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Comment by kevindication | Hacker News Reader

People who don't vaccinate their children do so as a luxury provided by the vast majority who do vaccinate.

Herd immunity helps, but the problem is that no vaccine is 100% effective and there are those who can't get vaccinated for health reasons (such as allergies, compromised immune systems, etc.). So, if you like, we're all relying on herd immunity to some extent, and people (hard not to type "morons") who don't vaccinate themselves or their kids are reducing the level of herd immunity. They're putting other people at risk--not just their own kids.

And, sadly, from the article: "“I used to say that the tide would turn when children started to die. Well, children have started to die,” Offit says, frowning as he ticks off recent fatal cases of meningitis in unvaccinated children in Pennsylvania and Minnesota. “So now I’ve changed it to ‘when enough children start to die.’ Because obviously, we’re not there yet.”"

How are you supposed to make an educated decision about the safety of these vaccines, when there's a good chance that the CDC is lying to you about the data?

Just read RFK's article on the vaccine autism link:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/7395411/deadly_im...

I've seen a ton of evidence since this article saying that the vaccine-autism link is false. However I've seen zero evidence that the alleged CDC cover up of the safety information didn't actually occur. How are you supposed to make an educated decision about the safety of these products when the head of the CDC vaccine division goes on record saying they are hiding information about their safety.

You mean the article that the submitted article explicitly calls out as unbelievably shoddy, and for which Rolling Stone has issued multiple corrections?

I know the science in the article is wrong. But if you actually read the article, it isn't really about the science, it's about the CDC hiding data from the public. And this has not been challenged, in fact the CDC admits it.

So I ask again, how are you supposed to make an educated decision based on facts, when the CDC admits that they have no qualms about hiding the facts from you.

I think you said it yourself. You've seen a ton of evidence that the vaccines are safe (and presumably very little evidence otherwise). If you believe they are credible sources then you should make your decision based on the available evidence, not some worry that the CDC has other evidence that they are hiding from you.

Do you have evidence that the CDC is hiding data from the public in this case?

As I said yesterday, the behavior of individuals within organizations is largely the result of systemic forces. This much we know from psychology, sociology, and organizational behavior. (C.f. the Milgram experiments, the Asch conformity tests, the Stanford prison experiment, etc.)

Clearly different cases are different, but making a completely new decision based on each new case shows a misunderstanding of human behavior; as long as our systemic environments are the same, we will tend to produce the same sorts of behaviors.

So the burden of proof shouldn't be on me here to prove the CDC is covering up information, the burden of proof should be on them to show that they've changed the systemic structure of their organization since 2000 in a way that promotes transparency and accountability. And I haven't seen any evidence of this.

I'm not saying these vaccines are necessarily dangerous, they're probably not. All I'm suggesting is that if you try to interpret history and make decisions without using the lenses of sociology, psych, and OB then you're bound to find yourself over in Iraq looking for WMDs, boycotting France, putting poisons into your body, etc.

You could have just said "no," instead of flailing your hands around.

"I know the science in the article is wrong."

And that's when I stop paying attention.

There's a good chance the errors in the original article were introduced by amateurs trying to redo the science after the CDC covered up the original data. Which is sort of my whole point.

Well, honestly, even if you broke it down in terms of one disease versus another, I think vaccines still take the cake:

Don't vaccinate: Might get polio, whooping cough, meningitis, measles, mumps, rubella, tetanus or superflu. All of which are either deadly or crippling diseases, in some cases even when treated.

Vaccinate: Might become autistic. Which is a serious behavioral disorder.

And of course the comparison is even easier when you remember that vaccines have no link with autism.

There is no such thing as superflu and you will not get polio.

And you won't become autistic if you do vaccinate.

Stop vaccinating on a massive scale, and polio will be back. It's not gone yet and can still be found in Africa, India, and the Middle East.

Look at your source and see if they are credible.

first they say that vaccines contain mercury which they do not they contain thimerosal (sodium ethylmercurithiosalicylate) that is not mercury. Further in the body it is metabolized to ethylmercury which is still not mercury. It still has a whole ethy group. There are entire compounds that by slight deviation can mean the difference between fatal and essential.

While ethylmercury has some links to not being that great for you, the fact that the article is so grossly negligent to call a compound mercury (because everyone knows it is bad stuff) tends to hint that their is either a political agenda or that are looking to scare up a story.

Further, thimerosal was removed from all children vaccines in the 90's so even if there was a link, there is no valid reason today to not vaccinate you child.

Personally, (if it where mercury) I would much rather expose my child to even a small dose of mercury to prevent a return to the infant mortality rates of a century ago.

Can you imagine a time when it was unusual for a family to not loose a child. Ponder that for a moment, then weight it against the risks. Up until vaccination technology, a family would almost assuredly loose a child in their lifetime.

My grandmother lost her older sister at 10 years old to a vaccinatable disease. That was the reality back then The math says it all, something changed infant mortality rates and medical science has testable reproducible results that say they where responsible for that change, until the witch doctors can provide reproducible results, I am sticking with the guys that are using science.

Well, no they have to catch it from somebody that _do_ have it in the first place, so the real culprit is those who have the decease currently.

But yeah, statistically you are most likely to get to sick if you aren't vaccinated but at a certain point vaccination doesn't make sense at all.

So the non-vaccinated aren't the real culprits because they have to get it from someone who has the disease because they are not vaccinated?

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