Anti-vaccine parents and the package insert paradox

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Hey, anti-vaxxers, help me out here!

You’re big fans of vaccine package inserts, right? You’re constantly waving them in parents’ faces insisting that they “reveal” the “truth” about vaccine dangers, right?

So why do you ignore the package insert when it talks about the benefits, efficacy and safety of vaccines?

[pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]You’re big fans of vaccine package inserts, right? So why do you ignore the package insert when it talks about the benefits, efficacy and safety of vaccines?[/pullquote]

According to Stop Mandatory Vaccination:

The risks for each vaccine are stated right on the vaccine package inserts but these inserts are not given to parents or even to adults considering the suggested vaccines for them. It is also doubtful that the doctor or nurse dispensing the vaccine has fully read the product insert

A full list of contraindications and adverse events listed in the package inserts is available on the Immunization Action Coalition website. While the incidence of any particular adverse reaction listed on the insert may not be unacceptable in the eyes of the manufacturer or the CDC, every parent has both the duty and right to know what they are so that they can decide whether the benefit outweighs the risk for their child or themselves. (my emphasis)

The folks at Stop Manadatory Vaccination, seem to believe that package inserts are so important because they are:

  • Accurate
  • Filled with valuable information
  • Scrupulously honest

Let’s take a look at the package insert for the MMR (mumps, measles, rubella) vaccine. It includes nearly two pages of possible vaccine side effects. Nothing is too small or too rare to be listed.

Looks scary, right?

But there’s more!

According to the package insert, the MMR is highly effective!

Clinical studies of 284 triple seronegative children, 11 months to 7 years of age, demonstrated that M-M-R II is highly immunogenic and generally well tolerated. In these studies, a single injection of the vaccine induced measles hemagglutination-inhibition (HI) antibodies in 95%, mumps neutralizing antibodies in 96%, and rubella HI antibodies in 99% of susceptible persons.

According to the package insert, the MMR has been extensively tested!

Efficacy of measles, mumps, and rubella vaccines was established in a series of double-blind controlled field trials which demonstrated a high degree of protective efficacy afforded by the individual vaccine components. These studies also established that seroconversion in response to vaccination against measles, mumps, and rubella paralleled protection from these diseases.

According to the package insert, the MMR dramatically improves public health!

The impact of measles, mumps, and rubella vaccination on the natural history of each disease in the United States can be quantified by comparing the maximum number of measles, mumps, and rubella cases reported in a given year prior to vaccine use to the number of cases of each disease reported in 1995. For measles, 894,134 cases reported in 1941 compared to 288 cases reported in 1995 resulted in a 99.97% decrease in reported cases; for mumps, 152,209 cases reported in 1968 compared to 840 cases reported in 1995 resulted in a 99.45% decrease in reported cases; and for rubella, 57,686 cases reported in 1969 compared to 200 cases reported in 1995 resulted in a 99.65% decrease.

The package insert mandates scrupulous attention to safety, acknowledges risks, emphasizes informed consent and asks for detailed explanations of any adverse reactions:

The health-care provider should inform the patient, parent, or guardian of the benefits and risks associated with vaccination. For risks associated with vaccination see WARNINGS, PRECAUTIONS, and ADVERSE REACTIONS.

Patients, parents, or guardians should be instructed to report any serious adverse reactions to their health-care provider who in turn should report such events to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services through the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System …

In fact, if you read the entire package insert, you would almost certainly opt to vaccinate your child!

See the paradox?

You claim that package inserts offer vital, scrupulously honest information about vaccines. They do.

So why aren’t you vaccinating?

998 Responses to “Anti-vaccine parents and the package insert paradox”

  1. Hens Zimmerman
    September 9, 2016 at 6:28 pm #

    First of all, thanks for opening the discussion and your blog. I am in general an atheist, very much against all kinds of “magical thinking” including homeopathy, etc.

    But here’s the thing: the mere title of this blog post lumps together all the vaccines as if they are either a) all good or b) all bad. This is exactly what I found very disturbing in the discussions I found when we got our baby, now 6 years ago. I went to the talks of the anti-vaccine folks, and found to my relief that the spokes person invited us all to do our own research and ask questions where appropriate. So when the cards from the Dutch RIVM came in, inviting us to insert lots of vaccines in our little girl, I tried to do my own research. From the beginning it was clear for me that I wanted to vaccine at least against polio, because I found several cases in the Netherlands in recent years. So our option became: DTP or DKTP (where K stands for “whooping cough” or Bordetella pertussis). Now, DKTP was widely available and free of charge, where as DTP had to be ordered and was not free of charge. So I asked our family doctor if there was really a good reason to vaccine against Bordetella pertussis. The RIVM (the Dutch institute concerned with the vaccine program) admitted that the K in DKTP was for a bacteria that was not seen in the wild anymore, because the Bordetella pertussis had evaded the vaccine (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC88555/). They also agreed the “whooping cough” was only very rarely a serious threat for very young infants, and by the time we were in the running for the vaccines the actual threat was very debatable. Especially because the vaccine did not yield an immunisation against the bacteria (because of the mutation that was now seen). So my wife and I bought the DTP vaccine to avoid inserting unnecessary stuff into the veins of our lovely baby girl. You see, I’m super glad it’s 2016 and I’m all for vaccines, but I find it disturbing that the discussion is always very unscientific: you’re either for or against. Even those in the know ridicule those who doubt the effectiveness of a single vaccine. In fact, when I was doing my own little google research 6 years ago I found that the scientific community has not done enough research on the effectiveness of combined vaccines (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD005530.pub3/abstract;jsessionid=B44955282F1765F9532AA3B163EA9D4E.f01t03) with some papers even claiming a less effective approach in combining vaccines. Our family doctor agreed the standard combination vaccines are free because they are mass-produced and sponsored, even though the K part is not preventing against bordetella pertussis as good as it could be if the newer strains were used. I personally would find it great if the discussion would be less black or white. A bit of openness would be very welcome. Is it cheaper to use a gazillion DKTP injections that are already produced or would it be better for our children if the vaccine against ‘whooping cough’ was actually up to date? Same for the HiB vaccines: the WHO agrees that it does not immunize infants against the NTHi strains of haemophilus influenza.

    • swbarnes2
      September 9, 2016 at 7:02 pm #

      You don’t stop vaccinating just because the vaccine is less effective than we wish it were. It’s better for a kid to have some resistance than none at all.

      http://www.rivm.nl/en/Documents_and_publications/Common_and_Present/Newsmessages/2015/Concerns_over_whooping_cough_despite_modifications_to_vaccination_programme

      “Whooping cough can be extremely serious, sometimes fatal, for babies who are not or not fully vaccinated. In order to better protect this risk group, three changes in the pertussis vaccination schedule have been implemented:…The RIVM monitoring of whooping cough data in the Netherlands shows that these changes have indeed led to fewer cases of pertussis in 6-month-old infants up till 8-10 year-old children.”

      Your paper doesn’t say what you think it says. Strains drifting does not equal “evading” the protective effect of the vaccine.

      I’m sorry, but your baby was already being exposed to hundreds of antigens a day. One more would have done no harm, and would have given her SOME protection from a deadly disease. You chose instead to leave her absolutely wide open to a potentially fatal infection.

  2. Nick Sanders
    September 4, 2016 at 4:47 pm #

    I’m starting to wish I actually did work for Big Pharma. Then, at least I’d get paid for putting up with these idiots, plus I might not have had to pay $90 for an off-hours clinic to confirm that, yes, I sure do have an ear/sinus infection, so I could get some Augmentin.

    Why does the really obvious stuff always have to happen on the weekend when my regular, much less expensive, doctor’s office is closed?

    • Azuran
      September 4, 2016 at 7:16 pm #

      I sure as hell wouldn’t mind getting all those ‘bonuses’ I’m supposed to get from Big Pharma for vaccinating.

    • Charybdis
      September 4, 2016 at 8:35 pm #

      You just need to diffuse some essential oils, rinse your sinuses with a Neti pot containing a mixture of green tea, chicken soup and kale. If you could find a chunk of placenta to toss into the mix, it would make the rinsing mixture an order of magnitude more potent. Ask your chiropractor to align your chakras and drink plenty of homeopathic water. That’ll fix you up in no time.

      (please don’t tell me I need to specify this is sarcasm)

      • Monkey Professor for a Head
        September 5, 2016 at 12:18 am #

        Don’t forget the breastmilk. Squirt that stuff right up there!

      • JGC
        September 7, 2016 at 2:17 pm #

        But how many C do I dilute it to (with vigorous shaking, of course) before I squirt it up my nose?

  3. Maud Pie
    September 4, 2016 at 10:14 am #

    Barzini’s repeated demands for someone to respond to the YouTube videos he links has given me an idea. Perhaps someone with more entrepreneurial spirit and ambition could take this up: a personal debunking service. You can charge an hourly rate to watch the videos, prepare a point by point response, educate the client on all the background information necessary to understand the debunking, and explain, in a way the client can understand, why the video is pseudoscientific rubbish. It’s a tedious task to do all this for free on Disqus, but monetary compensation might provide the incentive.

    • Charybdis
      September 4, 2016 at 11:17 am #

      It sounds like a great idea, but for one thing. Even when the points are evaluated and debunked using scientific studies, education and citable papers/articles, etc, the questioner is no more likely to agree with the debunking/rebuttal than they were before.

      They are bound and determined that vaccines are somehow shady/bad medicine and no amount of rational education and explanation of the science involved will make any difference to them.

      Look at Barzini: Aluminum is a neurotoxin! Responsible for Alzheimer’s! Aluminum is in vaccines! Inject babies with known neurotoxins! Mercury is STILL in vaccines! Ingestion is not injection!…yada, yada yada, ad nauseam. Not knowing that some illnesses are viral and some are bacterial and that antibiotics have made great strides in our ability to fight and cure bacterial illnesses, but that antibiotics don’t work for viral illnesses. Not recognizing or accepting that adjuvants make vaccines safer because a much smaller amount of the virus or part of the virus (proteins, usually) can be used and the adjuvant helps the body produce the required immune response. Not realizing that ethyl mercury and methyl mercury are NOT the same thing, nor caring that they are different when it is pointed out.

      Numbers of us have rebutted/debunked Barzini’s claims, but s/he doesn’t care. We have said it different ways, posted links to peer-reviewed journal articles, posted links to places like CDC, FDA, NIH, etc that spell out vaccine ingredients and potential side effects, provided quick thumbnail summaries of how the immune system works, pointed out flaws in his logic, explained why the paragons of science he references (Humphries, Sears, etc.) are considered quacks and that their work is highly questionable.

      Barzini doesn’t care about all that. Nor do a lot of anti-vaxxers. If rational scientific evidence doesn’t convince them, then nothing will. Until/unless they themselves or a close family member/friend catches a VPD and suffers greatly from it or dies. Then it *might* start to maybe sink in that vaccines are a good thing.

      • Maud Pie
        September 4, 2016 at 11:28 am #

        You are right, of course, but at least the debunker could earn some money. Woo believers are always transferring their money to charlatans, but with this scheme some money would be diverted away from the quacks.

        • Charybdis
          September 4, 2016 at 11:57 am #

          True. I don’t know who would have the patience for it, though.

          • Maud Pie
            September 4, 2016 at 9:36 pm #

            I sure wouldn’t, that’s why I’m proposing someone else do it.

    • Barzini
      September 4, 2016 at 11:50 am #

      I would personally be willing to pay money for such a service

      I fully admit that I’m biased, but I’m genuinely trying to learn what both sides have to say

      • Sonja Henie
        September 4, 2016 at 2:19 pm #

        It doesn’t seem that way to me. You have only presented “evidence” from anit-vaccine cranks such as Humphries, Sears, et al, and articles that support your opinions.

        • Barzini
          September 4, 2016 at 8:26 pm #

          Christopher Shaw is a ‘crank’ ?

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            September 4, 2016 at 8:35 pm #

            Absolutely. Try to find some scientific evidence that hasn’t been spoon fed to you by anti-vax cranks. Please cite appropriate papers THAT YOU HAVE READ and quote the relevant sections (not the abstract).

