actual scientists and doctors, making fun of idiotic or unprofessional behavior is an appropriate response. NOt the most important one, of course, but appropriate.
@Dr. Bimler: Indeed, I have seen advertisements from a certain publisher (their name begins with E) that tout their extensive lineup of medical journals. I am not the target audience for these ads (I am a physicist rather than a physician), but I have done business with this publisher. They don't charge publication fees, at least for the journals I use, but they do charge libraries for subscriptions, and the pricing of these journals has been extensively criticized for the last several years. (I believe the S and W entities have similar business models, but I have never had occasion to publish in any of their journals.) So if E_______ is collecting money (other than subscription fees) from Big Pharma, they have an even bigger racket going than any of us has suspected.
TMR:
And when a child is injured by a real disease, these are the same ones who claim that it is part of "natural selection." Because it was obvious that child did not have a "perfect immune system."
TMR comes across as so over-the-top that they appear to be a parody. At least that's how it looks to me. Alison McNeil (Robert McNeil's daughter) seems to be one of the grand poohbahs of the "thinking moms" and writes some of the most paranoid anti-science screeds. I wish the anti-vaxx craxy would keep it all in one place but I guess that's too much to wish for.
I remember my early internet days, when everyone was named "Cloud" or "Sephiroth" and some number, and everyone's avatar was some combination of skulls, demons, flames, swords, guns, bacon, and such.
Or that the parents fed them one serving of an unhealthy food, which "devastated" their immunity.
Right, they reject vaccines which have been tested and evaluated by the FDA in favor of industrial chelating chemicals that have not undergone any testing or evaluation by the FDA.
I can do one better...
Ten score and sixteen years ago, an intelligent man brought forth on this world, a new vaccine, conceived in science, and dedicated to the proposition that all infectious diseases can be quite evil.
Now we are engaged in a great war on science, testing whether evidence and reason, or any science so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.
We are met on a great blog of that war. We have come to comment on a post of that blog, as a final resting place of those lies and half-truths from those who have given their lives to leading us into an intellectual darkness.
It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not stop, we can not waiver, we can not quit our fight. The innocent people, living and dead, whoâve died or have been discapacitated by infectious disease, call on us to carry on this effort.
The world will little note, nor long remember what we write here, but it cannot forget what we do away from here.
It is for us the living, the vaccinated, the propellers of reason and science, to be dedicated here and everywhere to the unfinished work which they who came before us have so nobly advanced.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from those whoâve been made dead by polio, pertussis, meningitis, or influenza, we learn that they did not die in vain, that this nation, led by science, shall have a new birth of reason, and that the scientists made up of people, working feverishly for the people, and encouraged by the people, shall not fail in their mission on this Earth.
What's next, the Magna Carta?
When I came across this yesterday, I felt that my early intimations about TMR were being fulfilled- it is truly the Mother Lode**- I read on and keep wishing that I'd come across a cue that one of our own had taken my hint and launched a Sokal of epic proportion- but no, I think it's real deal. Lately, *chez idiots* ( PRN, NN), the 'Arab Spring' is being aped with talk of general strikes, civil disobediance and protests "in the streets".
If you peruse AutismOne 2012's listings you'll notice that perhaps more discuss 'rights" than discuss therapies. Usually, these are presented by lawyers or teams of lawyers. We might say that the entire movement was launched nearly 20 years ago in the offices of a legal firm by the earliest enabler of the Chief Rebel Scientist ( Mssrs Barr and Wakefield, respectively).
AoA, the Canaries and TMR, like Mssrs Null and Adams, rely upon getting distraught people even more riled up: it's a tried and true method that discourages serious thought and enables fear mongering and incediary speech while promoting intra-group solidarity.
I'd ask the Thinking Moms: if you heap anathema and derision on your own government, why do you also accept government-sponsored education and therapy for your children? Right, I guess that *none* of you accept those benefits.
** perhaps I should say,"load".
@ Palindrome. I was at the Hive yesterday posting in an article about Gardisil and African Americans. The vaccination rate is lagging behind other demographics. A TMR type was waxing poetic about how nature gave us an immune system to fight all this off, that African Americans were genetically different, blah, blah. When I pointed out that God also gave us smallpox, polio, and measles and it was vaccines together with our immune systems the edge she flipped. Called me a white devil. I am not even white, I am Osage. Hard to fight that kind of insanity.
The part that always frustrates me is I feel rational thinkers are out numbered. On any article in the LA Times, the crazies come out in force. There was an article about the risk to the power grid from a large coronal mass ejection like the 1859 Solar Storm. The posts came from religious nuts, climate change deniers, complaints about UN scientists, almost nothing pertaining to the articles main premise. Have the inmates taken over?
LOL. Kelly, can you post a link? I have to see that.
@ Kelly M Bray
Same here, but let's not forget that the internet is the modern soapbox. Size XXL.
Nowadays, anyone with a grudge and too much time could make its opinion heard all over the world. Repeatedly, ad nauseum.
And people with extreme opinions are more likely to hold the microphone than moderate people. Just look at the demographic of abstention during any election. What's how my country came close to have a far-right president in a previous election: all of his supporters voted, while the usual voters for the moderate candidates went fishing.
I believe that they are more reasonable people out here. I just wish they could be more vocal. Shruggers are not helping.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all children are created equal..." I wonder if these individuals know that Thomas Jefferson and his family were inoculated against small pox? http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/inoculation
As to the 'nyms, does Mountain Momma really suppose she's the only Mountain Momma on the Internet?
Because I survey both general woo-meisters and anti-vax specialists, I envision a system of cross-currents between these websites and the groups that cluster around them; for example, Dr Herbert shows up @ PRN, then I read she will present several times at AutismOne. Miserably impoverished concepts and themes ( like the solar storms Kelly mentioned) trickle down to the public and are shared amongst them through social media. As Orac illustrates, she responsible for the plagiarism steeped in sewage cited by him above, posts regularly ( and offensively) at both AoA and TMR. It's an endless loop of incestuous mis-information sharing and self, as well as mutual, congratulation.
Articles blithely dreamed up at both generalists' sites will show up all over the net. The marriage of corporations and governments to push vaccines is certainly a popular notion: Null has about 19 articles about it at his websites. Similarly, the *revolution* meme has been circulating since last year. What I hear lately involves uniting the disparate groups together into one gigantic coalition of the willing. Supposedly, a conference will soon bring together about 100 natural health groups to "work on their issues". Oh boy, just what we need!
Offhand, it kinda looks like the Tea Party types are trying to gloom onto the antivax movement. Or maybe the antivax loons are trying to get support from the Tea Party types.
(Also, I've heard noises of another anti-flouridation scare, brought to us by the same ignorant reactionaries who gave us the first one. So it seems inevitable that their anti-science crap would merge with that of the anti-vaxers.)
@ Raging Bee:
I find that those I survey use politicised rhetoric that originates from either end of the spectrum- it's all fine as long as it attracts more followers and initiates more sales.
@ kruuth: Here's the link to the Ho-Po article that Kelly M. Bray referenced:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/22/hpv-vaccine-black-girls_n_1373…
There is a poster there who referenced the *research* conducted by Dr. Sin Hang Lee at Milford Hospital, Connecticut. Orac blogged several times about this guy whose *research* was touted by SaneVax:
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2012/02/microcompetition_with_antivac…
@Reuben Gaines
Well done. I'd award an internets for the effort if I had any.
