Blogiverse - Talking About Everything

Just a blog of some guy. Actually, it's just a place for me to collect info, and is here more for me than you. I don't really have a single thing that I talk about, more like everything in the Blogosphere. Maybe it will be interesting, maybe you'll be bored to death. Hey, it's my web page, so I can do with it as I please. I just hope that you get some information or enlightenment out of it when you come to visit. So please visit often! Oh, and scroll down to the bottom for my big red A.

My Photo
Name: Larian LeQuella
Location: 3rd Rock from the Sun, New Hampshire, United States

This is MY blog, where I write about whatever I feel like. Actually, it's more of a collection of information that I like to have access to. If you want to find out more about me, you can go back to my homepage, or visit my Facebook, Twitter, or even MySpace pages.

25 January 2010

Who's Afraid of the HPV Vaccine?

Found this interesting article over on Science Daily. I was going to post it over at Facts, not Fantasy, but I have already posted a few articles there today, and I want to keep the change to the childhood vaccination schedule on top for a while. I did find the article particularly interesting in the findings and some trends I have seen in human behaviour. And this seems to confirm things I have known about specific mindsets for quite a while.

And again, my daughter has the vaccines, even though she is on the autism disorder spectrum. And as a responsible parent, she will be made aware of all aspects of human sexuality, and have all the tools available to her to make the smart decisions that I hope she will make. Especially considering that abstinece only teaching has time and time again been proven to be a dismal failure. Anyway, here is what I consider an interesting article on science, psychology, and health.

Who's Afraid of the HPV Vaccine?

A new study concludes that people tend to match their risk perceptions about policy issues with their cultural values, which may explain the intense disagreement about proposals to vaccinate elementary-school girls against human-papillomavirus (HPV). The study also says people's values shape their perceptions of expert opinion on the vaccine.

HPV is a widespread disease that, when sexually transmitted, can cause cervical cancer. In October of 2009, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended that the vaccine be given to all girls ages 11 or 12. However, the recommendation has been mired in controversy, and so far adopted in only one state and the District of Columbia.

An online experiment involving more than 1,500 U.S. adults reveals that individuals who have cultural values that favor authority and individualism perceive the vaccine as risky, in part because they believe it will lead girls to engage in unsafe sex. But individuals with cultural values that favor gender equality and pro-community/government involvement in basic health care are more likely to see the vaccine as low risk and high benefit.

The study was funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and is being published online this week in the journal Law and Human Behavior. It found that people exposed to unattributed, balanced information about HPV vaccines tended to produce something called "biased assimilation," a phenomenon in which culturally-identifiable groups draw opposing conclusions and become more divided rather than less divided as they consider evidence.

But when biased assimilation was compared to another survey result, researchers were surprised. "An even bigger effect for all subjects was the perceived values of experts," said Yale University law professor Dan Kahan referring to another part of the experiment in which arguments about the vaccine were matched with fictional experts.

Researchers designed fictional, but culturally identifiable advocates to be seen by respondents as holding opposing and culturally distinct values. The researchers devised the "advocates" to be seen as holding pro-authority and individualistic, or pro-community and pro-equality worldviews.

When views about HPV vaccines came from sources respondents believed shared their values, individuals tended to be more willing to accept the information. But when it came from an expert whom they perceived held values different from theirs, the information was not accepted. In the first instance, respondents perceived the experts to have cultural credibility and trustworthiness, but when respondent values differed from the experts, the experts were perceived to lack cultural credibility.

As a result, when experts thought to hold pro-authority and individualistic values asserted the vaccine was risky, respondents who held the same values agreed with them. When other experts who were thought to hold egalitarian and pro-community values argued that it was safe, respondents who held the same values agreed with them, intensifying overall disagreement about use of the vaccine.

"This is what the debate in public looks like," said Kahan, who led the study. "Basically, people who hold one set of values see experts with whom they identify as reinforcing their views."