          • Wren
            September 5, 2016 at 3:40 am #

            Or just stop hand waving away the explanations you have been given here.

          • Barzini
            September 5, 2016 at 8:02 am #

            I posted the links to those papers to see if anyone was familiar with them or had an opinion on them and also simply as proof that research is currently being performed into a possible link between alzheimers and other disorders and aluminium

            It seems unlikely that everyone involved in such research is a ‘loon’, ‘human waste’ or a ‘snake-oil salesman’

          • Wren
            September 5, 2016 at 8:47 am #

            Even if there is a link, the aluminium in vaccines is of a far lesser amount than aluminium obtained through food. It is not a reason to forgo vaccination. Yes, I know you believe that somehow aluminium injected IM crosses into the brain when ingested aluminium does not, but you have not provided evidence to support that claim.

          • Amazed
            September 5, 2016 at 9:17 am #

            When has this particular piece of human waste ever produced any research? I mean research and not “research”.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 5, 2016 at 9:19 am #

            The heck that’s your reason for posting this tripe! That’s another typical anti-vax meme, to try to be oh-so innocent! Not buying it, not from you.

            There may be one or two non loon, human waste, snake-oil salesmen who get involved in such research, but once they found out what’s going on they either cross over or leave.

            BTW, I just noticed your picture shows you smoking a cigarette. Are you a lung-cancer denier as well?

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            September 5, 2016 at 9:33 am #

            Not science. Please provide appropriate quotes from relevant papers (not abstracts) and place them in the context of preponderance of scientific evidence.

          • Charybdis
            September 4, 2016 at 8:39 pm #

            Crank, quack, charlatan, snake-oil salesman, sham, fraud, mountebank, flimflammer, take your pick.

          • Barzini
            September 5, 2016 at 7:58 am #

            It’s an interesting article and I agree that research funded by anti-vax groups is likely to generate results which question vaccination

            However, it works both ways

            Ultimately, the article supports my growing belief that the peer reviewed journal process is flawed

          • Sonja Henie
            September 5, 2016 at 9:12 am #

            Your growing belief, LOL! That’s another anti-vax meme! Keep it up Barz! You like to show your bias.

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            September 5, 2016 at 9:33 am #

            Not science. Please provide actual science.

          • September 5, 2016 at 7:16 pm #

            Of course it’s flawed, Barzini. Perfection is not possible in the real world….it’s kind of like democracy in that respect. And peer review is only the first step, anyway.

    • Michael McCarthy
      September 4, 2016 at 3:08 pm #

      “explain, in a way the client can understand”
      Printing pop-up books is probably expensive on a case by case basis.

      • shay simmons
        September 4, 2016 at 9:38 pm #

        I don’t think there are enough crayons for it, either.

      • Maud Pie
        September 5, 2016 at 9:43 am #

        I wish I had thought of your pop-up book simile when I posted this. “In a way that they can understand ” is a pretty weak way to get my meaning across.

        Just to clarify, this was a tongue in cheek suggestion to counter the anti-vaxxers’ whiny “but you didn’t explain it to ME” whenever someone links to sources that debunk whatever charlatan video du jour they are currently spouting.

        • Michael McCarthy
          September 5, 2016 at 11:36 am #

          “In a way that they can understand ” is a pretty weak way to get my meaning across.”
          Nah, it was fine.
          The old “you didn’t explain it to me” seems less pervasive than “you’re not listening to me” or “you’re an idiot and you don’t know what you are talking about”, IMO (although those responses are likely a result of their own failures in understanding).

    • yugaya
      September 5, 2016 at 10:44 am #

      “Barzini’s repeated demands for someone to respond to the YouTube videos he links” Damn, I seem to have missed all the fun.

    • Sue
      September 6, 2016 at 8:28 am #

      We do that for free:

      https://www.facebook.com/FriendsOfScienceInMedicine/

      Most people posting silly stuff don’t intend for it to be de-bunked – we provide that service anyway!

  4. Amazed
    September 3, 2016 at 5:50 am #

    Damn it! I am turning into the thing I despise most: those who say the right thing but don’t do it. I still haven’t found the time to get my boosters and I really should. Too much work, going on avacation, being unwell… I have to remedy the situation next week.

    I still found the time to get my flu shot, though.

    Such threads make me think my SIL is a really smart cookie. Whenever faced with people lecturing on how dangerous vaccines are, she just asks, “What do you do for living?” Mind you, she doesn’t follow doctor’s recommendatons to a T. But she sure as hell isn’t fooling around with Amazing Niece’s health when it truly matters. A deviation from the purees that the doctor says Amazing Niece should eat when the kid won’t have them? Not a big deal. Possible tuberculosis and measles? Big, BIG deal.

    • Nick Sanders
      September 3, 2016 at 2:40 pm #

      I’m working on getting my boosters. Turns out there had been a bit of a snafu with my current GP getting my records from my pediatrician (I’m only 30). But I have paper copies to take with me next time I go; which is gonna be soon thanks to this stupid sinus infection.

  5. FormerPhysicist
    September 2, 2016 at 3:28 pm #

    Just took my 3 kids in for flu shots. Didn’t read the insert. I expect them to be brain-dead zombies tonight. (Actually, I do, but that’s because I haven’t kicked them off youtube today …)

    BTW – I have reverted to referring to the disease as influenza, to distinguish it from idiots who talk about “the stomach flu” being over in 24 hours and no big deal.

    • Nick Sanders
      September 2, 2016 at 3:33 pm #

      Last few times I’ve had the “stomach flu” it may have only lasted 24-48 hours, but it was certainly a big deal. Not only is it abject misery on a scale I rarely ever experience, I’m often so violently ill that I begin to genuinely worry about electrolyte imbalances.

      • FormerPhysicist
        September 2, 2016 at 3:43 pm #

        Stomach flu can mean so many things … I think my circle uses it to mean any illness that includes vomiting (at all).

        • Sonja Henie
          September 2, 2016 at 4:33 pm #

          Agree with this and with your first post. I don’t know where/when/how influenza got conflated with gastroenteritis, but many people certainly think they’re one and the same. Kids do tend to vomit/have diarrhea with just about every illness, at least mine did, but the PRIMARY symptom of influenza is cough and body aches. I do everything I can to distinguish them when I talk to parents. I think that’s the reason for so many flu shot “failures”.

          • kfunk937
            September 3, 2016 at 9:03 am #

            I have really fond memories of my dad passing a fake cell phone for emergency (filled with faux medicine, in the form of sweet-tarts) in through my front door with the prescription I couldn’t pick up myself for intractable vomiting (to the point of mild, coffee grounds sign) and diarrhoea. It was either food poisoning or a stomach-virus. I remember thinking at the time that my body would be found in a noxious pool of embarrassing liquids, and feeling some embarrassment because of that. I didn’t blame him, mind you. He’d a history of a weak stomach dropping infants when they even spit up in the past. There was no way he wanted anywhere near a potentially contagious event, nor anything resembling one.

      • Amazed
        September 2, 2016 at 3:43 pm #

        Same here. About 16 miserable hours (followed by 10 days of being off colour). Just about a month ago. It was a big deal even without the fact that it put a stopper on my spa vacation that I had planned to start about 3 hours before the “stomach flu” arrived.

    • Chant de la Mer
      September 6, 2016 at 3:55 pm #

      I don’t know what’s worse, people confusing a stomach bug with the flu or confusing a cold with the flu. No your little cough and runny nose is not the flu, if you didn’t feel like you were run over by a truck and dying it’s probably not the flu.
      Caveat, if you had a flu shot and still catch influenza that might make it milder and similar to a cold.

  6. Barzini
    September 2, 2016 at 1:34 pm #

    Not sure who has the time, but I’d appreciate hearing the opinion of anyone who’s interested in this youtube presentation from Dr. Suzanne Humphries:

    I saw it a while ago and managed to track it down, I feel like it’s a good introduction into fears over aluminium in vaccines (obviously only an introduction)

    Trojan Horses and Clusterbombs: Dr Suzanne Humphries on aluminum in Finland

    https://youtu.be/PWP6e2CYPo8

    • Nick Sanders
      September 2, 2016 at 1:37 pm #

      Here you go:
      http://americanloons.blogspot.com/2013/11/783-suzanne-humphries.html

      • Barzini
        September 2, 2016 at 1:54 pm #

        Yeah read that already – what do you think about the presentation?

        • Amazed
          September 2, 2016 at 2:27 pm #

          What do you think of the court rulings against ex-Dr Andrew Wakefield?

          To answer your question: I think the woman is human waste. I also think it’s pathetic how you scramble to hide behind the authority of a loony doctor while disparaging the vast majority of doctors who do support vaccination.

          Doctors are a great thing, as long as they say what your pathetic little mind craves to hear, and all others are not trustworthy, huh?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 2:53 pm #

            No you’re the one that only listens to certain doctors and calls the others ‘human waste’

            I don’t do that

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:02 pm #

            http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Suzanne_Humphries

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:05 pm #

            Yeah, what do you think about what shes actually says? That’s what interests me…..

            Are these guys crazed loons also?
            https://youtu.be/_b6tqVSdotE

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:44 pm #

            Youtube is not evidence. Sorry, Barz. Produce something peer-reviewed. Oh wait, it’s a conspiracy! That’s why these guys can’t get their stuff in peer-reviewed journals, right?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:47 pm #

            It was a genuine question, I would like to know what people here think about what she says

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 5:48 pm #

            Give me a paper and I’ll read it and tell you. I’m not going to review a random YouTube link; that’s not science.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 5:51 pm #

            What’s sad is that those 2 videos and one link are all he has. In contrast, I responded with something different each time, most of which were either published studies or cited published studies. Fat lot of good it did, though.

          • demodocus
            September 2, 2016 at 6:13 pm #

            is s/he posting the same 2 videos over and over? a bit spammy, that.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:16 pm #

            Yep. One by Suzanne Humphries, one by Bob Sears. And refusing to consider that they might be lying, since when shown studies that differ from what they are saying the response has been “Nuh-uh! Check the video!”

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:02 pm #

            OK, but this is exactly why your message isn’t getting through

            Instead of engaging people who are below you in terms of scientific knowledge, instead of generating information for their level of understanding, you just dismiss and insult and demand scientific papers from people who have probably never even looked at one in their entire lives

            Your approach isn’t working

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:04 pm #

            Except Roadstergal isn’t doing outreach, she’s responding to a person who came to a doctor’s blog and started shitting all over the place as if they knew more than the modern medical community.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:06 pm #

            I’ve repeatedly said I’m no expert and repeatedly asked you to for a critique of some anti-vax information

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:08 pm #

            Which you have been given.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:16 pm #

            must have missed that

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:09 pm #

            And we’ve given it. We’ve shown you that your understanding of aluminum and its distribution and effect on the body are incorrect. We’ve shown you that your understanding of methyl and ethylmercury and their distribution and effect on the body are incorrect. And you just keep posting the same link to the same YouTube video.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:15 pm #

            Which you refuse to watch or give any opinion on – one person even refuses to watch anything on youtube because it’s not peer reviewed – what????

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:19 pm #

            Your brain is definitely addled.

            I can’t watch YouTube at work.

            That should not hamper you from giving us evidence for your positions – or even just stating them clearly.

          • demodocus
            September 2, 2016 at 6:29 pm #

            its like some jobs will let you look at discus but not youtube or something

          • Azuran
            September 2, 2016 at 9:42 pm #

            Because any smart people know that you don’t get your medical information on freaking youtube. It’s totally unregulated and has 0 oversight or any kind of peer reviewing procedure.
            You can, basically, find whatever YOU are looking for. Which is not how finding scientific information is supposed to work.
            I can probably find a video out there explaining why the center of the earth is actually made of cheese.

          • Wren
            September 2, 2016 at 6:04 pm #

            But you are the one claiming to have evidence, though the best you can provide is a YouTube video. You are dismissing the scientific evidence, and those who do understand it.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:05 pm #

            You won’t even tell me what’s wrong with the video

            Are these guys loons?

            https://youtu.be/_b6tqVSdotE

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:08 pm #

            He was lying by the second sentence, so, yes, definitely a loon.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:16 pm #

            could you just for once, one single time, tell me why?