@ 11 Antaeus Feldspar:
It isn't that "somehow no one except them can see it." It's that those 'in charge' can see it, do see it, and go ahead anyway. It's that all the people who have anything to do with decisions about public health are so callous, so cruel, and so purely avaricious that they know they're killing children and they just don't care.
That's the subtext in all of that, that these brave revolutionaries aren't just fighting ignorance. They're fighting evil on a scale never before seen. They don't always put it right out in the open, but it underlies everything else. I think that's part of the reason they are often so vicious to those who disagree with them. They don't see their opponents as wrong, but as purely evil, which makes any tactic acceptable.
Okay, now I know what bumper sticker I want:
I'm a Thinking Mom and I vaccinate.
Maybe I should rename myself "Quack Killah." Yeah
That just made me think "Ghostface Quackah", but that's not going to work very well, for several reasons.
First, you're not a duck, and second, it's too easy to read the latter as a racial reference that would be inappropriate (though not bigoted) given the overall context.
I still think it's amusing enough to mention.
I might be jumping to conclusions here, but if this post is anything to do with my sudden surge on the Babble Poll (closing in on TMR) big squishy cwtches all round. Thanks xx
http://www.babble.com/baby/baby-development/top-autism-blog-nominate/in…
You mean like this?
If you have a *glowing* review of your bastardized version of the Declaration of Independence from AoA...what more could you ask for?
How about this?
http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?read=239070
Oh yeah, Lisa Goes is a *child advocate*, as are the 25 posters at AoA, offering their support of Lisa Goes son's doctor:
http://www.ageofautism.com/2011/10/will-the-real-doctors-and-journalist…
Dear god....that article at HuffPo..
the stupid....it burns
I just went back to the HuffPo article and a couple of my posts are gone. The one where I say God gave us smallpox etc too is still there, but the one where I suggest vaccines + our immune system is a good idea is gone.....
Do they just randomly delete posts so the thread makes even less sense?
but my little affectation is so obscure that very few readers know its significance.
Are you kidding? I stumbled across this blog years ago when searching for something quite other (Blakes 7 related, obviously) and decided immediately that I *had* to read it, no matter what the subject, just based on the 'nym. And I'm glad I did!
Suddenly I recalled that Ms Goes is *also* responsible for the loathesome article which compares vaccines to Keynesian economics ( A Keynesian Look at Autism; AoA) wherein the "false stimulation of the immune system" is substituted for the "false stimulation of the economy".
When that appeared, someone who had studied economics declared it, and I quote him- f#@king insane-. Goes' inexpertise in *three* subjects remains unsurpassed. Oops, I left out writing.
Anyone with a "Level 2 mod badge" can delete comments:
Whatever "as long as you handle the task responsibly" means is unclear; obviously, if the comment got through moderation in the first place (not all topics are premoderated), there's something of a quality-control problem going on. There also seems to be a significant work-at-home contingent among the moderators.
@Kelly - you just cracked me up with your comment about "monotonous"!!
@ Kelly M Bray: My post about HPV vaccine and black girls made it out of "moderation*. I linked to the RI blog about SaneVax and Dr. Hang Sin Lee:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/22/hpv-vaccine-black-girls_n_1373…
Go look...and reply to my comment. Let us know if you get out of moderation...so that one of us can comment again. (The RI *regulars* have each other's backs)
"Anti Thinking Moms"
Better epithet for them?
This poet thinks so.
Reading the nick's, I thought it was a roller derby team.
GH
I am well aware that antivaxxers believe there to be a percentage of the world's population that is Part Of The Conspiracy, fully complicit, fully evil, etc. etc. But unless they believe that everyone in the world is either part of the Thinking(-Impaired) Mom's Revolution or part of the Giant Conspiracy, then they must acknowledge that there is some percentage of the world's population which is not on either side and does not have any reason to ignore the blatantly obvious. Over half the children in the United States being devastated with health problems would be pretty freaking obvious. So why is something which would be so obvious, if it were real, completely escaping the notice of everyone who isn't part of the Conspiracy and isn't part of the TIMR?
@ Kelly M. Bray: I've been posting at the Ho-Po...and getting past moderation.
I "took care of" blackcherry and her remarks about "you devils"....
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/22/hpv-vaccine-black-girls_n_1373…
Just when I thought I was out you pull me back in at Huff Po. This won't make it through moderation but is a reply to she who said (I'm paraphrasing) "HPV vaccine bad, look at the YoooTooob"
"I get my science from scientists whose work is published in peer reviewed journals though my DH and I do find some You Tube videos have an extraordinarily calming effect on our son. This one in particular is invaluable http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtN1YnoL46Q
Long-time lurker who felt compelled to throw in 2c....
Anthropologist Underground had a great post I stumbled across in my lurkings - might hit at least part of the nail on the head:
http://shethought.com/2011/05/25/social-status-and-immunization/
While I have no kids of my own, my sisters have mentioned being exasperated with other parents who view parenting as some kind of competitive sport - it's all about them, not the kids. And I keep remembering the tagline of a TV PSA about foster parenting: "You don't have to be perfect to be a perfect parent".
@ Autismum: Don't blame me for "pulling you back in" at the Ho-Po...please direct your comments at Kelly M Bray :-)
I have a couple of comments in moderation at the wretched hive...including one that *mentions* Scopie's Law. Let's see if my snark passes muster.
Raging Bee @ 29
Here's a blog to take a look at
http://wemustknow.net/
Roger: thanks...I guess. That's some serious repository for just about any conspiracy-story you can think of. I mean...
In truth, the Big Pork Industry has been planning this campaign to take down all family farms with hopes to eventually siege complete control of the American Food Supply.
Okay...who knew? All that 9/11 stuff is now officially OLD.
When I read and listen to effusive blatherings, I realise that although the creators of this nonsense might gush endlessly, there is a limit that is externally imposed: listeners and readers may accept it to a certain point *but* the effervescent folly will advance too far in its inevocable trend toward the event horizon of fantasy saturation.
A woo-meister may drone on and on about pure foods and toxins, whine about remediating illness through veganism, supplements and chelation, then rhapsodise about energy exchange and chakra-balancing but will most likely hit the brick wall of indignant common sense when he reveals precognitive knowledge of a person's future health status while suggesting a laying on of hands. And claiming easy cures for serious illnesses sans pharmaceuticals. Or that everyone is corrupt. Unhindered
grandiosity sows the seeds of its own demise.
I have a feeling that the continuous conspiracies and end-of-the-world forecasting by those I survey will meet a similar fate: dismissal by most of the audience. Ironically, most of these antics are employed to increase audience, hits or revenue. Whether the author is named Mike, Gary, Jake or Lisa, recently I have detected a ubiquitous whiff of desperation in their offerings.
I've held this in as long as I can.
Are they not men?
@34
Or better yet, "Thinking Moms with the Facts Vaccinate"
Antenaus Feldspar @48: OH MY GOD, Dick Roman has suceeded and the Leviathans have taken over!!
WE'RE ALL DOOMED!!!!!
