Vaccination & epidemic

[lumberjim]

SIDS is not a specific cause of death. Who are you to say that the two events were unrelated? Also, using that rooster and sun analogy is like calling me stupid.

And you don't need 100% herd immunity to eradicate a disease. All you need is perimeter immunity. My kids are unlikely to come into contact with either disease. They are definitely not going to spontaneously generate them.
I don't disagree with the concept of immunization. I do disagree with giving kids 20+ shots before age 2.

Neither of us is going to convince the other about this. I don't care if you give them to your kid, just don't tell me I have to do the same.

[DanaC]

As much as I agree with vaccinations in the main, I also know that they were almost certainly responsible for the severe chronic eczema that has blighted my life and wrecked my childhood. The timing of the jump from ordinary little bitty baby eczema rash to full blown horror was too damn close.

Mum didn't want to continue after the first one. I was flared and uncomfortable. She was bullied and cajoled and made to feel like a bad parent and hysterical mum for wanting to cease the shots. They persuaded her to do the next and bang: full blown eczema within a day.

When i say bullied and cajoled, I mean properly ganged up on by several nurses at the clinic, the doctor, and even a consultant from the hospital. I don't know why. Maybe they had targets.

My cousins meanwhile, who also had some baby eczema, weren't given the shots until they were better. Their doctor advised against.

[Undertoad]

Why do you people hate clodfobble?

[Clodfobble]

Heh. I actually thought you'd moved this thread to a hidden forum, it went quiet so quickly before. It's cool though. I've been way, way, (WAY) less depressed in general since going on my kids' diet. I feel awesome for the first time in who knows how long, maybe ever. The thread popped up and my only thought was, "Huh, I can see it after all."

Still not going to participate in it, but I also don't feel compelled to, so that's good. You guys carry on if you want to.

[Adak]

Originally Posted by DanaC

As much as I agree with vaccinations in the main, I also know that they were almost certainly responsible for the severe chronic eczema that has blighted my life and wrecked my childhood. The timing of the jump from ordinary little bitty baby eczema rash to full blown horror was too damn close.

Mum didn't want to continue after the first one. I was flared and uncomfortable. She was bullied and cajoled and made to feel like a bad parent and hysterical mum for wanting to cease the shots. They persuaded her to do the next and bang: full blown eczema within a day.

When i say bullied and cajoled, I mean properly ganged up on by several nurses at the clinic, the doctor, and even a consultant from the hospital. I don't know why. Maybe they had targets.

My cousins meanwhile, who also had some baby eczema, weren't given the shots until they were better. Their doctor advised against.

Eczema is caused by a genetic predisposition, (among other things), and stress definitely makes it worse.

Which is what vaccinations are - stressors which induce an immune response. Your cousins doctor was quite right, imo.

Perhaps your doctors knew of an outbreak of a childhood disease in your area and at that time, and had received instructions to vaccinate everyone they could, to prevent it's spread.

The outbreak may have disappeared by the time your cousins saw the doctor.

Handling outbreaks of highly contagious diseases, is never perfect. Doctors can be damned if they do over-vaccinate, and definitely damned if they don't.

[DanaC]

I agree Adak. But I also think that the tendency to dismiss as invalid mothers' concerns about their children was much worse back in the 70s.

left my mum with a whole lot of guilt and wishing she'd stood her ground more. Though she really tried. As i say, they even drafted in a consultant to come talk to her because she was being 'obstinate'.

I am still broadly in favour of vaccination programmes, mind you. But Jim's right: they don't need to vaccinate every single child. And forcing the parents who do not wish it for their children is wrong imo.

What they need to do is get better at presenting the message so that fewer parents will opt out without specific reasons (such as that their child has a family history of certain illnesses).

using the law as a blunt instrument only serves to further increase suspicion and cynicism.


[eta] ok, I have actually read the article now. I am still not sure whether I agree with the ruling or not, but this is a matter of two parents disagreeing on the best thing for their daughters. Horrible for all concerned.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

Heh. I actually thought you'd moved this thread to a hidden forum, it went quiet so quickly before. It's cool though. I've been way, way, (WAY) less depressed in general since going on my kids' diet. I feel awesome for the first time in who knows how long, maybe ever.

....

Still not going to participate in it, but I also don't feel compelled to, so that's good. You guys carry on if you want to.

I was just wondering recently how it was going for you, Clod. So do you think you are allergic to gluten as well, or is their diet just that much better for everyone?

[Clodfobble]

Oh I've been off gluten for 4.5 years, and yes, it made a big difference for me in general health, though I wouldn't say I noticed anything brain-wise. Dairy, on the other hand, noticeably messes with my mood, so I have been on and off it over the last 4 years as my will waxed and waned.

But my kids (and now I) are on something called the Specific Carbohydrate Diet, which is no grains, sugars or starches of any kind. Just meats & eggs, fruits & vegetables, nuts & seeds. It's intended to purposefully starve out all the major classes of bad gut bacteria by not providing them the polysaccharides they feed on. I do believe that it's just that much better for everyone, but I also know it's not a realistic lifestyle commitment for most people, because ev.er.y.thing. must be made from scratch. I make my own mayonnaise, fruit rollups, salad dressings, broth... (not all in the same meal, of course.)

[tw]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

It's intended to purposefully starve out all the major classes of bad gut bacteria by not providing them the polysaccharides they feed on.

Polysaccharides (ie glucose, fructose) by itself is not a problem. But these tend to be more destructive when one eats too much of any sugars. An overwhelming majority of us do. Many foods are routinely 'improved' to increase sales - even bread. A body with too many sugars is then (recent research suggests) much more susceptible to damage by those polysaccharides.

