Vaxxed: From Coverup to Catastrophe, the anti-vaccination film directed by the discredited anti-vaccine activist Andrew Wakefield, will be showing all this week at the Guild 45th in Wallingford.
Wakefield made headlines back in 1998 when he published a paper in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet demonstrating a connection between the MMR vaccine and autism. In 2010, the article was retracted by the Lancet in the light of evidence that Wakefield had fabricated data for his article and that he had “financial conflicts of interest” associated with his claims. His medical license was revoked in the UK, but Wakefield has remained a hero to the anti-vaccination movement.
While Wakefield alone isn’t to blame for the spread of the autism-vaccine myth (hat tip to Jenny McCarthy for doing her bit, too), Wakefield’s singular contribution to the death of children worldwide should not be underestimated. Whooping cough (pertussis), for example, is back on the rise after being nearly wiped out due to the widespread refusal by parents to have their children vaccinated.
According to the CDC, “during 2012, 48,277 cases of pertussis were reported to CDC, including 20 pertussis-related deaths. This was the most reported cases since 1955.” The graph at right shows the rise in whooping cough cases following Wakefield’s Lancet article.
Vaxxed was produced by Del Bigtree, formerly a producer of Doctors, a daytime US talk show, of which the British Medical Journal warned: “Consumers should be skeptical about any recommendations provided … as details are limited and only a third to one half of recommendations are based on believable or somewhat believable evidence.”
As Sarah Gill of The Age notes, “It’s not a stretch to say that the title of this new film could well describe the shenanigans of Wakefield himself in the late `90s – the cover-up being the secret contract with lawyers who paid him to construct a case against the MMR, and the catastrophe, of course, the worldwide slump in vaccination… There is something profoundly ironic about Wakefield pointing to the commercial interests of the pharmaceutical industry or accusing the CDC of data manipulation when you consider his own undisclosed financial interests behind the 1998 Lancet study and his role in what has been called one of the most flagrant frauds in medical history.”
Variety magazine describes it as a “slickly produced but scientifically dubious hodgepodge of free-floating paranoia,” so grab some popcorn and a surgical mask and head on over to the Landmark for some close quarters time with a vaccine-free audience.
(Thanks to Michele for the tip, though it did not lead to the article she perhaps hoped for.)
Did you see the movie? Have you read Dr. Wakefield’s original study in the Lancet? Clearly not as this article is comprised of inflammatory opinions with no credible facts or data to back it. Sighting Wikipedia, really?vRepeating what other media sources have reported is not investigative journalism by any stretch.
Let’s look at some facts:
Vaxxed is not focusing on Dr. Andrew Wakefield.
Vaxxed is about the CDC Whistleblower, Senior Scientist Dr. William Thompson.
Dr. Thompson came forward to admit his part in manipulating data in a study that he co-authored to cover up a statistically significant in autism occurring in Black boys when the MMR vaccine was given before 36 months of age.
“My name is William Thompson. I am a Senior Scientist with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where I have worked since 1998.
I regret that my coauthors and I omitted statistically significant information in our 2004 article published in the journal Pediatrics. The omitted data suggested that African American males who received the MMR vaccine before age 36 months were at increased risk for autism. Decisions were made regarding which findings to report after the data were collected, and I believe that the final study protocol was not followed.”
Vaxxed looks at the way that data was manipulated and how the study was changed part way through the to reduce the outcome.
Vaxxed talks about VAERS (Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System) https://vaers.hhs.gov/index and how to help parents navigate that system.
Vaxxed explains vaccine court: http://www.nvic.org/injury-compensation.aspx
If your child has a doctor documented vaccine reaction, as mine has, you cannot sue the vaccine manufacturer. If your child immediately spikes a fever, seizes and dies in the doctors office after receiving their vaccines, you cannot go back to the manufacturer for any accountability. They are 100% free of liability. Instead you go to vaccine court. When you win your case it is not the vaccine manufacturer that pays out that money. It is you and me, the tax payers. We pay when vaccine manufacturers are found guilty of negligence.
Vaxxed explains how vaccines are brought to market. With all medications there are studies that can take years to get a new drug on the market. The gold standard in double blind placebo studies. Vaccines are not held to that standard. They are brought to the market with, in comparison, very little research.
As you can see, Vaxxed is about much more than Dr. Andrew Wakefield and one study.
It will be showing at the Guild 45th Theater in Wallingford through Thursday June, 23rd. Showings for today, Sunday June 19th are 2:00pm, 4:15pm, 7:00pm and 9:45pm. Monday-Thursday it will be shown at 4:15pm, 7:00pm and 9:45pm. I urge everyone to see the film.
Snopes on that:
http://www.snopes.com/medical/disease/cdcwhistleblower.asp
Is it safe for me to attend? Specifically, will those who live with unvaccinated children be in attendance? I have newborn twins and don’t want to put their safety at risk.
ScottyHufflepuff,
You and your children are coming in to contact with unvaccinated people on a daily basis. Any adult that hasn’t maintained their boosters is effectively unvaxxed. Immune compromised children are either unvaxxed or out of date. Those undergoing cancer treatments are unvaxxed or that have recently received a bone marrow transplant. The reason the latter are unvaccinated is because their immune systems can’t take the hit the live virus vaccines take on their bodies. Or the adjuvants used.
So yes, you may encounter unvaccinated or less than fully vaccinated individuals at the Vaxxed showing, but not anymore than you do in day to day life.
I hope this information helps and you are able to see the film.
