Let’s sue vaccine rejectionists for damages

Bioethicist Arthur Caplan thinks it is time for vaccine rejectionists to put their money where their mouth is. They should be legally and financially responsible for the damage and death caused by their decisions.

Anti-vaccine zealots say that whatever one’s reason for opposing vaccination for themselves or their kids, America must respect their choice. They yell about freedom, individual rights and liberty. A lot of Americans apparently agree with this view…

… But shouldn’t they be held accountable for that choice when it hurts others?

Caplan invokes the recent instance of a New Mexico woman who traveled through four US airports while infected with measles, but a better example might be the measles outbreak in San Diego in early 2008. As I wrote in How vaccine rejectionists hurt the rest of us, an unvaccinated 7 year old boy returned from a foreign vacation incubating the measles.

Ultimately 73 children, including intentionally unvaccinated children and children too young to be vaccinated, were quarantined for 21 days each because of significant exposure to measles.

… The outbreak was brought into the community by an intentionally unvaccinated child and initially spread by other intentionally unvaccinated children. Even though the outbreak was easily contained, one quarter of children who became ill were too young to be vaccinated, and the taxpayers spent $125,000 containing an outbreak that was entirely avoidable.

Caplan believes that the parents of the 7 year old boy should be legally liable for damages. He invokes two giants of American jurisprudence:

… Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes who said, “The right to swing my fist ends where the other man’s nose begins.” He was paraphrasing the great British philosopher John Stuart Mill who argued in a classic 1860 essay that the sole justification for interfering with another person’s liberty was to prevent harm to others….

… If you infect my newborn or my grandmom because you put your liberty over your duty to help protect the weak and the vulnerable and chose not to get vaccinated then you are responsible for the harm you do and you ought to be liable for it.

Vaccine rejectionists should be happy to accept legal responsibility. They are supposedly sure that vaccinations are unnecessary because diseases like measles disappeared “naturally” and no longer pose a health threat. If that’s the case, they have absolutely nothing to worry about.

On the other hand, the responsibility for hundreds of thousands, possibly millions of dollars in damages, might provoke a reassessment of the “risks” of rejecting vaccination. When the risks spread beyond danger to others, to danger to their own wallets, they may have an epiphany and decide that accepting vaccination makes far more financial sense.

Caplan concludes:

I don’t really don’t care to give lawyers more business but if the only way to get those who put other lives at risk by selfishly or stupidly not vaccinating is to sue them then so be it. If the lady from New Mexico is a Typhoid Mary spreading measles throughout America as she goes her merry uninoculated way then she ought to pay for those she disables, sickens or kills.

Let’s sue vaccine rejectionists for damages. Then we will learn if they are ready to put their money where their mouth is.

232 Responses to “Let’s sue vaccine rejectionists for damages”

  1. Squillo
    March 16, 2015 at 12:44 pm #

    I just went back and deleted a comment on an older post (http://www.skepticalob.com/2015/02/would-you-take-obstetrics-advice-from-an-attorney-me-neither.html). It doesn’t show up for me on the page anymore (I didn’t clear my cache, either.) I did it through the Disqus interface, using the drop-down arrow that appears to the right of the comment (not through the “Edit” option).

  2. guest test
    March 14, 2015 at 3:16 pm #

    can I delete?

  3. guest test
    March 14, 2015 at 3:15 pm #

    Test post

  4. John Barleycorn
    March 14, 2015 at 11:20 am #

    It looks like the heavy hand of censorship lives here.

    • fiftyfifty1
      March 14, 2015 at 11:33 am #

      what are you talking about?

      • John Barleycorn
        March 14, 2015 at 11:43 am #

        I’m trying to follow the discussion here but half of the comments have been deleted.

        • fiftyfifty1
          March 14, 2015 at 11:51 am #

          He pulled his own comments I believe.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 11:58 am #

            It looks like the moderator deleted the comments.

          • March 14, 2015 at 12:15 pm #

            Dr. Amy almost never deletes comments, and is very vocal about why (that being the nearly universal response of NCB and antivax blogs when faced with any dissent or criticism)

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 12:28 pm #

            I’ll be interested in what she has to say about the deleted comments.

          • momofone
            March 14, 2015 at 1:50 pm #

            I’m a registered user, and just deleted my own comment too.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:09 pm #

            Did you see the comments before they were deleted?

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:15 pm #

            I did. They were an embarrassment to any thinking person. But then, you anti-vaxxers aren’t big on thinking. I am genuinely surprised that this one seem to finally get how he was embarrassing himself.

          • Guest
            March 14, 2015 at 1:49 pm #

            They certainly were.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 12:15 pm #

            And how would you know? A machine to detect who deleted them, maybe? A tip for John: Dr Amy leaves comments that disagree and outright insult and swear at her. She’s hardly likely to feel threatened by a bunch of nonsensical comments like the deleted ones were. She loves such comments because their authors prove her point more eloquently than she could.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 12:25 pm #

            I asked her about this. Let’s see what her reply is.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 12:58 pm #

            Well, we saw her reply. We also saw yours. I want my prophetical prize handed to me. I knew that would be your reaction.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:05 pm #

            Do you believe Dr. Amy?

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:13 pm #

            Totally. Why did you take the time to ask her if you wouldn’t believe her? I knew you wouldn’t.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:15 pm #

            What would you say if I told you that I can provide you with absolute proof that Dr. Amy deleted the comments(practiced censorship) and then told you a lie that she didn’t delete the comments.

            Would that alter your opinion of her in any way?

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:18 pm #

            Not at all. I can tell you I can provide you with an absolute proof that moon is made of cheese. Would that alter your opinion of the moon in any way?

            I find it telling that you’re not providing the proof but asking me to believe you. I don’t, and I won’t buy that nice bridge you’ll offer me next either.

            Provide me with the proof, and you can have my opinion changed. Bring this absolute proof on.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:31 pm #

            Are you ready?

            Take a look at this…

            http://iurl.no/0t7q2

          • Guest
            March 14, 2015 at 1:32 pm #

            Let’s try, shall we?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 1:32 pm #

            Oh look, I just deleted my own comment.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:35 pm #

            “Let’s try shall we”
            Thank You

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 1:36 pm #

            Shows up as deleted on my page. Huh.

          • Guest
            March 14, 2015 at 1:37 pm #

            test

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:38 pm #

            Yes, what about it?

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:44 pm #

            Only moderators can delete a registered users post.
            Dr Amy is the moderator, in case you were unaware.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:54 pm #

            Indeed? With Disqus, it’s such a fog that I cannot even anonymize my comments. I don’t believe a word about what’s possible and what not. They can write whatever they want about their rules.

            Guest’s comment followed the time honoured thread of those who had been handed their asses here: first anonymizing their comments and then deleting them altogether. We’ve had some such people here and they admitted that they did. I have no idea how they did it but it speaks more of my (lack) of computer skills than anything else.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 2:26 pm #

            You can make whatever claim you want about Disqus.

            The proof is on the page.
            Look at all the guest ‘test’ un deleted comments.

            It looks like you’re experiencing a little repeatability problem with your hypotheses.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 2:28 pm #

            Now please explain how this translates into “traffic[ing] in lies”.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 2:31 pm #

            I’ll leave that up to you, gentle reader.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 2:36 pm #

            Ok, in that case, it doesn’t. Good, that’s what I had thought from the beginning, nice to have confirmation.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 2:44 pm #

            You’re experiencing a big repeatability problem with YOUR hypothesis. That isn’t the first vaccine post and this guest wasn’t the brightest anti-vaxxer mind on earth or even on this site. All other anti-vaxxer comments still stand – and many of them sounded far more impressive than his attempts. If Dr Amy was in DELETE mood, she should have gone after them.