Nevertheless, when experts who held pro-authority and individualistic values asserted that the vaccine was safe, and experts perceived as holding egalitarian and pro-community values argued it was risky, subjects with those values tended to moderate their original viewpoints and give consideration to an opposing viewpoint, because the information came from someone they perceived shared their values.

The study is the most recent in a series researchers have conducted with NSF support to test the "cultural cognition thesis:" the idea that because individuals can't easily judge risks when it comes to evaluating complicated or disputed policy issues, they rely on beliefs grounded in cultural ideology to help them. Previous findings have shown cultural cognition thesis explains disagreements over the risks of private gun ownership, conflict over the risks of novel sciences like nanotechnology, and the relatively low perception of various risks displayed by white males relative to other groups.

The Food and Drug Administration used "fast track" procedures to approve the HPV vaccine in 2006, and a CDC committee recommended universal vaccination of school girls shortly thereafter. In September 2009, the CDC approved an HPV vaccine for males ages 9 to 26 for prevention of genital warts, but stopped short of recommending mandatory vaccinations. The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices plans to look at the vaccine's effectiveness in preventing HPV-related cancers in males at its next session this February.

"We hypothesized that 'cultural credibility' would have an effect," said Kahan. "But we didn't expect it to be as large as it turned out to be."

From previous studies, the researchers knew that "biased assimilation" would have an effect, perhaps even a larger effect than "cultural credibility." But, that was not the case. "Biased assimilation" divided subjects, but "cultural credibility" had the biggest impact.

"The result suggests that the identity of the source is a more important cognitive cue than how people feel about the information alone," said Kahan.

The researchers suggest that anyone who has a stake in promoting informed public debate make an effort to recruit information providers that have diverse cultural outlooks and styles. The key, they say, is to avoid creating or reinforcing any impression--even a tacit one--that a scientific debate over policy is an "us versus them" dispute

Labels: ,

20 October 2009

An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All

I found this article on Wired. I highly encourage you to read it!

An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All

By Amy Wallace

To hear his enemies talk, you might think Paul Offit is the most hated man in America
. A pediatrician in Philadelphia, he is the coinventor of a rotavirus vaccine that could save tens of thousands of lives every year. Yet environmental activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. slams Offit as a “biostitute” who whores for the pharmaceutical industry. Actor Jim Carrey calls him a profiteer and distills the doctor’s attitude toward childhood vaccination down to this chilling mantra: “Grab ‘em and stab ‘em.” Recently, Carrey and his girlfriend, Jenny McCarthy, went on CNN’s Larry King Live and singled out Offit’s vaccine, RotaTeq, as one of many unnecessary vaccines, all administered, they said, for just one reason: “Greed.”

Thousands of people revile Offit publicly at rallies, on Web sites, and in books. Type pauloffit.com into your browser and you’ll find not Offit’s official site but an anti-Offit screed “dedicated to exposing the truth about the vaccine industry’s most well-paid spokesperson.” Go to Wikipedia to read his bio and, as often as not, someone will have tampered with the page. The section on Offit’s education was once altered to say that he’d studied on a pig farm in Toad Suck, Arkansas. (He’s a graduate of Tufts University and the University of Maryland School of Medicine).

Then there are the threats. Offit once got an email from a Seattle man that read, “I will hang you by your neck until you are dead!” Other bracing messages include “You have blood on your hands” and “Your day of reckoning will come.” A few years ago, a man on the phone ominously told Offit he knew where the doctor’s two children went to school. At a meeting of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an anti-vaccine protester emerged from a crowd of people holding signs that featured Offit’s face emblazoned with the word terrorist and grabbed the unsuspecting, 6-foot-tall physician by the jacket.

“I don’t think he wanted to hurt me,” Offit recalls. “He was just excited to be close to the personification of such evil.” Still, whenever Offit gets a letter with an unfamiliar return address, he holds the envelope at arm’s length before gingerly tearing it open. “I think about it,” he admits. “Anthrax.”