I see, so I should be concerned about the overall load of unvaccinated neighbors. Got it. Damn those immune compromised kids and those undergoing cancer treatment that can’t tolerate vaccines. What can the rest of us healthy people do to keep each other safe from communicable disease? Vaccinate?
Scientists disagree on why pertussis is making a comeback, and while the a rise in unvaccinated children may play a role, there is also evidence that pertussis is being spread by recently vaccinated children! http://www.webmd.com/children/vaccines/features/whooping-cough-rising-despite-new-vaccine. The vaccine may prevent the disease, but not transmission. So in fact, newborns or immunocompromised people who cannot be vaccinated may actually be more at risk from being around recently vaccinated children than those not vaccinated. Further, it is now known that the pertussis vaccine wears off after a couple years, so even vaccinated people are at risk of contracting or spreading the disease. Some scientists believe that the bacteria causing pertussis has evolved to be more virulent, perhaps because of over-vaccination. https://www.statnews.com/2016/01/12/why-whooping-cough-rise/. These issues aren’t just a cause for concern in the case of pertussis. There is evidence that recently vaccinated individuals can actually spread measles and other illnesses. For this reason the John Hopkins Center until recently had on their website a recommendation that immunocompromised individuals avoid contact with those recently vaccinated. http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2015/03/24/recently-vaccinated-individuals-spread-disease.aspx. For this reviewer to blame Dr. Wakefield for the deaths of children is inflammatory and irresponsible. Children have died or received severe complications from vaccine reactions. Do the research.
http://www.nvic.org/vaccines-and-diseases/Vaccinations–Know-the-risks-and-failures-.aspx.
I urge you to go see this film, and draw your own conclusions.
I would have more faith in the “do the research” crowd’s advice if they showed any evidence of their research informing them about things like the difference between an attenuated live vaccine (like MMR) and acellular pertussis (not live, can’t cause infection).
For those that are somehow on the fence here, may I suggest The Vaccine Page on Facebook? https://www.facebook.com/thevaccinepage/
Dr. Wakefield’s original study was retracted, before he lost his medical license … but I’m sure you can find it on the interwebs if you want to make yourself misinformed about MMR.
As for sourcing, Wikipedia is in another world of credibility compared to nvic.org – puhlease.
VAERS? It has its role but then again it has documented reactions such as the flu shot turning one man into the Incredible Hulk and is a favorite for plaintiff’s lawyers, so best not to “do your own research” in VAERS.
Thompson? Eh. Incompetent stats, ensnared by the Hooker/Wakefield crowd, a sad story but really all smoke no fire.
These arguments have gotten so tiresome but since this is local it seemed worth the time to post some corrections. Shame on the Guild – what’s next, a Flat Earth / Climate Denial double-header?
I fully expected conspiracy theorists and the paranoid would be coming out of the woodwork to comment on your post, and I was right. Next do a post about fluoridated water, I dare you. 😀
Please let’s keep the tone respectful. To raise concerns about product safety and government transparency hardly makes one a conspiracy theorist or paranoid. Vaccine safety concerns are being raised by informed people on both sides of the political spectrum, and bear no relationship to climate-change denial. If these concerns prove founded, it won’t be the first time in history that the weight of established scientific authority has been wrong. 19th century Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis was ridiculed and vilified in his lifetime for making the radical suggestion that doctors should wash their hands before delivering babies. His assertions were perceived as dangerous because they challenged pervading medical practices and implicated doctors in the deaths of thousands of mothers who died after child-birth in Europe’s finest hospitals. After his death, germ theory proved him right. To rely on second-hand media sources is to be uninformed. To rely on government assurances of safety, when our government is liable for vaccine injury compensation and therefore not a disinterested party, is naïve.
As the mother of a 15 year old with regressive autism spectrum disorder, I’ve been following the developing science in the autism field for 13 years. Although I’m trained as a lawyer, not a doctor, I’ve been to scientific conferences and regularly read peer-reviewed, journal-pubished scientific articles and abstracts on the latest developments in autism research. Am I convinced that vacciines cause autism? Certainly not. Is it plausible that they may trigger autism in genetically suspectible individuals? Yes. Here’s why.
1) Although some babies are born with autism, it is now uncontroverted that there is such a thing as “regressive autism”.
2) The classic view that autism was genetically predetermined is being replaced by an epigenetic view, in which, it is believed, environmental triggers may cause autism in genetically susceptible individuals.
3) A growing body of scientific research points to autism as a chronic inflammatory condition. Studies have found immune system irregularities and impaired detoxification in inidividuals with autism. Taken together, these point to a paradign in which autism may be triggered in susceptible individuals by any one or more of a variety of environmental insults, including toxins in the birth mother or the environment; antiobitic use causing dysbiosis; viral or other pathogens; and (plausibly) vaccines, because of the vaccine components themselves, toxic additives in the vaccines and/or because giving too many vaccines at once overwhelms an infant’s developing immune system. Under this paradigm, it’s not a question of whether it’s thimerosal (which has now been removedformmostvaccines without bringing down autism rates) or the MMR, but rather whether a developing immune system can handle the onslaught of multiple stressors. Factors, which have been found to be correlated with a higher incidence of autism, such as low vitamin D in autistic children and mothers of autistic children go to the immune system and detoxification. (They also explain why it’s possible that autism could be more easily triggered in African Americans, who do not absorb vitamin D as readily from the sun. For example, rates of autism are disproportionally high among Somali immigrants living in Minnesota)
4) Vaccines can cause harm. Two prior versisn of the MMR were withdrawn in the 1980s because they caused meningitis. Our government has paid out billion of dollars in compensation to vaccine-injured individuals. In several cases, our government and others have conceded that the MMR triggered autistic symptoms.