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:18 pm #

            He claimed vaccine ingredients have not been tested for safety. I have shown you multiple studies testing both ingredients and entires vaccines for safety over the last few days.

            If you connect those two statements and find the problem, I’m not really sure how you’ve managed to get on a computer and post as much as you have.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:21 pm #

            Could you please tell me what’s wrong with the video (other than it being on youtube and the presenter being ‘human waste’)

            This is the type of question regular people want answered

            This is why people are heading towards CAM

          • Wren
            September 2, 2016 at 6:29 pm #

            A YouTube video just plain is not how science is done. If you have concerns about vaccines, discuss them with your doctor, a trained medical professional who is there to address your medical concerns. Why would you even believe something on YouTube? If the claims on the video were credible at all, the correct forum to present them would not be YouTube. I don’t even need to view the video to know that the claims are not credible because they go against current scientific consensus and are not being presented in a scientific setting, to face peer review from others who understand the claims, but being presented on YouTube to people who have no understanding of the science.

            Most “regular people” understand that they are not as knowledgeable about subjects as experts who have devoted their lives to study in that area. If they develop concerns about vaccines, perhaps from seeing antivax claims, they consult people with more knowledge than themselves to address those concerns.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:34 pm #

            You don’t know what the video is about, this is incredible – this is exactly why you are losing patients to CAM

            Of course peer review is essential for investigation, bringing drugs to market etc… – but to not even listen to a doctor because he expresses himself via video is just insane

            I don’t operate at that level and neither do the vast majority of other people

            I’m off, it’s been an interesting experience, but I’ll look elsewhere from now on for the answers to my questions

          • Wren
            September 3, 2016 at 12:08 pm #

            The last time I watched a doctor take his case to the public on vaccines when he was going against the scientific consensus it was Andrew Wakefield. He caused so many to believe in the vaccine-autism link, a link that has failed peer review in a huge way. His “science” was so far outside of ethical boundaries that he has been struck off the medical register here in the UK and his paper has been withdrawn.
            I really do not care what level you “operate at” except that that level appears to be incapable of understanding the science of vaccines and simultaneously incapable of understanding that you lack that understanding.
            The majority of people can at least grasp that those who spend years, decades even, studying a particular subject have more knowledge than those who do not and do not believe that they know more than the experts. Anti-vaxers do not make up the majority.

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 3:57 am #

            I dipped in the video, wasting 15 minutes of my time, and told you what was wrong.
            Can you now have the courtesy to spend a couple of minutes of your time telling me what you think of those specific claims she made and whether you still believe them despite the clear evidence she is a liar?

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:05 pm #

            You’re the one saying the existing outreach is just plain wrong. If you’re going to argue the basic science, you have to understand the basic science. If you don’t want to understand the basic science, don’t argue it with professionals. You can’t have it both ways.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:20 pm #

            Yeah, there’s a growing movement against regular medicine, especially vaccination, but also a host of other medications

            There’s a shift towards CAM – which I agree is nonsense mostly

            This haughty attitude has a lot to do with it, people who refuse to watch a presentation because it’s on youtube are not going to get their message across

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:24 pm #

            That’s not my only haughty stance. I also make it a point to only fly on a plane that has a licensed pilot, rather than a guy who’s seen some YouTube videos. I’m super elitist.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:27 pm #

            I’m pretty sure a pilot would look at a video on youtube about flying if asked to, especially if teh video was by a pilot

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 9:43 pm #

            If said pilot was well known in the aviation community for saying de-icing was dangerous and should be forgone, and had been addressed multiple times over the years, I doubt said hypothetical pilot would have any more patience for them and their videos than we have around here for your videos.

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 10:03 pm #

            And what’s more, no one would fly with him because dirty planes fall out of the sky, inarguably.

            Whereas, if Barzini’s kids get sick, he can blame everyone else and get an extra star on his martyr badge for having to look after them. He’d be the victim, of course.

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 3:52 am #

            If it was from a pilot who had never flown a plane himself, I doubt it.
            (Humphries has never done a single piece of vaccine research in her entire medical life)

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 8:56 pm #

            Sooo fancy.

          • Daleth
            September 3, 2016 at 9:32 am #

            This haughty attitude has a lot to do with it

            Wait, it’s “haughty” to decline to waste your time absorbing misinformation from sources that are known to be incompetent and not evidence based? In my book that’s not haughty, it’s just smart.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 9:41 am #

            Thousands of concerned parents, the vast majority of whom are well educated and compassionate, disagree.

            Your approach simply turns such people away, towards woo

          • Daleth
            September 3, 2016 at 9:44 am #

            What approach would turn “concerned parents”/antivaxxers towards reason and science? If you can point me to an approach that works, I’ll gladly use it.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 9:51 am #

            Well imagine a parent goes to a doctor and says she watched an anti vax film

            There are two ways to react:

            1) Say that the person who made the film is a loon and human waste and that you refuse to watch it or discuss it and that you will only respond to information that has been peer reviewed

            2) Watch it, make a list of the untruths, and explain why they are untruths

            I’d go for option 2

          • Daleth
            September 3, 2016 at 2:25 pm #

            I’ve tried option 2, Barz. It doesn’t work. That is, it makes the “concerned parent” retreat from the particular point that I’ve explained is false, but it doesn’t actually reduce their belief that SOMETHING SOMEHOW is bad about vaccines.

            Case in point: 15 years ago antivaxxers were flipping out about thimerosal, so we pointed out that there was absolutely no evidence anywhere in any study (other than the couple that Dr. Wakefield faked) that showed any connection between thimerosal and autism.

            Antivaxxer response: “But it’s mercury! And mercury is bad! It must be causing problems! Do more studies and in the meantime, we’re not vaccinating!”

            Scientists’ response: “Ok, we’ll take the thimerosal out of all the childhood vaccines just so you KNOW FOR SURE that there’s nothing you even incorrectly believe to be causing autism in childhood vaccines.”

            Antivaxxers’ response: “Ok cool, but damn, it was about time…. and… OMG BUT THERE’S ALUMINUM! YOU’RE CAUSING AUTISM!!!!!!!!!! There is no other possible explanation for all this autism–it’s GOT to be something in the vaccines, and since there’s no more thimerosal, we’ve decided it must be this other compound that’s still there!”

            Science: “But there’s absolutely no scientific evidence anywhere from any study that this compound causes autism, and a basic understanding of chemistry tells you that this form of aluminum wouldn’t be expected to cause any harm even in large amounts, much less in the trace amounts found in vaccines.”

            Antivaxxers: “We don’t believe you! There MUST be something dangerous about vaccines! You guys are just shills for Big Pharma!”

            …it just goes on and on and ON. There is no reasoning with people who have simply decided to believe something despite massive evidence to the contrary. You might as well try to persuade a Jesuit not to believe in God.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 2:31 pm #

            I don’t know, there were plenty of scientists, doctors and researchers against mercury also – not just conspiracy theorists

            But I appreciate your general point, I can see how it’s not easy

          • Charybdis
            September 4, 2016 at 11:41 am #

            Yet again, there is no mercury in vaccines anymore, except in multi-dose vials of flu vaccine. So you can stop worrying about the mercury issue now.

          • Barzini
            September 4, 2016 at 11:48 am #

            Fully aware of that, however the fact that there was is of concern, the fact that many researchers have concerns over other ingredients like aluminium is of concern

            Obviously not to you, but to some people – I don’t see these people as loons, especially as some of them are respected doctors, researchers, etc…

          • September 8, 2016 at 2:19 am #

            Nope. There isn’t. It’s alum.

          • September 4, 2016 at 6:10 pm #

            Nor has there ever been mercury in vaccines in any case. Barzini needs to learn basic school-level chemistry concepts before commenting on them if he wishes to have any realistic hope of sounding like anything other than an ignorant fool.

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/13cac82ab2ea5425fff43de06449adf2512b01fe06e01730e8a5835124baa99f.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1fcb1603d18e932fad27c48fdb553b465ae80fc4c14b43fc1f3f0ab6e2663f58.jpg

          • Wren
            September 3, 2016 at 2:47 pm #

            You are yourself a prime example of why option 2 does not work. Plenty of the untruths in your videos, and your comments themselves, have been explained as untruths. You either ignore the explanation altogether or insist it is false.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 3, 2016 at 3:06 pm #

            The film is just short of 2 hours long, and as I said, the first lie happens at roughly 1 minute. That’s two hours to watch it, and a few more to catalogue all the errors as they are profuse, and several more after that looking up the studies that prove them wrong and writing up the whole breakdown of the film.

            To quote Alberto Brandolini, “The amount of energy necessary to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it.”

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 3:48 am #

            I did option 2 for you.
            I showed she was talking out her backside.
            Good enough?

          • Charybdis
            September 4, 2016 at 11:37 am #

            Nope, not even close, sorry. Perhaps it is your perception of what she is saying. /sarcasm

          • Nick Sanders
            September 3, 2016 at 2:59 pm #

            Your cheerleading for woo sure doesn’t help.

          • Ron Roy
            September 4, 2016 at 7:52 am #

            Oh I though YOU were cheerleading for woo.

          • Charybdis
            September 3, 2016 at 11:19 am #

            But when you stubbornly refuse to even think about or consider things that are said/posted/cited, things like the level of aluminum in a vaccine is very small and been proven safe over 60+ years of testing and use, you repeat over and over “Injecting aluminum = guaranteed Alzheimers!!! Not safe! See discredited doctor’s videos on the YouTubes!!” this is when we start to get testy.

            There is a world of evidence (citable, even) that we have provided information from and links to, but you keep tossing out the same two or three things in response (I can’t even call it a rebuttal). Not working, dude.

          • September 5, 2016 at 7:25 pm #

            Okay. Do an experiment for me.

            First, watch this:

            https://youtu.be/ODf_sPexS2Q

            Second, watch this:

            https://youtu.be/xn2jB_s-8VM

            And here comes the practical part. Please add a little sodium chloride (it will be marked in your cupboard as “table salt.”) into some boiling hot water (hot water from the kettle will do) and stir it throughly.

            Once you’ve breathed some of the salty-steam in … please come back and report whether the table salt behaved like either of the videos.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 6:00 pm #

            Why? She’s a quack. That’s well documented! If you want to learn about vaccines, you don’t Google anti-vacccine practitioners.

            Here, try this: http://immunize.org/

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:10 pm #

            Still waiting for you to tell me what is wrong about what she is saying

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:12 pm #

            OK, if you’re not going to give us any papers…

            Give us a concise list of her points. If they’re the same as yours, we’ve already addressed them, but, you know – we’re nice. Benefit of the doubt, and all.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:13 pm #

            If you get the time let me know….

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:14 pm #

            Do you not understand the points you’re trying to make?

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 7:13 pm #

            https://medium.com/@visualvaccines/why-dr-suzanne-humphries-an-anti-vaccine-activist-is-lying-to-you-about-measles-ce446d0a7e0f#.kttzh7eb2
            She’s a lying liar.

            Just one reason. I’ll find more.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 7:37 pm #

            More: http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2011/02/16/dr-suzanne-humphries-and-the-internation/
            “Polio virus was not responsible for the paralysis in the first part of
            the 20th century.”

            http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Suzanne_Humphries
            “Suzanne Humphries is a nephrologist (kidney doctor) who has recently (as of 2011) become a vocal proponent of pseudoscience and quack medicine. Humphries has been involved with the International Medical Council on Vaccination, a front group for vaccine hysteria, and is a signer of the organization’s anti-vax Project Steve petition. She has written several blog posts and done several podcasts and interviews insinuating that kidney failure is caused by vaccines.
            Humphries uses this purely anecdotal, unstudied, “feeling” of vaccines’ role in kidney disease to try and justify why her complete lack of training in any relevant field of immunology or vaccines doesn’t disqualify her as an “expert” on the topic.”
            Plus much more.

            http://americanloons.blogspot.com/2013/11/783-suzanne-humphries.html
            http://sparkonit.com/2013/12/30/misconception-about-vaccines-a-review-on-dr-suzanne-humphries-claims/
            “The claims on vaccination made in video by Dr Suzanne Humphries are unsupported by any scientific evidence and sound more pseudoscientific, backed up by emotional phrases to convince people how bad vaccination is, it will easily fool people and make sense to those who are unaware of how vaccines work.”
            That’s you, Barz!

            http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/suzanne-humphries-bad-advice-on-the-polio-vaccine/
            “Israel’s Ministry of Health has been monitoring the sewers since 1988 as an early warning system for the presence of the poliovirus. In June 2013 wild poliovirus was found in the sewage in some of Israel’s southern cities. Testing discovered wild poliovirus in several children who were previously vaccinated with IPV.