Many food labels simply use multiple names for sugars so that sugar does not appear as the #1 ingredient.

Generally, it takes maybe three days just to reduce those sugar levels in places such as the liver (yes, this is a ballpark number based in how much sugar was being consumed and the diet in those three days). An example of why low sugar diets have so little effect until at least day three.

We also know that excessive sugar is one reason for less memory retention.

So should one not consume Orange juice? Of course not. If any food has no nutritional value (even sugar free diet foods), then it only creates more or future problems. Foods that contain sugars must also have required nutritional benefits. Orange juice does (if not consumed in excess). No sodas (pop) do - not even diet drinks.

[orthodoc]

Originally Posted by lumberjim

SIDS is not a specific cause of death. Who are you to say that the two events were unrelated? Also, using that rooster and sun analogy is like calling me stupid.

And you don't need 100% herd immunity to eradicate a disease. All you need is perimeter immunity. My kids are unlikely to come into contact with either disease. They are definitely not going to spontaneously generate them.
I don't disagree with the concept of immunization. I do disagree with giving kids 20+ shots before age 2.

Neither of us is going to convince the other about this. I don't care if you give them to your kid, just don't tell me I have to do the same.

LJ, I was not calling you stupid. I was pointing out that association is not the same as causation.

This is the difficulty that epidemiologists live with. They report associations. Sometimes the increased risk that they report is associated with the exposure in a causal relationship, and sometimes not. When they report an increased risk, smart people don't ignore it; they investigate it.

No, you don't need 100% herd immunity, but you need more than perimeter immunity. You need more than 95% immunity, so that the chain of transmission breaks at every possible point. When more than 5% decide that they or their children don't need immune protection, the herd becomes vulnerable. Given the rise in vaccine refusal in the US, chances are very good that at some point your children will come into contact with one or more of the diseases to which they have no immunity, and most likely at the most vulnerable time of their lives - as adults.

If you disagree with many 'shots' before age 2, would you be willing to immunize your children against the major killers of the 20th century? Meaning: Diphtheria, polio, tetanus, pertussis, measles, mumps, rubella. Quite a few more immunizations have been recommended, and all recommendations are backed up with clinical evidence.

Conventional doctors have no dog in the fight about immunization, except that they are aware that the more people who believe charlatans and refuse vaccination, the more vulnerable the population becomes. Charlatans are the ones preaching doom and reporting anecdotes, rather than controlled, reproducible studies.

[lumberjim]

Back in 1999, our first pediatrician (a large practice) stopped seeing us because we decided not to get the mmr. The doctor that was trying to convince us to get it was maybe 27 years old. She said she had seen so many kids die of measles, and it was a horrible killer.

I think there were something like 60 cases of measles reported per year in the US at that time and 0 fatalities. I think they had a dog in the fight. Maybe she lied. Maybe she had been living in India. ... but she was clearly deceptive.

Do doctor's practices keep statistics of how many patients are/are not vaccinated? Are there financial ramifications or rewards involved?

Anyway, to answer the question... if my kids were going to India, or another high risk area, I would seriously consider it. ... but while they are in school, if they get ANY immu, they have to get ALL, because we would lose the philosophical exemption. They are both strong and healthy. If, by some freak vector, they did contract measles or mumps, they would receive prompt medical care, and have an excellent chance of surviving it anyway.

Once they are adults, if they go into the medical profession, or join greenpeace or something that would put them in contact with nasty things that could be thwarted by vaccines, then I would probably encourage them to research the vaccines, and go about getting select immunizations.

It is 100% risk reward in my opinion. So far, the risk is greater than the reward.

[Undertoad]

I would like to build my own house, that would be so sweet! But when the day came to start, I would leave most of it up to architects, carpenters, plumbers, people who know what they're doing.

I mean I've only taken one single shop class, Electronics. And the one thing that class did was to assure me that I should DEFINITELY NOT be wiring my own house.

What classes did you take that tell you you have the ability to make this call. Did you in fact take Biology? Probability/statistics? Did you get taught germ theory and got a 90 on the test? I had pre-meds and pre-dents for roommates in college, so I know what I'm talking about.

This is not to say U R DUM so never take it personally. You know I love you man.

I'm actually saying WE R ALL DUM. We all fuck up our lives, always, regularly, because we don't know what we're doing.

So, a carpenter told you he sees houses not built out of brick to be unstable, and he's seen a bunch of them blow right over. Does that discredit the entire profession of carpentry? Does it mean The Fix Is In from from the Big Brick Industry? One single carpenter with an opinion, trying to make a point, doesn't mean I should take over pounding nails for my own place. If I want a really solid house, I should still be leaving all that shit up to other people. I am qualified to decide what color the paint should be, and what the wiring for the network should be, and not much else.

[Pico and ME]

Why not give these vaccinations to adults instead? It's adults that are most threatened with serious complications from these diseases, no? Getting measles, mumps or chicken pox while young isn't quite as serious and in fact helps to build up natural immunity. I grew up in the 60's and I think I got sick with all three while very young. I think most of my friends and classmates did too. I don't recall the level of fear then that is being pushed today.

[lumberjim]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

I'm actually saying WE R ALL DUM. We all fuck up our lives, always, regularly, because we don't know what we're doing.

This is the only part of your post that makes any sense to me. I'm not following the construction analogies.

So, we agree on this point. It's just that Playing God, injecting live viruses into infants in an aggressive, broad brushed manner seems a lot riskier to me.

[Undertoad]

But is all medicine Playing God, or just the parts that sound freaky and/or scary and/or we don't know how they work exactly?