New discoveries are often met with skepticism or even opposition. Vaccines are not new to the medical world but even now there are people that are against sticking a needle of microbial material into a baby for reasons like citing the discredited Wakefield paper on the MMR vaccine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMR_vaccine_controversy) or a list of other reasons claiming they are harmful (http://drtenpenny.com/why-i-investigated-vaccines/).

Some of us have heard of the Disneyland Measles outbreak or Sherri Tenpenny having to cancel her scheduled talks in Australia (Tenpenny is an anti-vaccination proponent).

Nevertheless, anti-vaxxers have been going at it for a while, but they've as of late gained some media attention, especially after the measles outbreak.

What about everyone here? I'm personally 100% for vaccines (assuming no contraindications) although I will admit to never having glanced through the literature anti-vaxxers have presented for their arguments. There are posts on the Internet about paediatricians that will turn away parents that do not intend to vaccinate their children (and good on these doctors!) for the sake of other patients' safety. Then there is the other side, where doctors will also give their opinion on either delaying or forgoing vaccines (and with medical schools teaching unequivocally to vaccinate, I wonder how these guys got their MD / MBBS). And all the anti-vaxxers will latch on to every word these doctors say and claim their stance against vaccination is backed up by actual medical opinion.

The best comeback against anti-vaxxers I've heard is "so you'd rather want your kid dead than autistic?"

Yeah, despite the occasionally weird and polarizing opinions 'round these parts, I don't recall a single person on the board ever expressing an anti-vax agenda.

Also, (full title is "Anti-Vaxx mom abandons movement after all seven of her kids get whooping cough")

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/04/anti ... ing-cough/

I think it's terrible, a horrible infringement on free speech and generates a culture of fear and control.

The fact that anyone, anywhere, can hack into someone's computer and access their entire identity and then post it online is horrible. Expressing any views that are against the culture of the internet/4chan/tumblr resulting in your information spread in the name of "justice"? My god! What have we become! A nation of public shames and hackers! I'm not for a lot of opinions, but to hack their online stuff so others can find their personal lives? Despicable!

oh wait that's doxxing....

Anti-vaxxers are poor, misinformed people.

And they should probably get their kids taken away from them.

Bit xlxlxltreme over there, don't you think? Who exlxlxlactly is going to look after these kids? I don't want my taxlxlxl money going towards that shit.

that was unexlxlxlpectedly funny

If the government mandated all vaccines had to be administered by Whole Foods staff there would be a line of anti-vaxxers running for miles outside every store.

I'm 100% pro vaccines. At first, all I had to do is ask myself "who is against it?" to realize that vaccines bring more good than bad sides.

It's fucking insane. These parents are literally endangering both their own children, and the children around them. It's the single most harmful ant-science movement I can think of.

Not really a good "comeback" since it gives credence to the idea that vaccines can cause autism, which is completely false.

well right, but they believe it does - ergo - they wish their child was dead rather than autistic. I see where he's coming from.

Since the supposed link to autism has been so thoroughly debunked, some anti-vaxxers have adjusted tactics and actually go as far as suggesting that potentially fatal diseases can be of benefit to a child. Behold!

http://www.amazon.ca/Melanies-Marvelous ... 1466938897

"Melanie's Marvelous Measles was written to educate children on the benefits of having measles and how you can heal from them naturally and successfully."

Oh man, the reviews for that book are so cathartic to read in their anger. Great - and the book looks like pulsating, vile shit, too.

"Tiffany's Fantastic HPV was written to educate little girls on the benefits of having a greatly increased chance to develop cervical cancer that cannot be cured with science but with the power of prayers to almighty Jayzoos."

At first when I saw the book I was like but then I read the user comments and was like

Edit: Actually I feel kind of bad. Looking it up, it sounds like she'd lost a child from what she thought was an improperly administrated vaccine (He'd actually had a genetic disease that was more likely at fault).

I considered adding something like "assuming they do even though they don't", but thought that was an obvious premise and therefore rhetoric ballast. Vaccines not causing autism is trivial information, only according to anti-vaxxer dogma this information is a lie. It's not like there's a debate whether they cause autism, just a reasonable consensus that they don't and a group of people that ignore that reason. However, if those people can't be convinced that their basic assumptions are false, there's still the option to point out implications of their reasoning, which sets the context for the above comeback. So assuming contrafactually that vaccines do cause autism, but also prevent deadly diseases, and knowing this anti vaxxers still decide against vaccinating their kids - it would seem that they consider autists unworthy to live.

That book on Melanie's Marvellous Measles seems a little hard to take seriously. It feels just a bit too stupid to have been written with actual intent to convey a serious message.

The chances of dying from measles aren't that high (more common diseases that we have no vaccine for have greater potential to kill) but obviously we want to lower that chance to an absolute minimum or zero using whatever resource available. In this case, vaccines.

