Evan Burton

A number of people have found problems with Internet Explorer 10 and this version of the Forum (IP Board 3.3.1). I certainly have issues; I am unable to create a new paragraph whenever I post. Is anyone else having problems with IE10 and the Forum? Thank you.

In Australia and New Zealand, today - 25 April - is ANZAC Day. Lest we forget.

I think a lot of people here might benefit from listening to this.

Like has been said - no citations.

Steven,

Don't forget to write in LARGE LETTERS and COLOURED FONT to show you are serious and have credibility.

Hi Ken - Welcome to the Zoo!

Just kidding - hope you enjoy yourself here and find valuable information or opinions.

I've always appreciated the irony of groups like Natural Newsa nd their ilk: "Don't listen to Big Pharma! They just want your money! Instead, buy my latest book where I expose how the government is trying to kill you. Don't forget to purchase the bonus DVD for only $5.99 extra...".

John,

Do you remember Dana McCaffery? She was born in a NSW area where the AVN (anti-vax group) was prevalent. Parents stopped getting vaccinations, herd immunity was lost in that area and there was an outbreak of pertussis - whopping cough FFS! In this day and age, whooping cough broke out in NSW! Little Dana was only 32 days old and thus too young to be vaccinated.

She died from pertussis.

This is what happens when people don't get vaccinated: people die.

In 15 or 20 years, my own immune system is going to be weakened and I won't be able to fight off diseases like this. My only defence against them is herd immunity, so that the disease cannot take hold in the community in the first place. This means we should be aiming for a vaccination rate of 90% or preferably more.

This will also affect you - you'll have to rely on herd immunity, so you have a dog in this fight too.

Oh – I forgot to answer your question regarding the double blind trials.

First off, you obviously just read what you wanted to, because the questions was answered:

http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1276/has-any-peer-reviewed-double-blind-study-been-made-on-any-vaccine-regarding-effi

and

http://www.skepticalob.com/2009/10/latest-argument-of-vaccine.html

and

http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.0010033

and

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10493337

and

http://www.lancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(96)06255-1/abstract

Amazing what you can find if you actually search for it.

So, Steven: where exactly did I say: "I want governments to read all e-mails"? The worst I said was "First off, I don't really have a problem with most forms of surveillance when it comes to security." Once more you demonstrate that you are incapable of rational debate. People say one thing and you claim they said something else.

You really are dangerous // BURTON

Golly its you who want to let the government look at all emails.

I just want vaccine choice.GAAL

,

expect me to start shoving facts and reality into your world. // Burton

GOLLY, IMHO BURTON WOULD MAKE A WONDERFUL COMMUNIST COMMISSAR ,Gaal

Sorry Steven; I forgot to put the [sarcasm] [/sarcasm] tags on it. You see, you’re an anti-vaxxer and you may not know it but there is a minority amongst you whose foolish delusions include the notion that vaccination actually doesn’t work…. thus my sarcasm.

Anti-vaxxers are different from what I would call the fringe groups of society. You can have your 9-11 truthers, moon hoaxers, chemtrail believers, whatever; they can have their beliefs and reality will keep chugging along without a care…. but anti-vaxxers, well you actually pose a threat to public health. You really are dangerous. People listen to the lies put out by the AVN, Wakefield, etc and don’t get vaccinated. That affects herd immunity meaning that people that can’t be vaccinated for whatever reasons are now put at risk and diseases that were once considered to be eradicated are now resurfacing in the general population.

I don’t give a damn about you but when your fantasies affect myself and others, expect me to start shoving facts and reality into your world.

You expect people to believe an anti-vaccination website on vaccination issues? A website that pushes "natural" cures and methods? I'm sure you can show that vaccines don't work, right?

VACCINATION PROGRAM SUCCESS

One of the basic human “needs” is the desire for simplicity. We have limited cognitive resources, and when we feel overwhelmed by complexity one adaptive strategy is to simplify things in our mind. This can be useful as long as we know we are oversimplifying. Problems arise when we mistake our schematic version for reality.

In this same vein we also like our narratives to be morally simple, so there is a tendency to replace the complex shades of gray with black and white. This is perhaps related to cognitive dissonance theory. We have a hard time reconciling how someone can be both good and bad, or how a good person can do bad things. So there is also a tendency to see people as all good or all bad. We can transcend these tendencies with maturity and wisdom, but that takes work.

A good example of the desire for simple moral clarity is the anti-vaccine movement. Their world is comprised of white hats and black hats (guess which one they perceive themselves as wearing), as evidenced by the blog posts and comments over at Age of Autism. There is a certain demand for purity of thought and message that seems to be getting worse over time in a self-reinforcing subculture. Many now see their struggle in apocalyptic terms.