            Then again, the rape comment is worthy of banning on this site. Dr Amy banned a follower who cussed at other commenters despite repeatedly being warned not to. But that isn’t what happened in this case.

            AND then again, I’m waiting for you to jump to defense to the offended rape commenter. After all, we saw how flippantly you take such posts.

          • Paul
            March 14, 2015 at 4:00 pm #

            Why did’,t Dr. Amy just say that they were banned for making rape comments? When I read down it looks like the rape comment came way before the ban.
            ..just saying.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 4:06 pm #

            Because he wasn’t banned at all, I think. When Dr Amy bans, she says so. And I don’t remember her deleting comments that looked far more convincing than the ones that were deleted. As I said, the poster first anonymized his comments, showing his desire to distance himself from them. It makes much more sense to me that later, he’s deleted them somehow than Dr Amy suddenly starting deleting.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            March 14, 2015 at 5:51 pm #

            He was banned. I deleted one or two rape comments. He deleted the rest. then he returned using a different email, but the same IP address. I banned that account, too. I suspect that the “people” questioning the deletions are the sock puppet account of the original commentors.

          • March 14, 2015 at 8:07 pm #

            It’s awfully convenient. A random poster makes escalating bizarre, inflammatory comments, escalates to the point of rape threats, since Dr Amy has deleted comments that were threatening to other commenters in the past.

            Second random anon complains about the comments disappearing and creates a very agenda-driven and organized campaign to “prove” Dr. Amy is specifically lying in her very longstanding assertion that she doesn’t delete dissent.

            Third random commenter appears with specific, timely “support” and suddenly there are a bunch of random “interested parties” pop up – none with disqus accounts – and support the agenda.

            After GOMI got hacked not long ago?

            I smell troll.

            Trying to lay some base to attack from, likely in support of some kind of “takedown” or discrediting of Dr. Amy.

          • Who?
            March 14, 2015 at 8:38 pm #

            Not sure I’d go as far as ‘organised’-that’s pretty high praise-but coordinated maybe.

            For me the giveaway is how passionate they are that things not be deleted-why do they care if they blow in and out?

            If it is organised then it means Dr T is rattling the cage of someone quite big, which is interesting in itself.

          • Jocelyn
            March 14, 2015 at 8:40 pm #

            Yeah, whenever several new commenters all pop up at the same time, all supporting each other in a very specific viewpoint, it’s awwwwfully suspicious.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 9:01 pm #

            Just happening to find a 4 year old page that nobody had commented on in a week, no less.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:19 pm #

            Errrrrr….SO, then a CONSPIRACY is afoot?

            How very exciting!

          • LibrarianSarah
            March 14, 2015 at 10:41 pm #

            A conspiracy requires multiple parties not one person making sockpuppets and acting like a douchebag online.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:22 pm #

            Disqus is actually funded by the KOCH BROTHERS.
            OMG! They must be collaborating with antivaxxer nutters to discredit poor Dr. Amy!

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 1:24 pm #

            I can’t speak for Amazed, but in my case, only very slightly.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 1:29 pm #

            As an addendum to my previous reply, if your proof is “You see, I was Hoaxbusterscall all along! And I tell you I didn’t delete my comments!”, I feel I will be morally obligated to punch you for wasting our time.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:31 pm #

            And then, I’ll say, “Hey, not true! I was Hoaxbusterscall all along (thanks for helping me remember my name, BTW!)! And I tell you I did delete my comments!”

            Come on, Nick, who are you going to believe? Me or John?

          • LibrarianSarah
            March 14, 2015 at 3:33 pm #

            It wouldn’t surprise me if John Barleycorn and Hoaxbusterscall were the same person and Hoaxbusters somehow deleted his own comments and came on again as “John Barleycorn” to accuse Dr. Amy of censorship and stir up more shit.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 4:39 pm #

            Good, I’m glad that I’m not the only person that thought occurred to.

          • March 14, 2015 at 6:13 pm #

            Seconded. And also possibly UI designer. Aside from not talking like a developer, its an extremely timely expert visit by someone with very specific supporting evidence. And there’s a clear agenda happening here. I suspect it’s a deliberate attempt to discredit Dr Amy saying she doesn’t delete. I wonder if it’s related to how vocal she is about the deleted posts on Midwifery Today, or one of the many other sites and people she’s called out for that.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 6:21 pm #

            And here I thought I was just being irrational by thinking the same thing.

          • LibrarianSarah
            March 14, 2015 at 10:37 pm #

            I doubt it is anything as well thought out or personal. My bet is that Hoaxbusterscall et al. is a troll that get’s his or her jollies by stirring up shit. She/he was probably bored and decided to spend his/her Saturday fucking with us. I am on vacation so I decided to walk on the beach instead of take the bait.

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            March 14, 2015 at 1:28 pm #

            Considering that in the way too many years that I’ve hung out here, there have only been a handful of comments that ever get deleted, and most of the time when that happens it is obviously by the person who deleted them (to the point that they admit it), and there has almost never been a case in which it is verified that Dr Amy deletes any comments, and even when she bans people, she admits it up front, given the choice between believing Dr Amy or believing that she suddenly went on a deleting rampage, I’ll go with believing her.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 12:43 pm #

            That is an interesting attitude. You say the comments were nonsensical. Is that why they were deleted?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 12:54 pm #

            Go look at any of the other vaccine articles, and notice how all the dissenters’ comments are still there, even those of people who got banned for being abusive. Dr. Tuteur doesn’t engage in censorship, but there’s no way to prevent someone from deleting their own posts.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 12:57 pm #

            As it became clear that Dr Amy isn’t the one who deleted them (something that only you believed in anyway), I suggest you ask the author because he deleted them. It won’t be the first time someone invests time and effort here to have their ass handed to them and then they rush to delete.

            But of course, you don’t believe this either. You’re so convinced that it was Dr Amy’s doing. I can imagine what kind of sites you use to lurk at if your first reaction is to think there was censorship at play.

          • UI Designer
            March 14, 2015 at 3:23 pm #

            This actually falls within my area of expertise as a web developer UI designer. That’s part of the reason why this blog post drew my attention.

            Disqus is a fine piece of software, in my opinion and Dr. Amy made a wise choice in using it for her comment section.

            An important piece of functionally that Disqus incorporates is the inability for users to delete their own comments and instead allows the option to anonymize.

            The reason for that is that it prevents people coming along, loading the comment section with comments and then deleting them so that you end up with what you have here which is a literal one sided discussion that is useless to anyone and degrades the quality of the blog.

            That is why it’s up to the Moderator to delete posts and disable information that is posted there.

          • Paul
            March 14, 2015 at 3:31 pm #

            Holy crap! John Balreycorn totally busted the woman out!

            Dr. AMy Tutor has some explaining to do, IMO.

          • UI Designer
            March 14, 2015 at 3:39 pm #

            To be clear here. I’m not accusing anybody of anything but my professional opinion is that a Moderator account is absolutely necessary to perform the delete function.
            And, as I stated, it’s with good reason.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 4:41 pm #

            Explaining of what?

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 3:36 pm #

            Disqus was never a fine piece of software to me. It gave me all sorts of trouble and a few weeks ago, it blocked this entire site over many comments on a single post (a vaccine one).

            I still cannot even anonymize my comments. I have no trust in Disqus.

          • UI Designer
            March 14, 2015 at 3:46 pm #

            I’m just trying to offer a professional opinion spoken from someone with over 20 years of experience. You, of course are free to disregarded it if you so choose.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 3:53 pm #

            I’m relaying my personal experience. And it isn’t mine alone. Many posters here have complained of the same thing.