5) Thousands upon thousands of parents have reported that their children developed a high fever followed by autistic regression immediately their MMR shot, often given in combination with other vaccines. Critics make the argument that correlation does not mean causation and that other factors could be responsible for the sudden regression. But I have yet to hear a story about a child who suddenly regressed into autism the night or week BEFORE the MMR. The first rule of medicine is listen to your patient. Parental reports, though anecdotal, should not be ignored, but rather, should be an impetus for further inquiry.
People blame the “anti-vaxxers” for lowering vaccine rates and the loss of herd immunity, but if we could only turn our attention away from name calling to unbiased scientific research, we could find the answers to make our vaccine programs safer and re-establish public trust so that we wouldn’t need coercive laws, which deprive people of our most cherished fundamental liberty–the right to control one’s body.
With scientific answers, we can find solutions that would not destroy herd immunity. These may include separating out vaccines and spreading them out over a longer schedule, and looking at family history, genetic and immune mrkers to determine which inidviduals are most likely susceptible to vaccine injury.
The most important message of the film is that our laws need to change to make vaccine manufacturers accountable. To shield them from liability and then put vaccine implantation, public information, safety review and liability all in the hands of the government creates a highly dangerous situation.
You must know that there has been *a lot* of unbiased scientific research finding no connection between MMR and autism, right?
But the goalposts keep moving … “But what if it’s only genetically vulnerable African American boys between the ages of 14 and 19 months who live in Northern climates with low Vitamin D who are too much gluten before having 4 shots that day? We need more research!”
I exaggerate (a bit) but is there ever going to be enough research to exonerate MMR after the Wakefield fraud? Apparently not, for some.
Where is this “a lot” of unbiased research? I’d like to see it. There have also been independent studies replicating Wakefield’s findings. I realize these have been criticized for using the same arguably faulty methodology that Wakefield used. But even if the theory is wrong, might the hypothesis (as in the case of Semmelweis–see below) be right? To consider the argument settled because Wakefield has been discredited is overly simplistic. For one, political pressures may have played a role in the determinations about Wakefield. It should be noted that his colleague and co-author Dr. Walker-Smith has since been cleared of any wrong-doing and had his physician’s license reinstated; Dr. Wakefield did not take part in that legal proceeding. (BTW, my late father was a highly-respected gastroenterologist for 40 years before retiring. I’ve heard Wakefield speak at several conferences and I find him sincere and credible. I find it hard to believe he intentionally committed fraud. Dr. Arthur Krigsman, who beneficially treated my daughter for gastrointestinal issues, has been a colleague of Wakefield’s, and at least at the time we saw him a decade ago, concurred in his views.)
But even if Dr.Wakefield became a little over-zealous in his research, he may have stumbled onto something important. His recommendation of a single measles vaccine may have been motivated by profit desire, but more likely it comes from his not wanting to take a stand against vaccines per se.
If you see the movie you will learn that, according to Dr. Thompson, the CDC’s findings initially showed not just a 3x greater prevalence of autism among African American boys who received the MMR vaccine before their third birthday rather than after it, but a 7X greater prevalence of “isolated autism” (meaning autism without mental retardation, birth defects or certain other conditions) among children of all races who received the MMR before their 3rd birthday rather than after it. But the data was manipulated so these findings were suppressed from the final report. Besides even if the MMR adversely affects only genetically vulnerable African American boys living in Northern climates, etc. (as in your exaggerated example), it would still be important to tease that out! A goal of research should be to identify potentially at-risk subgroups.
What is really needed is a study comparing vaccinated with unvaccinated children, but although there have been informal reports looking at unvaccinated populations (such as the Amish, where autism rates are very low), a large, scale study of that nature has not been published to my knowledge. Maybe that would settle the issue once and for all.
But even if the vaccine-autism question were to be settled once and for all, do you really think it’s such a good idea, as a matter of public policy, to shield vaccine makers from liability, and trust the government with testing vaccine safety, when the government stands to be liable for billions if not trillions, of dollars injury claims if it should turn out that Wakefield was actually right?
I think the courts are hardly the place to settle questions of science. But then I wasn’t trained as a lawyer 🙂
https://www.healthychildren.org/English/safety-prevention/immunizations/Pages/Vaccine-Studies-Examine-the-Evidence.aspx is one of a bazillion starting points to read legitimate studies in quality peer-reviewed journals.
Others have found fault in those studies. See, e.g., http://www.fourteenstudies.org/studies.html. If you go to that website, you will see there are counter studies too.
I’m willing to say the issue is far from settled. Can’t we just leave it at that?
WHY NOT SPLIT THE MMR INTO 3 SHOTS? Why do you defend the MMR? If there is even the slightest chance it causes harm — and millions of parents worldwide say it does — then why not make single shots available? No studies needed. Give parents a choice. If any subset is vulnerable, we should not sacrifice them. Make single shots available and allow every child to be vaccinated or not according to their unique medical and genetic needs. Vaccines are not 1 size fits all. Not everyone who smokes gets cancer; not everyone who gets vaccinated with the MMR gets autism. But that does not mean cigarettes or the MMR are safe.
Because the antivaxx charlatans like Wakefield would then move the goalposts and claim that three separate shots resulted in 3 times the “toxins” (aka adjuvants)? For starters …
There may be a few of you out there that truly only want a split MMR but for most it seems like a convenient Fear Uncertainty and Doubt wedge issue.