So what has this award-winning 58-year-old scientist done to elicit such venom? He boldly states — in speeches, in journal articles, and in his 2008 book Autism’s False Prophets — that vaccines do not cause autism or autoimmune disease or any of the other chronic conditions that have been blamed on them. He supports this assertion with meticulous evidence. And he calls to account those who promote bogus treatments for autism — treatments that he says not only don’t work but often cause harm.

As a result, Offit has become the main target of a grassroots movement that opposes the systematic vaccination of children and the laws that require it. McCarthy, an actress and a former Playboy centerfold whose son has been diagnosed with autism, is the best-known leader of the movement, but she is joined by legions of well-organized supporters and sympathizers.

This isn’t a religious dispute, like the debate over creationism and intelligent design. It’s a challenge to traditional science that crosses party, class, and religious lines. It is partly a reaction to Big Pharma’s blunders and PR missteps, from Vioxx to illegal marketing ploys, which have encouraged a distrust of experts. It is also, ironically, a product of the era of instant communication and easy access to information. The doubters and deniers are empowered by the Internet (online, nobody knows you’re not a doctor) and helped by the mainstream media, which has an interest in pumping up bad science to create a “debate” where there should be none.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE SOURCE.

Labels: , ,

18 July 2009

Time for Fat Tax

Okay, so I just saw that advert where the family goes fishing and it says that we don't need a tax on the crap that we buy that's bad for us. Sadly, I think we do need that tax...

Come on, be honest, how many people look like those in the advert? How many people that generally by chips, soda, and that type of junkfood actually DO eat responsibly and actually exercise? This is a case where we have acted so irresponsibly that we abdicated our right to consume like the obese cows we have turned into. If obesity wasn't an epidemic, I would agree with the sentiment of the commercial, but just looking around on the beach, it's like several hundred pods of whales have washed up! Heck, I'd go so far as to force people to humiliate themselves before being allowed to buy soda, chips, and other junkfoods. If they have those items in their cart, they will have to step on a scale that measurs their bodyfat (we have some pretty good ones now that are accurate to within a percent or two), and if they are lardasses, a big flashing light goes off, and a speaker announces to everyone in the store that a "fatty fat fatso is getting fatter". And since this behaviour is going unchecked, and is also responsible for so many health problems, I have no sympathy that the burden comes on them.

I enjoy a cigar from time to time as well. I know that's not the healthiest habit, but again, I am willing to pay extra for that. Heck, there are a lot of things that drive direct costs to how incredibly unhealthy this nation is, that may be occasional pleasures to people. You need to make it a cost benefit analysis to them. Not something that makes it more convenient. Hell, tax the shit out of McDonalds and their ilk too.

Some things that I even thought would help people get more motivated to change their lardass lifestyle:

- Make Helath Club dues tax deductible (provided the guym is actually used).
- Give people a tax break if they are able to pass a PT test (administered by the health club, not the gubment).
- Make the total cost of all FRESH fruits and vegetables a tax deduction as well.
- In other words, make people care about being healthy and benefit from it in ways that matter outside the quality of life (let's face it, looking like a fucking blob doesn't seem to matter to folks...).

Shit like this bugs me, because I'd rather not see us having to resort to this, but let's face it. As a nation we're about as unhealthy as a nation can be, and still be able to walk over to the Ben and jerry's counter without collapsing of a heart attack. We stopped caring, so at this point we need to be treated like the children we are acting like, and have some sense beaten into us.

Just my rant for the day. Now, I'm gonna go jogging, and then my wife wants me to cut up some veggies for our dinner tonight.

EDIT TO ADD: I did want to make an acknowledgment that there ARE medical conditions that do make life difficult for many people. However, that doesn't mean to just give up on an attempt at a healthy lifestyle. It's no excuse to have a 5000 calorie per day diet. Put down the deep fat fried Twinkie dipped in baconaise, and have an apple instead. I doubt that 32% of the US has an uncontrolled thyroid problem (obese)! Or that 65% are just big boned (overweight). Heck, I know that I myself need to take my own advice and lose a few pounds and have a better diet. That commercial just really pissed me off.