            I’d expect that such a discrepancy would attract the interest of someone who is in this field. But your reply sounds much like an argument of authority. I am not saying that Discus is a bad platform. I don’t know enough about such platforms. All I’m saying is that *I*, as a user am experiencing trouble, so it isn’t without glitches. I know it’s supposed not to let comments be deleted by anyone else but the moderator. But then, it wasn’t supposed to crash under the weight of comments either. It’s supposed to let me log with my user name and it doesn’t, it demands my email.

            There are things that even I know are wrong with it.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:25 pm #

            Yes, that’s what I’m saying. I totally know it was Dr Amy’s doing.

            Let’s see when Dr Amy is going to delete this comment, right?

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            March 14, 2015 at 1:24 pm #

            Quick question: how can you tell the difference between a moderator deleting comments and a poster deleting their own? How would it “look” any different?

            Actually, if the moderator deletes them, isn’t it more likely that they disappear completely and don’t leave a “this comment was deleted” trace behind them?

  5. MaineJen
    March 9, 2015 at 12:59 am #

    http://hoaxbusterscall.blogspot.com/

    Oh guys. We have an anti-vaccine, 9/11 denialist, Sandy Hook denialist and (from the looks of it) Holocaust denialist here.

    I do not believe we should engage any further.

    • Who?
      March 9, 2015 at 1:07 am #

      Oh he’s one of the special little people all right, I’m out.

      How does one deny Sandy Hook? Another government conspiracy?

      Bizarre.

      • MaineJen
        March 9, 2015 at 1:08 am #

        I’m done as well. There is some horrifying stuff over there.

        • March 9, 2015 at 1:32 pm #

          “There is some horrifying stuff over there.”

          I host a community call on talkshoe …

          http://iurl.no/s74x8

          8pm Eastern, Monday nights(tonight). You are welcome to call in and make a case for vaccinations.

          I’m actually a gracious host. You will be treated with fairness with ample time to get your points across.

          Do it for the children.Be brave and do it for the children.

      • March 9, 2015 at 1:04 pm #

        “Oh he’s one of the special little people all right”

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

        “argumentum ad hominem, means responding to arguments by attacking a person’s character, rather than to the content of their arguments.”

        “Fallacious ad hominem reasoning is normally categorized as an informal fallacy, more precisely as a genetic fallacy, a subcategory of fallacies of irrelevance.”

    • Guest
      March 9, 2015 at 4:25 am #

      Good call, Jen

      Don’t forget Darwin denier. I’m that too.

      I’m sorry but I must haves missed the “engagement ”

      If you mean by that that you are going to stop with your baseless and pointless counter babble and fallacious non reason then, thank you.

      • mainejen
        March 9, 2015 at 8:56 am #

        Just keep in mind that comments on this site generally do NOT get deleted. So your…fascinating commentary will be here for all to see for as long as you wish. Your own words condemn you far more effectively than we ever could. I believe that would explain the resounding silence.

        • March 9, 2015 at 1:24 pm #

          “Just keep in mind that comments on this site generally do NOT get deleted”

          That’s so gracious of you not to delete comments.
          It would look pretty stupid to have all of your non responses to deleted posts visible.

          “Your own words condemn you far more effectively than we ever could.”

          Citing Supreme Court decisions and providing proof of your fallacious non reasoning is grounds for condemnation?

          So far you people have solely employed…

          Appeals to Authority(logical fallacy)

          Ad Hominem Attacks (fallacious)

          Appeal to Ridicule(fallacious)

          Baseless, not sourced or referenced, non responses.

          You did a brilliant job of thuroughly discrediting yourselves by confronting the issue with fallacious tactics and countering with baseless refutations without even citing a single source to back up anything you said.

          Bravo!

          “I believe that would explain the resounding silence”

          Actually it was 4 am and I finally went to bed.

          • mainejen
            March 9, 2015 at 1:46 pm #

            I was actually referring to your rape comment to Who? below, but whatever, dude. I’m sure everything’s been screencapped by now anyway.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:52 pm #

            You’re probably right. I shouldn’t have said anything suggestive of breaking off an item inside of Who’s
            butt.

            If Who is butt hurt then Who has my apologies.

          • Who?
            March 9, 2015 at 8:43 pm #

            Oh he doesn’t experience that as rapey, it’s probably how he makes points in real life. Getting people to appear to agree with you by hurting them until they stop challenging is a pretty standard behaviour set for your right wing control freak. His obsession with bottoms likely puts him at odds with certain elements in that environment, though, hence perhaps his enthusiasm for it on line.

            Trouble for him is, even wth sticks he’s imagined he’s jamming up our bottoms, we still think he’s wrong. And in the meantime he’s still appealing to his own authority while dismissing everyone elses’, misunderstanding the US Supreme Court and potentially the entire system, attacking us (well me) for having a bottom susceptible to penetration while disagreeing with him, ridiculing us for disagreeing with him and/or being sheeple, and mistaking no references for none available.

            So, pot, meet kettle, I think.

          • demodocus' spouse
            March 10, 2015 at 11:04 pm #

            To be fair, left wing control freaks do use pain to get people to “agree” with you, too. Certain Russian and Chinese leaders come to mind. Conspiracy nutters come in both versions.

          • Who?
            March 11, 2015 at 12:01 am #

            It’s true. The obsession with what might go into and out of bottoms is what made me assume he’s right wing-in my world most extreme right wingers come out of a socially repressive religious environment which demonises homosexuality, making references to bottoms pretty highly charged as both transgressive and deeply insulting.

            He could be out of a different environment, and certainly, violence and torture is on the menu for many governments, even sometimes those who should know better.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:31 pm #

            YES! The Russians, Chinese and the MF’n KOCH BROTHERS(they own Disqus, BTW) are collaborating with me and a whole host of antvaxxer nutters to discredit poor Dr. Amy because we sure as hell know that she don’t ever censor.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 11:55 am #

            They actually threatened to rape you? By way of the internet? You could have contracted a computer virus.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 2:21 pm #

            I love your attitude and how flippantly you take a rape comment because hey, it’s only an internet thing but you’re so focused on finding out how comments disappeared because hey, it’s an internet thing and it’s a BIG thing!

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:47 pm #

            What rape comment? It appears to be missing.
            You want me to take your word for it? I don’t think so.

        • John Barleycorn
          March 14, 2015 at 11:45 am #

          Did you delete the comments? It’s hard to follow with half of the discussion is deleted.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            March 14, 2015 at 12:31 pm #

            I didn’t delete any comments. The person who posted them deleted them.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 12:53 pm #

            It appears as if they invested a lot of time dialoging here and then just deleted their own comments.

            That’s quite peculiar.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 12:55 pm #

            So are denying 9/11, Sandy Hook, and the Holocaust. No one is claiming they weren’t peculiar.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:12 pm #

            That’s why their comments were deleted?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 1:23 pm #

            I’m guessing they couldn’t handle being challenged.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:52 pm #

            The person in question was a registered Disqus user based on the personalized icon next to their posts.

            Only a moderator(Dr. Amy)can delete a registered users post. Registered users can only anonymize their posts

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 1:57 pm #

            Via standard means. No coding is perfect, and it would not at all surprise me to find out there are exploits Disqus isn’t aware of.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 2:11 pm #

            So the person was a superhacker? You’re beginning to sound a little paranoid/conspiratorial yourself there, Nick

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 2:17 pm #

            When did I say anything about being super, or even above average? Disqus recently broke several pages of this blog because one of them received over 1000 comments. To me, that indicates that Disqus is made of some really crappy code. Getting through that is less “breaking into Fort Knox” and more “breaking into your neighbor’s tool shed”. And even then, that’s assuming they figured it out themself, rather than reading about it from someone else who figured it out.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 2:37 pm #

            Sure

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:27 pm #

            Why don’t you dial up the secret sauce and delete your own comment then, champ?

          • John Barelycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:43 pm #

            “No coding is perfect”

            That’s correct Nick, especially when an entire contingent of Chinese and Russian hackers, funded by the Koch Brothers start chopping away at it.

