Tag: vaccine injury stories

Is It Rational to Be Anti-Vaccine?

Why do some people think that they are making a rational decision when they skip or delay their children’s vaccines?

Are parents making a rational decision when they skip or delay their children's vaccines?
Are parents really making a rational decision when they skip or delay their children’s vaccines?

Is it because they “know” that they are right?

Or because others reinforce their beliefs?

Is It Rational to Be Anti-Vaccine?

Whatever the reason, we should be clear that skipping or delaying vaccines, leaving your child at risk to get a vaccine-preventable disease and putting others at risk, is really not a rational decision.

“It is not the case, of course, that people make decisions about vaccination based solely on rational, evidenced-based, scientific perspectives.”

Timothy Caulfield et al on Injecting doubt: responding to the naturopathic anti-vaccination rhetoric

Instead, people often seem to skip or delay vaccines after fear helps a number of cognitive biases, heuristics, and logical fallacies take hold and change their perception of risk into something that is much different from reality. That fear is stoked by misinformation and propaganda they see on the Internet or hear from friends and family.

Or they become influenced by the idea that their child has been damaged or injured by a vaccine, even though in the great majority of cases, it has been shown that vaccines do not cause those problems.

“Well, if you’re going to inform yourself about vaccines, I think anybody who’s truly informed will realize that getting a vaccine is much better than not getting one. If you’re choosing not to vaccinate your child, it’s because you’re getting, frankly, bad information about vaccines.”

Paul Offit, MD

So call it what you want, but no, in general, it is not rational to be anti-vaccine, especially considering that:

Do you know what the biggest clue that it isn’t a rational decision in most cases?

Changing Your Mind About Vaccines

When a rational person is given new evidence or information that not only challenges their worldview, but blows it out of the water, what do they do?

They change their mind.

“It is irrational to hold any view so tightly that you aren’t willing to admit the possibility that you might be wrong.”

What would it take to convince you that you were wrong?

When do anti-vax folks change their minds?

“I don’t feel I’m putting my child at risk. There’s nothing that’s going to change my mind on this on that specific vaccination.”

More often than not, it is after one of their kids gets sick or there is a disease outbreak nearby.

Instead of changing their minds in the midst of disease outbreaks and immunization mandates, some parents decide to break the law…

If you are not vaccinating and protecting your kids, what would it take to get you to change your mind about vaccines?

Do you need to see double blind placebo controlled studies, studies with saline placebos, studies with vaccines tested together, or long term safety studies?

Do you need to remind yourself what the pre-vaccine era was like? Or understand what will happen if too many people stop vaccinating their kids?

Don't wait until it's too late to vaccinate your child.
Don’t wait until it’s too late to vaccinate your child.

Whatever it takes, hopefully you don’t wait too long and regret your decision.

Of course, no one wants to intentionally harm their children. But you can’t do what’s right and make a rational decision if you are relying on bad information and advice.

More on the Idea of Rational Anti-Vaccine Beliefs

Jenna Jameson Helps Explain the Modern Anti-Vax Movement

Jenna Jameson is the latest “celebrity” to be talking about vaccines.

Is Jenna Jameson anti-vaccine?

And it helps explain what is going on in the modern anti-vaccine movement.

Jenna Jameson Helps Explain the Modern Anti-Vax Movement

So why is Jenna Jameson talking about vaccines?

Is it because she is vegan?

Many vegans vaccinate.

Maybe, but many vegans vaccinate themselves and their kids…

Is she just against vaccine mandates?

One of the best reasons to question vaccines is because the government is mandating them?

Sure, it is possible she just has a problem with the government telling her what to do.

Not encephalitis, but a motor vehicle accident can lead to a brain injury or even chronic traumatic encephalopathy though.
Not encephalitis, but a motor vehicle accident can lead to a brain injury or even chronic traumatic encephalopathy though.

But that became a less likely reason as she kept tweeting…

Jenna Jameson thinks that vaccines cause peanut allergies.

That vaccines can cause peanut allergies is a common anti-vax talking point. They think that it has something to do with peanut oil adjuvants, even though these peanut oil adjuvants were never actually used in any routine vaccines.

It eventually came out though.

Jenna Jameson is questioning vaccines because she feels that her child nearly died after her vaccines – from a febrile seizure.

A febrile seizure after a vaccine has Jenna Jameson questioning vaccines.

And of course, it is bullying to try and explain that febrile seizures are not a life-threatening reaction.

So what’s the problem?

Jenna Jameson made a lot of misinformed statements about vaccines.
Jenna Jameson made a lot of misinformed statements about vaccines.

It’s not Jenna Jameson questioning vaccines or even whether or not she vaccinates her kids.