Labels: , ,

27 April 2009

Swine Flu Fears!

Swine Flu Okay, the title links to a series of Scientific American articles about the Swine Flu that should hopefully educate folks. And while it may be too soon to really laugh about this and all, I have found a coupe things that just makes me go "Hmmm. That is sorta funny."

First of all the comic. This is from XKCD, and ful credit goes to him for everything about that image and humour. I just love XKCD because it's so wacky and off the wall.

The other thing I found is something that implores devout folks to forgoe any medication. Again, I was amused by this, and then at the same time disgusted with myself that I was hoping for a pandemic should "they" buy into it!

Note to real Christians: PLEASE do NOT take Tamiflu or any of those demon drugs invented by strict evolutionists!

If you:
1) ...believe evolution should not be taught in school...
2) ...believe that evolution is still a theory without strong support...
3) ...believe that Darwin was a nut and 'Origin of Species' is an evil book...

...I urge you NOT to take Tamiflu under any circumstances. Taking this anti-viral drug is tantamount to admitting that evolutionary science (and those scientists who received the 'origin' of their education in public schools) is useful and helpful to sick people. Clearly viruses were CREATED, and these damn evolutionist whackos are trying to mess with the Creator's plan.

Viruses evolve and adapt at such a rapid pace that it takes evolutionary scientists (you know, those ones that conservative religious types rail against) tons of hard work to stay one step ahead of the mutations.

If you believe evolution is an unproven theory, taking anti-viral drugs is clearly an admission that you believe, when the chips are down and your health is at risk, that you believe that science has a better chance of saving you than prayer.

Risking your life to save people from a rapidly 'evolving' virus is a sure way to land yourself in Satan's brimstone swimming pool.


Sorry, it just was such a great Poe that it had to be done! And the elimination of the shallow end of the gene pool... Yeah, again, I sorta feel bad for that!

Labels: , ,

23 April 2009

Pro-disease Nutters...

Public Heath Hazard Warning!
There are people out there that think vaccines cause autism. They have some "celebrities" in their ranks. Never mind that these people are just plain WRONG in their assertions, but they are a public health risk in their stances. Dr. Phil Plait (The Bad Astronomer and President of JREF) takes on these nutters on a regular basis. Not because it's particularly astronomy related, but because these nutters are lying to make their case, are endangering children (not only their own, but others as well), and are trying to drag public health back 70 years. (P.S. That body count is out of date, I think the numbers are closer to 18,000 and 160 as of 23 April 09.)

Invariably, every time he makes a post on his blog, the nutters come to try to spread their lies and falsified claims. A fellow that posts on Dr. Plait's blog by the name of Todd W. has made a preemptive compilation of why these nutters are wrong. So, for your enjoyment, here is that list (with some added material at the end for even MORE actual evidence and citations):



The Truth About The "Evils" Of Vaccination




by Todd W




Before making any comments on how evil vaccines are and how they cause autism, please read the following. I apologize for the length, but the mouthpieces of the pro-disease anti-vax movement spout so much nonsense and misinformation.




MMR



(info available from FDA, CDC, investigative reports by Brian Deer)



  • Some in the pro-disease anti-vax movement claim that the MMR has/had mercury in it. However, the MMR vaccine does not and never has had any mercury in it.

  • The basis of the “MMR vaccine causes autism” argument is a flawed study by Andrew Wakefield, who had several ethics breaches, including failure to disclose financial compensation from a lawyer representing families claiming MMR cause their children’s autism, failure to disclose financial interests in patents for MMR alternatives, failure to include data which contradicted his conclusions, use of contaminated samples to support his conclusions.

  • Independent studies trying to replicate Wakefield’s results have come up negative. To date, no properly controlled study has shown a causal link between vaccines and autism.




Thimerosal



(info available from both FDA and CDC)



  • Thimerosal is a preservative that is used in the manufacturing process of some vaccines and other medicines to prevent the growth of bacteria and fungi, which could otherwise cause illness or injury.