            Poor Dr. Amy

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 10:15 pm #

            You’re adorable.

          • Medwife
            March 14, 2015 at 3:55 pm #

            Yes. His brilliant persuasive arguments were about to blow the top off of vaccines, 9/11, Benghazi, and the Kennedy assassination. Dr Evil- I mean, Amy- had to take drastic action. But you’ve figured it out! Watch out, you’ll be next!

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:40 pm #

            Why do you need to go looking at that stuff when we got us a big ol’ stinkin’ CON-SPRA-SEE right here.

            You see, Dr. Amy is under attack by the Russians, The Chinese and no less than the Koch Brothers themselves.

            They used their enormous war chest to snap up Disqus and disabled it’s functionality solely for the purpose of making poor Dr. Amy look bad.

            My oh my, the evils that are wrought!

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            March 14, 2015 at 1:19 pm #

            It appears as if they invested a lot of time dialoging here and then just deleted their own comments.

            That’s quite peculiar.

            It’s not all that peculiar. We get the occasional loon that does it, when they’ve had their assess handed to them and don’t want to leave a trace.

            We also get the occasional person so embarrassed by their participation that they delete their Discuss account, so their posts end up as “Guest”

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 1:20 pm #

            Which happened to the Guest we’re discussing. Pity I don’t remember his Disqus name.

          • Somewhereinthemiddle
            March 14, 2015 at 1:31 pm #

            Not peculiar really. My theory as to why someone that extremist/ paranoid in their views might delete their comments because are paranoid that “the man” is watching them. Wouldn’t want to leave comments where the goverment could find them and attempt to “reprogram” their minds ya know? 😉

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:54 pm #

            You mean paranoia like the kind expressed by posters here that are suggesting that there is some sort of big coordinated conspiracy to discredit Dr. Amy by disabling Disqus’s functionality so that the one guy can delete his own comments?

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 12:55 pm #

            Are you sure you didn’t delete the comments?

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:39 pm #

            You clearly traffic in lies. OK, explain again why we need to trust you and defer to your authority?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 1:44 pm #

            First, I’d like to hear your explanation of how comment removal, and statements about who did it, invalidate a veritable sea of scientific data.

          • Amazed
            March 14, 2015 at 2:11 pm #

            Hmm, given the fact that Dr Amy was here and commenting when you started your “It was YOU who deleted the comments!” rampade, I’ll say the fact that our discussion is still here shows that she doesn’t feel threatened by your powerful discovery.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:50 pm #

            She has no fear of losing her blind sheep followers.

            Why should she?

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 10:04 pm #

            Rampage? You seem to a fondness for over-dramatization,
            You come across a lot like ‘Who?’ and ‘MainJen’.

            I suspect you are all the same people using alternate accounts.

            actually it’s quite obvious that you are stacking the deck.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 1:57 pm #

            The person had a personalized icon next to their posts(Disqus registered user)

            Only a moderator(You)can delete a registered users post. Registered users can only anonymize their posts

            Any registered Disqus user who doubts this should try and delete their own test post(thanks again, Nick)

            https://www.evernote.com/l/AGfq38Zt-GVMRKLMnVtXjLuGFzvxip5dnSk

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 2:21 pm #

            I’m still waiting on your answer about how comment deletion invalidates scientific data. There’s missing the forest for the trees, and then you seem to have gone and missed the forest for a few blades of grass.

          • Somewhereinthemiddle
            March 14, 2015 at 2:35 pm #

            Just out of curiosity, if the comments of *just* this one poster were deleted, why would that be? Why would Dr. T delete *only* those comments and not the entire thread? If she were trying to silence debate, why leave up the dozens of comments in response to the one person as evidence that she was deleting comments? Oh right, because that would make no sense would it. One of the commenters above even mentioned to that person that comments are not routinely deleted warning them that they would remain posted as long as they were left there by the poster. Maybe they (wisely) decided that they didn’t want their stuff floating around out there.

            Sorry, just not buying your conspiracy theory.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 10:00 pm #

            That is exactly why Disqus does not allow that.

            That is exactly my point.

            Dr. Tutor deleted the comments. Only the moderator can do that. Here again is the link to that fact….

            https://www.evernote.com/l/AGfq38Zt-GVMRKLMnVtXjLuGFzvxip5dnSk

          • Somewhereinthemiddle
            March 14, 2015 at 10:48 pm #

            And it has been explained why he was deleted which was that he was making light of rape and using threatening language against other commenters. Seems like a justiable reason for deleting comments and banning someone no?

            In any case, you are boring, predictable, and annoying. Good luck with all that.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            March 14, 2015 at 11:08 pm #

            Ban alert!

            I’m now going to ban you.

          • Gus
            March 14, 2015 at 11:22 pm #

            I’ll leave you to your Faith now.

            Worship in peace.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 9:25 pm #

            It looks like the Koch brothers are gunning for you now Dr. Amy.

            Anal rape will be the least of your worries at this point.

            Sorry to hear that!

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 10:06 pm #

            I was asking mainejan. But, mainjen is one of your sockpuppet accounts isn’t it, Doctor?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 14, 2015 at 10:19 pm #

            Well, you’re the expert on sock puppets here. And probably anything else, if we give you five minutes.

    • March 9, 2015 at 4:29 am #

      Good call, Jen

      Don’t forget Darwin denier. I’m that too.

      I’m sorry but I must haves missed the “engagement ”

      If you mean by that that you are going to stop with your baseless and pointless counter babble and fallacious non reason then, thank you.

  6. March 8, 2015 at 6:24 pm #

    Here’s a few questions I attempted to have answered by an official at the CDC…

    “Would not the lifting of legal protections for vaccine manufactures ease peoples minds?

    Why would parent want to accept a risk using a product when the manufacture refuses to accept a much lesser risk(financial loss)

    for their very own product?”

    Here’s the result…
    http://youtu.be/zyM7IAZw7Pc?list=UUSs5knAC6T1q-RUVSgTUC3w

    Pure bureaucratic stonewalling. The CDC simply refuses to answer these simple questions.

    If you want to risk you child by injecting them with a product that the manufacturer refuses to assume responsibility for then you are a fool.

    • Nick Sanders
      March 8, 2015 at 6:27 pm #

      I have a simple question for you. Why, out of all the posts on this blog, did you pick one that was 4 years old?

    • Amy Tuteur, MD
      March 8, 2015 at 6:44 pm #

      I have a question for you? Have you studied immunology? Can you explain to us exactly how vaccines work? If not, why should we take you seriously?

      • March 8, 2015 at 6:50 pm #

        Apparently, the manufactures have assessed the risk and have decided for themselves to not to take responsibility.

        You can attempt to claim the risk are minimal but that would be contrary to this information. Would it not?

        • Amy Tuteur, MD
          March 8, 2015 at 6:56 pm #

          So you don’t have any understanding of how vaccines work and you don’t know any immunology. Therefore, you are wasting our time.

          • March 8, 2015 at 6:58 pm #

            One thing that I am sure of is that the vaccine manufactures themselves understand and that is what is at issue here.

            They understand the risk and refuse to assume responsibility.

            You have no answer for this conundrum do you, Doctor?

          • March 8, 2015 at 7:00 pm #

            You should be a good candidate for a position over at the CDC. Over there you won’t even have to bother attempting to respond.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            March 8, 2015 at 9:10 pm #

            It’s not a conundrum to me, because I understand the issues involved. Clearly you don’t.

          • March 8, 2015 at 9:26 pm #

            You understand the issues involved yet you don’t provide any answers other than to assert your “credentials”. You are quite typical.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            March 8, 2015 at 10:12 pm #

            Because your only claim is: “it seems suspicious to me,” while acknowledging that you know nothing about the medical or business aspects of vaccines. The fact that it seems suspicious to you tells us more about you than about vaccines.

