Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

[Siggie]

Great... The fact that the number of unvaccinated children is rising means people are listening to the nonsense from morons like Jenny McCarthy who claim vaccines cause autism despite not having a shred of evidence in support of their argument and in spite of tons of medical research showing the vaccines are safe.

A rising number of California parents are choosing to send their children to kindergarten without routine vaccinations, putting hundreds of elementary schools in the state at risk for outbreaks of childhood diseases eradicated in the U.S. years ago.

Exemptions from vaccines -- which allow children to enroll in public and private schools without state-mandated shots -- have more than doubled since 1997, according to a Times analysis of state data obtained last week.

The rise in unvaccinated children appears to be driven by affluent parents choosing not to immunize. Many do so because they fear the shots could trigger autism, a concern widely discredited in medical research.

But with autism rates rising, some parents find that fear more worrisome than the chance that their child could contract diseases that, while now very rare in this country, can still be deadly.

Last year, a 7-year-old boy triggered a measles outbreak in San Diego after he returned, infected, from a family trip to Switzerland. His parents had chosen not to vaccinate him or his siblings.

Click for complete article

[KanadaHye]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

Not to mention it costs money to have children vaccinated... and it seems people who are barely scraping by would have an added incentive not to get their child vaccinated. We have entered a new era of economic Darwinism.

[Siggie]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

The article addresses that. Before cost was an issue, but there is not federal money to cover it if that is the problem.

For generations, most children went unimmunized only if their parents couldn't afford the shots, a problem now remedied through federal funds.

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/programs/vfc/default.htm

[Sip]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

I think we need another wave of polio or something else to wipe out a bunch of babies for people to realize praying, wishing, hoping, and fear doesn't make diseases go away.

[Siggie]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

I don't know what it's going to take Sip.
People just want to blame something for autism and vaccines were the only thing they could find that they all had in common. They overlooked the fact that nearly all children are vaccinated.

It's frightening because we've already seen outbreaks.

[Sip]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California



It all goes back to 2 factors:

1. Anti-intellectualism in the US. When an expert says something that seems counter intuitive, painful, or somehow "disturbing", people are very quick to dismiss her for a wide array of often non-scientific reasons. Also, more often than not, the average people simply don't understand the science behind things. Sure there are no absolute guarantees and a scientist will be the first to admit that, but a 92nd percentile (for example) is VERY different than a 50-50shot

2. There are a lot of self-proclaimed false prophets out there that take advantage of the readily available public media (Internet, TV, etc) who claim to know things or advocate things where in reality they have absolutely NO business talking about. Anything from arguing for or against "global warming", or "vaccination", or stem cel research, or evolution, or global economics, or politics, etc etc ... unfortunately this is also feeding the #1 above.

I read a quote on an iced-tea cap recently that said something along the line lines that the illiterates of the 21st century will be the ones that aren't able to learn, forget, and relearn

As a people we have to start learning to deal with the massive amount of mis-information that is mixed in with information. Long ago, you'd go to the expert and whatever he or she said would pretty much go (right or wrong). Now, everyone thinks he or she is an expert in everything ... and if not, they think they can find quick answers not stopping to think where the answers are really coming from.

[Siggie]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

I completely agree.

They aren't teaching enough critical thinking in schools...

People are ignorant of science and they distrust it.
They then rely on intuition and anecdotes because they can understand that.

[jgk3]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

k, thanks for your input on that.

[ArmSurvival]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

tons of medical research showing the vaccines are safe.

Can you show us some?

[Siggie]

Re: Rising number of unvaccinated children in California

tons of medical research showing the vaccines are safe.

Can you show us some?

Certainly.

Chen, Landau, Sham, & Fombonne. (2004). No evidence for links between autism, MMR and measles virus. Psychological Medicine. 34(3):543-53.

Dales, Hammer, & Smith (2001). Time Trends in Autism and in MMR Immunization Coverage in California. Journal of the American Medical Association, 285 (9), 1183-1185.

DeStefano & Chen (2000). Autism and measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine: No epidemiological evidence for a causal association.
Journal of Pediatrics. 136(1):125-6.

Farrington, Miller, & Taylor (2001). MMR and autism: further evidence against a causal association. Vaccine, 19(27),3632-3635.

Hornig, Briese, Buie, Bauman, Lauwers, et al. (2008). Lack of association between measles virus vaccine and autism with enteropathy: a case-control study. PLoS ONE, 3(9):e3140.

Hviid, Stellfeld, Wohlfart, and Melbye (2003). Association Between Thimerosal-Containing Vaccine and Autism. Journal of the American Medical Association, 290,1763-1766.

Kay, Melero-Montez, & Jick (2001). Mumps, measles, and rubella vaccine and the incidence of autism recorded by general practitioners: a time trend analysis. British Medical Journal, 322, 460-463.

Madsen, Hviid, Vestergaard, Schendel, et al. (2002). A population-based study of measles, mumps, and rubella vaccination and Autism. New England Journal of Medicine, Volume 347,1477-1482.

Mäkelä, Pekka Nuorti & Peltola (2002). Neurologic Disorders After Measles-Mumps-Rubella Vaccination. Pediatrics, 110 (5), 957-963.

Peltola, Patja, Leinikki, Valle, Davidkin, & Paunio (1998). No evidence for measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine-associated inflammatory bowel disease or autism in a 14-year prospective study. Lancet, 351,(9112), 1327-132.

Stehr-Green, Tull, Stelfeld, Mortensen, & Simpson. (2003). Autism and thimerosal-containing vaccines: Lack of consistent evidence for an association. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 25 (2), 101-106.

Taylor, Miller, Farrington, Petropoulos, Favot-Mayaud, Li, & Waight. (1999). Autism and measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine: no epidemiological evidence for a causal association. Lancet. 353(9169), 2026-2029.

This last one is a meta-analysis that combines results from 10+ studies to see if there's a link and of course, like the rest, finds none.

Parker, Schwartz, Todd, and Pickering (2004). Thimerosal-Containing Vaccines and Autistic Spectrum Disorder: A Critical Review of Published Original Data. Pediatrics, 114 (3), 793-804.

I found all of these peer-reviewed journal articles in about 10 or so minutes and I searched for "Measles vaccine autism" so I wasn't searching FOR confirming research. I invite you to conduct your own literature review.