Pediatricians as Vaccine Pushers

We often here that pediatricians are vaccine pushers, at least from anti-vaccine folks…

If that is the case though, how come pediatricians don’t routinely push any of the following vaccines on kids:

1. Adenovirus vaccine – only given to enlisted soldiers during basic training
2. Anthrax vaccine – high risk people only
3. BCG vaccine vaccine – high risk people only
4. Cholera vaccine – recently approved in the United States as a travel vaccine
5. Hepatitis E – not available in the United States
6. Japanese encephalitis vaccine – a travel vaccine
7. Meningococcal C vaccine (MenC) – not available in the United States
8. Meningococcal B vaccine (MenB) –  has a “permissive” recommendation in that parents are told they can get it if they want their kids to avoid MenB infections, but it is not required yet.
9. MenHibrix – a combination between Hib and Meningococcal Groups C and Y, but it is only given to high risk kids and was discontinued in the United States because of low demand
10. Plague vaccine – discontinued
11. Rabies vaccine – high risk people only
12. Shingles vaccine – seniors only
13. Smallpox vaccine – high risk people only
14. Tick-borne encephalitis – not available in the United States
15. Typhoid fever vaccine – a travel vaccine
16. Typhus vaccine – discontinued
17. Yellow fever vaccine – a travel vaccine

Sure, it would be hard to push a vaccine that has been discontinued or not even available in the United States, but if your goal was to aggressively push vaccines, how hard would it be to get Big Pharma to start making them available?

That would more than double the number of vaccines that kids would have to get.

Those Times “Vaccine Pushers” Said No To Vaccines

And how come some of the biggest vaccine advocates have been against plans for mass immunizations if they are vaccine pushers?

In addition to Dr. Albert Sabin advising against President Gerald Ford’s plans for universal vaccination against swine flu in 1976, Dr. Paul Offit missed the chance to push the small pox vaccine on us in 2002. He instead advised for a different plan:

Here’s another way to do it. We can make the vaccine. Make sure we understand who’s going to get it, who’s going to be giving it. Then wait, wait for there to be one case of documented smallpox somewhere on the face of this earth and then we can move into vaccinating people, large numbers of people.

Dr. Paul Offit

Dr. Offit, who is routinely called a shameless vaccine pusher by anti-vaccine websites, was the sole member of a CDC vaccine advisory committee to vote against President George Bush’s 2002 plan to vaccinate about 500,000 health care workers against smallpox. He feared that the risks might outweigh the benefits.

For More Information on Vaccine Pushers

• The Most Dangerous Vaccine
• Preparing for Bioterror
• Sabin Urges A Delay on Swine Flu Shots
• Antivax 101: Tactics and Tropes of the Antivaccine Movement

Updated February 7, 2018

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Last Updated on February 7, 2018