Apart from the fact it short of rips off the title of George's Marvellous Medicine insanely blatantly, I can't get even marginally pissed over this book (and the title rip off is more of a "Seriously? Think of a better title you twit" rather than anger), it feels almost like a troll publication.

Some people are so ignorant. We have evidence to the contrary, but people still insist that vaccines are bad. I'm pretty sure those are the same kind of people that say that global climate change is a "hoax". It's totally happening right now, people.

I dunno if climate change deniers and anti-vaxx cross over. it seems like anti-vaxx is largely an annoying privileged liberal thing and climate change is an across the board conservative thing.

What's pathetic, is that they typically aren't the "global warming is a hoax" kind of people, but the "I shop at whole foods because everything is 'organic'".

Make way for the new kind of 21st century scientific ignorance that has slowly awaken inside the households of many American people. We're no longer talking about southern trash who can't connect the ideas of excess CO2 emissions+rapid deforestation=changing climate. Rather, this is a rebellion against all "synthetic/artificial/not natures way/esc". The bad reputations for GMOs and vaccinations is all in the name of "nature is better than mankind and we need to stop dicking with nature".

..what a delusion to believe humanity and its creations is not part of nature.

Yeah there's absolutely no relationship between vaccine denial and climate change denial whatsoever. People who think vaccines cause autism are uniformly Whole Foods all-natural organic-only lefty Democrats who believe vaccines are a vast right-wing Big Pharma conspiracy; associated beliefs and practices include detox diets, GMO neanderthalism, and opposition to all chemicals ever, everywhere. People who think climate change is a lefty hoax to assert more government (and eventually UN) control over their lives are uniformly talk radio Republicans. There's a subset of libertarian-ish Republicans who don't think the government should (or even does to begin with) have the right to mandate vaccination in children, but they don't think it causes autism, ergo they aren't anti-vaxxers.

Okay, I must be mistaken. I would identify as liberal, but I totally disagree with those who believe that vaccines are harmful. I kinda think that GMO's are a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it could generate more foods for a growing population. On the other, I think there could be carcinogenic chemicals put into our foods that we have to look out for. There's carcinogenic chemicals in our soft drinks, so we're already at risk of cancer. I'm not entirely anti-chemicals, just so long as the benefits outweigh the risks.

I have two younger brothers with fairly severe autism, as well as medically diagnosed Asperger's syndrome myself (I despise people who self diagnose as having Asperger's), so I've got first hand experience when it comes to autism spectrum disorders. People who champion the idea that vaccines cause neurological disorders are horrible pieces of shit, in my opinion. There's zero link between autism and vaccines (or at least the MMR vaccine), and there's scientific evidence to prove that.

http://www.wcvb.com/health/no-link-betw ... s/32480462

This video fits with my cognitive biases!

Then you have people like my mother, who buy organic, donate to animal shelters and rarely uses chemicals while also thinking global warming is a lefty hoax. Though she's entirely pro-vaccination, at least.

Your mom sounds like my kind of woman!

Your mom is a lefty hoax. Democrats are using her to tarnish global warming denialism by making it appear to Republicans like it's associated with radical feminist vegan chemophobia, forever discrediting it in their eyes. Then they will vote for a carbon tax to spite liberals everywhere.

Clever girl.

I need this on a t-shirt.

How big in reality is the Anti Vaccine "movement"? I've only seen endless posts from the anti,anti vaccine movement. Seems to just be a few cheery picked cases Neil deGrasse Tyson et al. are ranting on.

Fucking ungrateful hippies, like the "raw" food crowd.

http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archi ... ns/380252/

I mean, the title alone should say a lot.

I don't know how big the anti-vaxxers are in each country, but I'm pretty certain the numbers will vary across countries. They're an annoying bunch to think about though.

There's also the "for choice" bunch that don't oppose vaccines directly but want to give the antis the right to choose not to vaccinate.

And I remember this picture from some time ago:
http://www.funnyjunk.com/Vaccinations+a ... es/5445303

This is always an interesting topic to mull over for me, because while I do not put myself on the "anti-vaxxer" side of things, it is worth noting that both my parents are hardcore anti-vaxxers (i.e. BOTH of them have discussed it with me individually and at family gatherings in an attempt to sway opinions, much to the dismay of everyone else at the table with a working internet connection). For this reason, I can feel traces of the opinion seeping through my blood sometimes--it's really hard to shake the things you were brought up with as a kid. A close friend of my mom's had an autistic son, and because of some complications that came about when he was born around the time he was getting vaccinated, she was absolutely convinced that a botched vaccine contributed to her son's condition. Keep in mind this was around 2001-02, at the height of that one disputed study's popularity, before it was thoroughly debunked. As far as I know she still retains that belief.