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:42 am #

            That fact that you resort to a diversionary tactic by trying to change the subject to my personal level of knowledge that has nothing to do with the relevant facts presented in my post tells me something about you.

            You are afraid to deal with the subject.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 12:43 am #

            You haven’t presented any relevant facts.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:00 am #

            You wouldn’t know a relevant fact if it crawled up your leg and bit you on the ass.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:21 am #

            It looks like your Harvard education has left you bereft of any ability whatsoever to conjure up even a remotely compelling response to a fair question.

            Did you give up already?

            Harvard has filled your head with a lot of “facts” but no ability to funnel any of that “wisdom” in to a compelling argument to help defend your cherished belief system.

            Harvard is a scam.

            Speaking of “law suits” you should try to sue those bastards and get some of that hefty tuition back.

            Harvard sucks balls!

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 11:40 am #

            Moderator,

            Who are you speaking to in this post? The comments are deleted. What is the point of this when it’s impossible to read responses? You should probably consider deleting all comment since half of them are missing already. This thread is useless.

        • Who?
          March 8, 2015 at 7:19 pm #

          I’m not so sure they are worried about losing-after all, as you say, they are rich and powerful and so can afford the best lawyers. I’m pretty confident that if it was anything like a fair fight with sophisticated commercial opponents the pharmaceutical companies would relish it. But who looks good defending claims made on behalf of sick kids by their distraught parents?

          Why is it so many of these families find it difficult to get lawyers? Just like insurance companies, lawyers are great at assessing risk, and won’t take on pro bono cases they can’t win. The companies (and courts) would therefore be expensively tied up for years by self represented litigants. When the pharmaceutical companies win (which they have overwhelmingly done when these things do go to court) they look bad because there is still a damaged child.

          Vaccine court is the best thing that ever happened to people who believe their children were injured by vaccine. Many more claims are successful than they would be at full trial, and it’s way cheaper. And they get to go and live their lives with a sense of vindication.

          What they don’t get to do is face the organisation they believe caused the injury, and I wonder if this is what they really want: a day in court to speak their mind. Court doesn’t give that either, despite what you see on whatever legal procedural it is you like to watch in your time off.

          • March 8, 2015 at 9:23 pm #

            Your post seems liken attempt to sugar coat an egregious situation.

            Civil liability is a tool to hold manufactures accountable for the products they produce.

            Civil liability has protected us from defective cars and toys and food and drugs that have passed federal licensing and safety standards.

            Why give civil liability immunity to a company who’s products are consistently touted as being safe and effective by every so called ‘health professional’?

            Why was it so important to establish this special protected status if the risks are so minimal?

            The VARS reporting system states that vaccine injuries are underreported.

            Out of the relative few cases that are reported, even fewer would have the resources and wherewithal to sue.

            You say that court cases make manufactures look bad because there is an injured child but lobbying for and getting special civil immunity privilege looks especially bad from a PR perspective.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 8, 2015 at 9:54 pm #

            Where does the VAERS say any such thing?

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            March 8, 2015 at 10:17 pm #

            Well, doesn’t VAERS show that the HPV vaccine turns girls into Wonder Woman? I don’t think that is listed on the known reactions for the vaccine injury court.

            See? Injuries are under-reported!

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:02 am #

            “Like other spontaneous reporting systems, VAERS has several limitations, including underreporting”

            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccine_Adverse_Event_Reporting_System

            Under the heading “Limitations”

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 12:40 am #

            1. That’s not VAERS saying it, it’s an article about VAERS.
            2. You seem to have left out that the rest of the section completely undermines your point.

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:46 am #

            The little numbers next to the paragraph will take you to the source…

            https://vaers.hhs.gov/data/index

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 12:48 am #

            So, since that is the actual answer to my question, why did it take you two tries to produce it?
            Also, once again, the rest of the page undermines your claims.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:07 am #

            please quote the part that “invalidates”.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 1:18 am #

            If you’re going to use quotation marks, at least get the word right. I never said it invalidated your claim, but it does call it into serious question:

            The very first thing the page tells you:

            “Guide to Interpreting VAERS Case Report Information

            When evaluating data from VAERS, it is important to note that for any reported event, no cause-and-effect relationship has been established. Reports of all possible associations between vaccines and adverse events (possible side effects) are filed in VAERS. Therefore, VAERS collects data on any adverse event following vaccination, be it coincidental or truly caused by a vaccine. The report of an adverse event to VAERS is not documentation that a vaccine caused the event.”

            Then, in the section about your much trumpeted underreporting:

            “”Underreporting” is one of the main limitations of passive surveillance systems, including VAERS. The term, underreporting refers to the fact that VAERS receives reports for only a small fraction of actual adverse events. The degree of underreporting varies widely. As an example, a great many of the millions of vaccinations administered each year by injection cause soreness, but relatively few of these episodes lead to a VAERS report. Physicians and patients understand that minor side effects of vaccinations often include this kind of discomfort, as well as low fevers. On the other hand, more serious and unexpected medical events are probably more likely to be reported than minor ones, especially when they occur soon after vaccination, even if they may be coincidental and related to other causes.”

            And scattered across the page are a few more similar statements reiterating that VAERS is not a record of causation.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:24 am #

            Is there a point in there somewhere?

          • Who?
            March 8, 2015 at 9:54 pm #

            Bofa talks above about why the vaccine court was created (at the request of anti-vaxxers). The vaccine court is an alternative, not a replacement.

            Lack of resources to sue is a great reason to have a more streamlined system-way more people get way more money, for proving very little or nothing, than they would if they chose to go to court.

            What PR would make a pharmaceutical company look good, in your opinion?

          • March 8, 2015 at 11:58 pm #

            From the Supreme court decision PDF available online…

            “..Awards are paid out of a fund created by an excise tax on each vaccine dose.

            As a quid pro quo, manufacturers enjoy significant tort-liability protections. Most importantly, the Act eliminates manufacturer liability for a vaccine’s unavoidable, adverse side effects.”

            “Held: The NCVIA preempts all design-defect claims against vaccine manufacturers brought by plaintiffs seeking compensation for injury
            or death caused by a vaccine’s side effects.”

            “The vaccine manufacturers fund an informal, efficient compensation program for
            vaccine injuries in exchange for avoiding costly tort litigation and the occasional disproportionate jury verdict.”

            From Scalias disenting opinion…

            “Indeed, the FDA has never even spelled out in regulations the criteria it uses to decide whether a vaccine is safe and effective for its intended use.”

            “The dissent believes the Act’s mandates are irrelevant because they do not spur innovation in precisely the same way as state-law tort systems.

            “For the foregoing reasons, we hold that the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act preempts all design-defect claims against vaccine manufacturers brought by plaintiffs who seek compensation for injury or death caused by
            vaccine side effects. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.”

            Sotomayer Dissent…

            “Vaccine manufacturers have long been subject to a legal duty, rooted in basic principles of products liability law, to improve the designs of their vaccines in light of advances
            in science and technology. Until today, that duty was enforceable through a traditional state-law tort action for defective design.”

            When you read through it there an emphasis on what is the new criteria for what would need to be proven in a tort case. Vaccines are a product classified as “unavoidably unsafe”. The plaintiff will now have the burden of proof to establish that there exists a safer alternative that was not used…

            Sotomayer Dissent(cont.)…

            “Accordingly, I believe §22(b)(1) exempts
            vaccine manufacturers from tort liability only upon ashowing by the manufacturer in each case that the vaccine was properly manufactured and labeled, and that the side effects stemming from the vaccine’s design could not have
            been prevented by a feasible alternative design that would have eliminated the adverse side effects without compromising the vaccine’s cost and utility.”