Wakefield has not wavered in all these years in his call for single vaccines to be made available. Go speak to one family who experienced adverse reaction to the MMR. Hear how it turned their lives upside down, how it damaged their child. Multiply that by a few hundred thousand. YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU ARE PERPETUATING. Parents know. Your loyalty to Merck and their trivalent MMR makes no sense. A wedge issue? You allow a faulty vaccine to continue to damage children because you fear parents will stop vaccinating their children? Do you fear people will stop taking pain meds when one pain med is found to cause harm and so pulled? Or when fraud is found in the data? If the CDC actually addressed vaccine safety issues, parents could trust their recommendations. If the CDC wasn’t a revolving door to jobs with Merck, then parents could trust their recommendations. But because Merck and their billion dollar marketing department have taken over the CDC and convinced people in this country that mentioning vaccine safety makes someone a conspiracy theorist, the topic of vaccine safety has become taboo. You believe the MMR is safe? Go get one. Heck, you’re an adult and weigh ten times more than a 12 month old. How many MMR shots do you think you can handle? Are vaccines 100% safe? Or are they POTENT immune stimulants? Is it normal to catch measles, mumps and rubella all the at the same time? Is it normal for your body to have to create antibodies to all three at once? For some kids, the triple dose IS TOO MUCH, yet you would condemn them to either autism or no vaccine choice at all because you fear it’s a wedge issue. Shame on you. Go find a family harmed by the MMR. You won’t want have to go far. They’re everywhere. My own great-nephew spent nearly a year of his life in the hospital with seizures from the MMR. THIS IS MEDICALLY DOCUMENTED. A good friend of mine’s son regressed into autism after the MMR. THIS IS MEDICALLY DOCUMENTED. Instead of fearing this as being a wedge issue, why don’t you go out into the world and meet those with injured kids, spend a day in the life with someone with vaccine damage. Watch this NBC video from the 1980’s when major media would still cover vaccine safety issues. There is a history of bad vaccines that cannot be denied and must be stopped. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtOh6vFnWg4
Wakefield recommends vaccines repeatedly in the film. The film is provaccine. View it, and count how many times they recommend them.
Wakefield is an advocate of vaccines. No where did he state that he was against vaccinations.
Regarding the MMR specifically, he asks that these three vaccines be separated into a measles, mumps, and rubella. He and the others were merely suggesting that more research is conducted regarding safety of combined vaccinations (not currently studied yet implemented).
As for the other vaccines, he and many others, stated they would like to see more specific and rigorous studies conducted. Studies specific to 1) the effects of specific vaccinations administered at different ages (maybe later is better, we don’t know because no one has studied it); 2) effects of combining these vaccinations (which has not been studied, yet our children receive 6-8 vaccinations at their 2 month well visit), the effects of specific vaccinations of people of different races (the current studies show significant gaps in this information), and that vaccines be categorized similarly to other drugs with regard to research and safety studies prior to releasing it to the public (i.e., vaccines do not have any of the requirements for testing or safety that all other pharmaceuticals have).
The take away points were clearly stated:
1) That congress subpoena Dr. Thompson and investigate the allegations of fraudulent reporting.
2) That congress repeal the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act and hold MANUFACTURERS liable, not the public or doctors.
3) That the single measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine be made available.
4) That pharmaceutical drugs are tested accordingly. In fact, I will say it again, vaccines DO NOT go through the rigorous testing or held to the same standards as other drugs put on our market.
No on in the movie EVER stated that vaccines are bad, nor did they make a case for people not getting vaccines. They just want further studies into the effects of administration and at specific ages.
I work with children who have been directly effected by vaccinations. I have a fully vaccinated child, but I certainly didn’t follow the recommended schedule.
Further, new research has been showing that there are genetic markers that can indicate who may or may not have an adverse reaction. I would like to see this be researched as well.
What does non-biased research from several different facilities hurt?
You keep pulling me back in!
Since you said it twice, where is your evidence that vaccines are not tested and licensed the way drugs are? Please don’t cite this movie.
Here’s a useful link for those who prefer to get their vaccine information from docs that are not proven frauds, however “pro-vaccine” they try to position themselves: http://www.historyofvaccines.org/content/articles/vaccine-development-testing-and-regulation
Note that the number of human subjects in vaccine trials is usually greater than in drug trials.
The history of vaccines is full of vaccine scares that haven’t held up to scientific scrutiny, in very culturally specific and kind of interesting ways. Wakefield-MMR is a particularly undead one that took awhile to come to our shores from England. Hep B scares in France didn’t really cross the pond. And so on.
The anti-vaxx or vaccine-skeptical community has adapted rapidly and now professes to “just want more research,” or wants personalized schedules (based on wildly misunderstood genetic variants like MTHFR), or to “green our vaccines” (whatever that actually means). Who doesn’t want more research and “green vaccines” right?
But my experience with this movement is that there will *never* be enough research to convince its advocates that vaccines are safe enough (and yet they’re willfully uncritical of anything that supports their feeling that vaccines are unsafe).
The net effect of this movement is to undermine the public health by encouraging parents to delay or decline vaccinations for their kids. That’s how this hurts.
Thanks for the Semmelweis mention, that turns out to be an interesting story, and maybe a little more complex than portrayed. Less than a generation later, Pasteur elaborated a germ theory of disease, and Lister became the “father of modern surgery” when he applied that to sterile surgery. Semmelweis had a good hypothesis, but his theory was medieval. Political bias can play a role in the progress of science or lack thereof, but it’s hard to get a lot of traction without a supportable theory.
