6/29/04
THE VACCINE DEBATE
9 PAGES

Over the last few months Lauren and I have been spending a good deal of time researching something I never expected to lend a second thought to: vaccines. Specifically, we've been researching their safety to determine whether or not we plan on letting our daughter get them. This was always a no-brainer for both of us. Isn't it for everybody? You just get the vaccines. That's what you do. You get vaccinated to protect yourself from getting diseases. Because if you get just a little bit of a disease then your immune system will build up a defense and know how to react if it ever encounters that disease for real in the future. Makes sense to me. That's how chickenpox works after all. You get it as a kid and then you're immune to it forever. No brainer.

Well then we were out in California on our road trip and my friend Laura who has an 18-month-old daughter tipped us off to the apparently on-going and escalating controversy surrounding vaccines. Apparently, she said, they've been linked to all kinds of bad things like autism, SIDS, brain damage just to name a few of the more severe potential side effects. She said that lots of kids were having these negative reactions simply because their little bodies with their immature immune systems couldn't handle the vaccine. She urged us to look at the research out there before we just blindly made a decision.

We talked with other parents of young children, parents our age, and asked them what they did about vaccinating. Several of them said that they gave their kids the vaccines but they waited longer than the recommended timeframe. Rather than giving them a particular shot at 2 months, they waited until their kids were a year old. And rather than giving them 3 shots, each containing 3 vaccines at one sitting, they only gave their kids one at a time and spaced them out more.

Okay, that philosophy made sense to me. The immune system is still developing, so give it time to get stronger before you start pumping all this bad stuff into it. But I was still hesitant to go all the way towards Laura's philosophy of not vaccinating at all. In the long run I believed what we've all been brought up to believe, that vaccines prevent us from getting sick. The reason there are no more polio cases in this country is because of vaccines. The reason we never got measles as kids was because we were vaccinated. So sure, maybe we should hold off on giving certain vaccines, but if nobody ever got them at all it would lead to epidemics of these old diseases.

As Lauren and I started to do our own research, reading books and articles about the subject, we did find some very alarming stories about babies getting their vaccines and then two days later dying in their cribs. The doctors would just indiscriminately label it as SIDS without looking into the possibility that it was the vaccine that caused the death. Countless stories of kids going into convulsions, having seizures, developing neurological disorders, asthma, ADD, autism, mental retardation, all within a very small window (as early as the same day or within 7 days) after receiving their shots. It was very scary stuff. Stuff that would make any parent at least think twice and maybe flat out say, "My kid is NEVER getting vaccinated."

For the most part Lauren was the one reading these books and she was passing the information on to me. It was good this way because she could be the one to react, and I could be the one to play devils advocate. When Lauren told me that we were NOT vaccinating our child, I was hesitant to jump onto that bandwagon. My mind still couldn't reconcile a couple things. First of all, sure I'll give the statistics and the stories their due attention. Yes, I'm sure there are some kids who have had bad, terrible reactions to vaccines. But then again, there are some people who have flown on a plane and it crashed into the ocean.

What I kept coming back to is the argument that the World Health Organization and the American Academy of Pediatrics keep making: "The benefits outweigh the risks." Maybe 1 kid in 1000 has a bad reaction to a vaccine. But how many MORE would get sick and die if NOBODY got the vaccines? That was another cognitive dissonance I was having. Sure, maybe my kid could get by without being vaccinated. But would she just be riding on everybody else's vaccinations? Since everybody else was vaccinated and not getting these diseases, maybe she would be safe in the midst of them. But ethically, is it right to make all the other kids assume all the risk and let my child ride on that? Obviously not.

Even with all the horror stories Lauren was recounting to me from the books she was reading, I was still leaning toward vaccinating our child but delaying them until her little immune system was stronger. I asked Lauren if the books she was reading had any advice for a better vaccination schedule than the one the AAP recommends. She couldn't find any in the books.