            Ratherthan wait until the first case of paralysis or death from polio, the Israeli Ministry of Health, acting on guidance from the World Health Organization (WHO) for situations like this, decided to vaccinate all children under the age of 9 who have already been vaccinated with two doses or more of the Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) (the only one givento children since 2005) with the Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV), a live, attenuated vaccine.The goal was to prevent spreading the virus to those unvaccinated because they are too young or too ill or because of their parents’ choice, or those in whom the vaccine wore off. The decision sparked a controversy in Israel, with even parents who are usually pro-vaccine
            concerned and parents who are anti-vaccine vocally opposed.

            Dr. Suzanne Humphries is an M.D. who now rejects conventional medicine in favor of “holistic” medicine, including homeopathy. She is also an anti-vaccination activist. Dr. Humphries took it upon herself to warn Israeli parents not to vaccinate their children with OPV, undermining the Ministry of Health’s efforts to prevent an outbreak of this dangerous disease.

            Dr. Humphries’ first approach to Israeli parents was on a June 30, 2013 Youtube video with problematic, unreliable claims. For example, Dr. Humphries claimed polio epidemics were caused by widespread use of DDT, ignoring both the New York epidemic of 1916 ,which preceded widespread use of DDT, and the fact
            that the claim has been thoroughly debunked. Worse, Dr. Humphries’ video tries to convince parents that polio is not
            dangerous; while most people who contract the disease will not have those symptoms, polio can cause paralysis or death. The CDC says “Estimates of the ratio of inapparent to paralytic illness vary from 50:1 to 1,000:1 (usually 200:1).”

            She knows more than the World Health Organization, eh, Barz?

            And, she is on the list of the Encyclopedia of American Loons.
            http://americanloons.blogspot.com/2013/11/783-suzanne-humphries.html

            “You see, not only are vaccines unnatural, they are “disease matter”,which, I suppose, is a compelling point for anyone who swears by the laws of medieval alchemy.

            You know, a real sign of quackery is claiming you know more than all the other authorities in a particular field.

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 8:25 pm #

            She’s an effing mental case, IMO.

          • Ron Roy
            September 4, 2016 at 7:43 am #

            ”That’s why these guys can’t get their stuff in peer-reviewed journals, right?” No it’s because peer reviewed journals rely on the advertising dollars of the pharmaceutical industry and they will not publish anything that will hurt their bottom line.

          • Azuran
            September 4, 2016 at 8:32 am #

            *rolling my eyes until they make a 360*
            No, it’s because they are crap study made with shitty scientific method.
            There are a LOT of studies that were published out there that go against the ‘bottom line’. Stop thinking everything is a conspiracy.

          • shay simmons
            September 4, 2016 at 9:41 pm #

            The nasal flu vaccine getting short shrift from ACIP being only the most recent case in point.

          • Heidi_storage
            September 4, 2016 at 8:49 am #

            Wrong, wrong, wrong. The editors’ and journals’ bottom lines don’t depend on what they publish, and pharma companies have absolutely NO power to compel editors to publish anything. Editors love publishing novel stuff, as long as it looks legit.

          • September 4, 2016 at 6:45 pm #

            That’s an interesting hypothesis but clearly not the case.

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/95e25c72c9da10f780a72073158784ca3e4b0bcba989270c90d96945733e575a.jpg

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 8:37 pm #

            Sears?
            Quack, quack, quack, quack!

            Readers note his claim to fame is his “alternative vaccine schedule”. When asked about any evidence for his “schedule” [being safe and effective] his answer was – “There is very little to no evidence.”

            Viz:
            www(dot)reddit(dot)com/r/IAmA/comments/1728o9/iama_coauthor_of_the_baby_book_edition_everything/

            itsajelly 99 points 3 years ago*
            “Dr. Sears, what evidence do you have to support your alternative vaccine schedule? Do you think it’s possible it validates parents’ fears about vaccines rather than alleviates them?”
            .
            DrBobSears[S] 76 points 3 years ago
            “There is very little to no evidence.
            .
            Now there’s a guy who has some credibility and isn’t just pandering to his irrationally frightened patients by giving them his own, personal, untested schedule that he doesn’t even know is safe or effective.

            He should lose his license.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:41 pm #

            Here’s a quote from Dr. Paul Offit:

            “Aluminum is considered to be an essential metal with quantities fluctuating naturally during normal cellular activity. It is found in all tissues and is also believed to play an important role in the development of a healthy fetus”

            I still listen to what he has to say

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 8:58 pm #

            Give a flippin’ source.

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 8:59 pm #

            That youtube video again, wait and see.

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 9:08 pm #

            Oh look!
            Barzini is shown that Bobby Sears’ main claim to fame was pulled from Bobby’s colon and wiped onto the pages of the book he’s selling and Barzini’s response is to ignore that fact and change the subject – just like all the other anti-vaccine cultists.

            How unusual.

            Sears should lose his license because he is recommending an untested protocol that he admits hasn’t been shown to be safe or effective. He may be recommending a schedule that does a great deal of harm.
            His schedule may cause teh autismz and teh autoimmune diseases. Sears doesn’t know and doesn’t care just as long as he sells books and office visits.

            It doesn’t get sleazier than that.

          • Daleth
            September 3, 2016 at 9:29 am #

            That quote is, as I recall, not from Offit but from his employer, the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Whoever said it, they’re right. Aluminum is the third most common element on the planet earth (oxygen is #1) and it is found naturally in so many plants and animals that the average adult ingests 7-9mg every single day.

            And the average exclusively breastfed baby ingests 7mg of aluminum from its mother’s milk in its first six months of life. In other words, babies get almost twice as much aluminum from breastmilk as they do from vaccines, since following the CDC vaccine schedule results in a baby getting 4.4mg of aluminum adjuvants in its first six months.

            Then once the baby starts cereals and other solid foods, it gets far more aluminum in its diet. Vaccines don’t even come close to delivering the amount of aluminum that a normal toddler would eat in a week.

            One source (there are many other reputable sources for these facts):
            http://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center/vaccine-ingredients/aluminum#.V8rN_q4deHk

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 9:32 am #

            The old ingestion is the same as injection defense – hilarious

          • Daleth
            September 3, 2016 at 9:38 am #

            The old ingestion is the same as injection defense – hilarious

            Explain to me how it’s not, Barz. Neither ingestion nor injection delivers anything straight into the bloodstream. Neither injection nor ingestion keeps the substance in question from reaching the brain. Since time immemorial people have been killed by poisons that they “merely” ingested. Eating cyanide, for instance, will shut down your respiratory system so you suffocate to death.

            As for neurotoxins, eating badly prepared puffer fish–that is, ingesting the neurotoxin it contains–shuts down your nervous system, paralyzing and killing you within a couple of hours (see link below). The same is true of botulism–that’s another neurotoxin that can kill you within a couple of hours of your eating it.

            So can you explain, using non-quack sources, what you think the big difference between ingestion and injection is?

            Puffer fish:
            http://hubpages.com/food/Why-Japanese-Fugu-Sushi-Can-Kill-You
            “The very moment you consume tainted puffer fish, the tetrodotoxin poison… immediately attacks the nervous system… which prevents your neurons from communicating with each other and more importantly with your brain.”

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 3:44 am #

            The end result of both is aluminium in the systemic circulation.
            The only difference is how it got there in the first place.
            Are you really this stupid?

          • Sonja Henie
            September 4, 2016 at 8:46 am #

            I think we know the answer to that.

          • Wren
            September 3, 2016 at 12:24 pm #

            Doesn’t Sears actually advise those who choose not to vaccinate or choose to follow his delayed schedule to keep that decision quiet, so their kids are still protected by herd immunity?

          • Reality022
            September 3, 2016 at 1:58 pm #

            Why yes, yes he does.
            Intentionally undermining public health efforts – another reason his license should be pulled.

          • Amazed
            September 2, 2016 at 5:38 pm #

            Ah yes, you have your kids just walk around like human bombs proclaiming that healthy children should not be bothered by preventable diseases. Besides that being a lie, you blatanty show your regard to those who aren’t this fortunate. There is none.

            But you don’t call others human waste! What a lovely soul you have! You won’t call that even when you and your little disease vector sicken and perhaps kill them.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:42 pm #

            I have no problem with preventing preventable disease – just not by injecting neurotoxins

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 8:54 pm #

            Don’t break your neck falling off your high horse!

          • JoeFarmer
            September 2, 2016 at 9:03 pm #

            No one will ever accuse you of being smart, Nilweenie.

          • Azuran
            September 2, 2016 at 9:23 pm #

            Except that our ‘certain doctors’ are basically 99% of all doctors, immunologists, pediatrician and every kind of health care provider.

        • The Bofa on the Sofa
          September 2, 2016 at 2:34 pm #

          Barzini – given that Suzanne Humphries is a total loon (see Nick’s link about), I put no stock in anything she says.

          And yes, Nick “read that already.” He is very familiar with Humphries. He already knows that she is a quack, and therefore has the link explaining it handy.

          For pete’s sake, you actually think you are telling us stuff we haven’t heard a hundred times already? You have said nothing new. We’ve heard it all before.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 2:48 pm #

            And yet you still think injecting children with neurotoxins is a good idea

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:42 pm #

            What neurotoxins are you referring to?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:47 pm #

            Aluminium

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:48 pm #

            PRATT.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:52 pm #

            Jeez, now it’s clear, I’m gonna start injecting

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 4:53 pm #

            On this page alone, it’s starting to feel like.

          • Wren
            September 2, 2016 at 5:42 pm #

            Please tell me how much aluminum/aluminium the average baby ingests in their first year. Go ahead and give it for both breastfeeding and formula feeding. Then tell me how much is injected in vaccines.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:48 pm #

            You don’t inject breast milk or tuna

            It doesn’t get past the blood brain barrier

            I eat apple pips, but don’t inject cyanide

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 5:49 pm #

            Ingestion vs injection makes no difference to the blood-brain barrier. And mercury from tuna absolutely does get past the blood-brain barrier.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:59 pm #

            A vaccination is deliberately designed to cause a massive immune system response – it’s a completely different story

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:00 pm #

            *buzzer* Incorrect, sir or madam.

            A vaccine is very specifically NOT designed to cause a massive immune system response. It is designed to cause a small, targeted response to create memory.

            Have you considered taking a biology course?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:10 pm #

            Either way, it’s a lot different to eating a tuna sandwich

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:10 pm #

            Yeah, it’s much better for you.

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:11 pm #

            Yes, that is true. Tuna has methylmercury, which is an actually-harmful form of mercury that gets to the brain readily. See my link above. A vaccine is orders of magnitude safer.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:14 pm #

            OK, I’ll keep eating tuna and you keep injecting babies with mercury

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:16 pm #

            That is, again, toddler-level logic. “X is way safer than Y.” “Well, no, as you can see from the evidence, Y is safer because of these reasons.” “Well, FINE, I’m just going to KEEP DOING X!”

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 7:45 pm #

            There is no thimerosal in any routine childhood vaccine.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 7:56 pm #

            Why not?

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 8:04 pm #

            Oh, cute little trap, eh? Because acitivists insisted that Thimerosal in vaccines caused autism. The research never supported that, the WHO strenuously disagreed with removing it b/c it made vaccines more expensive, something the wealthy anti-vax parents never have to worry about, but the rest of us do, especially back then when insurance wasn’t required to cover vaccines, and autism rates have gone up if anything since it was removed. Happy?

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 8:05 pm #

            Because it was removed in a misguided attempt to appease people like you. That attempt failed.

            When people have a powerful need to be speshul and natcheral, reasoning with them is a waste of time.

            As you are demonstrating here today.