The desire for simplicity even extends to factual claims. They oppose vaccination, and so they tend to make every argument against vaccines possible – even arguing, against all the evidence, that vaccines do not work. If vaccines were effective but carried significant risks, that would cause a genuine dilemma (cognitive dissonance). But if vaccines are both ineffective and risky, there is no dilemma, the cognitive dissonance is resolved, and the brain is given a nice dose of dopamine as a reward.

This means that defenders of science-based medicine have to counter anti-vaccine propaganda stating that vaccines do not work. For example, the data on measles is overwhelmingly clear, but this has not stopped vaccine deniers from distorting the data to argue that measles just happened to decline all on its own. It’s a massive exercise in not seeing the forest for the trees. Deniers look for anomalies in the data (usually artifacts of data collection) and then use that to call the big picture into question. Or they confuse death rates with incidence rates (death rates can decline just by improvements in medical care – this does not mean that the spread of the disease was decreasing). Meanwhile the big picture is dramatically clear – vaccine introduction lines up nicely with plummeting disease incidence.

So forgive us if we take the time to point out when further evidence comes to light that vaccines are effective public health measures. A recent study published in Pediatrics reviews the evidence for the effect of the varicella (chicken pox) vaccine on varicella-related deaths. They found:

During the 12 years of the mostly 1-dose US varicella vaccination program, the annual average mortality rate for varicella listed as the underlying cause declined 88%, from 0.41 per million population in 1990–1994 to 0.05 per million population in 2005–2007. The decline occurred in all age groups, and there was an extremely high reduction among children and adolescents younger than 20 years (97%) and among subjects younger than 50 years overall (96%). In the last 6 years analyzed (2002–2007), a total of 3 deaths per age range were reported among children aged 1 to 4 and 5 to 9 years, compared with an annual average of 13 and 16 deaths, respectively, during the prevaccine years.

That’s an impressive decline, if the absolute numbers are low. But when you are talking about childhood deaths, any reduction is welcome. Although it was not covered in this study, other studies also have looked at varicella incidence and hospitalizations, also finding a dramatic decrease. For example:

The vaccination program reduced disease incidence by 57% to 90%, hospitalizations by 75% to 88%, deaths by >74%, and direct inpatient and outpatient medical expenditures by 74%.

All of this data is also with the single doses vaccine, which was found not to produce adequate antibody levels in some children. The current recommendation is for a second follow up dose to boost immunity levels. It is probable that the two-dose vaccine will produce even more impressive results.

And so as not to oversimplify the picture – the varicella vaccine did come with a possible unintended consequence. Previous generations were often exposed to chicken pox in children throughout their life, resulting in a natural immunity booster. With the near elimination of chicken pox due to the vaccine, older adults have waning immunity and this has possibly led to an increase in herpes zoster. Once infected with varicella the virus is never completely eliminated from the body. It goes dormant in the dorsal root ganglia (packets of sensory nerve cells just outside the spinal cord) and can be reactivated later in life. It’s possible that decreasing antibody levels in older adults who are no longer getting exposed to cases in children are allowing more cases of zoster to occur.

The data on this is currently mixed. Models predict an increase, but actual surveillance has produced unclear results. The worst case scenario is that the older generation will experience an increase in herpes zoster, but this will be a temporary effect as the next generation will never have had chicken pox due to the vaccine. There is also available a varicella zoster vaccine to reduce the risk of zoster in the at risk generation.

Conclusion

There is a large and growing body of scientific data from which we can draw a few very reliable conclusions. Vaccines work. The general concept is sound, and specific vaccines have clearly been effective in significantly reducing (and in two cases eliminating) infectious disease. They are not risk free, but the incidence of adverse events is orders of magnitude lower than the benefits of the available vaccines.

We need to continue active surveillance of vaccine safety and effectiveness, as well as tight regulation of vaccine manufacturing. Vaccines are an important public health intervention, and we need to watch the vaccine program closely.

Despite this, vaccine opponents have continued to argue that vaccines are not safe or effective. Thankfully the data is so clear that the public is largely ignoring them.

TOXIC MYTHS ABOUT VACCINES

Ever since there have been vaccines, there has been an antivaccination movement. It began shortly after Edward Jenner discovered how to use the weaker cowpox virus to induce long-lasting immunity to smallpox, there has been resistance to the concept of vaccination, a resistance that continues to this very day. Reasons for this resistance have ranged from religious, to fear of injecting foreign substances, to simple resistance to the government telling people what to do. Some fear even the infitessimally small risk that vaccines pose for the benefit of resistance to disease far more than they fear the diseases themselves, a result of the very success of modern vaccines. Of course, vaccines, like any other medical intervention, are not without risks, making it easy for them to jump on any hint of harm done by vaccines, whether real or imagined, even though vaccines are among the very safest of treatments.