Antenaus Feldspar @48: OH MY GOD, Dick Roman has suceeded and the Leviathans have taken over!!
WE'RE ALL DOOMED!!!!!
@ Mephistopheles
"We are Devo!"
Lilady and Kelly, your efforts were heroic over at The Wretched Hive, but the forces of woo are strong there. But It was not enorely for naught, I have decided to become monotonous . . . just to be safe.
Lilady and Kelly, your efforts were heroic over at The Wretched Hive, but the forces of woo are strong there. But It was not enorely for naught, I have decided to become monotonous . . . just to be safe.
Pareidolius, a monotonous relationship is a good defense against STD's
"Pareidolius, a monotonous relationship is a good defense against STD's"
So is totally abstaining...which isn't a lot of fun...but you'll win the "war" :-)
Here from the NIH website...
http://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/ps/retrieve/ResourceMetadata/VCBBCF
does it seem they want all the power of being a doctor without going through the curriculum? doctors has a lot of power and today, they are collaborator with the patient but apparently, these people didn't get the memo and still think doctors are patronizing.
A.L. (just doing meta-cognition on this post)
Autistic Lurker @65--
Well, to be fair, when these women come into the doctors' offices spouting some ridiculous "fact" that's already been disproven a thousand times, there would be a temptation to get pretty patronizing with them, wouldn't there?
These folks are so delusional. I believe they think they're actually "winning" in the court of public opinion. Have any of you seen the claim that "40 to 50 percent of new parents are no longer vaccinating"? This meme is quickly becoming an accepted truth in antivax circles. Anything to convince themselves they're "turning the tide," I suppose....
#16 "One wonders if this is their sad attempt at countering the "Thinking Person's Guide to Autism" h_ttp://thinkingautismguide.blogspot.com/ or just getting people all sorts of confused with the whole "Thinking" part. HINT: Only one group is thinking, and that group edited a heck of a book on autism.
My opinion, of course."
I think this is EXACTLY what the intent was
"but my little affectation is so obscure that very few readers know its significance."
I initially thought it was some sort of homage to the similarly-named vacuum. "Nothing gets by an Oreck (Orac?)"
My take on the TMR is that it is just another of the incestuous splinter sects from AoA and other notorious anti-vaccine organizations. They are not representative of the overwhelming majority of parents who have children on the "Spectrum".
They believe, in their delusional state, that they have *right* on their side. They reject science in favor of pseudoscience...hey it takes an education to understand medical texts, immunology and the epidemiology of vaccine preventable diseases.
Their rants that they unleash on their websites and the venom directed at anyone who isn't in lockstep with their collected group think, is simply...mind-boggling.
If I ever wanted to write a book about how NOT to advocate for your children or for yourselves...the TMR would be one of my prime sources. Truly pathetic.
GMP and Consumer Labs are a good start toward solving Jay's potentual QC problem. Whored after negative statements and abused studies in journals that are financially dependent on advertisers is a recurrent theme.
Lilady you are awesome!!!! I went over to HP and to be honest there was not much left to say. Between you and Heywood Merton and Dyson you ripped them a new butt. Blackcherry is the worst kind of racist, no different from the KKK.
i did post something but I was so ticked off that I don't think it will get through moderation.
""You Devil"??? You sick, self righteous, ignorant, judgemental racist. How DARE you judge someone by the color of their skin instead of the content of their charactor!!!! How do you know what the racial heritage of lilady is? Just a bigots guess? Here is another surprise, I am not white. "
@ Kelly M Bray: I was just *slumming* at the Wretched Hive.
Yes, I did a job on the racist...but your postings weren't too shabby, Kelly.
Remember, when you have a dialogue going on the Ho-Po, let us know....even if you have to go *off-topic* here.
Thanks!!
I was just having a fun discussion with a creationist there. He was arguing the reason that radiometric dating does not support a young earth is because God temporarily changed the decay rates.
I told him "Remember Occam's Razor is not just something you use to shave your butt.â
Of course, in order to make a 10,000 year old earth appear 4.5 billion years old by radiometric dating that change in the decay rate would result in enough readiation being released to instantly boil the oceans and sterilize the planet.
I guess god had to perform a lot of additional miracles after the fact to clean up the mess he'd made of the world...
This *meisterwerk* has made its debut @ TMR.
-btw- its author hangs with the Canary Party as well as TMR and AoA. Thus she'll be attending many, many cocktail parties @ AutismOne 2012.
Maybe that will help her writing.
Kelly, can I steal that quote about Occam's Razor? Occam's Razor does get overused in some applications (just because something's simple doesn't mean it's right, but it's a pretty reliable rule of thumb and a great indicator of when you need to do extra work to make your case), but most of the time it would save a great deal of silliness.
Anytime Calli, anytime! :-D
Meanwhile, back at the TMR blog...we have this gem:
http://thinkingmomsrevolution.com/2012/05/11/freedom-to-think/#comments
"Mamacita" has decided that she is *opting out* of vaccines for her baby, based on her utter ignorance and a *belief* in some sort of *alternative* vaccine schedule...because there are just *too many, too soon* immunizations recommended for her special snowflake.
where's the science in this article?
Refuting dangerous lies about science is science.
I do suspect that we are being audited by one of the Thinking Moms! And I'm not referring to Autismum, Science Mom, Liz, lilady, Calli or Chris- I mean from the TMR blog.
Take a bow, Ms Blaze.
Think of it as evolution in action
Where"s the "science" in any of Blaze's articles on the TMR website?
http://thinkingmomsrevolution.com/category/blaze-tmr/
Have fun guys...Shortly I must leave my laptop (sigh)...to attend a wedding celebration for two close friends.
"(Yes, I know I use a 'nym, but my little affectation is so obscure that very few readers know its significance. Come to think of it, few readers care about its significance even after I explain where it comes from...)"
I'm old enough to remember Blake's 7. I had a crush on Avon, even though he was a craven coward (hey, I was 8..)
As the mother of a 3 1/2 y.o. son who is currently being assessed for Autism Spectrum Disorder, I have lost count of the times I have been abused for giving him all his shots. I even got his second MMR early when there was a measles scare at his daycare.
Apparently my mystical bond with him is not strong enough, and I have allowed my mommy-cred to be destroyed by (boo, hiss) scientists, because they all lie. I'm paraphrasing, but you get the idea.
Parroting conspiracy theories does not make a person a thinker, no matter how much they play the "persecuted for my ideals" card, and I wish I had half your eloquence and ability to make your point.
Keep up the good fight. :)
Actually, Vila was the craven coward. Avon proved that he could be pretty brave when the situation demanded it. Of course, he tended towards amorality. In one memorable episode he and Vila were trapped in a small orbital space ship that didn't have enough fuel to land safely with the weight it had on it. Avon was obviously seriously considering dumping Vila out of the airlock so that he could land safely. Fortunately, another solution presented itself.
Here's the latest screed from Alison MacNeil at the TMR (Thanks to Denice Walter):
http://thinkingmomsrevolution.com/2012/05/16/the-letter-i-wish-i-could-…
This is an "open letter" (rant) directed at her child's former pediatrician whom she refers to as Dr. Asshat. Within that "open letter" she refers to her son...