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 8:22 pm #

            So your anti-vaccine disinformation was blown out of the water by Roadstergal and your response is to ignore it with a handwave and then babble some juvenile taunt?
            What a seeker after TRVTH you are!

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:02 pm #

            Define “massive”.

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:03 pm #

            The kind you get from a measles infection?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:07 pm #

            bigger than big, but not as big as monumental

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:10 pm #

            So – about _this_ big?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:14 pm #

            a little bit bigger, but you’re about right

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:17 pm #

            _This_ big was a femtometer. So just a little bigger than that – yes, sounds about right.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:12 pm #

            Am I on Candid Camera? Did I wander into some sort Marx Brothers skit without being told? Please tell me you don’t consider that an actual answer.

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 8:17 pm #

            Barzini picked up her crayon and scrawled, “A vaccination is deliberately designed to cause a massive immune system response…”

            Don’t understand this vaccine/vaccination stuff at all, do you?

            Here’s what you should have scribbled –
            “A vaccination is deliberately designed to cause an massive adequate immune system response. Some vaccine antigens do not trigger an effective level of immune response so smart/genius scientists have figured out how to achieve the desired immune response through the use of adjuvants.”

            The facts compared to your delusions are, as you say, “a completely different story”.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:19 pm #

            adjuvants made from proven neurotoxins

            Go for it, have a double dose

          • Azuran
            September 2, 2016 at 9:22 pm #

            Oh I would totally have a double dose. Because it’s totally safe you idiot.

          • Charybdis
            September 3, 2016 at 11:05 am #

            Adjuvants made vaccines safer. Know why? Because adjuvants made it possible to use less of the infective element in the vaccine because the addition of an adjuvant helps the body develop the appropriate immune response to a small portion or inactivated portion of the actual disease causing agent.

            You think it is safer to inoculate someone with a live, active virulent version of these diseases?

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 3:36 am #

            That would be a different story, yes.
            So why talk about it when you are meant to be discussing aluminium?

          • Wren
            September 2, 2016 at 5:54 pm #

            Vaccines are not injected into the brain. They are also not injected into the bloodstream.

            Babies and toddlers often end up with small cuts in the mouth (teething/teeth plus learning to move lead to falls, accidentally biting themselves, etc) so breastmilk or formula would certainly come in contact with the bloodstream.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 7:44 pm #

            Also, breast milk is digested and the products of digestion get into the blood stream. I know you know this, but Barzini doesn’t seem to understand that’s how babies grow!

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 5:55 pm #

            Orally administered methylmercury from seafood gets in the brain. Eg:

            http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0045653505004637?np=y

            FFS.

          • Azuran
            September 2, 2016 at 5:56 pm #

            Cyanide is still totally super toxic when you eat it dude. So why are you eating a known poison?

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 5:57 pm #

            It’s almost like… the dose makes the poison…

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 3:34 am #

            0.5% of ingested Al is absorbed into the bloodstream.
            It can go anywhere that injected Al goes.

          • September 2, 2016 at 9:33 pm #

            Good job that’s not in vaccines then. Compounds aren’t elements.

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 9:34 pm #

            Where can that kind of talk possibly lead? Barzini isn’t susceptible to silly old science. What about all his feelings????

          • September 8, 2016 at 2:15 am #

            Lurkers.

          • Michael McCarthy
            September 8, 2016 at 10:16 am #

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvRtHuMm1BQ

        • Nick Sanders
          September 2, 2016 at 2:56 pm #

          I think Humphries is a splendid example of ultracrepidarianism and should shut up about things she clearly knows jack shit about.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 2:59 pm #

            Would you class the presentation as complete nonsense? Genuine question…..

            What about the researchers who are investigating a hypothesis that aluminium causes alzheimers – are they loons also?

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:01 pm #

            I’d class pretty much everything Humphries has ever said about vaccines, and a few other topics, as complete nonsense. And she is not one of those researchers.

            But hey, tell me when a toddler develops Alzheimer’s won’t you?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:04 pm #

            If you ever get round to telling me what she gets wrong let me know – I am genuinely interested in what a staunch pro-vaxer like yourself thinks about it (I’m fully aware of the dangers of biased information)

            But please no more of what you think about the person

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:06 pm #

            I did, twice.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:12 pm #

            You really didn’t – I genuinely would like to know what she gets wrong – I fully admit I’m no expert

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:18 pm #

            Both of my links contain explicit information on what she gets wrong. FFS. It’s like you are completely unwilling to do any but the most shallow observation on this:
            Homeopathy.
            Ignoring and even twisting evidence.
            Outright making shit up.

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 3:31 am #

            There is this too.
            http://www.skepticalob.com/2016/08/anti-vaccine-parents-and-the-package-insert-paradox.html#comment-2873913760
            Almost everything she claims to be factual falls apart on closer examination.

          • Who?
            September 3, 2016 at 5:07 am #

            It’s been done to death. It was investigated in the 70s and got nowhere.

            That said, we know more, we do better.

            Since no one young enough to have had modern vaccinations is old enough yet to be in line for AD, I take it you aren’t suggesting a link there?

    • Reality022
      September 2, 2016 at 9:42 pm #

      Suzy Humphries seems to be completely ignorant of vaccines and immunology. Take a look at this howler of an error/lie that is a very fundamental concept and is very fundamental knowledge:

      www(dot)vaccinationcouncil(dot)org/2012/07/05/herd-immunity-the-flawed-science-and-failures-of-mass-vaccination-suzanne-humphries-md-3/
      “Herd Immunity.” The flawed science and failures of mass vaccination, Suzanne Humphries, MD
      Quoting Humphries loondrool:
      “Prior to vaccination, mothers were naturally immune to measles and passed that immunity to their infants via placenta and breast milk.”
      Bzzzt!
      Wrong!
      No passive immunity from breastfeeding:
      www(dot)ncbi(dot)nlm(dot)nih(dot)gov/pubmed/8886155
      Measles antibodies in the breast milk of nursing mothers.
      “Our result suggests that very little level of measles antibody is passed through the breast milk.”
      and:
      Immunity, breastfeeding, and the timing of measles vaccine
      “Doesn’t breastfeeding give baby antibodies? Wouldn’t that prevent measles? Or can breastfeeding interfere with the MMR vaccine?”
      “Breastmilk does contain antibodies, but they’re a different kind of antibodies. They’re not the IgG antibodies that circulate in the blood, they’re IgA antibodies that concentrate more in body secretions, including nasal mucus and breast milk. These IgA molecules don’t interfere with vaccines. They provide modest protection against mostly gastrointestinal infections (think diarrhea and vomiting illnesses)—which makes sense, because the breastmilk IgA molecules are swallowed. They don’t make their way into the blood, or at least not very much—like other proteins, if you swallow them they’re mostly torn apart during digestion. Breastmilk IgA provides just a little protection against infections that are caught via the respiratory tract, including the common cold and measles.”

      IgA – which is not the type of antibody found circulating in blood. It is promptly digested like other proteins.
      Suzanne Humphries is an idiot.
      .
      The next part of her moronic quote:
      “Vaccinated mothers may have vaccine immunity, which is not the same immunologically, as natural immunity. One of the major differences in the vaccine-induced immunity is that it cannot be passed from mother to infant.”
      Bzzzt!
      Wrong again! She’s broached 2 topics and is idiotically wrong on both.
      Mothers with MMR induced antibodies do pass on transplacental passive immunity:
      www(dot)ncbi(dot)nlm(dot)nih(dot)gov/pubmed/14646978
      Passive acquired immunity against measles in infants born to naturally infected and vaccinated mothers.
      Protective antibody titers were detected in 50% of infants from group I and only 18.2% in group II (p<0.02).
      ***Note Group II is vaccinated.
      CONCLUSIONS: Passive acquired immunity in infants born to mothers who have had measles lasts longer than in infants born to vaccinated mothers. Nearly two thirds of infants (65.4%) in the 7th month of life did not have sufficient maternally derived neutralizing antibodies to protect against measles. Our data suggest that the recommended age for the first dose of measles vaccine during measles epidemics should be lowered to 9 months, with re-vaccination at 12-15 months.
      The conclusion? Both groups passed along passive immunity. Immunity from mothers who had wild measles lasts longer.
      .
      www(dot)ncbi(dot)nlm(dot)nih(dot)gov/pubmed/9178461
      Passive immunity against measles during the first 8 months of life of infants born to vaccinated mothers or to mothers who sustained measles.
      Neutralizing antibody titers of 47 infants whose mothers sustained measles (measles group) and 70 whose mothers were vaccinated (vaccine group) were compared at birth, 4 and 8 months of age. All children had antibodies at birth and 88% at 4 months. At 8 months, 49% had antibodies in the measles group and 15% in the vaccine group (P < 0.001).
      .
      etc., etc., etc. Suzy is an ignorant alt-med twit or a liar. Take your choice.

      Why anyone would take advice from this demonstrable medical moron is beyond me.
      Any questions?

      • Mike Stevens
        September 4, 2016 at 3:28 am #

        And the clinical correlate to that evidence is the observational finding that despite breast feeding being almost universal in the third world for around 2 years for each infant, they are the ones with a massive burden of infant measles cases and deaths.

        If breast feeding prevents measles, what measles-mimicking disease are these kids dying from? Dengue? Smallpox? Green monkey disease? Loony redspot syndrome?

    • September 2, 2016 at 10:11 pm #

      americanloons.blogspot.com/2013/11/783-suzanne-humphries.html

    • Heidi_storage
      September 3, 2016 at 8:15 am #

      Barzini is boring. “Watch this awesome video! Aluminium is VERY BAD, but only when injected! There might be a tiny risk of Something Bad happening when you get a vaccine, so I ain’t doing it! You are poopy heads because you won’t watch the awesome video!”

      Repeat dozens of times, and there ya have his entire argument (and source list), folks. And if that doesn’t convince you that vaccines are dangerous, then…you are probably a reasonable human being.

      • Barzini
        September 3, 2016 at 9:09 am #

        Keep on injecting those neurotoxins, no one is stopping you

        • Azuran
          September 3, 2016 at 9:22 am #

          Well, I don’t know what you have been injecting yourself with. But whatever it is, judging from your comments those past few days, it sure has been affecting your brain.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 9:25 am #

            “There’s no question that mercury does not belong in vaccines.

            There are other compounds that could be used as preservatives. And everything
            we know about childhood susceptibility, neurotoxicity of mercury at the fetus and
            at the infant level, points out that we should not have these fetuses and infants
            exposed to mercury. There’s no need of it in the vaccines.”

            “Mercury in Medicine – Are We Taking Unnecesary Risks?” Hearing Before the Committee on Government
            Reform; 106th Congress; July 18, 2000; page 212 ; Serial No. 106-232 (Testimony of Dr. H. Vasken Aposhian,
            Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology, and Pharmacology, University of Arizona)

          • Daleth
            September 3, 2016 at 9:43 am #

            And that’s why we removed thimerosal from childhood vaccines, fifteen years ago. No childhood vaccine given in the US since then contains any thimerosal at all. The only vaccine a child could get with thimerosal is the flu shot, but the flu mist nasal spray is also available and contains no thimerosal, and in any case the flu shot is not required.

            Wow! It’s amazing how autism rates plummeted after we took thimerosal out of vaccines! …oh wait…

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 9:53 am #

            Yeah, and the number aluminium vaccines has increased over the same time

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:05 am #

            But since mercury and aluminum are not the same thing, the effect would not be the same. It would have a different effect. Which we have not seen either.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 10:09 am #

            sure, it’s all hunky dory, proven neurotoxins being injected into babies – awesome

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:16 am #

            Like we said again, and again, and again. Dose matter. You obviously have 0 open mindedness, why are you still wasting your time here? You are not interested in learning anything.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 3, 2016 at 10:52 am #

            Spammy repetition.

          • September 5, 2016 at 7:20 pm #

            Barzini, if it’s proven….

            All you have to do is tell us, with cites:

            1)At what dose is the chemical neurotoxic
            2)At what dose is it in the product

            Why can you not do this?

          • Sonja Henie
            September 3, 2016 at 10:25 am #

            Has it? Please document!

          • Charybdis
            September 4, 2016 at 11:28 am #

            You can vaccinate aluminum?