I think the problem with this discussion and the reason the answer seems so blitheringly obvious to most people is due to an ambiguity in what illnesses should be and should not be vaccinated. Obviously something like measles or smallpox makes perfect sense and I have no qualms with that being mandatory for children to have or something, but something as benign as the flu shouldn't really be a mandatory concern, should it? I mean, unless you're really old or have increased susceptibility to disease for whatever reason, most people's immune systems are pretty well equipped to deal with the flu either way so that doesn't really seem like it should be a mandatory thing. An all-or-nothing approach regarding this sort of issue is usually where the controversy lies. From what I know (though admittedly I try to avoid this discussion for the most part just because I was raised with the "wrong" viewpoint), there are lots of complications and side-effects that can arise from administering vaccines, too, so shouldn't there be some sort of a cutoff point based on the severity of the disease and its potential to spread?

If I sound like a total dipshit here, feel free to call me out on it because I'm honestly still pretty ambiguous on the matter entirely. The vaccinations I've received in my life have been only those that are absolutely mandatory, as my parents actively tried to prevent me from getting any other ones in my childhood. I've never had a problem with getting sick or anything, rarely miss school days and whatnot, but I know the "I didn't get vaccinations and I never got sick so I guess there's no point to them" argument is a terrible one. Trouble is, now that I'm an adult and can make my own decisions, I'm not really sure what I should and shouldn't get vaccinated for.

Also for the sake of discussion, here are a couple of anti-vaccination articles online that my mom sent me in the aforementioned attempt to convince me of the evil of Big Pharma or whatev. I haven't given them too close of a read (I have an exam in two hours, I shouldn't even be here responding to this haha) but from what I can tell they at the very least seem relatively informed in their stance. What do you guys think? I haven't looked too much into the sources, either, are they legitimate?

Here and Here

As much as I would like to dissect and then squash the arguments in the 2 linked articles, it would take time to review the papers and do a literature search to properly compare multiple studies, synopses and summaries etc on vaccines. I don't really have the research skills to do all of that, unfortunately.

If you're unsure what to be vaccinated for then I would recommend you visit a doctor and explain which vaccines you have got and what else might be required. You'll probably be asked about travel (because it is safest to vaccinate against specific illnesses endemic to countries if you going to be there often) and career (because certain professions like medicine require more vaccines than others).

Your location says Canada and I did a quick Google and this link is specifically if your immunization records are inadequate (either this means you lost the records or you weren't properly immunized, can't tell) http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/publicat/cig ... 03-eng.php

Anti-vaxxers have gone at it again though, now they're comparing injections to rape because both involve "penetration"
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/nation ... m=Facebook

I had a really interesting discussion on the subject with my girlfriend; she always has a very different outlook on things due to her completely different background.

Her point was that the anti-vaccination people are really, really privileged... Meaning that in these days when polio, whooping cough and other serious illnesses are still a rarity, the goofballs can afford to complain about the lack of choice and campaign against vaccines. Should the lack of herd immunity cause a major outbreak of, say, polio in one of the anti-vaccination strongholds, the people would immediately be willing to pay major bucks to get their kids vaccinated. And that's true. Seeing the neighbors' kids vomit around and suffocate because of whooping cough, or witnessing someone getting permanently crippled due to preventable polio will make the jennymccarthies of the world re-evaluate their choices, guaranteed.

What is lamentable about the situation is that the anti-vaxxers are essentially on their way to causing such an outbreak. Having the "informed" rich people and the dirty anti-everything hillbillies and hippies keep their kids clean of vaccines means that at some point, there's going to be a major outbreak of something. And unfortunately, it also means that the anti-vaccination movement will only come to an end with a pile of juvenile corpses.

What's even more pitiful is the fact that the people in the USA (yes, it's mostly a US thing) will also (probably unintentionally, but still) create breeding grounds for various diseases that could be eredicated. If people talk about "the American Taleban" in various contexts, it's worth noticing that as far as getting contagious diseases eredicated, the anti-vaxxers are doing exactly the same thing as Taleban and certain Muslim clergymen in the Horn of Africa: keeping the diseases alive and the vaccines necessary in the foreseeable future. You know, nobody needs a vaccine for smallpox nowadays... care to guess why?


Big enough to cause major urban areas in the USA to lose herd immunity. That's big enough, IMO.

Very unfortunately, there's also a bunch of people that think in this manner:
- Don't have the (preventable by vaccine) disease, like measles/poliomyelitis/pertussis? Good.
- Caught the disease? Good! Because "when" you recover, you'll be immune forever and it's like getting the vaccine except without all the "risks" and the immunization from the disease will be better.

There's a lot of idiots out there that got deceived by nonsense on the Internet and once they see how truly terrible the experience of pertussis or meningococcal meningitis out there (especially if their kid gets it) they'll be shocked straight back into reality. But the above-mentioned group of hardliners are in a whole new realm of stupidity where they think getting the actual illness is the best way to be immune, if ever they did get the illness. I suppose they forgot about the fact that some of these illnesses have a good chance at crippling or killing the host.

I can confirm that within the passed several years I have not got a flu shot and still have yet to catch a serious flu (probably like a cold or something).

wash your hands and keep proper hygene