Civil discourse is kinder than name calling. Why can’t we discuss vaccine safety? Those you call “conspiracy theorists” and “paranoid” are the parents of vaccine injured children who daily experience the results of a culture of refusal to discuss vaccine safety. Parents who followed the CDC guidelines and trusted their pediatricians but learned too late that safety issues with vaccines are ignored, that contraindications to vaccination are ignored, that safety studies on the effect of giving multiple vaccines at a single visit have never been studied. The people you call conspiracy theorists know about the methylation cycle, glutathione interruption, and cytkokine storms. They’ve read every scrap of published science on the immune system and neurological toxins. They follow the emerging science of epigenetics. They work daily to detoxify their kids and to try to help their kids live “normal” lives despite their injuries. You judge us, parents of injured children, so cruelly. Why? We want safer vaccines not for our kids — our kids can no longer be vaccinated. Their immune systems are too damaged, their allergies too severe, their seizures too frequent. We seek safer vaccines, saner vaccine schedules, medical freedom of choice, and individualized medicine to protect YOU and YOUR kids and the kids yet to be born. You can disagree with us, but please stop being cruel.
Call on your congressional representatives to investigate Dr. William Thompson’s disclosures:
After turning over thousands of documents to Congressman Posey, Thompson has been waiting two years for a subpoena so he can testify before Congress over what may be the biggest medical coverup ever.
Vaccines are unnecessary. Just wash your hands before going to the bathroom.
Preach! Handwashing after the bathroom? Second biggest medical coverup of all time. Do the research.
It’s 100% organic
Jordan, your review shows you have barely a surface understanding of vaccines or the issue of fraud at the CDC as shown in VAXXED. Your reference to the pertussis vaccine, which the 2013 FDA study revealed creates atypical carriers (vaccinated people can acquire and spread whooping cough without knowing it), is not only inaccurate, it’s dangerous. Vaccines are potent pharmaceutical products. If we are to be a nation that uses vaccines as part of public health policy, we must work diligently to ensure that every vaccine is safe and effective. There should not be a taboo against discussing issues of vaccine safety. This film asks for the MMR to be split into three separate shots: measles, mumps, and rubella. Why do you not want individual vaccines made available? Why should parents not have a choice?
As for Andrew Wakefield, again, do your homework. http://journal-neo.org/2016/06/08/what-media-hid-in-de-niro-autism-film-affair/ To millions of parents around the world who watched their child regress into autism after receiving the MMR, Wakefield is a hero. He has repeatedly called for single vaccines to be made available. William Thompson’s data, presented to Congressman Posey, who presented it to the House floor, and which the House Oversight Committee is now investigating, shows a link between the timing of the MMR and autism. Why do you want to turn this into a pro vs anti-vaccine argument? This is about safety. About injury. Why do you trust Merck? Remember VIOXX? Why do you trust the CDC when the head of the CDC at the time of the study examined by VAXXED was Julie Gerberding, who one year after leaving the CDC went to work at Merck, as President of their Vaccine Division. Have you ever seen a more blatant conflict of interest?
WE MUST DISCUSS VACCINE SAFETY. The topic of vaccine safety must not be taboo, it must be discussed by every parent, pediatrician, doctor, citizen, and politician. Demand safe vaccines, saner schedules, freedom of medical choice. Know the limits of vaccines, know which ones provide only personal protection, know which ones create atypical carriers, know which ones have low efficacy, know which ones come with the highest risk for adverse reaction. If you choose to vaccinate yourself and your loved ones, you should know everything there is to know about each and every one in order to vaccinate safely.
“Have you ever seen a more blatant conflict of interest?”
Yes! Try your hero Wakefield.
He failed to disclose that his “research” was funded by lawyers trying to generate a class-action lawsuit against MMR. He also tried to patent and market a split Measles vaccine. It goes on: http://briandeer.com/mmr/lancet-summary.htm
Any attempt to inspire a conversation about vaccine safety fails from the start if your starting point is this fraud. It’s an important conversation that would work a lot better if your skepticism extended to Wakefield and co. Find better heroes.
If you want to learn what VAXXED is really about read this and then see the movie.
http://jennifermargulis.net/blog/2016/06/facts-on-vaxxed-a-cheat-sheet/?utm_source=JenniferMargulis.net&utm_campaign=7c0b35e4d4-Blog_posts2_4_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e9fe2f8233-7c0b35e4d4-110758865
If you want to learn about what VAXXED really is, please read this and see the movie.
http://jennifermargulis.net/blog/2016/06/facts-on-vaxxed-a-cheat-sheet/?utm_source=JenniferMargulis.net&utm_campaign=7c0b35e4d4-Blog_posts2_4_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e9fe2f8233-7c0b35e4d4-110758865
Oy, another hey-vaguely-worried-parents-buy-my-new-made-up-vaccine-schedule book, this time from Dr Paul instead of Dr Bob.
It’s time for me to duck out of this thread, I think I hear someone blowing the anti-vaxx Horn of Gondor over on Age of Autism.
I appreciate the desire expressed above for a respectful conversation but it’s just not going to be found following comments supporting a pseudo-documentary directed by one of modern science’s greatest villains. Fruit of the poisonous tree.
I’m really disappointed that this is showing in our neighborhood. Also disappointed in the stunning number of adults who will in the same breath, rightfully accuse Congressmen of ignoring scientific consensus, while also throwing doubt of the safety of vaccines – and ignoring the very same method and consensus in favor of an unscientific and discredited conspiracy. And it’s especially galling because it’s NOT a harmless conflict of opinion. It’s harmful.