          • Sonja Henie
            September 3, 2016 at 10:24 am #

            Also, thimerosal-free flu shots are available. There is no vaccine, for kids or adults, that does not have a thimerosal-free version.

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 9:49 am #

            As Daleth said. Even though we had no proof whatsoever that it did anything dangerous, we still removed it because of idiots like you who don’t understand science. And yet, after we removed it, absolutely nothing changed. Proving us right and you wrong. And yet you are STILL going on about it.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 9:58 am #

            Is the guy who made the quote below an idiot also? and all the other doctors and researchers who recommended the removal of mercury? They were all idiots?

            And yet you have faith in a system that has so many idiots in influential positions?

            “There’s no question that mercury does not belong in vaccines.

            There are other compounds that could be used as preservatives. And everything
            we know about childhood susceptibility, neurotoxicity of mercury at the fetus and
            at the infant level, points out that we should not have these fetuses and infants
            exposed to mercury. There’s no need of it in the vaccines.”

            “Mercury in Medicine – Are We Taking Unnecessary Risks?” Hearing Before the Committee on Government Reform; 106th Congress; July 18, 2000; page 212 ; Serial No. 106-232 (Testimony of Dr. H. Vasken Aposhian, Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology, and Pharmacology, University of Arizona)

          • September 6, 2016 at 1:06 pm #

            9th grade chemistry failure. Next.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 9:59 am #

            And these guys? These guys are idiots also?

            https://youtu.be/_b6tqVSdotE

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:04 am #

            Yes

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 10:09 am #

            Well how can you have faith in an establishment that has so many idiots in it?

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:15 am #

            Well, for one, Dr. Sears is considered an idiot by his own establishment.
            There are idiots everywhere. Which is why we rely on peer review and the scientific method.
            And a youtube video is neither.

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:04 am #

            and I can’t believe you are STILL posting those same stupid video.
            Talk about a one trick pony

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 10:09 am #

            still waiting for a critique, that’s why

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:13 am #

            Oh we told you many time: It’s full of lies, not worth of consideration.

          • Mike Stevens
            September 3, 2016 at 10:59 am #

            Its a long video, so I just dropped into it at random.
            (see below)
            This was interesting.
            The first study she cites (Flarend) is a study on 6 rabbits, 5 of which got IM adjuvant injections. It does not say what Humphries says it says. It actually is supportive of the safety of vaccination with aluminium adjuvants, and the authors say so. The increase in Al levels in serum was 0.8% after IM injection, and these levels dropped subsequently. The lowest levels of Al were in the brain, with extremely low levels of retention.

            The second study is on human infants (Movsas), and again doesn’t say what Humphries says it says at all. In fact it never concluded aluminium is not excreted at all – it demonstrated that serum levels of baseline aluminium did not rise at all following injection. If this is the case, then how is it dangerous?

            The last study is by Priest, who used aluminium citrate injection (not an adjuvant). Less than 1% remained detectable afetr 48 hours.

            So none of these papers support Humphries calims. In fact, I’d say her misrepresentation of them was so gross that it amounted to professional misconduct. She is certainly wilfully lying.

            I don’t really want to fisk the other 110 minutes of this execrable video, thanks. on minute was enough to show me what a charlatan and devious quack this woman is.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 11:10 am #

            Thanks, exactly the kind of info I was looking for

            She also mentioned how incidence of scarlet fever has plummeted despite there being no vaccine – without mentioning that it is treated by antibiotics – that sounds very dodgy also

          • Mike Stevens
            September 3, 2016 at 11:19 am #

            Scarlet fever incidence changes periodically. Vaccines have nothing to do with it, no, but did you know that it has dramatically increased in the last few years?
            https://www.gov.uk/government/news/update-on-rising-scarlet-fever-across-england

            How would Humphries interpret that I wonder….. a disease incidence rising because there is no vaccine?

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 11:47 am #

            I’m agreeing with you, I was pointing out how she deliberately avoided mentioning antibiotics – ie she insinuated that the decline in incidence was somehow natural

          • Mike Stevens
            September 3, 2016 at 2:47 pm #

            I understand.

          • kfunk937
            September 3, 2016 at 5:27 pm #

            I’ve only ever seen one case, about 20 yrs ago in a walk-in clinic. And I didn’t recognise it immediately when I saw it, even though my late husband had Rheumatic Fever as a child, before antibiotics.

            From what you’ve written before, the UK is getting pasted with a scarlet fever. It’s only a matter of time before it happens in the US, I suppose.

          • Mike Stevens
            September 3, 2016 at 6:24 pm #

            My son had it earlier this year..

          • September 4, 2016 at 10:29 pm #

            I had it as a child, twice in rapid succession.

            This was because I’d successfully argued (at about five) that I was a big girl and could take my medicine ALL BY MYSELF. And then my mother spied and found I was dumping my antibiotics down the drain all week.

            That’s one of two spankings I ever got in my life. The worse punishment was the second round of scarlet fever. I’m nearly 40 and I remember it VIVIDLY.

          • corblimeybot
            September 4, 2016 at 11:01 pm #

            My brother had scarlet fever when we were kids, about 25 years ago. His teacher thought he was exaggerating how bad he felt, and made him walk home from school covered in vomit.

          • September 8, 2016 at 2:14 am #

            Yep, another dodgy thing they like to try and pull is this:

            “Diseases were going down before vaccines. [Mortality (i.e. Death) graph goes here]

            Also, watch for cherry-picked incidence graphs.

          • Reality022
            September 3, 2016 at 1:24 pm #

            Gee, she’s one of their “strongest” advocates and it seems she is either a complete ignoramus or a sleazy self-serving liar… or both.
            And her research publication record is unimpeachable (only in that it is also unfindable).

            The “experts” the anti-vaccine cult has on hand to defend their delusions are a laughable, motley crew of quacky, misfit unknowns and bat-sh!t crazy crackpots.

          • September 3, 2016 at 2:24 pm #

            It’s so awkward when someone actually takes the time to view their “evidence.” Thanks for taking one for the boiler room team 🙂

          • Reality022
            September 3, 2016 at 10:05 am #

            Bob Sears spam, repeated on this discussion endlessly by Barzini.
            Spam.

            Reported as spam.

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 10:08 am #

            sure it’s spam, hilarious, the quicker you get me banned from this forum the better

            If a neuro scientist tells me injecting aluminium into mice causes brain damage – I’m concerned

            If you’re not then fine, keep injecting

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:13 am #

            You know that injecting basically anything directly in the brain is going to cause brain damage right.
            Like we’ve told you many many time DOSAGE MATTERS

          • Nick Sanders
            September 3, 2016 at 2:48 pm #

            Reminds me of a “study” that I sometimes see cited as “proof” MSG is harmful because it causes lesions on neurons. What the people citing leave out it that the procedure used was to soak neurons directly in a 10% solution of the stuff. It’s hard to think of something that wouldn’t cause damage under those circumstances.

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 6:59 pm #

            Yea, It’s like that viral video on youtube of someone pouring snake venom into blood and it turns all gooey and they are like ‘This is what it does inside your body!!!!!’
            Not saying snake venous isn’t super bad, but Blood is a super fragile substance. You can probably make it do the same thing with a lot of other relatively harmless product.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 4, 2016 at 2:38 pm #

            Well, for the cytotoxic venoms that is what it does inside your body. But you are right that blood is not the right substance to show it with, since you can get blood to go all nasty just by vigorously stirring it.

          • September 5, 2016 at 7:19 pm #

            Or mixing it with specific different blood, for that matter!

          • September 4, 2016 at 9:39 pm #

            Or like the cola project they did at school to show how much cola rots teeth when lots of the class was either losing baby teeth themselves or had younger brothers and sisters who were. Except…the cola-tooth was bathed overnight and most of the next day while it was in the flavoured water/weak juice for less than 5 hours. This was bullshit and I knew it at the time and I was like ~8-10.

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 10:24 am #

            so, you are actually trying to get yourself banned?

          • Mike Stevens
            September 3, 2016 at 10:31 am #

            “If a neuro scientist tells me injecting aluminium into mice causes brain damage – I’m concerned”
            Can we see that study or paper, please?
            Remember to ensure that the mice got the same dose of aluminium per Kg as human infants would, and not more, won’t you…

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 10:51 am #

            Here are a couple of his papers on Pubmed:

            Aluminum hydroxide injections lead to motor deficits and motor neuron degeneration
            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2819810/

            Aluminum vaccine adjuvants: are they safe?
            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21568886

            Here’s another from the Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry
            http://omsj.org/reports/tomljenovic%202011.pdf

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 11:06 am #

            and yet, here we all are. not suffering from the complications those mice had. The study itself acknowledge that we don’t see the same sign at all in humans. They even hypothesize that a lot of other or concurrent factors could be at play here, like perhaps the fact that we aren’t mice. (Tylenol is extremely toxic in cats, for example. I hadn’t stopped taking it because it kills cat. Because I’m not a cat.)
            At most, they recommend more testing. Nothing else. They don’t recommend we stop vaccination.,

          • Barzini
            September 3, 2016 at 11:07 am #

            So you agree we should do more testing?

          • Azuran
            September 3, 2016 at 11:12 am #

            I have no problem with more testing. However, there is probably already a lot of testing out there.
            You think we wouldn’t have noticed it Alzheimer was way more frequent in vaccinated people?

          • Wren
            September 3, 2016 at 12:16 pm #

            I figured it out! Barzini is a mouse! This is why he refuses to be vaccinated for human diseases at human doses. It all makes sense now.

          • demodocus
            September 3, 2016 at 7:54 pm #

            andd then there’s chocolate and garlic! 2 of my food groups

          • September 4, 2016 at 10:24 pm #

            Ahhh, the four food groups. Garlic, chocolate, cheese and carbs.

          • Mike Stevens
            September 3, 2016 at 11:26 am #

            Ah, those would be papers by the “neuroscientist” Christopher Shaw, the ophthalmologist and antivaccine activist.

            Luck you didn’t cite the papers of his that have been withdrawn, such as the one in Vaccine.

            He seems to have done experiments in mice using (over 2 weeks) around 5 times the dose a human infant would receive in 5 years.
            Do you think that’s an honest comparison?

          • September 3, 2016 at 2:22 pm #

            Maybe he’s spent too much time on vaccinepapers! Shaw. Tomljenovic. Derp.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 3, 2016 at 10:47 am #

            “If you’re not then fine, keep injecting”

            You are certainly not impressing ME by repeating the same tripe over and over, Marco, or Barzini.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 3, 2016 at 10:23 am #

            Thanks for reporting.

          • Ron Roy
            September 4, 2016 at 7:56 am #

            Can’t stand the truth can you?

          • Charybdis
            September 4, 2016 at 11:26 am #

            No, we just don’t suffer fools gladly.

          • Ron Roy
            September 4, 2016 at 7:55 am #

            All journals that are financed by drug companies. Evil power at it’s best.

          • Heidi_storage
            September 4, 2016 at 8:43 am #

            Sigh. I’ve actually worked on the staff of a medical journal, and reputable journals are not tools of Big Pharma.

            First of all, ad revenue (from drug companies and others) is only one source of financing for journals, and it has been falling precipitously in recent years owing to changes in the publishing industry and increasing restrictions. In the main, journals tend to be financed by the membership fees of the organizations who own the journal. For instance, part of the membership fee for the AMA goes toward producing JAMA.

            The peer review/manuscript acceptance process is carried out entirely separately from the ad inclusion process, and the editors are always extremely careful to ensure that an ad is not accidentally given advantageous placement (i.e. a birth control ad next to a birth-control article).

            All authors, reviewers, and editors must disclose all affiliations, study funding sources, and potential conflicts of interests.

            Studies that are financed by pharmaceutical companies are always given an especially careful scrutiny. If the reviewers or editors believe that the authors have overstated their results (especially in the Conclusion or Discussion), they make the authors edit the offending portion. All claims of novelty or other exceptionalism (e.g. “the lowest-dose estradiol available”) must be backed up with a literature search of PubMed, the Cochrane database, and other databases. All clinical trials carried out after 2005 must have been registered in a database such as the NIH’s ClinicalTrials.gov.