It’s her using her celebrity status to scare other parents away from vaccinating and protecting their kids.

Jenna Jameson is happy that she is scaring parents away from vaccinating and protecting their kids?
Jenna Jameson is happy that she is scaring parents away from vaccinating and protecting their kids?

Want to question something?

A febrile seizure is a vaccine injury now?
A febrile seizure is a vaccine injury now?

Question why parents listen to celebrities like Jenna Jameson when they try and make them think that vaccines are dangerous and cause things like peanut allergies, asthma, diabetes, and autism.

Or that febrile seizures are a dangerous reaction, a vaccine injury, that should keep them from continuing to get vaccinated.

“Fevers can be caused by common childhood illnesses like colds, the flu, an ear infection, or roseola. Vaccines can sometimes cause fevers, but febrile seizures are uncommon after vaccination.”

What is a febrile seizure?

Would you skip or delay your child’s vaccines, putting them at risk to get a life-threatening disease and putting others at risk, because Jenna Jameson, Rob Schneider, Kat Von D, Bill Maher, Kristin Cavallari, Lisa Bonet, or Cindy Crawford told you to?

More on Anti-Vaccine Celebrities

Can Vaccines Cause Herpes Infections?

It’s very easy to understand why some folks believe that vaccine injuries are so common.

Vaccines don't cause eczema and they certainly don't cause herpes.
Vaccines don’t cause eczema and they certainly don’t cause herpes.

It’s because they think that vaccines are poison and everything is a vaccine injury, even an infant’s herpes infection!

Can Vaccines Cause Herpes Infections?

Wait, could someone actually get herpes from a vaccine?

Yes, which vaccine causes this???
Yes, which vaccine causes this???

Do we even have a herpes vaccine?

Chickenpox, shingles, and herpes are all members of the herpesviridae family of viruses, but they are not all herpes.

As most people understand, we do have a herpes zoster vaccine, but that is for shingles – and it has nothing to do with the actual herpes virus. Remember, shingles got the name herpes zoster before it was known that it was actually caused by the chicken pox virus (varicella zoster).

And while there is a very large herpesviridae family of viruses, which includes the herpes simplex virus that causes cold sores (HSV1) and genital ulcers (HSV2) and the chickenpox virus, it also includes viruses that cause mono (EBV) and roseola (HHV6 and 7).

Still, only HSV actually causes herpes.

So no, none of the viruses we get could actually cause herpes.

It is thought that nearly 48% of people have HSV1 though and that you can be contagious, shedding the herpes virus even if you don’t have an active cold sore.

Where is the evidence for vaccines being contaminated with herpes viruses?
Where is the evidence for vaccines being contaminated with herpes viruses?

So what’s more likely, an infant was exposed to someone with HSV1 and got infected or they received a vaccine that was contaminated with HSV1, something that has never been documented?

What are some other “possibilities?”

Could it be eczema vaccinatum?

While eczema vaccinatum is a thing, it is a thing that occurs when someone with eczema gets or is exposed to someone who has recently had the smallpox vaccine.

Eczema vaccinatum has to do with the smallpox vaccine...
Eczema vaccinatum has to do with the smallpox vaccine…

It is why the AAP once considered eczema a contraindication to getting vaccinated.

It is unlikely that the infant pictured above was exposed to someone who recently had the smallpox vaccine though and he doesn’t have eczema vaccinatum anyway…

Colloidal silver or CBD oil on eczema???
Colloidal silver or CBD oil on eczema???

And no matter how confident these folks are in their advice to treat and diagnose this baby, they are wrong.

It's truly mind numbing when these folks try to blame everything on vaccines.
It’s truly mind numbing when these folks try to blame everything on vaccines.

Everything isn’t a vaccine injury.

It is always the vaccines...
It is always the vaccines…

What happens if parents actually start to believe anti-vaccine folks who are claiming that HSV1 infections are caused by vaccines?

How do vaccines cause herpes virus?
How do vaccines cause herpes virus?

In addition to skipping or delaying vaccines, putting their kids at risk to get pertussis, measles, Hib, and other vaccine-preventable diseases, they might not take precautions to actually keep them from getting herpes!

Fortunately, most kids with herpes do well if they are outside the neonatal period - after they are about a month old.
Fortunately, most kids with herpes do well if they are outside the neonatal period – after they are about a month old. Hopefully this mom posts an update to the anti-vax group too.

And we will see more kids ending up in the hospital or dying with herpes infections.

More on Vaccines and Eczema

Can You Go to Jail for Not Vaccinating Your Kids?

Believe it or not, parents have been jailed for not vaccinating their kids.

In a recent Michigan case, a mother was jailed for refusing a court order to vaccinate her son. The court had agreed with the boy’s father that the child should be vaccinated and protected.