One of the biggest myths that antivaccinationists believe and like to use to stoke the fear of vaccines is the concept that they are full of “toxins.” The myth that mercury in the thimerosal preservative commonly used in vaccines in the U.S. until early 2002 was a major cause of autism is simply the most recent bogeyman used to try to argue that vaccines do more harm than good, as was the scare campaign engineered in response to Andrew Wakefield’s poor science claiming a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. Now that study after study have failed to find or corroborate a link between thimerosal in vaccines or vaccines in general and autism to the point where even the most zealous of zealots are having a hard time defending the claim that mercury in vaccines cause autism any more, predictably the campaign against vaccines has fallen back on the old “toxins” myth. If you peruse antivaccinationist websites, it won’t take long to find articles claiming that vaccines are full of the most terrifying and nasty toxins. Examples in the media abound as well. For example, Jenny McCarthy, comic actress and former Playboy Playmate who has been doing the talk show and publicity circuit lately to plug her book in which she claims that vaccines caused her son’s autism and that she was able to cure it with “biomedical” interventions and diet, recently gave an interview in which she said:

What I really am is “anti-toxins” in the vaccines. I do believe that there is a correlation between vaccinations and autism. I don’t think it’s the sole cause, but I think they’re triggering–it’s triggering–autism in these kids. A really great example is…is, sometimes obesity can trigger diabetes. I do believe that vaccines can trigger autism…It’s so much more than just mercury. That is one ingredient in the recipe of autism…I’m talking about all of them. I’m calling for cleaning out the toxins. People don’t realize that there is aluminum, ether, antifreeze, still mercury, in the shots…People are afraid of secondhand smoke, but they’re OK with injecting the second worst neurotoxin on the planet in newborns.

Another example of what I sometimes call the “toxin gambit” comes from Deirdre Imus, wife of shock jock Don Imus, with both husband and wife being well-known and reliable media boosters of the claim that vaccines somehow cause autism:

So, where are the evidenced based (conflict free) studies that prove the safety of these “trace” amounts and proof that there are “no biological effects” of any amount of mercury being injected into our children and pregnant moms? Also, where are the evidence based studies proving the safety of vaccines given to pregnant moms and our children that contain other toxins such as aluminum and formaldehyde?

The most recent example of this tactic comes from an organization called Generation Rescue, which just last week ran a full-page ad in USA Today, paid for in part by Jenny McCarthy and her present boyfriend Jim Carrey:

Besides being one of the most egregious examples of a post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy that I’ve ever seen from an antivaccination site, this Generation Rescue ad demonstrates clearly a new strategy (or, more properly, a resurrection of an old technique) now that science is coming down conclusively against mercury in vaccines as a cause of autism, a strategy of propagating fear by linking vaccines with “toxins.” So what’s the real story? Are there really deadly toxins in vaccines that parents should be worried about?

To answer this question, I thought I’d use what to me is arguably the most amazingly over-the-top examples of this strategy of listing “toxins” in vaccines as a jumping off point. This example is embodied in a post by one Kent Heckenlively writing for the Age of Autism blog entitled FDA Says A-OK: Vaccine Ingredients from A to Z. This post examines a list taken straight from the CDC website of ingredients found in vaccines besides the bacterial or viral proteins designed to evoke the protective immune response and tries to scare parents about almost every one. Of course, nearly all of these comparisons fail to acknowledge that time-honored pharmacological principle that “the dose makes the poison” and extrapolate horrible consequences known to occur during prolonged exposure or exposure to large amounts to the tiny amounts in vaccines. That’s exactly what Mr. Heckenlively does to what is, I must say, a truly ridiculous level. However, as patently ridiculous as Mr. Heckenlively’s post is, I believe that it is not a straw man and still worth starting the discussion with because it serves almost as a reductio ad absurdum concentration of actual arguments that antivaccinationists make about “toxins” in vaccines. A few examples, starting with these, will readily show you what I mean:

Neomycin is used as an anti-bacterial. It is also nephrotoxic and can cause kidney damage.

And:

Polymyxin B is used as an anti-bacterial. It binds to the cell membrane and alters its structure, making it more permeable. The resulting water uptake leads to cell death. Side effects include neurotoxicity and acute renal tubular necrosis.

And:

Streptomycin is used as an anti-bacterial. Streptomycin stops bacterial growth by damaging cell membranes and inhibiting protein synthesis. Specifically, it binds to the 16S rRNA of the bacterial ribosome, interfering with the binding of formyl-methionyl-tRNA to the 30S subunit. This prevents initiation of protein synthesis. Humans have structurally different ribosomes from bacteria, thereby allowing the selectivity of this antibiotic for bacteria. Streptomycin cannot be given orally, but must be administered by regular intramuscular injection. An adverse effect of this medicine is oto-toxicity. It can result in permanent hearing loss.