            Ghost authorship, honorary authorship, dual publication, and other authorly shenanigans are not looked upon kindly, and are grounds for suspension or banning from publishing in the journal.

            The peer-reviewed journal is most definitely not perfect, but the reputable editors’ ethical standards are WAY higher than those of the alt-med sites that are financed by herbal supplements, homeopathic “remedies,” dubious devices, and other witchcraft that people DIRECTLY HAWK to their gullible readers without any oversight whatsoever.

          • Azuran
            September 4, 2016 at 9:01 am #

            and ‘journals’ of anti vaxxers are better because????

          • Charybdis
            September 4, 2016 at 11:24 am #

            Because they know the TRUTH that the government, doctors, Big Pharma, and all rational people are keeping hidden as a way to OPPRESS the masses and maintain control over everyone!!!! *Insert maniacal laughter here* /sarcasm

            Those “journals” ego-stroke them, praise them and laud their so-called “intelligence”. They make them feel smug, superior and delighted to be included in an exclusive club, sorry, ECHO CHAMBER that infinitely repeats the incorrect information to reinforce these bad ideas. They feel special, one of the “elite”. Teh FEELZ trump actual science, every time.

          • Maud Pie
            September 4, 2016 at 2:17 pm #

            You nailed it. They also bolster themselves with the Pollyanna offensive that anyone who doesn’t believe teh big pharma Eeevull conspiracy must be a naively optimistic ignoramus. That deters lots of people from challenging their conspiracy theory.

          • Ron Roy
            September 4, 2016 at 12:08 pm #

            That’s easy to answer big money and power vs little or no money and certainly no power. Drug companies control almost every aspect of disease care and they oppose anything that will keep people healthy and that’s why doctors practice disease care and not healthcare. The few that do are persecuted by people like yourself.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 4, 2016 at 1:54 pm #

            Drug companies are way smaller than oil companies. If oil companies can’t buy off the climate community, how did drug companies afford to buy off all the doctors?

          • Ron Roy
            September 4, 2016 at 3:35 pm #

            Medical school donations, research grants, gifts etc. http://www.npr.org/series/130598927/dollars-for-docs-how-pharma-money-influences-physician-prescriptions

          • Mike Stevens
            September 4, 2016 at 7:42 pm #

            Where’s mine then?

          • Azuran
            September 4, 2016 at 7:23 pm #

            Anti-vaxxers journal still have 100% of the power to decide what will and will not make it inside their journal. So they can absolutely post anything that agrees with their view and block anything that doesn’t.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 4, 2016 at 1:58 pm #

            I’d love for you to show me where the National Academy of Sciences is financed by drug companies.

          • Ron Roy
            September 4, 2016 at 3:31 pm #

            That’s easy. They’re financed indirectly through foundations like the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation. Bill and Melinda Gates have invested heavily in drug company stocks sooo . You see how one hand washes the other.

          • shay simmons
            September 4, 2016 at 3:33 pm #

            Still making this claim when you are completely unable to provide documentation to support it?

            Oh, wait. That’s par for the course with you.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 4, 2016 at 4:09 pm #

            Bill and Melinda Gates also have souls and give a damn about the less fortunate. Snide insinuations are not evidence.

          • guest
            September 5, 2016 at 12:15 am #

            Funny, because they don’t seem to give a damn about destroying public education. My working hypothesis is that they do not have souls.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 5, 2016 at 12:48 am #

            I’m not in the mood to come up with some snippy way of asking, so I’ll just be straight: What in the hell are you talking about?

          • September 8, 2016 at 2:09 am #

            Well, explain to me what a soul is in ways we can test for then we’ll see.

          • Michael McCarthy
            September 4, 2016 at 4:13 pm #

            Don’t strain yourself doing those mental gymnastics.

          • Ron Roy
            September 5, 2016 at 2:56 pm #

            It was no strain at all thank you.

          • September 5, 2016 at 7:17 pm #

            Please take some basic chemistry courses and get back to us.

        • Sonja Henie
          September 3, 2016 at 10:30 am #

          You seem to belong to a school of debate that says to just keep repeating your so-called “point” over and over again. I have some experience with such people. I will just say, look at what happened to Marco Rubio when he tried that. His opponents made a fool of him, not that they had to try hard!

          • Maud Pie
            September 3, 2016 at 1:08 pm #

            I’m wondering if Barzini and my XH attended the same argument clinic. The repeated chanting with emphasis on some emotion laden phrase was his trick as well. Injecting NEUROTOXINS. ALUMINUM is a NEUROTOXIN. Vaccines cause LIFE CHANGING INJURIES. It’s like trying to reason with a pull-string talking action figure.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 3, 2016 at 1:19 pm #

            Well, my present husband, 36 years and counting, said just recently he learned that technique in HS debate. I have beat him at his own game a few times.

          • Who?
            September 3, 2016 at 6:48 pm #

            Perhaps he made a fool of himself, they just provided the stage and props….

    • Sonja Henie
      September 3, 2016 at 10:22 am #

      No pro-vax person is interested in what Suzanne Humphries thinks. She’s so far out, she’s out.

  7. Barzini
    August 31, 2016 at 11:01 pm #

    The reason I don’t vaccinate is because there’s a really small chance that a vaccination will cause severe life changing harm

    Whilst the chances of this are very low, we don’t understand why it happens yet

    Seeing as I’m perfectly healthy – I just don’t feel like taking that risk

    If you want to, that’s fine by me – go for it…..

    • Amy Tuteur, MD
      August 31, 2016 at 11:38 pm #

      But the risk of being harmed by the disease is much higher than the risk of being harmed by the vaccine. So if you care about the wellbeing of your children, you would vaccinate.

      • Barzini
        August 31, 2016 at 11:42 pm #

        I agree – but the risk of potential contraction of disease is a future and still very unlikely possibility (especially if one is already healthy, eating well, etc…)

        Whereas, the other risk, while far smaller, is right now and has potentially very severe consequences

        I personally don’t fancy taking that risk, so I don’t

        I understand why you do though and that’s fair enough

        • momofone
          August 31, 2016 at 11:45 pm #

          I think eating well and staying healthy (to the degree to which one gets to choose health) are very reasonable things to do. I’m curious about how they help if one is exposed to measles, or pertussis, or other vaccine preventable illnesses though.

          • Barzini
            August 31, 2016 at 11:53 pm #

            No guarantee of course – but the stronger we are, the stronger our immune systems are,

            No I don’t have any peer reviewed studies to support this controversial and far out opinion

          • Sue
            September 1, 2016 at 1:18 am #

            Of course you don’t – because it’s nonsense.

            Prior to widespread vaccination, essentially every child got measles, mumps and chicken pox – even the uber-healthy. Most recovered, some didn’t.

            (Wait – have I missed your tone? Or are you being serious?)

          • Barzini
            September 1, 2016 at 1:22 am #

            Yeah I’m serious, a healthy person has less to worry about than a weak person when it comes to things like chicken pox

            Are we actually having this discussion?

            Imagine a perfectly healthy child and one who is close to starvation – who would be more likely to be the most severely affected by chicken pox?

          • Barzini
            September 1, 2016 at 1:47 am #

            I guess parents of vaccine damaged children should just suck it up and be glad their kid took one for the team

          • Nick Sanders
            September 1, 2016 at 1:51 am #

            Well, I mean, that’s what you are saying these parents should do for you…

          • Barzini
            September 1, 2016 at 2:09 am #

            yeah, it’s like they’re native Americans and I’m General Custer with infected blankets, that’s exactly what it’s like……

          • Nick Sanders
            September 1, 2016 at 2:15 am #

            That’s not a completely disingenuous massive exaggeration of what I said. Nope, not at all.

          • Who?
            September 1, 2016 at 7:28 am #

            It’s interesting you see the parents as victims.

            Another nail in the coffin of your values and character.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:17 am #

            In what way is a parent of a vaccine injured child not a victim?

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 7:48 am #

            In what way is the actual injured person not the primary victim? You jump to sympathise with the parents, while bemoaning these imagined injuries to the children.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:02 am #

            Imagined?

            Of course the injured person is the primary victim, but I feel pretty damned sorry for the parents also – as I presume you do to, no matter what the cause of the injury was.

            The fact that we often compensate parents of children who are injured by medical procedures (including vaccines) also supports that outlook

          • Amazed
            September 2, 2016 at 8:31 am #

            Do you feel sorry for Micha and Natalie’s parents as well? The kids who died because a like of you chose not to vaccinate their kid yet demanded that they be treated as if he couldn’t be possibly treated like a disease-carrier and brought him to a waiting room full of babies instead of arranging a private visit out of a building with vulnerable people?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:55 am #

            You have evidence of this? Or are you merely repeating an anecdote from a biased source?

            You are claiming that six babies were infected with measles due to being in a waiting room with a teenager with measles – that’s one hell of a potent infection rate

            You are then claiming that 2 of these six babies developed SSPE and died

            The last time I checked it was thought that 1/2000 measles cases develop into SSPE

            This is some incredible stuff

            Sounds like anecdotal evidence to me – which remember is completely worthless in the world of science based medicine

          • Amazed
            September 2, 2016 at 9:14 am #

            Bullshit. I did have a reason not to believe your ability to judge someone as intelligent and sensitive.

            Listen, leech, unless you go with your kids in an isolated cave, you’re mooching off everyone else’s sacrifices. That’s a fact. Not sorry that you feel insulted. Since you are so happy to put others at risk and even tacitly admitted that you care not a whit about the not perfectly healthy people your special snowflakes might kill or maim, I consider it fair that you are a little miffed at your special status not being admired.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 9:19 am #

            Inject away, have a double dose for all I care

            I deliberately send my kids to a school with an incredibly low vaccination rate – that’s the opposite of moochin

            If I was moochin, I would move to California, lie about vaccine history, and select a school with 100% vaccination rate

          • Amazed
            September 2, 2016 at 9:23 am #

            Really? Your kids never go outside? You never take them to the park? They never ride the bus?

            School is just one tiny part of mooching.

          • Amazed
            September 2, 2016 at 9:17 am #

            Oh, and by the way your hypocrisy is showing. Zero compassion, hmm? Only one kind of parents are victims. I guess those kids are less dead because they were killed by someone like you.

            Glad to have this one proven. I knew you were just hot air.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 9:21 am #

            unsupported anecdotal evidence – looks like you have more in common with those ‘deluded mothers’ than you’d like to admit

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:47 pm #

            You are claiming that six babies were infected with measles due to being in a waiting room with a teenager with measles – that’s one hell of a potent infection rate

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

            In epidemiology, the basic reproduction number (sometimes called basic reproductive ratio, or incorrectly basic reproductive rate, and denoted R0, r naught) of an infection can be thought of as the number of cases one case generates on average over the course of its infectious period, in an otherwise uninfected population.[6]

            Disease Transmission R0

            Measles Airborne 12–18

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:51 pm #

            I presume this teenager was in a waiting room with these babies for a few hours at the very most

            Is the infectious period for measles not something like three week?

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:52 pm #

            That… that’s not what infectious period means at all… uhm, are you sure you’ve ever read anything about disease? Anything whatsoever?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:53 pm #

            No, I admit I don’t know

            What does the 12-18 number refer to? The number of people infected per?

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:54 pm #

            Yes, that’s exactly what it means, the average number of other people a single infected person passes the disease on to.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:56 pm #

            OK, but over how much time? How long is the person with measles infectious for on average?

            I thought it was at least a week, but I admit I don’t know

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:58 pm #

            From roughly 4 days before the rash appears to about 4 days after it appears.

            http://www.cdc.gov/measles/about/transmission.html

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:03 pm #

            Thanks…..

            So there are 192 hours in 8 days
            That means that on average 0.1 people per hours are infected if we assume an R0 of 18

            So, if the teenager was in a waiting room for 3 hours, we would expect him to infect 0.3 people

            Instead, according to this anecdote, he infected 6 people = 20 times more than expected

            Then we are told that two of the babies developed SSPE and died – I remember hearing that on average 1/2000 measles cases become SSPE

            These stats seem extremely suspicious

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 4:20 pm #

            If “people infected” were some kind of constantly running computer program, sure. But people sleep, go off by themselves, and spend time with the same people they’ve already exposed. They aren’t just constantly parading past new people, accruing infection percentages.