  • It metabolizes into ethylmercury, not methylmercury, a mistake commonly made by pro-disease anti-vaxers who claim that the amount of mercury that used to be in vaccine exceeded EPA exposure guidelines. Those guidelines were for methylmercury, a compound that has a half-life in the body of several weeks to months and is often found in fish or other environmental exposures. Ethylmercury, on the other hand, has a half-life of a few days to about a week, meaning that it is not in the body long enough for it to build up to toxic levels from vaccination to vaccination.

  • It was removed from the final product of nearly all vaccines around 2001/2002. This was a political move, due in large part to public pressure, rather than based on sound science. This was a recommendation rather than a regulatory requirement. A handful of studies that suggested problems with thimerosal, but which were inconclusive, prompted a “better safe than sorry” approach from the FDA while the issue was investigated by FDA, CDC and others. No follow-up studies have found any health risks beyond local hypersensitivity.

  • Some vaccines still use it during the manufacturing process, but remove it from the final product, leaving, at most, trace amounts. The influenza vaccine still uses thimerosal, though thimerosal-free versions are available.

  • Despite the removal of thimerosal from vaccines, resulting in exposure levels lower than anytime in the past, autism rates have not declined, suggesting that there is no connection between thimerosal and autism.

  • To date, no properly controlled study has shown a causal link between thimerosal and autism.




Other Vaccine Additives





  • Some pro-disease anti-vaxers claim there is antifreeze in vaccines. This is false. Antifreeze is ethylene glycol. Vaccines use polyethylenes glycol. These are different substances, the latter of which is not toxic. More info can be found at Inside Vaccines.

  • Vaccines contain formaldehyde. However, the chemical structure of the formaldehyde in vaccines is the same as that produced by our own bodies. It is used during the manufacturing process, but is diluted to remove it from the finished product, leaving only small or trace amounts. The total amount of formaldehyde in a finished product is far less than what is naturally found in the human body.

  • As an aside; the total amount of Formaldehyde in vaccines from the vaccine schedule for a 6 year old child is 1.2016mg, BUT 1 (one) banana contains 16.3mg!

  • Vaccines contain aluminum in a salt form. Pro-disease anti-vaxers claim this is toxic, and some will cite that 4ppm will cause blood to coagulate. However, individuals are not exposed to such amounts of aluminum in a single vaccination visit. Blow are the vaccines containing aluminum, with the corresponding parts per million (ppm) for an infant (~251 mL of blood in the body) and an 80lb. child (~4000 mL of blood); note the two numbers for DTaP represent extreme ranges of aluminum content: (I'm sorry, I tried to make this table all nice for folks, but now I can't get rid of all this extra white space... Stand by for an actual web page with this info.)





























ppm (w/v) = (weight in grams of sample/volume of sample in mL) * 106
Vaccine
ppm in infant
ppm in child
age received (in months)
DTaP (170mcg)
.677
.043
2, 4, 6, w/ final ~4-6 yrs
DTaP (625mcg)
2.490
.156

Hep A
.996
.063
12 w/ final ~6 mo. later
Hep B
.996
.063
birth, 1 or 2, final at 6+
HiB
.896
.056
2, 4
HPV
.896
.056
11 or 12 yrs., then 2, 6 mo.
Pediatrix
3.386
.213
2, 4, 6 (in lieu of DTaP, IPV and Hep B)
Pentacel
1.315
.083
2, 4, 6, 15-18 (in lieu of DTaP, IPV and HiB)
Pneumococcus
.498
.031
2, 4, 6, 12-15




  • Further, about 71% of the aluminum is excreted from the body after about 5 days or so.

  • An interesting source of aluminum is breast milk. After between 51 and 346 days breast feeding, a child will have taken onboard the same amount of Aluminium as from the total US vaccine schedule for a 6 year old child.




Polio





  • Pro-disease anti-vaxers claim that polio rates increased after the introduction of the polio vaccine, that OPV spread the disease, and that polio was on a decline before introduction of the vaccine. This is wrong.

