Thread: Should MMR jabs be compulsory?

Originally Posted by chocolate_frog

Originally Posted by rampant

As a side note: imagine what would happen if all the anti-vaccine parents had all their children at the same school. I shudder to think what would happen.

If you bring in the rule that they have to have the jab to go to a state school, then you would surely produce such a facility?

They can pay for their children's education of of their own pockets.

Strangely enough the majority of vaccine refuseniks come from a certain demographic, the "Creative Aspirants" and middle classes (often those who pay for educationI believe a certain institute does exits for them known as the Waldorf Steiner School. But I digress.







http://www.badscience.net/2009/02/lb...f-stephen-fry/

Originally Posted by flamingo

Homeworker, picasso and bovvy, its your kind of "the bloke in the pub told my brother" brand of science that is the cause of the current outbreak, and people like you will have the avoidable death's and brain damage on their hands.

Flamingo. You don't appear to have read my posts.

MMR is safe; a cost effective way to save lives & prevent handicap:

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/322/7279/130/b

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/art...?artid=1173183

Bad Science - Ben Goldacre

Read this, a thorough debunking of the MMR myth, amongst other examples of good scientific debunking.

But why should we bother we vaccination?
Take the polio virus as an example.

Wiki polio eradication

"In August 2003, rumors spread in some states in Nigeria that the vaccine caused sterility in girls, especially Kano. This resulted in the suspension of immunization efforts in the state, causing a dramatic rise in polio rates in the already endemic country. On June 30, 2004, after a 10-month ban on polio vaccinations, the WHO announced that Kano had pledged to restart the campaign in early July. During the ban the virus spread across Nigeria and into 12 neighboring countries that had previously been polio-free.[24] By 2006, this ban would be blamed for 1,500 children being paralyzed and had cost $450 million for emergency activities. In addition to the rumors of sterility and the ban by Nigeria's Kano state, civil war and internal strife in the Sudan and Ivory Coast have complicated WHO's polio eradication goal. In 2004, almost two-thirds all the polio cases in the world occurred in Nigeria (760 out of 1170 total)."

This virus was very nearly eradicated, almost at the point where vaccination could stop and nobody would ever contract polio again.

But one stupid, completely unfounded rumor goes busting in there and bam, 1500 kids are paralyzed and the virus lives on.

If we keep vaccinating, the MMR viruses will eventually go the way of polio- the herd immunity will eventually eradicate them.


Homeworker- totally responsible, yes, but also a really really stupid waste of money. Next time send it to me and I'll shower your kids with my healing spit.

There seems to be some consensus that the jab shouldn't be compulsory, but that it we might think it should be required to permit entry into state-funded education. But given the proven links between measles, mumps and rubella with severe disability and even death, does any parent have the right to stop their child from being vaccinated? Isn't a parent who won't vaccinate their child like the Jehovah's Witness parent who won't let their child have an operation? We tend to think that the courts should over-rule the latter: why not the former as well?

Another great reason for vaccination summed up in two little words:

SMALL POX



A disease that due to vaccination now only exists in a laboratory.

Originally Posted by _Artemis_

There seems to be some consensus that the jab shouldn't be compulsory, but that it we might think it should be required to permit entry into state-funded education. But given the proven links between measles, mumps and rubella with severe disability and even death, does any parent have the right to stop their child from being vaccinated? Isn't a parent who won't vaccinate their child like the Jehovah's Witness parent who won't let their child have an operation? We tend to think that the courts should over-rule the latter: why not the former as well?

A very good point. Maybe we should, with smoking/obesity for example the health issues mainly impact on the individual it is a life style choice for them. However with the question in hand, vaccination, and the issue you propose this where people are making decisions that impact on the another person's life. They deny the other's choice of life.

If you you choose not to vaccinate your child, you endanger not only your child but their friends and more children beside.

Picking up on your last point, Rampant, there seem to be several classes of harm which might affect others:

1) Actions which hurt or risk hurting yourself, and when that hurt doesn't cost the State anything (e.g. someone who does very risky sports but who has full private health cover and life insurance).
2) As above, but when one has no cover, and so will cost the State to care for you (e.g. heavy smokers, drinkers and other drug users).
3) Actions which harm or risk harm to one of your dependents (e.g. not allowing your child to have an operation it needs).
4) As above, but which also harm or risk harm to non-dependent others (e.g. not allowing your child to be vaccinated).

We'd have to be pretty paternalistic not to allow type-1) actions, but there are good arguments for banning 2) and 4), and I believe good arguments for banning 3) as well. Does a parent have the right to do (or not to do) something which harms their child, even though they may have (or think they have) strong reasons for doing so?

Originally Posted by Doc1701

Originally Posted by Biscuits_AB

Originally Posted by chocolate_frog

Originally Posted by Biscuits_AB

This was asked on Question Time last night. Personally I believe that they should be mandatory. Why the f*ck should people be allowed to risk the health of other people's kids?