            “In contrast to the interpretation of §22(b)(1) set forth above, the majority’s interpretation does considerable violence to the statutory text, misconstrues the legislative history, and draws the wrong conclusions from the structure of the Vaccine Act and the broader federal scheme
            regulating vaccines.”

            “the majority entirely ignores the Vaccine Act’s default rule preserving state tort law.”

            “The majority’s argument, however, ignores
            that the default rule under the Vaccine Act is that state law is preserved. As explained above, §22(a) expressly provides that the “[g]eneral rule” is that “State law shall apply to a civil action brought for damages for a vaccine related injury or death.”

            “Absent a clear statutory mandate to the contrary, there is no reason to think that Congress intended in the vaccine context to eliminate the traditional incentive and deterrence functions served by state tort liability in favor of a federal regulatory scheme providing only carrots and no sticks.”

            “The majority’s suggestion that “vaccine manufacturers fund from their sales” the compensation program is misleading.

            Although the manufacturers nominally pay the tax, the amount of the tax is specifically included in the vaccine price charged to purchasers.”

            “Trial courts, moreover,have considerable experience in efficiently handling and disposing of
            meritless products liability claims, and decades of tort litigation (including for design defect) in the prescription-drug context have not led
            to shortages in prescription drugs.

            Despite the doomsday predictions of
            respondent and the various amici cited by the concurrence, the possibility of a torrent of meritless lawsuits bankrupting manufac-
            turers and causing vaccine shortages seems remote at best.

            More fundamentally, whatever the merits of these policy arguments, the issue in this case is what Congress has decided, and as to that question,
            the text, structure, and legislative history compel the conclusion that Congress intended to leave the courthouse doors open for children who
            have suffered severe injuries from defectively designed vaccines.

            The majority’s policy-driven decision to the contrary usurps Congress’ role and deprives such vaccine-injured children of a key remedy that Congress intended them to have.”

          • MaineJen
            March 9, 2015 at 12:20 am #

            You know what’s “unavoidably unsafe?” Measles. Polio. Rubella.

            I love how, every time anyone asks you a basic question (like: how do vaccines work?), you dodge and redirect. Not gonna fly here.

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:33 am #

            The question is,, since vaccines are so safe and effective why don’t the “authorities”(CDC) bring pressure to bear upon the vaccine manufactures and the courts to overturn the civil immunity and help to set peoples minds at ease regarding the risks?

            “I love how, every time anyone asks you a basic question (like: how do vaccines work?), you dodge and redirect. Not gonna fly here.”

            What do you want? “credentials”, “bonafides”, something telling you that I’m a doctor or else the points being made are invalid?

            That’s an example of fallacious argumentation.

            It’s called “Appeal to Authority”(read and learn)…

            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority

            “In informal reasoning, the appeal to authority is a form of argument attempting to establish a statistical syllogism. The appeal to authority relies on an argument of the form:

            A is an authority on a particular topic

            A says something about that topic

            A is probably correct

            Fallacious examples of using the appeal include any appeal to authority used in the context of logical reasoning, and appealing to the position of an authority or authorities to dismiss evidence…”

          • MaineJen
            March 9, 2015 at 12:42 am #

            LOL. Okay. Bofa explained up above that the Vaccine Injury court actually makes it *easier* for those who have suffered injuries from vaccines to collect damages, and that such courts were set up at the request of anti-vaccine groups, essentially creating a ‘fast lane’ for anyone wishing to collect money because they think they/their children were harmed be vaccines. So…what is the complaint, exactly?

            Second point: appeal to authority. Right. Well, so far you haven’t identified yourself beyond “What are they trying to hide????”, so I’m going to go out on a limb and say that yes, even I probably know more about vaccines and immunity than you. I mean, I’ve only spent most of my career studying immune response and directly observing the actions of antibodies in actual patients. But what do I know, right? Maybe you should read and learn. An immunology textbook.

            You still haven’t answered any direct questions. You are like one of those talking heads on Meet the Press, just repeating the talking points over and over and not really saying much of anything that makes sense.

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:53 am #

            “So…what is the complaint, exactly?”

            I responded to that above with excepts from the Supreme Court decision regarding manufactures legal immunity. Please read it.

            “Second point: appeal to authority.”

            Being persistent with a logical fallacy doesn’t make it more compelling, sorry.

            “You still haven’t answered any direct questions.”

            OK, please allow me to respond with an equally nonsequiter, irrelevant question…What is the precise chemical makeup of a crocodiles lacrimal gland excretion?

            I await your answer.

          • Who?
            March 9, 2015 at 12:48 am #

            What civil immunity? You can sue pharmaceutical companies for vaccine injuries in the US if you want to.

            Find a lawyer and do it. Oh, that’s right, most lawyers won’t take pro bono they don’t think they can win and successful suits in the courts have been rare.

            Vaccine court was set up at the behest of anti-vaxxers, now not only are you not happy about it you’re claiming it stops you suing if you want to.

            And you wonder why people don’t take you seriously.

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:57 am #

            You’re blowing smoke. You have no clue what you are even saying.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:12 am #

            Why don’t you quote even one source that backs up your assertions?

          • Who?
            March 9, 2015 at 1:14 am #

            I’m done with you. What kind of person denies Sandy Hook happened.

            Broken toys are best avoided lest they cause harm. You are a broken toy.

            Oh and I read the judgment you posted, it doesn’t mean what you think it means, though I see the error in your thinking.

          • MaineJen
            March 9, 2015 at 1:16 am #

            Not only denies it, but posts mocking photos of the victims and their families, and makes harassing phone calls to people who are grieving. That makes me sick to my stomach.

          • Who?
            March 9, 2015 at 1:17 am #

            Oh is he a relative of that gun nut from a few months ago, do you think?

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:54 am #

            I certainly hope you people don’t actually represent the medical industry.

            If so, we’re all fundamentally fucked.

          • Who?
            March 9, 2015 at 2:06 am #

            Oh lovey you think we’re all fucked anyway. It’s how your poor broken brain works. Reactive, shallow and vicious. Your fear and rage throb off the screen.

            And you’re obsessed with bottoms, which I think we all know shows us what you are repressing. Not that any of the regulars here would hold it against you-but your fellow travellers won’t like it if they find out.

            One more thing to hide!

          • March 9, 2015 at 2:11 am #

            What I’m reacting to is being confronted with people who have an absolute lack of reasoning ability.

            Not one of you have even attempted to deal with the subject of my post and instead have resorted to every logical fallacy in the list of logical fallacies.

            Forgive me if my thoughts drift towards obsession with bottoms.

            I am after all, dealing with a bunch of a-holes.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 1:19 am #

            They did what?!

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:49 am #

            “posts mocking photos of the victims and their families”

            What are you even talking about?

            Provide a link for proof, if you are even capable.

          • mainejen
            March 9, 2015 at 1:58 am #

            You provided the link yourself.

          • March 9, 2015 at 2:23 am #

            What I have posted is videos that string together the imagery that spewed forth from the media in the ensuing days after Sandy Hook to help highlight the absurdity of what was presented as fact.

            You either haven’t looked into that subject much or you are the type that unquestionably accepts what is force fed to you from the tube.

            You most likely take it all in to your psyche just as you take all of your poison vaccinations, without reservation or any hesitancy.

          • MaineJen
            March 10, 2015 at 11:59 am #

            I am not going to post any more links to your despicable site. I don’t want to provide you any more hits (which I’m sure is the reason you are trolling here in the first place…why else would you make the url your profile photo and your user name). I’m sorry I posted the first link, to be honest.

            I was referring to a lovely photo I came across on your horrible excuse for a website. It features one of the six-year-old victims of Sandy Hook. His picture is featured along with the pictures of several members of a terrorist organization who were killed in a mass shooting. The caption reads something to the effect of “This poor kid has the worst luck, he keeps getting killed in mass shootings.”