  • Before the approval of the vaccine, paralytic polio struck 13,000-20,000 individuals every year in the U.S. The number of cases peaked at 21,000 in 1952, only three years before approval of the vaccine. By 1960, there were only 2,525 cases, and only 61 cases in 1965.

  • The oral polio vaccine (OPV) was nearly 100% effective in preventing polio, though it did have a very small risk of causing paralytic polio in the recipient. OPV-caused paralytic polio resulted in about 6-8 cases per year. However, when vaccination rates were low, OPV had the added benefit of contact immunity. In other words, the virus from the vaccine was present in the stool, resulting in about 25% of people who came in contact with the immunized person would also become immune.

  • With the eradication of wild type polio in the U.S., the OPV vaccine is no longer used, and the less effective inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) is used. This version does not cause paralytic polio. OPV has not been used in the U.S. since 2000.




Vaccine Court and National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP)



(info available from the Autism Omnibus Proceedings)



  • Pro-disease anti-vaxers claim that Hannah Poling and Bailey Banks are examples of successful Vaccine Court cases where vaccines caused autism. This is wrong.

  • Hannah Poling was found to have a mitochondrial disorder, and that the vaccine worsened her condition. The court did not rule that a vaccine caused autism. Note, mitochondrial disorder is not autism, though some in the anti-vax camp claim it is.

  • Bailey Banks was found to have suffered acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM). This disease occurs in approximately 1 or 2 per million vaccine recipients, compared with 1 per 1,000 individuals infected with measles and 1 per 500 rubella infections. The court ruled that this is a type of pervasive developmental disorder, but made clear that it is not autism. Like the Poling case, anti-vaxers try to distort the truth to make their case. In the case of ADEM, vaccination helps reduce the risk of contracting the disease by reducing the likelihood of natural infection.

  • Despite the low standards of proof in the vaccine court (more likely than not, or 50% + a hair), no one has been able to establish a causal relationship between vaccines and autism.

  • In three of the best cases put forth by the anti-vax movement, the court ruled in all three that vaccines did not cause the individuals’ autism.

  • Before VICP, the media fueled fears about vaccines, leading to increases in law suits and many manufacturers halting production of vaccines altogether. The VICP was proposed by a coalition of government, health organization, and industry representatives, as well as physicians and ordinary citizens as a means to ensure a suitable supply of vaccines while allowing legal recourse to those injured by vaccines.

  • Individuals may still seek damages through the tort system, if they choose, though they must then prove not only that the vaccine caused the injury, but also that the manufacturer was at fault.




Vaccines in General





  • Pro-disease anti-vaxers want vaccines that are 100% safe. This is never going to happen, as all medicines carry some risk. However, the relative risk of injury from vaccines is significantly lower than the risk of injury from getting the disease naturally. For more information, see the CDC website.

  • Reduced vaccination rates lead to higher incidents of infection. This has been illustrated in the U.K. following Wakefield’s bogus study, in Germany in 2006 (including two deaths in unvaccinated children), in California, in MN (where an unvaccinated child died from hemophilus influenza type b).

  • Pro-disease anti-vaxers claim that “Big Pharma” makes lots of money from vaccines. If vaccination rates dropped, however, there would be an increase in preventable illnesses, many of which have high rates of complications resulting in hospitalization and expensive treatment. See the link about Germany above for information on costs associated with the measles outbreak there. The money to be made from the diseases far outweighs any money to be made from vaccines.

  • Pro-disease anti-vaxers claim that better hygiene has led to a decrease in disease, rather than vaccines. However, many of the diseases prevented by vaccines are airborne, and are not greatly impacted by improved sanitation or hygiene.

  • Pro-disease anti-vaxers claim that too many antigens (the parts that make the vaccines work) are given at once, ignoring that infants and children are exposed to thousands of antigens every day by touching things and putting their hands or the object in their mouth, through absorption or by inhaling.