How do they risk other people's kids?

A child who has a MMR jab is not going to catch measles, mumps or rubella.

A child who hasn't had the jab IS at risk... but the parents chose to take that risk inthe first place.

The only way for there to be NO risk would be to only have ONE child who wasn't immunised in each school.

Exactly.

Exactly wrong, actually.

Immunisations aren't 100 % effective; never have been, never will be. The trick to it is to give everyone the shots so that almost everyone ends up at least moderately resistant to the disease, so there are too few susceptible individuals for an epidemic to get hold.

If you allow things like the MMR scare to spread, or if you allow single vaccines to replace them (I'll explain in a mo) then the percentage of immunity goes down, and you then have the health service taking care of people who got sick when they never should have done; in the case of rubella you have deformed kids which need care for life to look after, which is a hell of a financial burden if nothing else.

The reason you have triple vaccines and not single ones is simple: even young kids are smart enough to learn that a trip to the doc is going to be painful. With triple vaccines, first time round they don't suspect a thing, second time for the booster they're getting a bit wary, then that's it; no more injections for a while.

With single vaccines, first time round they squeak a bit, second time squeak a bit more, third time they're getting to know the drill and put up a fuss on the way, fourth time its tantrums all the damn way in. Quite a few mothers will put up with all that, but a significant number will reason "Oh, everyone else will have had the jabs done, doesn't matter if this screaming horror misses out on a few".

This actually happened in the 1970s; a triple vaccine was replaced by single vaccines on safety grounds. Like I said, people skipped out on some, and quite a few kids ended up dying of whooping cough, PREVENTABLY dying of whooping cough, because of the alteration in vaccine types.

That's why MMR comes in triple form and needs to be nigh-on compulsory: people are complete bloody morons and their kids need protecting from their parents' stupidity. This is, BTW, a special case; I have nothing at all against adults dying because they're morons, I just don't like to see kids snuffing it because their parents are berks.

Exactly.

Originally Posted by rampant

Originally Posted by _Artemis_

There seems to be some consensus that the jab shouldn't be compulsory, but that it we might think it should be required to permit entry into state-funded education. But given the proven links between measles, mumps and rubella with severe disability and even death, does any parent have the right to stop their child from being vaccinated? Isn't a parent who won't vaccinate their child like the Jehovah's Witness parent who won't let their child have an operation? We tend to think that the courts should over-rule the latter: why not the former as well?

A very good point. Maybe we should, with smoking/obesity for example the health issues mainly impact on the individual it is a life style choice for them. However with the question in hand, vaccination, and the issue you propose this where people are making decisions that impact on the another person's life. They deny the other's choice of life.

If you you choose not to vaccinate your child, you endanger not only your child but their friends and more children beside.

And that last line sums it up. People may have the rght to decide to do whatever they wish with their own offspring, whether on personal or religious grounds and within the law, but what gives them the right, whilst exercising their 'rights', to impact upon the lives of others? Any such measure should be compulsory, in order to protect others, just as the offspring of those others have been immunised in order to protect yours. This isn't an infringement upon anyones rights, but refusal is an act of selfishness and stupidity on the part of those who put others at risk. Immunisation is there for a reason. It may not be perfect, it may on occasion also have irreversable side effects upon individuals, but we have a responsibility to others, not just to our own self centred selves.

No.

Yes.

Or make it an opt out by exception.

ie You can opt out, but it is up the parent to sign the waiver. to the effect that they are fully aware of the implications, medically, socially/to the community and legally.

On a legal front, the NHS should withdraw payment for treatment for those who have refused the jab (not those who have been refused on medical grounds).

Any outbreak of the diesease should be investigated, and should "patient 0" be un-vaccinated, charged with Biological GBH (like those nutters who spread Aids on purpose).

if anyone wants the real story on this from an expert in the field of infectious diseases, listen to the quackcast podcast.

link to episode explaining the whole vaccine situation.

Originally Posted by chocolate_frog

On a legal front, the NHS should withdraw payment for treatment for those who have refused the jab (not those who have been refused on medical grounds).

You then, quite literally, visit the sins of the fathers upon the sons: if a parent decides not to vaccinate little Jimmy, then, on your scheme, Jimmy won't get state funded treatment, even though it's not his fault he wasn't immunised.

Originally Posted by Biscuits_AB

People may have the rght to decide to do whatever they wish with their own offspring, whether on personal or religious grounds and within the law...

People don't have the right to do what they wish with their own offspring, though: children have to be educated, they can't be locked in cupboards (more's the pity) etc. In medical contexts, parents' decisions are frequently over-ruled by the courts. It would be pretty alarming if parents did have carte blanche to do whatever they liked - it would turn children into chattels, rather than beings with rights. So where should the balance be struck between State intervention necessary to protect children, and State interference with family life?