Thursday 28 March 2013

Vaccinations - there is so much more to the debate

I didn't expect to be writing this post but I saw convo on Twitter that took me to this post:
Vaccinations and Why I am still Angry With the Media.

There are things in life that are binary
  • 1 and 0
    • Sun moon. 
    • Solar lunar
    • Dark light
    • Night day
    • Male female
    • On off
  • To vaccinate or not....
But there are things in life like rainbows where things aren't quite so binary, not so two-sided.

The vaccination debate is NOT simply about MMR and/or autism....

To reduce it to that is to support the status quo.

To disrespect people who spend hours, days, weeks, months researching it.

To ignore a great deal of information that is in the public domain.

Most anti vaxers are/were concerned with mercury/thimerosal (thimerosal is a mercury preservative) ... Yes, both of which have been taken care of to some degree, thanks to people speaking out and having concerns.

As far back as 2005, the BBC wrote here that it was being phased out of UK vaccinations.

Without people raising concerns, this would never have happened.

It wasn't just whether it was safe or not. It was the VOLUMES at which it was given, to a child who wasn't of a large enough WEIGHT to process or deal with it, which is why some parents who sit on the fence, do vaccinate, but at an older age, when the baby has the body mass to process the toxins.

Sometimes people address their concerns by giving single vaccines and there were mercury free vaccines available, when asked for/requested.

But then there are other issues at stake such as the effects of the Polio vaccine.

The contra indicators that can mean a vaccine is not safe.... But did the nurse check your child's medical history before they rushed you in and dealt with the next child in the queue?  Given that vaccinations are quite often done on a given day, on a drop-in basis where you haven't made an appointment so they can't possibly have looked into you before you arrived.

Perhaps find out what happens to a baby/child who wasn't in the right health to receive a vaccine.  Find out what happens then.


The fact that to be vaccinated is not necessarily to be immunized. <<< info on the link

To say unvaccinated kids put vaccinated kids at risk is to not trust the cover the vaccine purports to give in the first place!

There are deaths that occur...

I am so happy to see on >> this Mumsnet thread to see that pro and anti CAN debate together without mud slinging.

All too often (just in my personal experience) anti vaxers research their position but pro, swallow the info/leaflet given and go along for appointment, without giving it a second thought other than to wonder whether baby will cry or not.

As on the mumsnet thread I think both sides should research their position.

I am not going to say much more, as I am not a medical professional.  Also, I have already written about this subject on this blog before.

I would ask, so that each side can show each other some tolerance, that you read the contents of this link:
Three reasons why I don't vaccinate It was not written by me.

As you can see, the reasons are far more complicated than to do with the MMR media scare, and to reduce the debate to that, is to miss a whole arena of important information.

Let's at the very least be informed in our decisions, whatever they may be.

I am not writing this blog post to be sensationalist; I am writing it, as seeing those tweets had me awake till 2 a.m. so I could not just ignore it :-(

The information on this link is interesting too and also speaks of  the side effects to the Polio vaccination.

And don't get me started on flu shots.

This, my blog post, is deliberately not exhaustive or conclusive.  I am not going to go into every are of the debate and provide every link to something interesting.  It is a very personal decision and each person/parent should do their own research and make their own CONSCIOUS decision.

And even when people decide not to vaccinate it is not the end of the road.  There are many things then that are needed: extended breastfeeding, homeopathy, nutrtition, etc... and these don't go amiss with all children.

A great deal of immunity is provided from breastfeeding, but 6 weeks although better than nothing, is not enough.


Liska xx

13 comments:

  1. I like this post, I think it is important that we have an open discussion about these things. I put out my opinion on vaccinations and the media and you put your opinion on this matter out. Opinions are subjective and should never be taken as anything other. That's what so great about the time we live in. If you read someone's opinion on one subject you can easily find someone else's opinion on the same subject. It is then up to the reader to find out for her/him self to way up the merit of the differing opinions.

    I for one had a chat with my wife about this, and I just wrote about how I felt. I should probably in future put a disclaimer at the end of my blog posts saying that I might not have all the facts but this is how I feel about this issue, now go forth and research the subject if you are that way inclined.

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    1. I dreaded your response to my post but I am very pleasantly surprised with the considered comment you have left.

      I really appreciate it.

      Thank you
      Liska x

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  2. I exclusively breastfed my daughter and during that period she got the chicken pox badly, so I am unconvinced that enough immunity comes from that. Also as a child I had very bad measles and mumps. I just couldn't bear my children to go through those diseases and potentially pass them on to others less able to fight them off if I could have prevented it, so all my children have been vaccinated. It is a topic I feel very strongly about.