So this case was not just about vaccines, but about divorced parents who disagreed about how to care for their child…

Can You Go to Jail for Not Vaccinating Your Kids?

Although it isn’t common, historically, there have been other stories of parents going to jail for not vaccinating their kids.

Parents in Maryland were surprised that they might face jail time for not vaccinating their kids.
Parents in Maryland were surprised that they might face jail time for not vaccinating their kids.

Recently, in 2007, parents were warned that they might be sent to jail for not vaccinating their kids. The problem wasn’t just vaccines though, as these parents could have gotten exemptions. And they had several months to do so before the Judge gave his warning…

No one went to jail in Maryland in 2007.

Have you ever heard of John (Jack) Marsh?

Going to jail for not vaccinating his kids became routine for John Marsh.

In 1946, he was put in jail and his daughter, Betty Jane, was taken by child welfare services so that she could get a smallpox vaccine. His son Marlin was also to be taken, but couldn’t be found.

What happened next? We don’t know. That was the last report about John Marsh and his family.

We do know a lot about what happened before this though…

John Marsh was first jailed in 1937 for not vaccinating his kids.

John Marsh’s story started nearly 12 years earlier!

In 1934, he spent 7 months in jail because he wouldn’t vaccinate his children Daniel and Lorna. As in 1946, those children were taken and vaccinated and Marsh was released.

John Marsh was again jailed in 1937 for not vaccinating his kids.

He was also put in prison in 1937 over getting his son Eugene vaccinated.

John Marsh was jailed over and over from 1937 to 1940 because he wouldn't vaccinate his kids.

Why was he against vaccinating his kids?

John Marsh believed that his nieces were vaccine injured.
John Marsh believed that his nieces were vaccine injured.

He believes that a smallpox vaccine caused two of his nieces to go blind. One of them became blind about two weeks after getting her smallpox vaccine. Two weeks later, her sister also became blind. And then another.

What could have affected these girls in 1925 besides Mildred’s smallpox vaccine? Trachoma was once a common cause of blindness in the United States and it was quite contagious.

Even though two weren’t even vaccinated, the family still thinks that they all suffered from some kind of vaccine injury.

“The infrequency of eye involvement following vaccination is very striking when we consider the number of vac­cinations, the doubtful handling that many receive, and the ease with which infection may be transferred.”

Arthur J. Bedell, M.D., F.A.C.S. on Multiple Vaccination of the Eyelids

Interestingly, ocular vaccinia is a known, rare complication of getting a smallpox vaccine. It could occur if you touched the site of vaccination and then touched your eye, and so could also occur if you were in close contact with someone who was recently vaccinated, as the Marsh sisters.

Unlike these girls though, the infection typically only involves one eye, would cause lesions suspicious for vaccinia in or near the eye, which were never mentioned, and often leaves obvious lid deformities.

And doctors did not believe that those girls had a reaction to the vaccine.

John Marsh never won any of his cases and his kids always ended up getting vaccinated...
John Marsh never won any of his cases and his kids always ended up getting vaccinated…

Are there any other cases of parents going to jail instead of vaccinating their kids?

In 1899, apparently there wasn't a religious exemption to getting vaccinated.
In 1899, apparently there wasn’t a religious exemption to getting vaccinated.
Yes, we had anti-vax chiropractors way back in 1926.
Yes, we had anti-vax chiropractors way back in 1926.
In 1942, Bowser's two children were admitted to a county Children's home and vaccinated, as they had never been to school.
In 1942, Bowser’s two children were admitted to a county Children’s home and vaccinated, as they had never been to school.
This was in 1924, but just like today, these parents didn't win their court case.
This was in 1924, but just like today, these parents didn’t win their court case.

Could any of this happen now?

We still have truancy laws and laws about kids getting vaccinated…

Jack Marsh had an alternative to going to jail over not vaccinating his kids...
Jack Marsh had an alternative to going to jail over not vaccinating his kids…

But no one wants parents to go to jail over vaccination decisions.

And no one wants kids to be forced to get vaccines.

Vaccination laws were being strictly enforced to try and control outbreaks and epidemics of smallpox, which still occurred in the 1920s and 30s.
Vaccination laws were being strictly enforced to try and control outbreaks and epidemics of smallpox, which still occurred in the 1920s and 30s.

We also don’t want kids to get sick and disease to spread because of ignorance and unnecessary fear of vaccines.

Who is scaring these parents in the first place?
What is scaring these parents in the first place?

Unfortunately, anti-vax folks create a viscous cycle.

As they scare more and more parents, they create pockets of susceptible children, and larger and larger outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases, which eventually require stricter vaccine requirements and mandates to control.

More on Jail and Vaccines