So I started looking online. And I couldn't find anything. That's because with this particular topic, the sides are split black and white. Every scrap of research I could find came from one of two camps. Either the camp that includes AAP and WHO and the entire medical community who tells you that vaccines are necessary for the public health and anybody who doesn't get their kids vaccinated is putting EVERYBODY at risk. And then there is the polar opposite camp. The one that says that all vaccines are dangerous and ineffective and should never be given EVER… to ANYBODY. There is no in-between.

That made our research incredibly difficult. I've learned over the past few years when dealing with anything that people are passionate about, it's hard to determine who's right and who's wrong. Because each side is going to be so committed to making you think that their side is right that they're not going to mention the caveats to their theories, the things that would seem to contradict their point of view. But of course, those are the ONLY things that the OTHER side is going to mention. They're going to tell you every reason why the opposing side is wrong and why THEY are right. And all that leaves are a lot of unanswered questions.

I was skeptical about every bit of information I read and that Lauren read to me. I decided that the anti-vaccine people were really going to have to sell me on this. I didn't want to be one of those people who freaks out every time some new study comes out and says, "Oh no, saliva causes stomach cancer!!!" There are too many of those people in the world, ESPECIALLY in this society. People freak out whenever they hear of a new germ or a new study that says carbs are actually bad for you. And so they jump on these fad regimens only to find out from a study two years later that the original study was wrong.

So I didn't want to be one of those people, but at the same time I didn't want to be a blind sheep to the establishment and not question the "whys" of what we "just do".

The facts Lauren was reading me were intriguing. Statistics saying things like during an outbreak of Measles at a particular school in Ohio in 1995, ninety percent of the people who caught the disease had been previously vaccinated. Wow, that sounds pretty damning to the pro-vaccine people. After all, what's the point of getting vaccinated if most of the people who get sick during an outbreak had already received the vaccines? But when you consider the fact that probably ninety-five percent of people everywhere are vaccinated, just by sheer math the ratio of vaccinated to non-vaccinated people would have to be high. If 20 people got sick at that school, that means 18 of them had already been vaccinated. But that's 20 out of like 1000 kids. Now I wonder, were the two unvaccinated kids who got sick the ONLY unvaccinated kids in the entire school? That would turn the stats on their head. Then you could say that only 2 percent of vaccinated kids got the disease while 100 percent of UN-vaccinated kids got the disease. But again, not all the information is being given, so who do you believe?

The pro-vaccine people do it too. For instance, with regards to the Hepatitus B vaccine that you're supposed to give within the first two days of life. They'll tell you that children are most at risk of contracting Hep B within the first two months of life. They'll try to scare you into pumping a shot full of STD into your child because statistically, most kids who get Hep B are younger than two months old. What they don't tell you is that, statistically the kids who contracted the disease GOT IT FROM THEIR MOTHER. Their mother had Hep B because she got it from the father or some other sex partner who had it. So sure, if the mother or the father has been sleeping around, maybe it's a good idea to get the shot, but otherwise, the statistics aren't telling you the whole story.

Finally after doing as much research as I could take on-line, I decided to read the two books that Lauren had been reading. "Immunization: Theory vs. Reality" and "Vaccines: Are They Really Safe and Effective" by Neil Z. Miller. By the end of the books, I was sold. Our kids are NOT getting vaccinated.

I wasn't taken over by the many horror stories that the book recounts, though they did make me cringe. I maintained my clinical, scientific approach to the book. Truth be told, Lauren's conviction had already had me swinging to the side of "don't vaccinate at all" but I read this book intentionally skeptical. Mr. Miller was going to have to convince me beyond the shadow of a doubt.

And boy did he ever.

The first domino to fall was a series of charts that showed the decline of certain diseases. According to the findings he was presenting, many of the diseases that we vaccinate for were already on their way out when the vaccine was introduced! In fact by the time the Measles vaccine was introduced in 1963, the disease had already gone down from 13.3 deaths per 100,000 in 1915 to .03 per 100,000. The disease had essentially gone away on its own. Yet the medical community took credit for eradicating the disease over the next couple decades even though it probably would have disappeared anyway.