Why do you oppose making individual measles, mumps, and rubella vaccines available? For more than a decade the controversy has been around the trivalent MMR. This film is about trying to get the individual shots available, but hopefully, not through Merck who is already on trial for falsifying data on the mumps portion of the vaccine. http://blogs.wsj.com/pharmalot/2015/06/08/merck-is-accused-of-stonewalling-over-effectiveness-of-mumps-vaccine/ Have you noticed all the mumps outbreaks with college students? This is why. Not the antivaccine movement but a failed vaccine. The issue here is VACCINE SAFETY.
For those who don’t believe vaccine injury is real, here is an NBC documentary from when major media would cover the topic. Watch this. Then get active and DEMAND safer vaccines. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtOh6vFnWg4
From where should I demand my tinfoil hat though?
Please stop spreading this harmful unscientific and thoroughly debunked garbage. And stop moving the goalposts.
And using a thirty year old broadcast should tell you all you need to know about your theory’s current merits.
Today’s media will not cover vaccine safety issues so in order to show the history of vaccine issues, you have to go back thirty years. Do you have a vaccine injured child? Have you spoken to a parent of a vaccine injured child? Have you ever spent a day in the life of vaccine injured child? Even the FDA, the CDC, and the vaccine makers admit that vaccines do cause injury, they just don’t admit the full scope. But the CDC does say that less than 10% of all vaccine injuries get reported. Since they falsified data on the 2004 MMR-autism study, claims for autism aren’t even considered. More than 3 billion has been been paid out by the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Taxpayer money. Vaccine makers exempt from liability. Is every drug put out on the market safe? Are drugs recalled? Are drug makers sued? Yes, yes, and yes. Why would vaccines be any different? Merck makes the M-M-R II. Merck made VIOXX and admitted to hiding safety data that said it increased the risk of death to stroke and heart attack and they have paid out more than $6 billion in fines and fees for killing more than 50,000 people. This is the company you trust to make a safe MMR vaccine? If this country is to have vaccines as part of public health policy, then vaccine safety should be a top priority for everyone. As science moves forward, the vaccine approach will be abandoned in favor of safer methods of immune boosting. Children should not be harmed in the meantime. It is possible to have safer vaccines and saner vaccine schedules NOW. When vaccines were invented, little was known about the immune system at all, and just recently scientists learned that the lymphatic system is directly connected to the brain. They say all the textbooks have to be rewritten. And don’t tell me my information is harmful and dangerous. I’ve spent a decade reading all the science. You go spend a decade reading about the history of vaccines, about Charles Richet, gut dysbiosis, cytokine storms, aluminum toxicity, glutathione depletion, genetic mutations, the MTHFR gene, epegenetics — and you will understand that the process of vaccination is not a cutesy little poke in the arm but a potent biological and chemical stimulant that for some is too much, leading to injury or death. This is reality. Vaccines are not one size fits all. Each person should be assessed according to their own unique medical and genetic needs, just like they are for all other drugs.
I’m curious, do any of you have any clue how many more vaccines the US mandates than any other industrialized nation? Is it only anti-vax “conspiracy theorists” who feel that the world *might* not end if we didn’t give 36 vaccines to our pre-school kids, when countries like Iceland (with the world’s lowest infant mortality rate) give less than a third of those?
Since when is it harmful or dangerous to have more information? Do you burn books that go against your opinions and personal experience, too? If there was the slightest possibility that a major governmental organization was involved in fraud, would you want to know more about it? Is “informed consent” for medical procedures of any kind a frivolous freedom that should be waived?
You talk about fear-mongering, and that is all I see from this crowd. You compare those who are not blindly, unquestioningly faithful to organizations like the CDC (who have a history of financial entanglement with pharmaceutical companies: http://www.bmj.com/content/350/bmj.h2362) with climate change deniers. Funny, because it looks to me like the pot calling out the kettle. Much of the global warming denier crowd is somehow involved in the oil industry, which makes sense, when you don’t want your income affected by those scientists whose findings keep pushing solar and wind energy…it’s bad for business! It’s the pharmaceutical industry (which, FYI, spends more than twice what the oil and gas industry does on lobbying political influence, and a fair share on partly owning every major news source in the country) that should rightfully be defending vaccine safety…and they are, of course. Vaccines can and do caused injury; this is well-documented by researchers, by medical doctors, by our court system, and are written on the vaccine inserts themselves. Parents with injured children have done more research than anyone on this topic – and before you (again) talk down to those from whom you might be able to learn something, I mean the kind of research found on PubMed, from real scientists – and usually conclude that the science showing no link between vaccines and brain injury is met with the same number (or more) of that which shows the opposite. Much of the research they call for has simply not been done. You deny that there’s any potential bias in how the data on vaccine safety might be skewed (or not presented at all) by the media, or by our medical establishment (i.e. by the pharmaceutical industry). It’s interesting to me that so many defenders of pharmaceutical policy exist: you, who have nothing to gain in protecting the industry, and who could potentially lose your ability to make your own decisions about your health and that of your families based on corrupt science. Who claims “the science is settled”? I’ll give you a hint: those with huge financial ties to the pharmaceutical industry, which consistently pushes vaccines on every man, woman, and child, from cradle to grave (i.e. most medical doctors – who have been educated in institutions that take enormous sums of money from big pharma http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/03/business/03medschool.html?hp&_r=0, mainstream media – all with millions of dollars of sponsorship from big pharma, and the CDC – which we’ve established, for those paying attention, has been compromised by its ties to the industry)…and, of course, these claims are also made by sheep who listen to the above groups without pausing to look at how their message might be tainted, or without being critical of a government mandate that consistently protects vaccine manufacturers, or without asking questions about why we’re doing what we’re doing. Is it conspiracy theory to acknowledge that politics is deeply corrupt? Or to want reliable and unbiased information to insure we are doing the best for our children? Since what we hear in everyday life is SO skewed by the pharmaceutical industry, you can rail on the director of the movie all you want. Adults can take the message with a grain of salt, and form their own conclusions. To say it’s dangerous to see multiple sides of an issue is short-sighted at best and Orwellian at worst.