    I respect other peoples views and obviously no one should have to give their child a vaccine if they don't want them to have it, but it's the effect that can have on other people that bothers me. I just hope that enough people are vaccinated for us to eradicate Measles, mumps, rubella and more, that would be an amazing thing.

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    1. The current vaccination routine schedule does not contain a shot for chicken pox as far as I know. Some people actual have parties to ensure their child catches it to "get it out of the way" on the premise that you ordinarily only get it once.

      I did not mean that breastfeeding protects against everything but it does give a child a fantastic boost to their immune system.

      Vaccinating alone isn't always the answer as they sometimes don't offer the individual immunity. More and more cases of people contracting something they had the vaccination for.

      Also a problem can be the amount of toxicity we are giving our children in a short space of time given their small body mass. The quantity on the schedule and the fact that one is a FIVE in ONE, has really ramped up over 20 years and it may be another 20 before we truly realise the consequences of that.

      When people were raising concerns about mercury and thimerosal, they could have been ignored. But luckily they were not, and everyone's benefited from the fact that the informed raised merry hell about that. I think thimerosal has been taken out of most UK shots now, but may still be in the flu jab. What about the poor kiddies who had the shots before it was improved? They are guinea pigs then?

      Thank you for visiting and commenting.

      Liska x

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    2. I know the current vaccination schedule doesn't include chicken pox, my point was that if breastfeeding in my case didn't prevent or even reduce the severity of chicken pox, then I wouldn't have much confidence in it preventing other diseases either. Obviously breastfeeding does provide an amazing start to life and I would never suggest otherwise.

      I am someone who is very concerned with the amount of toxins my children are exposed to, and would never expose them to something harmful if I didn't believe it was for the best.

      My mum has scarring on the back of her eye from whooping cough as a child, these diseases can have horrific side effects that only get worse if you catch them as an adult. For me, I felt I had to prevent against that.

      I understand we all have different views and priorities. MMR was not a decision I took lightly. Vaccination is just something I feel incredibly strongly about.

      Anyway, well done to you for being so open about a potentially explosive subject.

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  3. This is a well-written, thoughtful & respectful post. But I have to respectfully disagree with you, at least in part. To be fair on Markus his post was specifically about MMR, not vaccines in general. The discussion on twitter was mostly prompted by the fact that there is now an epidemic of Measles in Swansea, said to be due to parents not vaccinating their children with MMR. Epidemics can spread. And looking back I saw no metion of Autism at all, just expression of incredulity at why parents woiuld not want to prevent their children from getting very ill.

    I've looked at the links here & I've looked online also & have yet to see any solid proof of any serious harmful affects of MMR. Yet we know it can protect against very serious diseases.

    So, I'm sorry: with MMR, to me, it is black & white. When you have the chance to protect your children & the risk of doing so is minimal or just heresay it really is binary.

    However if there is proof from solid research I would love to see it.

    Thank you however for expressing a contrary view so politely!

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  4. I remember this debate back when my daughter was born, 13 years ago and again when it kicked off with whether Tony Blair had allowed his baby to have MMR.
    All 3 of my children (13, 11 & 5) are fully vaccinated, that was are choice & it wasn't really an informed one to be honest! I just wanted to add that when we lived in Greece, all children have to be fully vaccinated in order to attend school, no proof of vaccination then they can't attend! So mine have had 'extra' vaccinations that they wouldn't have had if we were still in the UK!

    Great post with interesting links!

    Ellen

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    1. Ellen
      Thank you so much for such a lovely comment. You echo my personal experience. Everyone I have met who hasn't has done an awful lot of research (to justify themselves) but everyone who has, just done it routinely (I know there'll be exceptions and that's just with people I have met).
      The links weren't as good as ones I have found since. So I think I will be doing a follow up post.
      This post was based more on my feelings that the links and the most interesting stuff I read was 2 years ago, when I did my research and made my decision. In order to get into this debate I had to start searching all over again. It's been interesting and I am glad I did.
      Liska xx

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  5. This is a raging debate between me and my mum continually. She had polio as a child and I won't immunise the kids. Have sent her some links from here, thank you! Well said Liska. It's people like you who make a stand that make a difference and keep the debate open. XX

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    1. I have a helluva lot more links, so will be doing a follow up post.
      Thank you for support - it means a lot, given that you can get flamed for talking about this subject.

      Liska xxx

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  6. Hi Liska,

    I'd love to speak to you about your views on this. I'm doing some research for a TV programme into the recent measles epidemic and we'd like to get a balanced debate going around the issue of making MMR a mandatory vaccination. If you're interested, give me an email on catherine@walesandco.com or a call on 02920 22 55 88.

    Catherine

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Drop me a line, and I will visit you right back - as soon as I get chance. Thanks for your comment.