Basically what happened was a few generations worth of acquired immunity was being passed down. Somebody got the measles in 1915 and acquired permanent immunity to it. They passed part of that immunity onto their kids who got maybe a lesser form of measles in 1940 and then they passed it down again to the point where their kids were pretty much already completely immune. They didn't need a vaccine. By the time the vaccine came onto the market, the disease had already done its worst and the vaccine was pretty much useless.

This resonated with me. It's a concept that I had bounced around in my head a few years back in regards to flu shots. I got my flu shots a couple times in college. But then I learned that the shot they give you is actually LAST YEAR'S flu. But as we all know, flu viruses mutate each year. So if they give you last year's flu, then… how does that help you THIS year? It just didn't make sense. And that's exactly what these statistics were mirroring. Basically they're saying vaccines are a good theory, but at BEST they're inherently obsolete. In the time it takes science to create a vaccine, the disease has either run its course or has mutated into something else.

And in some cases, the vaccination is incomplete and would be inadequate even if it WAS up to date. In the case of the Meningococcal vaccine which is supposed to prevent Meningitis, there are literally dozens of strains of the virus and bacteria in the world. However, the vaccine that's given only contains ONE of those strains. And it's not even the strain that is the most frequent cause of the disease. When vaccinating for Pneumococcal Disease which has over 90 strains, the shot only contains 7. And again, they are not the 7 most dangerous strains.

We had a discussion with another mom about that one in particular. She said, "Well at least that's 7 less things you have to worry about." But to me, that's like walking around every day wearing a parachute just in case you fall out of a building… but then you don't wear your seat belt in the car.

Miller goes on to talk about the statistics of countries that don't require the vaccines and where less people get voluntarily vaccinated. In most cases, their disease rates are either equivalent to or BETTER than ours. They're people get measles and diptheria at about the same rate as us, or even a little less. But the real shocker is that in comparison to countries that don't require vaccinations, our rate of SIDS is through the roof. We are arguably the most medically aware and advanced country on the planet and yet over 8000 babies die each year from SIDS. In Japan where they no longer require vaccines, SIDS is virtually non-existent. The rate of SIDS in this country is almost as bad as that of a third world country that doesn't have access to medical expertise… or really, even a clean living environment.

The next few points Miller makes are the ones that ultimately sealed the deal for me. The ones that made me decide definitively, "Okay, we're not vaccinating our children." The first was his point that our bodies are meant to get a certain amount of disease when their young. That's when your immune system is strongest and can fight off these diseases. Getting these diseases as a child helps the immune system get stronger. It essentially practices on these childhood diseases like measles and chickenpox. It gets stronger during childhood so that by the time we reach adulthood, when the immune system isn't quite as strong, it's at least had practice and is ready for when disease comes through.

Miller says that vaccines are essentially robbing us of this necessary process. A disease has to pass through all sorts of outer defenses before it can infect the body. There are the nasal passages, the mucus membranes, the respiratory system and then ultimately the blood stream. But by injecting a little bit of the disease directly into the blood stream via a vaccine, we are cutting those other defenses out of the process. The body doesn't have the chance to build up its defenses in those areas. The body only learns how to fight the disease one way. When that immunity wears off in a few years (since no vaccine gives you lifelong immunity), the body is just as, if not more vulnerable than before because it never had the chance to practice.

George Carlin said it best in a routine from a few years ago. He talks about how he never gets sick because he doesn't shy away from people who sneeze, he doesn't wipe off the telephone, he doesn't even wash his hands every time he goes to the bathroom. As a result, his immune system gets a lot of practice. He then goes on to tell the story about how as a young boy he and his friends swam in the Hudson River…

"And it was loaded with raw sewage. That's right, we swam in raw sewage. You know, to cool off. And back then the big fear was polio. Thousands of kids every year were dying of polio. But you know what, in my neighborhood, nobody ever got polio. No one. Ever. You know why? BECAUSE WE SWAM IN RAW SEWAGE. It strengthened our immune system. The polio never had a chance. We were tempered in raw shit."