To the “harmful garbage” comment. We live in a largely unvaccinated society. Look at the science on just how long these vaccinations last, and the percentage of adults who have had boosters anywhere in the last 10 – even 20 years. Fun fact – wild measles, when contracted at an early age, gives lifelong immunity and has an incredibly low incidence of complications (see below – numbers taken from your very own CDC). Everywhere you go, outside of maybe a hospital, you encounter many more “unvaccinated” than vaccinated individuals. To label the movie, or any of the above comments, as harmful is going back to fear mongering.
I hope that anyone on the fence about this movie will read some of these comments, and see that moviegoers here have done their research, are rightfully skeptical of a corrupt relationship between our government and the pharmaceutical industry, and are simply wanting all sides of an issue to be freely available. Knowledge is power. Get your heads out of the sand.
I don’t burn books that go against my opinions, but I don’t HAVE opinions about scientific consensus. The scientific consensus invariably has infinitely more data and expertise than I do. If you have OPINIONS that are contrary to science then you have no business discussing the scientific merit at all and should stick to spiritualism or philosophy.
Ding ding ding! True colors alert: “Fun fact – wild measles, when contracted at an early age, gives lifelong immunity and has an incredibly low incidence of complications.”
Are you freaking serious? What an incredibly wrong and privileged statement to make (tell that to parents in the developing world). Even in the US measles has serious complication risks including encephalitis and death.
Sounds like you’re not even in favor of a single strain measles vaccine.
Bring back the dark ages! It’ll be “fun”!
You’ve taken a single quote out of context. The point I was making is that the majority of our population is effectively unvaccinated, since immunity is not lifelong when given via vaccine. And your concern with how devastating the disease is was addressed in the above chart, showing – from the CDC’s stats – that morbidity from measles occurs in approximately 0.0002% of the population.
Here’s another way of looking at the same CDC stats:
“Before the measles vaccination program started in 1963, we estimate that about 3 to 4 million people got measles each year in the United States. Of those people, 400 to 500 died, 48,000 were hospitalized, and 4,000 developed encephalitis (brain swelling) from measles.”
But sure, you can spin it the other way. Fun with stats!
I believe measles does remain the 5th most common cause of death in kids around the world.
From WHO:
“Measles is a highly contagious, serious disease caused by a virus. In 1980, before widespread vaccination, measles caused an estimated 2.6 million deaths each year.
The disease remains one of the leading causes of death among young children globally, despite the availability of a safe and effective vaccine. Approximately 114 900 people died from measles in 2014 – mostly children under the age of 5.
…
Accelerated immunization activities have had a major impact on reducing measles deaths. During 2000-2014, measles vaccination prevented an estimated 17.1 million deaths. Global measles deaths have decreased by 79% from an estimated 546 800 in 2000 to 114 900 in 2014.”
I also feel compelled to correct your assertion that most of us are effectively non-immune to measles. That’s very wrong. Perhaps you’re thinking of pertussis?
…and to present the other side of the coin (in keeping with the entire point of this movie/thread, which is vaccine safety), possible adverse reactions to the MMR, according to its manufacturer (notice that “encephalitis” is listed)… https://www.merck.com/product/usa/pi_circulars/m/mmr_ii/mmr_ii_pi.pdf
Interesting that “atypical measles” is one reported consequence, in clinical trials. There has been one death from measles in the last decade in the U.S. If those worldwide numbers stand, do you think it has anything to do with clean water, sanitation, and proper nutrition, or is the USA just magically special? If you take one nourished, healthy, unvaccinated child and one malnourished, unvaccinated child who’s living in poverty and expose them both to measles, their outcomes will be very different.
How would one know what the chances of having an adverse reaction are to the vaccine, so one might do a cost/benefit analysis of this particular shot? Perhaps studying those reactions in an unvaccinated vs vaccinated population. Has the CDC undertaken this study? No.
And sorry, friend. Vaccine-induced immunity wanes years/decades after the time of vaccination. No vaccine that I’m aware of has shown lifelong immunity. (If you find one, let me know!) Experts frequently state that those vaccinated in childhood (especially with measles, pertussis, and chicken pox) are highly susceptible to contracting the disease (and yet, we don’t have massive outbreaks every day – and certainly not with death en masse, doomsday, “dark ages” scenarios as described above). On contracting measles: “With time, especially if you don’t get natural boosting by being exposed to people with that same illness, your memory cells may tend to forget,” – Dr. Marcelo Laufer, chief of the division of infectious diseases at Miami Children’s Hospital.
Ufffffffffffff da. If there is a valid other side of the coin it is not from this movie, or slick but misleading infographics … I’d consider seeing a movie by Dr. Bob Sears (although I’m really tired of his schtick) or someone similar but Wakefield is the zombie vaccine scare fraud that just won’t stay dead, and you really do undermine your argument by suggesting that we should see his movie in the interest of balance.