  • They claim that combination shots should be avoided, and that parents should break up the vaccinations into individual vaccines and spread them out. However, this increases the total number of shots received, as well as exposure to those various “toxins” they hate so much.

  • There have been no properly controlled studies establishing a causal link between vaccines and autism.

  • There have been numerous properly controlled studies sponsored and run by various people and organizations around the world that have shown no link between vaccines and autism.




Population X and Vaccines/Autism





  • Pro-disease anti-vaxers claim the Amish do not vaccinate and do not have autism. This stems from a lie by Dan Olmsted from Age of Autism. The Amish do, in fact, vaccinate, and it appears that their rates of autism may be lower than in the general population.

  • Some claim that the Chinese do not have a word for autism (they do, it’s 自闭症 [zì bì zhèng]). And simply not having a word for the disease does not mean that it does not exist, merely that it is not recognized as a specific disorder. Did autism only afflict people after someone created the diagnosis? No, but it may have been called something else.

  • The same claim about the Chinese has been made about Somalis due to a recent article about Somalis in Minnesota. Again, lack of recognition does not mean that the disease never occurred in the population. Further, the cases in Minnesota do not have a consistent connection to vaccines. Some of those with autism have been vaccinated, some have not. Despite a lack of evidence, Generation Rescue (which runs Age of Autism) has told the Somali parents that vaccines were the cause.

  • There is a phenomenon called "Herd Immunity" (Google it). So even if you have your children vaccinated, the irrisponsible pro-disease anti-vax nuttters are still endagnering your child with their antics.




Some additional reading:
The CDC Pink Book has an appendix G with lots of statistics on cases and deaths. Here are some of the data for measles:
Disease: Measles in the USA
Year__Cases___Deaths
1961__423,919_434
1962__481,530_408
1963__385,156_364
(^^ first vaccine licensed)
1964__458,083_421
1965__261,905_276
1966__204,136_261
1967___62,705__81
1968___22,231__24
1969___25,826__41
1970___47,351__89
1971___75,290__90
(^^^ MMR licensed)
1972___32,275__24
1973___26,690__23
1974___22,690__20
1975___24,374__20
1976___41,126__12
1977___57,245__15
1978___26,871__11
(^^^ Measles Elimination Program started)
1979___13,597___6
1980___13,506__11
1981____2,124___2

Pertussis still kills over a dozen American babies every year.

Anyway, about the silly “money trail”… Which makes more money for “Big Pharma”: selling vaccines or by providing supplies and medication to hospitals for those who have been hospitalized due to pertussis, measles, mumps, Hib, etc? Be sure to provide real actual factual evidence of the type I can find in my local medical school library. Something like this:
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2005 Dec;159(12):1136-44.
Economic evaluation of the 7-vaccine routine childhood immunization schedule in the United States, 2001.

“RESULTS: Routine childhood immunization with the 7 vaccines was cost saving from the direct cost and societal perspectives, with net savings of 9.9 billion dollars and 43.3 billion dollars, respectively. Without routine vaccination, direct and societal costs of diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, H influenzae type b, poliomyelitis, measles, mumps, rubella, congenital rubella syndrome, hepatitis B, and varicella would be 12.3 billion dollars and 46.6 billion dollars, respectively. Direct and societal costs for the vaccination program were an estimated 2.3 billion dollars and 2.8 billion dollars, respectively. Direct and societal benefit-cost ratios for routine childhood vaccination were 5.3 and 16.5, respectively. CONCLUSION: Regardless of the perspective, the current routine childhood immunization schedule results in substantial cost savings.”

Links to support with actual DATA!

The economic study: http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/159/12/1136
The California experience with the 1990 measles epidemic: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=8855680
Another study on the impact of medical interventions on mental retardation, it notes the effect of measles, Hib an rubella: http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/160/3/302
The CDC Pink Book: http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/default.htm
And the Appendix G: http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/appdx-full-g.pdf
Just the cases and deaths: http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/G/cases&deaths.pdf

An Interesting article on some possible connection to Vitamin D and autism: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=vitamin-d-and-autism&sc=DD_20090424 I would caution reading too much into this though since it is very preliminary. After all, there have been correlations of autism with linoleum floors too!