"You broke my child. You took a healthy baby boy and by 18 months you left me with a yard sale of medical problems and neurological damage. Your response was one lousy referral to Early Intervention. Quite simply, you stole my sonâs future."
Such is the quality of the "journalists" at the TMR...and the quality of mothering at the TMR.
The letter she *wishes* she could send? What the hell's stopping her? Is she too cheap to buy first class postage, or is licking the back of an envelope to seal it beyond her capabilities? If you've got a rant, fair enough, post it for the world and call it a rant, but don't say "oh, I just wish I could send this to so-and-so" because you absolutley *can* send it to them. You just won't, because you know you're being an asshat yourself. I could make this an open letter to Alison MacNeil, I suppose, because that would have a lovely irony, but I am not interested in diving into TMR. Honestly, "I wish I could send this" is about as disingenuous "it's regrettable if you took offense."
But yeah. To talk of her son in those terms.... I have no idea what her son's prognosis *really* is, but if he matures enough to understand what she's said there (and many autists do), I have to wonder how he'll feel about that, about his mother regarding him as "broken" or as a "yard sale of medical problems".
There are also a lot of contradictions within that open letter. She attributes the GFCF diet with reducing her son's diarrhea -- but then states in the next paragraph that it was due to an undiagnosed Clostridium infection.
Down in the comments, a lot of parents talk about receiving actual, good, nuanced information -- but they describe it as "the anti-GFCF talk" and things like that, which demonstrates to me that they had already found crank information and had been fortified with anti-science crank arguments against what the well-meaning practitioners were about to tell them. These are not open-minded people. These are people who have set upon an opinion and are now bending their perceptions of the world to fit it.
Because, let's face it: if something bad happens in your life there just has to be someone you can blame for it, right?
It's many years since I watched that episode of Blake's 7, but wasn't it Orac that gave Avon the idea? If I remember correctly, Avon was desperately trying to think of something else to throw out, and mused aloud in Orac's presence, "What weighs 70 kilos?" Orac then helpfully volunteered an example of something that weighed a bit more than 70 kilos. Namely, Vila :)
@ Calli Arcale: I'm with you Calli...let her send that "letter" to the developmental pediatrician who diagnosed her child at 16-months-of-age. Here's the interview of Alison from the PBS broadcast. Note that she claims that he was developing "normally" until he had the MMR, DTaP and Hib vaccines at 15 months old:
http://video.pbs.org/video/1884325580/
If you view the video, you will also see an interview with her son's pediatric gastroenterologist, Dr. Timothy Buie. Here is the extended interview transcript with Dr. Buie:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/health/jan-june11/buieext_04-18.html
Dr. Buie is definitely not a Wakefield cheerleader...he was a contributor to the study that tried...unsuccessfully...to replicate Wakefield's study findings.
Alison's son is making nice progress and he will probably be able to read and comprehend what his mother stated about him. Nice going, Alison.
My 14 year old son has autism. He is geeky, gawky, dorky, sometimes skips when he walks, and runs funny. He is also intelligent, funny, tells horrible jokes, is kind, thoughtful, compassionate, and loves animals. He is a great joy in my life.
But there was a time a time when I was not so sure about what I felt. He was five and struggling at times. I wasn't sure how he was going to do in life, how he was going to make it. I was in a great deal of emotional pain. I was talking to my mentor in a program, and felt like I was being torn apart. My younger brother was severely mentally and physically disabled. It tore my parents lives apart, and all I saw was life going down that exact path. I cried out âWhy in hell did God damage my son's brain, why him???â My friend looked at me with great compassion and said â I don't knowâ. He then asked me âDo you love Tim?â I told him âWith all my heartâ. He then said â If I was able to give you the power of God right now...what would you do, what would you change?â. My mind whirled, but I was suddenly stumped. What could I change about him that would not change the parts of him that were unique and beautiful?
The little boy who would run down the daycare hall screaming "daddy" and jump into my arms.
The little boy who put his arms around me and tell me he loved me as âbig as the skyâ.
The little boy who would crawl into bed with me ask me to read a story with him and then curl up next me asleep.
I realized I loved him exactly the way he was, exactly who he was, perfect, and I would not change a thing.
That does not mean I won't help him be the best person he can be. But it means I am not going to go around thinking he is broken and cursing the world for creating him. I truly pity the mom's at TMR who are so busy being angry and resentful that they cannot appreciate the beauty of the child they have. I can and I am forever blessed by it.
@ Kelly M Bray: I could have linked to the study that Dr. Thomas Buie participated in...but I didn't want my prior comment to be stuck in moderation; here it is...
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2008/09/yet_another_really_bad_day_fo…
My impression of Alison MacNeil is that she is consumed by anger and vindictiveness and her *journalism* at TMR and AoA reflect this.
I love the invocation of the godlike goodness and infallibility of motherhood. Someone need to tell these people that *most* child abuse is done by single moms.
Kelly M Bray @94:
Beautiful post.
@Kelly M Bray. Thanks. My son is under assessment at the moment, and I needed to hear that.
Kelly M Bray @94:
Such a beautiful post, I shared your comment on Facebook (hope you don't mind).
Hi Kelly,
I was so impressed by your comment that I posted it to my blog. I've given a link back to your comment and credited you. Your comments about your son were beautiful.
Until you see your child get a vaccination (6 to be exact in my son's case), watch his fever raise to 105.9 and go into seizures....then lose every bit of speech he formerly had, in the SAME day (his speech still hasn't returned) ...you'll never understand why we KNOW it was caused by a vaccine. Call me a conspiracy theorist if you must, but you often see things in a different light when it happens to your child.
@DeShea:
I remember a comment by one person a long time ago. She said her son had had a seizure right before getting a vaccine. She admitted that had it happened right after, she'd probably have blamed the vaccine. Sometimes children get seizures and sometimes they happen right after a vaccine but aren't caused by said vaccine.
Even when you have seen what DeShea describes, it doesn't mean you "KNOW" that one event caused the other. There must be children who show the first signs their parents recognize of autism on the same day they get their first haircut - would someone who sees the haircut, and then later the signs of autism, say that they "KNOW" the haircut was the cause? No, they'd recognize that it was nothing more than coincidence. Yet the same parents might insist that the proximity between a vaccination and the signs of autism can't be a coincidence, with no good reason for ruling such a possibility out.
That's because haircuts are something we all easily understand. Vaccinations are mysterious, with all the work happening out of sight at a microscopic level over a period of several weeks, and involve the unavoidable infliction of pain on our offspring. If you understand something, it's easy to recognize when it's coincidence. If you don't, it's much harder to write that off, especially if you're already feeling pangs of guilt for making your child cry.
DeShea, you don't actually all-caps know it was the vaccine, do you?
You believe it was the vaccine, and it's likely nothing will ever convince otherwise, but the fact that B followed A isn't sufficient evidence to establish factually B was caused by A--particularly when's there a very large bodies of evidence indicating no such casual link exists.
Hey this sounds just like Dr. Jay's observation of a child becoming autistic right in his office after a vaccine or some such nonsense. DeShea, you clearly don't know what you think you know and if you are going to peddle the vaccine-autism nonsense, you might try to at least get your timing more realistic. Did you file a VAERS report and NVICP petition?