For the sake of argument let's table the notion that vaccines don't pose any risks like autism and SIDS. Let's assume they are all benefits and minimal risks and do what the experts say they do. In the immediate future, globally they may not have any negative side effects. But when you look at the big picture, one has to wonder if we're setting up the human race for its own demise. If we're not allowed to acquire natural immunity to regular diseases like measles and whooping cough, that means we're not passing that immunity on to our kids. Their immune systems are going to be inherently weaker. Then they get their vaccines and their immune system also gets no practice. After a few generations, our immune systems are going to be significantly compromised. And forget measles. To quote Carlin again, "What are you going to do when some super virus comes along that turns your vital organs into liquid shit? I'll tell you what you're gonna do. You're gonna get sick and you're gonna die and you're gonna deserve it because you're fuckin' weak and you have a fuckin' weak immune system."

And let's get real here. The diseases that we are being "immunized" against aren't life-threatening. In fact, most people who get these diseases don't even realize they have them. They might feel like they have a cold for a few days while their body is fighting it off and that's it. Measles, mumps, rubella, whooping cough. People who have had them will tell you that they were miserable, but truly these diseases don't kill people. Oh the doctors and the people propping up the vaccine culture will tell you differently. They'll give you statistics of people in the last 10 or so years who have died from these childhood diseases. What they're not telling you is that every single one of them - EVERY SINGLE ONE - had other circumstances going on that made them more susceptible to contracting the disease. Things like extreme poverty and dirty living environments can certainly increase the risk of these diseases and their effects. But everyday average middle-class people who wash their hands and don't have animal feces all over their house simply do not die from these diseases.

An interesting note too. Believe it or not, there are still cases of polio in this country. But in the last 20 years every single case of it… I repeat, EVERY SINGLE CASE of polio was contracted FROM THE VACCINE. The person took the vaccine and got sick days later. But all the medical community is going to tell you is that polio is still a disease that affects us, so you have to get vaccinated.

So not only are these diseases important for us to get in the interest of strengthening our immune system, but they are relatively benign. Most run their course on their own in a week or two and the worst that happens is you're bed-ridden for that time. I finally saw the rationales of WHO and AAP turned on their very heads. No, the benefits did NOT outweigh the risks. The benefits were only short-term, and the risks were both immediate and far-reaching.

Before I started reading these books my moral dilemma was that my child would be riding free on the risks of vaccinated kids. Now my moral dilemma shifted against the very kids I was worried about betraying. Now I'm worried that because of the vaccination program, my child won't get the diseases she needs to get as a child and as a result, won't be prepared for adulthood. Vaccination in its best form only confers TEMPORARY immunity. Basically kids will have artificial immunity throughout their school age years. But that immunity wears off right at the point where it's most detrimental.

Remember how as kids our parents wanted us to get the chickenpox? If your sister got it, they'd make you go play with her to make sure you got it too. They knew that we needed to get it as a kid because if we didn't, we'd end up getting it as an adult which at that point it COULD turn into a life-threatening disease. Well guess what? There is a chickenpox vaccine now and a lot of states are requiring it. Oh my god. Do you remember the chickenpox? Sure it sucked. It itched like hell, but really it was over in a few days. Is that really such a bad thing that we need a VACCINE for it? How many kids do you know died or were horribly disfigured by chickenpox? Again, maybe you could understand it if the vaccine gave you lifelong immunity. But it wears off! And it wears off right at the point when it would be really bad for you to get chickenpox. The chickenpox vaccine is relatively new and I fear for this generation when they turn 25. I can almost guarantee that the rate of shingles is going to go through the roof right around then.

And this is why I'm scared for my child. I'm not scared that since she's not vaccinated she'll catch these diseases in school. I'm worried that because everybody else is vaccinated, she WON'T catch these diseases until she's an adult. And that scares me. Part of me thinks, well damn, maybe we SHOULD just get her vaccinated to keep her even with everybody else. But no, I truly do believe that the risks still outweigh the benefits on this one.