Adverse reactions to MMR have been studied. You reference some yourself (although please keep in mind that package inserts “are written by lawyers for lawyers”). Encephalitis occurs approximately once following every 3 million doses of MMR. Encephalitis happens in about 1 in 1,000 cases of “natural” measles. So – yeah, it’s in the package insert, and vaccinations are not without side effects, including very rare serious ones. But the math on that one looks pretty obvious to me in favor of preventing natural measles from returning.
And yes, of course there are differences between the US and the developing world when it comes to measles outcomes, including improved nutrition and better health care. Yay for us. Vaccines are hardly the only public health success story of the last century.
I don’t really understand what studies you need to see (are you really on the fence about MMR?) … reactions have been studied. It would be unethical to do an experimental trial of vaccinated vs unvaccinated kids, observational studies of MMR and autism/developmental harms have been done many times, and it is actually very hard to impossible to do a proper observational trial of the entire vaccine schedule due to all the confounders and relatively small number of unvaccinated kids (making it unable to detect rare side effects).
As for lasting immunity, you’re the one asserting that “we are largely unvaccinated” due to waning immunity. So please prove that with studies looking at real-wrold outcomes rather than a “memory cells may tend to forget” quote or a cherry-picked declining titers lab study (N.B. that declining titers does not equal lack of protection).
So far measles immunity lasts past 20 years in 96-99% of vaccine recipients, and as a live virus vaccine it is expected to be lifelong. If the ID experts are wrong on that then we could do an adult booster but there is no reliable evidence that we need to do that at this point. As you noted, we’ve had imported measles outbreaks that did not infect all of us “largely unvaccinated” you claim are out there. Yes, plenty of vaccinated people do catch measles from travelers or the unvaccinated but that’s because there’s a lot more of us and even with 99% effectiveness there are vaccinated people vulnerable to imported measles. Which is why we vaccinated folks might sound a bit mad at Wakefield, Hooker, and other cranks.
And like you, I do have plenty of beef with “Big Pharma”, and regulatory capture, and am always happy to see more vaccine research.
Okely dokely then. I am well and truly out. May I leave with a peace offering? I think you and I would both enjoy Ben Goldacre’s books – Bad Science and Bad Pharma. I promise you’ll find them incredibly informative and entertaining. You will loooove what he has to say about pharma but be challenged in a good way on more woo topics. Science!
This review is completely inaccurate. It is absolutely not antivaccine, you clearly did not see the film. This is only about the fraudulent activities of the cdc over their handling of a study that revealed unfavorable findings. What’s revealed in the film? The data colleen Boyle tried to throw away, her handwritten notes to exclude the fact that there was a 246% statistically significant increase of harm amongst black boys. She also made notes to eliminate the harm associated with age groups, especially those younger than 36 months, showing a 700% statistically significant increase of harm across all ethnicities. Also revealed are emails between the senior scientist, and the head of the cdc, refusing to publish the findings. Also revealed are recorded phone conversations. #Vaxxed is at the guild 45th until june 30, it was just extended an entire week. See for yourself, you will leave the theater with a sick feeling in your gut. This film is for every individual, for vaccines, against vaccines, that point is irrelevant. Accountability in high places is very relevant.
http://www.ageofautism.com/2016/05/vaxxed-the-movie-facts.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ageofautism+%28AGE+OF+AUTISM%29
The TRUTH about Dr. Andrew Wakefield and his original involvement in the MMR Autism controversy. Watch this before labeling him a fraud. The documents provided by the CDC Whistle Blower, Dr. William Thompson, prove the CDC came to the same conclusion as Dr Wakefield, but colluded to hide the information from the American people for 15 years putting hundreds of thousands of children at risk. That is the real fraud. Come see the movie and judge for yourself.
Oh I see your troops were rallied from ageofautism.com Destructive irresponsible conspiracy theory. Stop it. And this is a local blog, stop sending your trolls.
I recognize all the of the commenters here as local. I am local. I am very visibly local as a published author. Here is my website: http://bernadettepajer.com/ I grew up in Seattle, went to the UW. I met JP Patches. I am homegrown and well-educated. I am not a troll, a nutcase, or antiscience. In fact, I am a member of the Northwest Science Writers and the Washington Academy of Sciences, and while my published work is fiction, the science in my books is accurate and has been peer-reviewed and earned the science seal of approval. If you were to spend significant time studying the science, history, and politics of vaccines, you would be rallying with us. One out of 6 children today are diagnosed with some sort of learning or neurological disorder per the CDC. The MMR is not to blame for all of those, nor for all autism– there are many environmental toxins damaging our children–but safety issues with the MMR and other vaccines, as well as common vaccine administration practices (such as giving vaccines to a child on antibiotics, and recommending Tylenol at time of administration) play a significant role in the epidemic. Vaccines are potent pharmacological agents and should be treated with respect and caution. Please, please, look deeply into this subject. If vaccines are to be a part of public health policy, we need to ensure they are as safe as possible for everyone and that each and every child is vaccinated or not according to his own health and genetic needs. Vaccines are not one size fits all. And when vaccines are being made by a company like Merck with a history of hiding data (lookup Vioxx), and when the CDC is a revolving door to Merck and others (see Julie Gerberding), then we must be even more vigilant. Go see VAXXED, please.
http://www.nvic.org/
“The National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) is dedicated to the
prevention of vaccine injuries and deaths through public education and
to defending the informed consent ethic in medicine.
As an independent clearinghouse for information on diseases and
vaccines, NVIC does not advocate for or against the use of vaccines. We
support the availability of all preventive health care options,
including vaccines, and the right of consumers to make educated,
voluntary health care choices.”
You’re either a liar or willfully ignorant. This is your “independent ” clearinghouse.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Vaccine_Information_Center
Just stop.