All of this is true but highly deceptive. Why? The recommended dosage of streptomycin for the treatment of various infections is 20-40 mg/kg per day, for a maximum of 1 g per day! Why is this relevant? Because every vaccine given to a child during his entire life probably doesn’t even come anywhere near 1 mg, that’s why. Antibiotics like streptomycin and neomycin are used in cell culture medium at low concentrations to suppress the growth of bacteria. The reason that these antibiotics are listed is because they’re used in culturing the cells necessary to grow the viruses used in making vaccines. By the time the vaccine is made, these antibiotics are only present in trace amounts, nowhere near enough to cause renal toxicity or ototoxicity, which only occurs with use at or above the range of the doses listed above. I suspect that Mr. Heckenlively knows this too but only mentions it because he knows it will scare parents. Indeed, he takes this sort of distortion to a truly comical extreme with this example:

Sucrose is used as a stabilizer. Over-consumption of sucrose has been linked with some adverse health effects. The most common is dental caries or tooth decay, in which oral bacteria convert sugars (including sucrose) from food into acids that attack tooth enamel. When a large amount of foods that contain a high percentage of sucrose is consumed, beneficial nutrients can be displaced from the diet, which can contribute to an increased risk for chronic disease. It has been suggested that sucrose-containing drinks may be linked to the development of obesity and insulin resistance.

Does Heckenlively honestly think that the baby is eating the vaccine or that there’s kilogram upon kilogram of sucrose in vaccines? Using Mr. Heckenlively’s logic, I could say that because there’s the chelation agent EDTA used in some vaccines as a preservative babies could use it as a treatment for heavy metal poisoning. Sadly, Mr. Heckenlively is not alone in using such distortions to attack vaccines. For example, here are some even more deceptive statements on other such antivaccinationist lists as well about other vaccine ingredients:

Sodium Hydroxide (also known as lye, caustic soda, soda lye.) Is corrosive and is an Eye, skin and respiratory irritant. Can burn eyes, skin and internal organs. Can cause lung and tissue damage, blindness and can be fatal if swallowed. Found in oven cleaners, tub and tile cleaners, toilet bowl cleaners and drain openers.

And:

Hydrochloric acid: CAN DISTROY TISSUE UPON DIRECT CONTACT! Found in aluminum cleaners and rust removers.

Neglected is the simple chemical observation that these effects depend upon the pH of these acids and bases. The reason they’re used in vaccines is to adjust the pH of the vaccine to neutral. The person who wrote these things clearly doesn’t understand the basic concept of pH. Does she honestly think that the pH of vaccines is either 0 (very acid) or 14 (very basic)? Moreover, sodium hydroxide, when it neutralizes an aqueous acid solution will simply form the sodium salt of whatever the anion was in the acid. Hydrochloric acid will form the chloride salt with whatever cation was in the base. When sodium hydroxide or hydrochloric acid are used, one to neutralize the other, the result is an NaCl solution of neutral pH: common table salt.

Of course, this list does contain a number of chemicals that do sound really scary. However, if you remember the pharmacological principle that “the dose makes the poison,” they are much less so. These chemicals are all present at extremely low concentrations in vaccines, certainly not at any dangerous levels. Moreover, some of the fearmongering about such seemingly scary toxins betrays a serious lack of understanding of basic chemistry.

I trust science. It is a self-correcting system. Yes, some studies can be corrupted... but the overall independence of science means you can't hide the truth. That's why I mock the (what I consider to be) rubbish that Steven chooses to champion.

https://www.change.o...-open-dealey-pl

isn't working

KK

That's because the link has been incorrectly copied. Can you point to the original?

Hell, I'm putting on my tin-foil hat to stop the CIA mind-control waves!

That's great.

Thank you Mark and Riley!

Jim,

Thomas raises a fair point here. Can you please explain? It seems to me your have skirted too close - if not over - the line.

Welcome Lindsay,

Hope you enjoy the place and it proves valuable to you. You can call me Evan, The Provocateur, Evil Right Wing Power Mad Would be Dictator or Dr Depravo (and his evil assistant Whirlpool).... whatever suits your mood.

Cheers!

Wow! Randy, you will have a wealth of experience and viewpoint to add to the Forum. Welcome!

All - the use of the term "Fetzering" is banned, as it is considered to be a personal attack.

Additionally, a reminder that the motives of a board member in posting here are not to be questioned.

Lastly, if you are going to accuse anyone of a falsehood or misdeed, be VERY judicious in how you phrase such. Our STRONG advice is to check with the Mods first, or better yet, don't do it at all.