DeShea, if you know is was the vaccine that caused the seizures then you would have no problem giving us the title, journal and dates of the PubMed indexed papers that show the vaccines cause more seizures than the diseases. Some examples:
accine. 2012 Jan 5;30(2):247-53. Epub 2011 Nov 12
Lack of association between childhood immunizations and encephalitis in California, 1998-2008.
Pediatrics Vol. 126 No. 2 August 1, 2010 (doi: 10.1542/peds.2009-1496)
Lack of Association Between Acellular Pertussis Vaccine and Seizures in Early Childhood
Pediatrics. 2010 Jun;125(6):1134-41. Epub 2010 May 24.
On-time vaccine receipt in the first year does not adversely affect neuropsychological outcomes.
Pediatr Infect Dis J. 2010 May;29(5):397-400.
Lack of association between measles-mumps-rubella vaccination and autism in children: a case-control study.
Pediatr Infect Dis J. 2006 Sep;25(9):768-73.
Encephalopathy after whole-cell pertussis or measles vaccination: lack of evidence for a causal association in a retrospective case-control study.
J Infect Dis. 2005 Nov 15;192(10):1686-93. Epub 2005 Oct 12.
Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis: more cases of this fatal disease are prevented by measles immunization than was previously recognized.
@DeShea
I am sorry about your difficulties. I do hope that things improve with time.
Now, have you considered the possibility that your son may have been infected with some pathogen several days to weeks before being vaccinated? Many diseases take anywhere from a couple days up to weeks between infection and first symptoms.
There are also a variety of conditions related to gene expression which do not manifest noticeably until specific genes are triggered (e.g., due to the body maturing and different signals being turned on and off).
As you can see, there are other factors at play that make your certainty a little less, well, certain.
I "believe" that my son's vaccination Caused his autism. And I KNOW it. A completely normal, developmentally ahead of most children his age. My son walked at 8 months, said his first words at 8 months and by 9 months waved bye bye and said 5-6 words. He went in to the doctor office a smiling, happy baby. The nurse even laughed at how "flirtatious" he was, smiling at her and even winked at her. We left and he was screaming and holding his head. We got home and he screamed for hours, holding his head. His fever went up to 105.9 despite Tylenol and Motrin every 2 hours as directed by his doctor. Cool bath didn't help. He lost everything THAT day. Can someone please send me a scientific study that shows where it has actually been tested that it is safe to give children 6-7 shots in one day? Because I haven't found one. No doctor can find one for me either. So when we say "untested" vaccine schedule, that is what we mean by it. That study does not exist. They've never, ever tested to see how children handle 5, 6, or 7 shots at one time. And no I didn't file a complaint with vaers because I was told the hospital would do that, which I found out a year later....they did not. They even denied that's son bad a reaction to the vaccines even though the papers I was given said that a reaction was a fever of 105 or higher and seizures or convulsions. But according to them, It never happened.
DeShea:
And what you have is still an anecdote. The fever could have been from an infection that was incubating before the appointment for the vaccine.
First which pediatric appointment involves that many shots? Do not count the MMR as three, nor the DTaP as three. They are one shot each.
Also, I asked you first to post the title, journal and dates of the PubMed indexed paper that vaccines cause more seizures than the diseases. You must answer that before we try to acquiesce to your demands.
Ah! Another person who did not read the Vaccine Information Statement that you are required to receive that explains all about VAERS and National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. This is the one for MMR.
Read it, and note that section 6 says:
I'm sorry, but those are by law supposed to be given with every single vaccine given. Now, if you can prove that your health care provider did not comply with federal law, you might have a case. Otherwise you have only yourself to blame for not filing a vaccine injury claim.
Myself:
Looking at the pediatric schedule, there could be that many vaccines. But those after twelve months are spread over a few months. So you can divide them between twelve and fifteen months.
If you do a search on PubMed you will see that new vaccines are tested with the present vaccine schedule, so that multiple vaccine case has been done.
Of course, the antigens from stripped down pathogens even in a dozen vaccines is minor compared to the full borne impact of a real disease. Something DeShea has not acknowledged, because he has not presented any scientific literature on how vaccines cause more neurological impact than the diseases.
(something needs to be done about the "posting too fast" idiocy)
DeShea, a vaccine reaction, sans anaphylaxis which is not what you describe doesn't happen that quickly. It just doesn't. The vaccine antigens have not even made it out of the muscle yet. From what you describe your son was incubating something prior to the visit. You can BELIEVE all you like but the biology just doesn't line up. Please do yourself a huge favour and stop blaming something that didn't have anything to do with your son's condition even though it is human nature to seek patterns. It just isn't healthy.
Really Chris?
incubation period n.
(Medicine / Pathology) Med the time between exposure to an infectious disease and the appearance of the first signs or symptoms.
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/_/dict.aspx?word=incubation+period
Stupid is as stupid does.
Did anyone notice that Th1Th2's comment didn't refute Chris's point? If anything, it confirmed it.
And nobody does it better than you, Th1Th2
So....putting the autism vaccine debate aside for just a moment....let's say for example, you get sick and are prescribed medication. You read the label and the side affects include seizure, convulsions, and fever of 105 or higher and to seek medical attention immediately if you experience any of these side effects. You do. You experience every major reaction the the label. You go to the hospital....and they tell you...nope, wasn't the medication. Can't be. Not possible. You see? I'm sorry If I don't answer every question and every demand, I'm a busy person with a very sick child. Please remember that once, doctors also recommended cigarettes. They were seen as a way to relax and even thought to be good for your teeth....we all know that was a mistake and they were dead wrong.
And as far as 6-7 shots,y son recieved 6 different "sticks". All were combos. I'd have to pull out the records to be exact on which ones, but he did not receive the MMR.
And yes I read the vaers excerpt. However I was told that the hospital would be the one to make the call. I found out a year later, after I was assured that it was taken care of, that OT was not.
Furthermore, it's pretty common knowledge that vaccine do cause autism in some cases, which was admitted by the former head of the CDC. I will post the link to the live video later, I'm actually atthe doctor's office right now. But of you research Hannah Poling that will get you on the right track.
When a fever manifests or any signs and symptoms for that matter, then obviously an infection is no longer in the incubation phase. It is now what is called the prodromal period. Do you know what a medical dictionary is, Chris and Julian? Use it, it's free.
http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/prodromal+stage
That's what happens when you let a persistently clueless non-medical pro-vax discuss a simple disease symptomatology.
Stupid is as stupid does. Confirmed.
And when they patiently explain the drug can't be responsible, because you developed the side effects long before the pills you took had time to disolve in your stomach and for the drug to enter your circulation, will you still insist "I just KNOW it was the drugs!" as you're doing here with respect to the vaccine?
Chris
I have two sons who are under the age of 4, and the second has just finished up his baby shots. AFAIK, we never omitted anything off the AAP schedule, with the only deviation involving moving a 3rd or 4th dose of something (Hib maybe?) from 12 to 15 mos, replaced with a flu shot.
In that time, we rarely, if ever, had even 4 shots in a visit (so rare that I don't even remember where it happened). It was generally 3. We also had the oral vaccine early on, but those aren't shots.
There is no reason why one needs to get "5 or 6 shots" at one visit if you are following the schedule. Four is even very rare.