These books by Neil Miller go on to detail other things that vaccines could be responsible for. Some are questionable. Autism and ADD have been linked to vaccines. But the other research I've done indicates that those theories are shaky at best. The symptoms of Autism (in vaccinated AND unvaccinated children) generally start to show themselves around 18 months. It just so happens this coincides with the time when the AAP recommends the MMR shot. They say that concerned parents can push back their MMR's if they want, but that Autism symptoms will still show up around this time regardless of whether or not they get the shot. With respect to ADD, Miller claims that since the mass inoculation campaigns began in the late 1950's, Attention Deficit Disorder has grown steadily. He fails to acknowledge that since the late 1950's the number of hours kids spend in front of the TELEVISION has also grown steadily. I personally think this is more to blame for ADD than vaccines.

However, some of Miller's other purported negative links to vaccines are intriguing. According to the research, vaccines can be blamed for both AIDS and Gulf War Syndrome. One strong theory is that AIDS is actually a mutated monkey virus that got into a batch of vaccines in the early 70's. Vaccines are created by pumping vials of the disease through dead animal flesh in order to weaken the disease. The drawback to this approach is that the serum inevitably picks up other toxins and diseases from the flesh it's passing through. Diseases that are unidentifiable to contemporary science because they either look like other human diseases or they are new mutations that science doesn't know about yet. HIV was possibly introduced because a Simian Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV) got passed into a batch of vaccines and then mutated once it was inside a human host.

Truly these books were fascinating. But like I said, they must be taken with a grain of salt. Like any research on this subject. Ultimately, seriously nobody in this debate can give you a definitive answer because there is always a counter-argument. There is always somebody on each side to say, "Oh yeah well what about this." And what's more, there is nobody like me coming from the middle ground, nobody who is only interested in exposing the real truth - rather than selling books or medicine.

My sister-in-law confronted Lauren and me on this a few weeks back when we explained to her our reasons for not vaccinating. She got right down to the point that will drive any parent crazy with worry. "Will you be able to live with yourself if Allison gets one of these diseases and dies?"

No I won't. If she gets polio and dies and I truly believe that the vaccine could have saved her, I will regret it forever.

The flip side of that is, "Will I be able to live with myself if I give her the vaccine and she dies or is brain-damaged from that?"

No I won't. Ultimately on this issue every parent has to go with their gut. And it can't just be a gut reaction to the horror stories from either side. You can't just read about how a little boy was happy and healthy and energetic up until the point when he received the vaccine and became a vegetable. You can't just read the stories of how an unvaccinated kid got rubella and died a horrific death. You've actually got to do the research, listen to both sides and then listen to what your gut tells you.

For me, it boiled down to the fact that, immediate vaccine side effects aside, I feel my child - and the entire human race - is more at risk if she receives all her vaccines than if she doesn't. I trust God and nature and believe that our bodies were designed perfectly to combat the toxins of this world. I believe at best that vaccines are a good idea, but are inherently obsolete. I believe that in the time it takes to create a vaccine, a disease will have done it's worst. After all, there are no vaccines for the Black Plague, yet nobody gets that anymore. I believe at worst, the temporary immunity a vaccine might give my child will hurt her more in the long run. And on a global scale, I think little by little vaccines are weakening us. I fear for our survival several generations from now when our immune systems are ill equipped to deal with whatever new mutation comes along.

So I will not be vaccinating my children. The only remaining hurtle for us is a legal one. Though it sounds like it should be a minor one. Legally, it is unconstitutional to require anybody to receive a vaccine. Though, depending on the state, the constitutionality varies. Some states require that you show a medical necessity for not vaccinating, while in others you can simply say, "I don't want it," and they'll respect your wishes. Most states allow a religious exemption. Christian Scientists after all view any medical intervention as against their religion.

Lauren and I cannot claim any legitimate religious reasoning for not wanting to vaccinate our child. Fortunately for us, Pennsylvania in their "religion" clause also allows for a "strong moral conviction similar to a religious belief." Basically if we are morally opposed to vaccines, we need only turn in a written statement as such, referencing the appropriate Pennsylvania code when they ask for our child's immunization record.

That's what we're told anyway. We'll see if it's that easy when she registers for Kindergarten. We'll see if it's that easy when she applies for college. We'll see if it's that easy when she tries to get a job in a hospital or overseas or in any other type of job where they "require" vaccinations.

We'll see.