One final addition to the discussion. Many people claim that autism is on some sort of WILD upswing, and is an epidemic of sorts. While I cannot say if there is a rise or not for sure, one thing is quite certain: The autism spectrum is much more understood in this day and age. We are able to correctly identify someone as autistic as opposed to mislabeling them as troublesome, distant, aggressive, impulsive, etc. There is a certain selection bias involved with the autism diagnosis increase claim.

Now, one of the places that a lot of this pro-disease nuttery is coming from is the Huffington Post (proving that woo and delusions know no political boundaries). So a good man who goes by IVAN3MAN happened upon this:

From the Huffington Post article:

Every 20 minutes, a child is diagnosed with autism. In a study of select populations around the United States, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) found that one in 150 children has the condition. According to the Autism Society of America, this is the fastest growing developmental disability with a 10-17% annual growth rate.


At Least 11% of American Women Smoke During Pregnancy



The negative effects of nicotine exposure to their fetuses and newborns are significant.


Huffington Post:

Throughout Healing and Preventing Autism, Jenny passionately reminds us that she and her dedicated army of advocates for autism are in this for the long haul:

Thousands of parents, like me, have learned so much and the only reason we won't shut up is to teach YOU, so you don't have to walk in our shoes. Dr. Jerry and I want to arm parents with all the tools and information necessary to have the healthiest baby you can. The next generation of kids is counting on it!



Jenny McCarthy SMOKING!
Jenny McCarthy SMOKING!



Jenny McCarthy SMOKING!
Jenny McCarthy STILL SMOKING!



Make of that what you will. And this is the lady that likes to inject one of the most deadly neurotoxins into her face, but thinks vaccines are bad... Wow... Just wow!

And for all those people who have anectdotal stories remember that the correlation may seem remarkable to you because anomalies always seem remarkable when they happen to you. However, what you need to understand is that in the context of the 360 million people in the United States, anomalies are actually not only expected, it would be remarkable if they didn’t occur. Here’s a back of the envelope explanation why (from another blogger that frequents BA http://padraic2112.wordpress.com/2009/04/25/my-last-vaccination-post-for-a-while/):


There is a simple reason why this is not relevant, take the following facts…
* children take vaccines
* autism displays its first symptoms in childhood
* children under the age of 5 make up ~7% of the population
* there are ~306 million people in the U.S.* about 80% of children are vaccinated entirely
(editor’s note: I didn’t make those numbers up, you can find them with a couple seconds and a web browser)


This means 306 x 0.07 x .8 = 1.7 Million children (roughly) have been vaccinated. With the vaccination schedule being what it is, then, there are somewhere around 100,000 children getting a shot every month (that last one is hand-wavey, it assumes a lot about frequency distributions, but that’s not really germane to my point). Autism rates are estimated at anywhere between 1 in 100 and 1 in 150 children, that means we have about 17,000 diagnosis of autism. If every single one of those autism diagnosis was given to a vaccinated child (they’re not, but again for our sake here it introduces very small error), and those 17,000 have a scatter distribution of vaccination patterns, that means not one, not dozens, not hundreds, but *thousands* of those diagnosis came within days or weeks of a vaccination: yes, this means that dozens will occur within an hour of a vaccination.


Put those thousands of people together on a message board (and since autism is hard to deal with, a very high percentage of these family *do* bond together, like SMA sufferers or MS or cancer or any other family-impacting disease), you’ll have a few thousand people all saying to each other, “Gee… MY kid got a shot right before her symptoms started showing, too! There are thousands of us! THAT CAN’T BE A COINCIDENCE.”


But you can see, it actually *isn’t* a coincidence… it’s exactly what we would expect to happen.

Labels: , , ,

The Out Campaign: Scarlet Letter of Atheism