I'll just reiterate what JGC said. Just because you observe symptoms included in the package insert doesn't mean that the mere presentation of them is created by the vaccine. There is that whole timing thing you know and as I said, there is no way that it could happen that quickly. But you want to believe that because it makes sense to you as a layperson and are prone to the confirmation repetition that vaccines cause autism. They don't and what happened to Hannah Poling is not representative at all of those who think vaccines caused their child's autism. Also, Julie Gerberding did not "admit" vaccines cause autism, just another vaccine canard you are repeating. Get off Mothering, Babycentre or whatever rubbish sites you haunt. They are not valid sources of information, just a bunch of mummies competing for who's raising the most special snowflake.
Why I consider the pro-vax as unintelligent human beings is that they don't use the word appropriately. Why would they count the "shots", when they should be counting the "vaccines" in the shot?
Stupid is as stupid does. Twice confirmed.
I hope you have some 'head of the CDC' in mind here other than Julie Gerberding, director of the CDC in 2008. Her name seems to be the one bandied about whenever this claim is dusted off and trotted out for everyone's amusement.
Far from admitting vaccines sometimes cause autism, addressing the case of Hannah Poling Gerberding on Friday March 7, 2008 issued a public statement that included the following:
Thingy is apparently oblivious to the fact that nothing he/she/it has posted refutes any of Chris' statements.
Stupid is as stupid does, indeed.
Whch of course was the post's entire point, thingy--that the fever was most probably caused by an infection that was already present but asymptomatic prior to the child being vaccinated.
@DeShea
You have been lied to, and, in your quest to find answers, you have believed those lies. I am truly sorry that this has happened to you and I sincerely hope that you will find the truth. Some of the other commenters here have provided a good starting point. You might also check http://antiantivax.flurf.net to discover what other misinformation you have been given.
Like it will ever stopped you from vaccinating an already infected child, symptomatic or otherwise? Let me give you a clue. You don't even test their pre-vaccination antibody titer levels regardless, so how does that you suddenly care about an underlying infection prior to vaccination?
DeShea:
Then it is obvious you did not read it closely enough, especially the part I quoted. So you still only have yourself to blame.
Again he says:
Post the title, journal and date of the PubMed indexed paper written by that former head of the CDC.
Add it to the list of PubMed papers you have been asked to provide to show that vaccines cause more neurological impacts (seizures, strokes, high fever, etc) than the diseases. I am also busy with a kid who has several medical issues. Last week he literally left a piece of his heart in Minnesota (surgery for a genetic heart condition), plus we have to replace a car that was totaled by a student driver. You need better excuses.
And I really hate this claim made by DeShea:
Actually it was known that cigarettes were cancer causing just after World War II. What you saw were tobacco company propaganda trying to divert attention from the real research. See:
The price paid: Manipulation of otolaryngologists by the tobacco industry to obfuscate the emerging truth that smoking causes cancer
And statement:
Shows that DeShea cannot count, and was already in the antivax camp before his/her child's second birthday.
Chris knew she had erred in the use of the word "incubating". She's quiet. You can even ask her again about the scientific basis of her assertion that...
....when, during the incubation period, no signs or symptoms exist.
Oh noes!
Apologies in advanced for all if any html issues.
DeShea @1:47pm 31 May
Pull it out, check, and report back.
I've skipped the rest of the comments because there's something I was thinking saying yesterday, and I think I still need to say it without checking what else has been said.
I’m asking you to check because human memory is fallible. We rewrite things in our heads every time we think about them. I’ve fallen into this trap: when I started looking for information on my own concerns about vaccines, I discovered that I’d mixed two of them up (chicken pox and MMR) until I double checked my child’s vaccine record to make sure I was looking for the right information. For my questions, the vaccines given had been DTaP and chicken pox; MMR had been a year earlier along with Polio. How did this happen? As you’re aware, Andrew Wakefield freaked everyone out over MMR, and I’d switched the dates for MMR and chickenpox in my head because of all the head there’s so much heated argument about it.
In an earlier post, you, DeShea, asked where were the studies
, raising the ante above the 6 your child received. You also bring up Hannah Poling. This tells me you’ve been around the anti-vaccine and vaccines-cause-autism rhetoric. And probably you’re been around it a lot.
And like I said, human memory is fallible. Are you sure that your own recollections have not been influenced by listening to other parents’ stories?
We (and I mean We in a general sense, not specific to this conversation) can’t help you sort out facts if what we’re trying to sort out aren’t actually facts.
And one last question for you, DeShea: are you here interacting with folks on RI because you’re still looking for answers about what happened to your own child, or are you trying to generalize your questions to encompass other people’s issues?
Um no DeShea. This didn't happen either. Six separate jabs of single vaccines, yes. Six jabs of combination vaccines, nope. I hope you are beginning to understand that embellishment isn't helping your case. I know it's the M.O. of anti-vaxxers but as you can see, easily refuted.
I simply do not have the time to answer every little question or demand on here but I will try. First, science mom, I believe I have been ultimately respectful on here, so please do not tell me what my son recieved and what he did not. Your experience may have been different from my son's. I have seen children go in and recieve only 1 or 2 at a time and just last week, a friend's son recieved 8. I will say, I was mistaken when I said ALL were combos, they were not all combos that he recieved. When I am wrong, I say I am wrong.
Next....to the person who said that I should have called and made a complaint myself....so...I should follow what the doctor and nursing staff say whenever it concerns vaccines and the vaccine schedule, but NOT when filing a complaint? You can't pick an choose, right? And I'm sure you know exactly WHY vaers was first implemented, correct? Because of so many reactions from vaccination that the pharmaceutical companies could not keep up. So now, vaccine makers are free from liability. The taxpayer now pays for it. Next, not exactly anti-vaccine...I want safer vaccines to be made for the exact reason that vaers was created.
As to the response about tobacco....then why we're Doctors still "for" tobacco use in the 50's? Why were ads put out that claims they were safe? For the same reasons vaccines are considered to be "safe" today? Paid endorsements?
Next, I am here simply because I am researching. One of the Thinking Moms, is on my friend's list on Facebook and I want to have a clearer understanding of what they stand for before and if, I decide to join.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Dh-nkD5LSIg
Here Julie gerberding chief of the CDC says that autism can be triggered in children with mitochondrial disorders. And yes, before anyone says it, it is biased. So...simply do not read the subtitles and the "breaks" (yes it is annoying throughout the video) and you will get an unbiased feed.
DeShea,
I did not mention VAERS, I mentioned the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. That is something different. I even quoted the part that was on the Vaccine Information Sheet that you are supposed to be given with each vaccine. It is your own fault if you cannot read and understand the difference, and ignored the sheet that was given to you. Do not blame the hospital for your lack of action.
Also, in general hospitals do not give vaccines unless a person is a patient (I know, my son has been a patient in now three different hospitals). Vaccines are given during routine well child check ups in medical clinics. Do work on your vocabulary as you learn to read the pieces of papers given to you. In the past two weeks I have received several dozens of pages, and I read them.
Again, you only have yourself to blame for not reading and understanding them. It says quite clearly on the federally required Vaccine Information Sheet that you can be part of the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, and even provides a toll free number. Again, it is not VAERS (that was the previous paragraph).