            Go ahead. Deny that it’s there. Defend it, if you can. Throw “freedom of speech” at us. And then explain to us, again, why we should listen to ANYTHING you have to say.

            I have no doubt you are trying to generate interest in your vile theories. But *you made fun of a murdered child*. If you think something like that is funny, then you are a vile human being. If that is an ad hominem attack, well then, guilty as charged.

          • March 10, 2015 at 1:14 pm #

            There was, allegedly, a school shooting in Pakistan and on the schools facebook page and elsewhere, the image of the child formerly identified as Noah Pozner from Sandy Hook was included among the Pakistani school shooting victims where he was also given a Pakistani sounding name.

            This appeared on BBC news reports as well.

            If you don’t have a problem with that then I don’t know what to tell you.

          • MaineJen
            March 10, 2015 at 3:28 pm #

            And there’s that link again.

            If you REALLY don’t see anything wrong with what you said, you’re even sicker than I thought.

          • March 10, 2015 at 3:41 pm #

            “And there’s that link again.”

            What link? hoaxbsterscall.com ?

            You’re the one who referred to murdered children as “terrorist”.

            You most likely jumped to that conclusion based solely on their appearance which is indicative of racism.(Islamaphobia)

            I don’t believe that children were actually murdered at Sandy Hook. There is just way too much evidence to the contrary.

          • March 10, 2015 at 1:30 pm #

            “His picture is featured along with the pictures of several members of a terrorist organization”

            They weren’t members of a “terrorist organization”. They were identified as murdered children.

            In your haste to condemn me you just slandered murdered children by calling them terrorists.

            That’s somewhat vile.

          • March 9, 2015 at 2:29 am #

            “makes harassing phone calls to people who are grieving”

            Where?

            You are going way out of your way to avoid a question to the point where you are now making shit up.

            You are an irksome soul.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:48 am #

            You brought absolutely nothing to the conversation anyway but a load of baseless assertions with nothing to back them.

            When I ask for a source you run like a scared rabbit.

            Adios!

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:55 am #

            “Broken toys are best avoided lest they cause harm. You are a broken toy.”

            I broke something off in your ass that you apparently can’t handle.

            The Truth.

          • March 10, 2015 at 2:21 pm #

            Here’s a video that explains the corrupt vaccine courts….

            http://youtu.be/6S1-LgYyjQg

        • Nick Sanders
          March 8, 2015 at 9:53 pm #

          That’s not the question you were asked.

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:04 am #

            The question has nothing to do whatsoever with the information in my post.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 12:42 am #

            No, it was quite clearly related. If you can’t prove you understand vaccines, there’s no reason to listen to your complaints about them, as Dr. Tuteur’s third question indicates.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:05 am #

            “Proof” meaning a piece of parchment paper that came out of some crusty, overblown and bloated institutional brain washing camp like Harvard?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 1:13 am #

            Proof meaning a simple demonstration of conceptual comprehension of the mechanics involved.

          • March 9, 2015 at 1:44 am #

            So, what if copy pasted something from some medical journal? What damn difference would that even make?

            I’m making a counter claim in response to a claim made on this specific post.

            What makes you believe that I have some burden of proof as to what level of knowledge I have on a related subject?

            That’s irrelevent!

            Sure, I understand how vaccines are suppose to work but that has no relevance to the discussion whatsoever.

            What real evidence do you have that vaccines even work?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 1:57 am #

            Smallpox.

          • March 9, 2015 at 2:39 am #

            What evidence do you have that vaccines are responsible for the reduction in smallpox cases?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 9, 2015 at 7:55 pm #

            Well, it being completely extinct now, outside of a few vials stored in research labs, is a start. That said extinction happened in lockstep with vaccination is another big clue.

          • March 10, 2015 at 2:18 am #

            So, what you are saying is that correlation = causation?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 10, 2015 at 7:56 am #

            It’s doesn’t equal causation, but a correlation that strong does jump up and down, waving it’s arms and yelling “Hey, look at me!”. I mean, I could show you peer-reviewed articles on the subject that have far more rigorous actual proofs, but given your comments about such things, I suspect it would be pearls before swine.

          • March 10, 2015 at 12:43 pm #

            http://hoaxbusterscall.blogspot.com/p/wall-of-calls.html

            Listen to the call i made to the CDC where the lady admits that thimerosal (mercury)is still in the vaccines…

            ‘CDC answers questions about thimerosal’

            (it’s half way down the page)

            There’s also a strong correlation between autism and vaccines but of course, correlation does not equal causation. Yet ,if you are injecting a known neurotoxin into a child it’s probably a safe bet that you may end up with neurotoxic symptoms.

            “I mean, I could show you peer-reviewed articles on the subject that have far more rigorous actual proofs”

            Not one person on this thread has yet to cite a single source or link for any of their assertions at any time. Why would you start now?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 10, 2015 at 4:26 pm #

            It’s still in flu vaccines, not the childhood schedule. There is no correlation. And I repeat, why would anyone bother showing studies to someone who has shown open contempt for them?

          • March 10, 2015 at 9:34 pm #

            Yes, Mercury is still being injected into children via the flu vaccine. Also, aluminum is at incredibly high levels in the childhood vaccine schedule.

            14.7 to 49 times more aluminum from vaccines than the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) safety limits allow.

            Aluminium is a known neurotoxin as well.

          • Nick Sanders
            March 10, 2015 at 10:50 pm #

            Thimerosal is not mercury, aluminum is not a neurotoxin.

          • March 10, 2015 at 10:22 pm #

            Let me ask you something Nick because you seem to be passionate about this subject.

            Did you watch the video that I linked to in my original post? The one where I strung together my multiple attempts to get in contact with a representative expert at the CDC to answer two questions?

            That is a part of their job, by the way, to interface with the public at large.

            Are you not in the least bothered by the fact that they would not return my call or speak to me officially and on the record regarding those two questions?

            Do you believe in authority without accountability.?

          • Nick Sanders
            March 10, 2015 at 10:50 pm #

            I believe they have better things to do with their time than repeatedly answer the same, clearly stupid, questions.

          • March 11, 2015 at 12:04 am #

            You’re a piece of work, to be sure.

          • Dr Kitty
            March 10, 2015 at 9:03 am #

            http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2011/06/20/todays-falsehood-correlation-i/

            Sometime correlation is an indicator of causation. corrrelation doesn’t PROVE causation, but it can suggest it.

            What is your alternative explanation for the eradication of smallpox? Can YOU prove causation?

          • March 10, 2015 at 9:54 pm #

            The burden of proof is on you that they work.

            I asked for evidence and you’ve provided nothing.

            The article you presented reinforces what I stated.

            Correlation is not causation absent other compelling factors, like repeatability. Simply stating that there is a correlation is not providing proof of anything.

            You should have read the article carefully because it seems to state the opposite of what you intended.

          • demodocus' spouse
            March 10, 2015 at 11:17 pm #

            My 1 year old sometimes catches his fingers in a door. At the same time, his fingers start to hurt. Sometimes he then presses harder on the door with his free hand, and at the same time his trapped fingers hurt more. Correlation =/= causation, however sometimes it is *highly* probable. But keep assuming that the vast majority of doctors in the world are either dupes or evil for recommending vaccines. Clearly you are much smarter than me.

          • March 11, 2015 at 12:01 am #

            Your child is probably vaccine damaged if they are exhibiting that type of behavior.

          • Who?
            March 11, 2015 at 12:05 am #

            Just when I think you’ve hit rock bottom (see how I said ‘bottom’, are you aroused and a bit disgusted at the same time, thought so) you have a spurious crack (see how I said ‘crack’ are you really worked up now, mind no bodily fluids get into the keyboard) at the kids.

          • March 11, 2015 at 12:30 am #

            Your butt references now out number mine 10 to 1.

            Why do you keep trying to steer the conversation back to that?

            It’s obvious that you have nothing else.

          • March 11, 2015 at 12:38 am #

            My quip about breaking off something in your butt seemed to have really peaked your interest.

            To make myself clear, I’m not here for a date hookup or anything of the sort so don’t ask me for a web cam chat or anything. That would be rather inappropriate.

            Try Zoosk or something-sheesh!

          • Who?
            March 11, 2015 at 12:46 am #

            That is horrifying. How dare you take that tone with me.

            Let’s be clear-you came up with the idea of anally raping me with an object then breaking it off inside my body, because I disagreed with you. You repeatedly made anal references. You did. You are violent angry and dangerous and really should not be out among, well, people.

          • Jack Boots
            March 11, 2015 at 1:15 am #

            That’s horrifying? You really need to get out more.

          • Mishimoo
            March 11, 2015 at 1:18 am #

            You’re certainly being a shining light for your cause.

          • Who?
            March 11, 2015 at 1:23 am #

            Yes push them hard enough and they’ll revert to type, every time. Though he went faster than I thought he might.

          • Mishimoo
            March 11, 2015 at 1:32 am #

            Of course! He also had to make the assumption that vaccines damage reading ability and language retention. Now if only he could be an amusing troll rather than a rude one.

          • Who?
            March 11, 2015 at 1:36 am #

            Dare to dream!!!

          • Jack Boots
            March 11, 2015 at 1:24 am #

            Look up the word “maudlin”

          • Who?
            March 11, 2015 at 1:24 am #

            Perhaps you could look up ‘vulgar moron’.

          • Jack Boots
            March 11, 2015 at 1:27 am #

            Look up anything that’s not related to the discussion.

          • Who?
            March 11, 2015 at 1:35 am #

            What discussion? Your mate derailed it days ago not long after re-starting it.

            Oh actually, why bother. Part of me likes keeping you all here for as long as possible if it means you aren’t out spreading dangerous nonsense to people who may not know better. And it is great practice to see where you all go when pushed-good taste, the law and risk of reputational damage make all that a bit tricky in real life but the knowledge is oh so handy, so thanks for that.

            But you are all soooooo predictable. Try and be a bit interesting and inventive, could you?

          • Mishimoo
            March 11, 2015 at 1:30 am #

            Thank you for proving my point by being consistent in your behaviour.

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 11:33 am #

            Shining lights are no match for the ban hammer! Ha Ha Ha!

          • John Barleycorn
            March 14, 2015 at 11:31 am #

            That person must have been horrible. It’s a good thing that my delicate sensibilities are being protected by deleting their comments.

          • demodocus' spouse
            March 11, 2015 at 8:49 am #

            Awe, he deleted. He told me that my child was clearly vaccine damaged! but I thought the kale and coffee enemas were supposed to help with that! Personally, I suspect that my little vaccine damaged snowflake will figure it out before he’s 17 months old. It’ll interfere with his piano playing, but I’m sure Hoax Perpetrator is doing his best.

          • March 10, 2015 at 10:02 pm #

            “The ‘victory over epidemics’ was not won by medical science or by doctors – and certainly not by vaccines… The decline has been the result of technical, social and hygienic improvement.”

            Gerhard Buchwald MD, Internal Medicine Specialist,Germany

            That assessment makes far more sense because there are multiple deadly diseases for which there were no vaccines ever developed and they also declined during the same relative time frame.

          • March 10, 2015 at 11:59 pm #

            You just persist in pointing to spurious correlations.

            What would better would be a thorough across the board study using control groups of vaccinated vs unvaccinated children.

            Good luck finding that one.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            March 10, 2015 at 11:02 pm #

            It’s over and your side lost. The anti-vax position and ant-vaxxers have been thoroughly discredited. Maybe you didn’t get the memo, but there’s nothing left to discuss.

          • March 10, 2015 at 11:53 pm #

            Basically what you are saying is that it is not necessary for the “authorities” to answer questions because the science is settled.

            No need to address the flagrantly hypocritical stance of promoting the idea of lawsuits for “anti-vaxxers” while manufactures enjoy civil litigation immunity.

            No need to address the blatant conflict of interest that is exhibited with the so-called “vaccine courts”.

            “We’re the authorities here and you just need to accept what we tell you to do and not raise questions because we will not answer them”.

            No thank you. No reason to do that when you show yourself incapable of rational dialog.

            Simply asserting that “there’s nothing left to discuss” is not rational dialog by any standard.

            It’s dismissive, disrespectful, hypocritical and totally inconstant with the image you normally try to project.

            Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) report….

            Deaths per year…

            12,000 — unnecessary surgery
            7,000 — medication errors in hospitals
            20,000 — other errors in hospitals
            80,000 — infections in hospitals
            106,000 — non-error, negative effects of drugs

            These total to 225,000 deaths per year from iatrogenic causes.

            http://www.drug-education.info/documents/iatrogenic.pdf

            These statistics, if anything, are most likely way underestimated based on the prevalence of underreporting.

            This reality hardly puts you in a position of an unassailable authority that is above answering questions.

            There aint shit that is settled, lady.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            March 10, 2015 at 11:59 pm #

            No, what I’m saying is that anti-vax is the flat earth theory of the 21st Century. It marks people as ignorant and gullible.

          • Jack Boots
            March 11, 2015 at 1:06 am #

            You finally banned me. It’s about time. a little late for damage control, however.

            -Hoax Busters Call
            hoaxbusterscall.com

    • The Bofa on the Sofa
      March 8, 2015 at 9:35 pm #

      Did you know that the Vaccine Injury Court system was proposed by anti-vaccination groups, because they wanted to make it easier to recoup damages due to vaccine injury? It’s actually easier to win there than it is in a civil suit because if it is one of the known adverse outcomes, it is presumed that the vaccine caused it, regardless of whether it did or not.

      Of course, the existence of the vaccine injury court system in no way precludes injured parties from suing vaccine manufacturers. Did you know that?

      The whole problem is that in suing vaccine manufacturers, you actually have a burden of proving damages, and you know what? That’s REALLY hard to do.

      • March 9, 2015 at 12:09 am #

        OK, so what other manufacturers of products can you name that have the same immunity from civil litigation that vaccine manufactures enjoy?

        Should not these special conditions inform you regarding the extraordinarily high risk associated with these products?

        What is so difficult to understand about the clear danger that vaccines pose based on this information?

        • The Bofa on the Sofa
          March 9, 2015 at 9:29 am #

          OK, so what other manufacturers of products can you name that have the same immunity from civil litigation that vaccine manufactures enjoy?

          Vaccine manufacturers do not have “immunity” from civil litigation. They can absolutely be sued in civil court. The problem is, it’s a lot harder to win a civil case than it is to win in the vaccine court, so people don’t do it. You actually have to prove your case.

          And what other manufacturers have a system set up so that they can have to pay damages WITHOUT having to go through civil litigation?

          • March 9, 2015 at 12:49 pm #

            The manufacturers don’t pay damages. The damages come out of a fund funded by a tax. Read the Supreme Court decision. I posted the relevant paragraphs that prove my point in this thread.

            “Vaccine manufacturers do not have “immunity” from civil litigation”

            Again, read the Supreme Court decision…

            From Sotomayer’s dissenting opinion…

            “More fundamentally, whatever the merits of these policy arguments, the issue in this case is what Congress has decided, and as to that question,
            the text, structure, and legislative history compel the conclusion that Congress intended to leave the courthouse doors open for children who
            have suffered severe injuries from defectively designed vaccines.”

            “The majority’s policy-driven decision to the contrary usurps Congress’ role and deprives such vaccine-injured children of a key remedy that Congress intended them to have.”

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