DeShea:
Yes, at the request of Barbara Loe Fisher. It was one of the programs put in during the 1980s. You should really learn to get your information from more reliable sources.
And learn how to use PubMed. Because when I asked for the title, journal and date of a PubMed indexed paper written by that person I did not mean a YouTube video. Do you understand the difference between a scientific paper and YouTube?
DeShea@June 1 11:15pm
I know you’re busy, but did you check the actual record, like I asked?
Did you? Since you say Sciencemom was wrong, could you fill the rest of us in on exactly how wrong? Can you list exactly which vaccines your child received the day before spiking that fever? Then we’ll all know what we’re talking about – including you.
And could you clarify what you mean by:
When I try to read back into your paragraph, it’s just not making sense for me.
OOps. I meant to address DeShea @11:05 but I didn't notice I'd misread the time
For a system with no Preview, it sure nasty about trying to post a correction! (The first one took 3x. Now we'll see)
DeShea cannot even distinguish who is commenting today, Friday the first of June, why should we expect him/her to know how to find the child's vaccine record? I have my kid's right in front of me, along with his big ol' box of medical records (it makes a good foot rest). He/she could not tell the difference between VAERS and NVICP (even after the NVICP paragraph was quoted!).
(stupid Wordpress, ten minutes is not too fast... I know Orac recognizes the email address from my old 'nym)
I had to change my email address... see, no picture!
For those of you who have complained about these Thinking Moms being disrespectful, I am finding that some of you are equally offensive in nature. You are all responding to basically ONE person, that would be me, while I am responding to many posts, every day. I have addressed the responses individually without naming each one, but I'm the one with the issues, right? Geez. Should I have filed the report? Yes. However when I was told countless times before I left that it was the HOSPITAL's responsibility and to NOT take action on my part, I did not. I called a few days later to the hospital and I was told that it would be done and no participation would be required by me. I thought it was taken care of so I researched no farther.
My son recieved the following vaccinations on the day of his immunization shots:
Varicella
DTaP
Polio
Pneumococcal
Influenza
Hib
Now, I am so sorry that I made a mistake when referring to the vaers and compensation program. My bad. I now see that mistakes are not acceptable and will try not to let it happen again. Geez people. I have yet to "insult" any of you on here but you criticize every move and smallest mistake that I make on here. But to each their own, as I say. I am a nice person and I'm not out to tear anyone down, but I just can't say the same for some of you.
As far as the pubmed article goes, of course I know the difference. So since I cannot bring one forward and admit that....can you also admit that there is not one study conducted that has tested the side effects of ANY child receiving the "recomended" vaccine schedule? The vaccines are studied separately, not as they are given. Please correct me if I am wrong BUT I know you will IF I am wrong :)
and just last week, a friend’s son recieved 8
Unless your friend's son is in the Marines and getting ready to deploy to yet another overseas pesthole, I would say that your statement is .... suspect. At best.
No shay....it is the truth. He was behind, and was given 8 at one time. I may be many things, but a liar I am not.
At around one year of age, up to 14 vaccines can be given in a single visit. That is, if you're really following THE recommended schedule.
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/downloads/child/0-6yrs-schedule-p…
And in other news...this is awaiting publication from a medical journal: http://m.naturalnews.com/news/035787_vaccines_autism_monkeys.html
Hewitson by way of Natural News? You lose.
And, DeShea, you would do VacTruth, to which this Natural News entry points, a favor by mentioning to them that citing the journal in question (which published the item in 2010) as "Acta Neurobiological Experimentals" is really embarrassing.
I would also plead forbearance over curiosity about this seemingly odd SEO tidbit.
I have been respectful for as long as possible. You may believe what you may, I will not convince you otherwise. Believe the "mainstream", heck, I probably would've too until I saw my son slip away from my own eyes. You may ridicule me for believing in news sources that are not "bought"..., but I assure you that eventually you will see that there IS the link. Call me a conspiracy theorist if you must, but my completely healthy, speaking, unvaccinated 1 year old is faring much better in life than my vaccinated, vaccine injured child has since the day of his last vaccinations. That's all the proof that "I" need. Good night all :)
DeShea:
You see, it is still your fault. You were give the Vaccine Information Sheet with a toll free number.
For one, you got the varicella vaccine and not the MMR, so you were already influenced by the Wakefield's lies. The pneumococcal vaccine was only added to the pediatric schedule in 2008, when it was well known that Wakefield was full of baloney. So you already were distrustful of real medicine, so why would you believe a hospital.
And I am still confused why you keep saying "the hospital." In my experience vaccines are not routinely given in "the hospital" unless the person is a patients. Before my son was discharged in January the nurse offered him a flu and pneumococcal vaccine. Typically the vaccines are given in a doctor's or medical clinic treatment room. Just like we visited yesterday for a post-surgical checkup. And now with computerized systems we get a check-out page that lists every single vaccine he has received since he was four months old.
And since you included pneumococcal, you might be within the time limit. So it is not up to you to get the records from "the hospital" and call that toll free number yourself.
DeShea:
Natural News? No, it is just a way to boost sales from Mike Adams. And, well, VacTruth is as legitimate as whale.to.
And if you want to convince just post the title, journal and dates of the PubMed indexed papers that show vaccines cause greater neurological impact than the diseases.
I wrote: "So it is not up to you to get the records from “the hospital” and call that toll free number yourself."
I meant it is up to DeShea to get the records from "the hospital" and call that toll free number.
I have received the records from both the hospital my son ended up in last January and the large medical clinic that his primary care doctor and cardiologist are part of. It only takes filling out a form, and sometimes a small fee.
So, DeShea, go get those records and call that toll free number, 1-800-338-2382. Be true to your convictions and get it done.
I just did a Google for you DeShea, you can click on it and learn how to get medical records from all sorts of places: medical clinic record request. And since Google customizes it for your location, it should in "the hospital."
Now go forth and become part of legal history!
DeShea, do you see a problem with this statement? You're indignant that I told you that your child did not receive six combination vaccines but yet I was correct about it by your own admission. I'm also correct about your child not getting ill and autism while walking out of the doctor's office. If you are as honest as you claim, you will confront that fact. Or, as I suspect you will do given your claims and your "sources" go join the Revolting Moms, change your story to fit with your beliefs and become as bitter, anguished and dishonest as the rest of them. If you want real help and hope, I recommend
TPGA they are an excellent source for parents with newly-diagnosed children and provide evidence-based resources, not "it's the vaccines" nonsense.
@DeShea
As mentioned, that study is not new, but rather a couple years old, now. On top of that, it was a very poorly done study. Orac, Dr. Steven Novella and others have already written about it, pointing out the flaws and why it doesn't really say what anti-vaccine activists try to make it say.
Once again, you have been lied to.
Oh, and the VICP is not "paid for by taxpayers". There is an excise tax on each vaccine sold ($0.75 per disease; so flu vaccine is taxed $0.75, MMR is taxed $2.25). That tax is collected by the Treasury Department and placed in a trust fund from which costs for the program are drawn. Of course, you might have known this if you had gone to the actual source (the VICP web page) rather than simply swallowing the misinformation fed to you by places like Natural News.
(BTW, you cite Natural News and rail against places that have been "bought". Did you happen to notice all the various products that Mike Adams has for sale on Natural News? And those ads are his own, not simply ad servers that throw up random ads like you see at the top of this blog.)
DeShea:
If you are unsatisfied with the level of research, then design a study to suit your demands. Be sure it complies with ethical guidelines designed to protect human subjects. Then write a grant to get it funded by your buddies at SafeMinds, Generation Rescue, Autism Trust, Autism Speaks and perhaps from Mike Adams.
Then go do it.
But after you obtain your child's medical records from the hospital and call that toll free number. And when you do that study to put in a conflict of interest disclaimer about being involved with NVICP. Something that Hewitson forgot, as did that Dr. Jon Poling also forgot to do.
DeShea you are not only a liar, but by calling Natural News a medical journal, you're an idiot as well.
DeShea @June 1 1:07 am
Yoo hoo, I poked around PubMed for you. I searched specifically for safety studies on the varicella vaccine, since it’s one of the later but not latest additions to the vaccine schedule. I also specifically looked for studies done in the United States, since that’s where both of us live (an assumption based on the discussions of NVIC and VAERS, both US-specific). Guess what I found? I’m going to break this into multiple posts for readability, and include the links last to avoid a moderation delay. All of the studies are behind paywalls which means I can only access abstracts (I did find some interesting studies for free, such as on a new flu vaccine, but they’re not really relevant to the topic at hand).
I found lots of reports on studying the co-administration of different vaccines. What does that mean? The vaccines are not being studied separately. For example, just this past month, an Epub ahead of print article (PMID 22622699) in Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal looks at the administration of different MMRV formulations with HepA and PVC in 1-year olds. Hmmm, what’s on the recommended schedule for 1-year olds? MMR, PCV, Hib, Varicella, and HepA! OK, they left out the Hib, but to me this looks like they’re looking at all the combined of effects of those combined vaccines.
So we don’t leave Hib out entirely, here’s part of an abstract from 2004 (PMID:1501430) “The study was done to verify that concomitant administration of a bivalent Haemophilus influenzae type b-hepatitis B vaccine (Comvax), measles-mumps-rubella vaccine (M-M-RII) and varicella vaccine (Varivax) would be well-tolerated and suitably immunogenic with respect to all vaccine antigens.” What do we have? MMR, Varicella, Hib, and HepB.
Once again, DeShea, does these reports look at the vaccines separately?
DeShea @June 1 1:07 am Part II
In case you’re wondering why I picked chickenpox instead of one of the very recent additions, it was because I wanted to check what kind of studies were done back in the 1990s, before Andrew Wakefield and all the current hullaballoo. And what did I find? The same types of studies. Long before the anti-vaccine crowd who don’t actually look at scientific literature started demanding them.
Some examples: In 1998, Kaiser looked at varicella vaccine administration with MMR and Hib (PMID: 9849978), compared to giving varicella by itself 6 weeks later. And a year earlier (1997, PMID: 9239770), MMRV with Hib had been compared to just MMR and Hib followed by varicella 6 weeks later.
This is the way vaccines studies have been done all along.
Here are the links for my 2 posts above. I hope the html works right since this will be my first try since the changeover.
Epub ahead of print article (PMID 22622699) in Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal looks at the administration of different MMRV formulations with HepA and PVC in 1-year olds: http://journals.lww.com/pidj/Abstract/publishahead/Immunogenicity_and_S…
MMRV and Hib Combo from 2004 (PMID:15014300) http://journals.lww.com/pidj/Abstract/2004/03000/Concomitant_administra…
Kaiser varicella vaccine administration with MMR and Hib (PMID: 9849978) http://journals.lww.com/pidj/Abstract/1998/11000/Safety,_tolerability_a…
1997 MMRV, (PMID: 9239770) http://journals.lww.com/pidj/Abstract/1997/07000/Safety_and_immunogenic…
On June 2 at 1:45 am Deshea wrote:
Referring to Ethan A Huff's rather vapid coverage of the old-news Hewitson monkey study. Huff's article was published May 6 2012 at Natural News.
Why, Deshea, do you assume that our host Orac is unfamiliar with the Hewitson team's research? Why do you assume that this paper is "new" or "awaiting publication"? Is it possible that you haven't done your research?
I review the twisting and flimsy history of Hewitson's meaningless sacrifices of a number of macaques at Totally False in at Least Two Dimensions "New Study: Baby monkeys develop autism after routine CDC vaccinations".
Please note that the Hewitson team's work was roundly criticized not only here, but elsewhere, four years ago.
Even if Deshea's facts were true, accurate, and represented reality (i.e. even if the shots did cause the problem rather than being mere correlation), even then...mass vaccination would still be warranted. Because it would still come down to a choice - you can either have a very small chance your child will develop autism (or whatever), or a considerably larger chance your child will die, become paralyzed, go deaf, go sterile, become bedridden, and even lose cognitive abilities. Remember - diseases we vaccinate against aren't scary because we vaccinate against them. If we didn't vaccinate against polio, we'd see a lot more kids in iron lungs, or early graves.
So Deshea, would you prefer your child were dead? Because if everyone refused vaccination, that would be a much, much more common outcome to the diseases your child was vaccinated against.
And, of course, there's no evidence that vaccination causes autism, which means the connection is extremely unlikely. With millions of subjects studied, any signal overwhelmed by noise suggests a very weak signal indeed.
What happened to DeShea? Is he/she actually getting the child's medical records from "the hospital"? Does he/she still have time to file a complaint in Vaccine Court? Did he/she find the pile of Vaccine Information Sheets where they placed them instead of reading them? Will he/she ever answer our questions?
Inquiring minds want to know!
Chris
Maybe he/she got him/herself a subscription to the Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal and is busy reading.
OT Venus transit: we had a projection screen attached to the telescope, as we did for the partial eclipse a few weeks back. When the sun set, I had resort to the internet (NASA Edge webcast).
Today and yesterday I wore my winter coat on errands. I came very close to adding a neck scarf. But, in retrospect, I would rather put on a coat than deal with the tornado warning episode we had last week at the Minnesota Mayo Clinic!
In addition to being arbitrary and laughable, there is a deep irony to the whole vaccines and homeopathy discussion.
If there ever was anything in existence like working homeopathy, it would be vaccines.
1. What matches the signatures of a viral infection more than an inactivated version of the virus?
2. Especially in the early days, the vaccines provoked a version of the reaction the immune system / body would have to the actual malady.
3. Vaccines work by "strengthening the immune system."
4. Some vaccines contain or contained poisons like mercury and substances that can be toxic like aluminum - but in extremely trace quantities. If a nano-trace of arsenic or nightshade is healing, why isn't a nano-trace of mercury healing?
Just saying ... Why isn't Jenny McCarthy painting rainbows on pictures of happy, vaccinated kids?
I think I'm going to start selling a homeopathic treatment to ward off the evil effects of vaccines - it'll have the same materials used in the evil vaccines, and like them, it'll be injected. You'll give it to your kids in advance on a regular schedule, in case the State forces the vaxes of death upon them. As a bonus, we should agitate for laws that if you have the anti-vaccine homeopathic treatment, you're exempt from getting that vaccine (since it won't be able to give the child autism anyway).
@Marion Delgado:
I've long believed that too. Well said.