            For SSPE, the exact numbers are hard to pin down, but the CDC put it at between 4 and 11 per 100,000 in the US between 1989 and 1991. That doesn’t mean a single outbreak has to hit 100,000/11 for there to be a chance of a person getting SSPE. It means out of all the people who get measles ever, roughly that many will get SSPE. Some will be from small outbreaks with higher than average numbers, as in this case, while others may be from larger outbreaks with lower than average rates of incidence. That’s the thing about mean averages of the whole, subsets rarely match it perfectly.

            Further, the risk of SSPE is higher in children who catch measles before two.

            http://www.cdc.gov/measles/about/complications.html
            https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/001419.htm

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:23 pm #

            Yeah I agree with all that

            However I deliberately took the maximum R0 of 18 and I also assumed that they were all in the same room for 3 hours (which seems unlikely, it was probably less than an hour), in addition there was no physical contact, sharing of saliva etc….

            Obviously we don’t know, but the stats seem suspicious

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 4:25 pm #

            The only thing suspicious is your understanding of how infection works. And your really dodgy math.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:30 pm #

            “Further, the risk of SSPE is higher in children who catch measles before two.”

            And infants under a year cannot be vaccinated against measles except in extenuating circumstances.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:41 pm #

            Are you an engineer? Because they come up with stuff like that. Now mind you, some of my “best friends” are engineers, e.g. my father, two cousins on my father’s side, my husband’s two brothers, my son-in-law and my son-in-law to be, just to name a few. Plus, my husband does engineering work although his degrees are in physics. He’s not quite so nuts as the others, either. He tends to think I know what I’m talking about.

            If the teen was in the waiting room for 3 hours:
            1) That’s a pretty badly run office
            2) How many people he exposed depends on how many other people were there in those 3 hours. He exposed virtually all of them. Some of them were vaccinated; some were partially vaccinated (you get a dose at 12-15 mo and again at 4-6 years in most states); some, as in the babies under 12-15 months were unvaccinated. Newborns lose what little protection they have from their moms in 3-5 months, and breast feeding does not confer any additional immunity.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:50 pm #

            Yeah, it’s a very basic calculation

            However, the stats are very suspicious – that someone infected six other people in an hour or so, with no physical contact, and that two of them then died?

            That’s pretty damned crazy and the very definition of unsupported anecdotal evidence that people round here are usually so suspicious of

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 4:58 pm #

            “no physical contact”

            It’s an airborne disease! :slams head against wall:

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:01 pm #

            I don’t mean it’s spread by contact, I mean that the guy never picked up the baby or went very close to it

            yes, I know it’s airborne

            If it was his baby sister and he was carrying her around and playing with her – there would be a greater chance of infection than if it was some random person a few meters away across the room

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 5:06 pm #

            You really have no clue how far droplets can travel, huh? “A few meters” is nothing. And that’s if he and the other people were rock still and never moved around the room at all during those 3 hours. They almost certainly got up a few times and moved around, if for no other reason than to keep their legs from aching.

            http://www.slate.com/articles/video/video/2014/04/mit_sneeze_study_new_research_shows_sneezes_can_travel_up_to_200_feet.html

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:09 pm #

            Yeah, come on, even so, the closer you are, the more likely you are to spread infection

            I well remember learning in school about how Florence Nightingale reduced infection in her hospitals by moving beds further away from one another

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:19 pm #

            I worked in a pediatrics office. We sometimes had 20 people in the waiting room, a number of them under 12 months, most of the kids under 5 (most under 3, really) meaning only partially immunized, and a few old enough to be immunized but refuseniks.

            I’m not sure what outbreak you’re referring to above, and due to the vagaries of Disqus, I can’t find the original post. Would you be so kind as to fill me in?

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:39 pm #

            Those are both about SSPE, a late effect of measles. Why don’t you believe them? Because Suzi told you SSPE is some made up disease?
            https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/sspe-a-deadly-and-not-that-rare-complication-of-measles/

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:41 pm #

            You can see how the stats seem suspicious

            The fact he infected six people in an hour or so is already incredible, the fact that two of them got SSPE (around 1 in 2000 cases) is even more incredible

          • corblimeybot
            September 2, 2016 at 5:52 pm #

            Doesn’t really seem suspicious at all. Measles is terrifyingly contagious. Clusters of bad outcomes like SSPE can appear for all sorts of reasons, including chance. Data clumps sometimes. And that’s much more likely than “it’s a conspiracy!”

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:57 pm #

            Well vaccines can also cause damage, especially ‘hot’ vaccines which generate clusters of injuries

            And yet the anecdotal evidence from these cases is dismissed with scorn on these pages

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 8:53 pm #

            What the hell is a “hot” vaccine?

          • September 3, 2016 at 7:03 am #

            “Bad batches.” They’re talking about manufacturing defects (sueable for, btw) in the same way that anti-vaxxers define vaccine injuries though.

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 9:07 pm #

            ‘These pages’ are not the be all and end all. Go back and play with your little friends who will comfort and support you in your ignorance and selfishness. You’re trying to pull the wrong crowd.

            See you at the hospital when you bring in a child demanding they be cured of a vpd your vanity left them open to contracting. We might even get a chorus of ‘doctors are so meeann’ at the same time.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 3, 2016 at 3:52 am #

            Hot?

          • Who?
            September 3, 2016 at 5:09 am #

            No, Nick, not hot, ‘hot’. Totally different.

            Do keep up!!!

            Though to keep up with this one you might need a bump on the head.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 6:00 pm #

            You’ve got the facts all conflated. Although infecting six people in an hour is hardly incredible.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:09 pm #

            Well neither does being injured by a vaccine containing aluminium – but on these pages any mother that claims that is ‘deluded’ and any doctor that claims that is ‘human waste’

          • Nick Sanders
            September 3, 2016 at 3:50 am #

            Except measles is well documented to be one of the most contagious diseases around, while aluminum adjuvants have been repeatedly studied for safety, with good results.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 8:51 pm #

            The measles virus stays airborne for up to two hours after someone with measles coughs or sneezes, which is highly likely because some of the early symptoms are a cough, runny nose and fever.

            The virus can also live for two hours on contaminated surfaces. And by “contaminated” I mean sneezed on or touched by a used Kleenex. If you have no immunity to measles ANY CONTACT with someone who is infected has a 90% chance of giving you the measles.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 4:57 pm #

            I spend 4 hours in a waiting room once. granted it was a private practice family GP’s (or maybe a ped, it was a very long time ago, and I was still in elementary IIRC) office and I recall them having a ton of people there that day. Way, way more that I usually saw when I went.

            Thank goodness there were Lincoln Logs so I didn’t go insane.

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 7:48 pm #

            Even an engineer would not make these grade school mistakes.
            I think you are dealing with a child or an adult who avoided math and science like the plague during middle school and high school.

            Edited to add: Or a chiroquack or a naturopathetic or an inaccustickurist.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 7:54 pm #

            Obviously he never took a statistics course.

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 7:55 pm #

            From looking at his maths babbling it is obvious she never took algebra… or at least never passed it.

          • Amazed
            September 3, 2016 at 4:14 am #

            You don’t need to take a statistics course to recognize his limitations. There was clearly a great failing in the educational system of the great wealthy Switzerland with this one. And I assume he still came out with an elementary school diploma.

            Horrible.

            Statistics courses are for more complex things.

          • Irène Delse
            September 3, 2016 at 6:11 am #

            My dad is a statistician. He likes to tell anecdotes of educated people, even math teachers sometimes, totally misunderstanding statistics.

          • Amazed
            September 3, 2016 at 6:39 am #

            I have no doubt it’s true. I totally misunderstand statistics as well and I am educated. That’s why I don’t really argue statistics. I am not competent. The thing is, it isn’t really stats that B. misunderstands. Is it really statistics to know that percentages and plain numbers calculate different things? I was taught this when I was 11 or 12, at school. Is it really statistics to know that if you want to see who gets sick more often, it’s percentages of vaxxed and unvaxxed that you should compare?

            And, which is more shocking, does one need stats to know that you cannot infect a part of person? I mean, maths part. One tenth, one hundredth… I’d think it’s plain old common sense. Sure, POCS is a part of stats, the way it is a part of literally every other science field. But that’s a part every college student – I am being generous here, since I’d actually expect it from every high school student – should understand. I am not talking about values and other complex issues. It’s evident, IMO.

          • Irène Delse
            September 3, 2016 at 8:19 am #

            I see what you mean. Percentages if more middle-school level math skills, IIRC. And then there’s basic human biology, like the concept of the internal environment of the body.

          • Amazed
            September 3, 2016 at 4:10 am #

            I take insult at this! *I* avoided maths and science like the plague every day at school. Was still infected with some because I am not an idiot and couldn’t avoid being infected. Somehow, I ended up knowing how you infect people and that you can’t infect a tenth of a person.

            My take is that Barzini is just a fool.

          • Reality022
            September 2, 2016 at 7:46 pm #

            Behold the arrogant ignorance of the anti-vaccinationists.
            What are you? 13 years old?
            Chee-rist! Go back to middle school.
            The system isn’t linear nor is it continuous. Look up those terms applied to functions and systems.

            The R0 is an average of the population reproduction.

            The “teenager” isn’t uniformly and continuously and homogeneously infecting folks at a rate of 0.1 per hour.
            He may go 3 days without infecting anyone then meet with some friends and infect 5 of them.
            A child of 2 may not infect anyone by virtue of staying at home for those 8 days of sickness. Someone else is going to make up that 2 year old’s 18 victims to give the average R0 of 18. That means a teen may infect 10+ at one sitting.

            It is just an average.

            Readers who understand Jr. High math note the arrogant ignorance of the anti-science, anti-vaccine activists.
            … and the Dunning-Kruger effect on display. They’re so dumb they don’t realize they’re dumb.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 8:45 pm #

            What. The. Fuck. Is. This.?

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 8:57 pm #

            I wish I knew. I’d love to know how one is supposed to infect tenths of a person. Or maybe I wouldn’t, because then I might just go mad.

          • September 2, 2016 at 9:10 pm #

            Ironically, this is sort of how herd immunity works. If everyone creates less than 1 additional case…disease goes kaput.

            This is vastly oversimplified of course

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 9:14 pm #

            Somehow I don’t think that’s quite what Barzini’s number salad was intended to show…

          • September 2, 2016 at 9:19 pm #

            Yep – It’s the same kind of irony as when we get to point out what natural immunity to rubella can do after a rant about MMR causing autism.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 9:19 pm #

            Oh, I totally see how infection rates could drop to less than one in aggregate. But the idea of infect 0.3 people because it was a limited time interval just strikes me as bizarre. Like I said, it reminds me a of a computer program’s progress bar.

          • September 2, 2016 at 9:21 pm #

            Yeh. I got distracted by the lack of knowledge of how measles works.

          • Amazed
            September 3, 2016 at 4:08 am #

            Barzini clearly thinks that you can infect just the leg of a person or something. Nothing this important. Certainly nothing producing consequences that an intelligent caring person like himself should be held accountable for.

          • Who?
            September 3, 2016 at 5:11 am #

            I think you’ll find all B cares about his all his rights. And maybe his freedums.

            Consequences and responsibility are for the poor and non-elite.

          • September 2, 2016 at 9:09 pm #

            That’s because you’ve missed how measles works. The measles particles were there for 5 hours (3 hours + the extra 2 measles would have been viable for in the airspace)

            And the fact that he would have been contagious just about for about four days prior to becoming symptomatic.

            The measles SSPE rate assumes patients older than 2 since kids younger than that are at a greater risk of complications such as SSPE – infants are not older than 2.

          • Damo
            September 7, 2016 at 1:30 pm #

            Yeah, you forget that the teenager was exposed to babies. It is not like the virus knows how many people it has infected and then stops when it gets to its magic number. We are talking about averages v. reality.

            I do agree about the bit about anecdotal evidence, though.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:36 pm #

            Why have you been posting all this anti-vax crip-crap if you don’t know anything about it?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:40 pm #

            I don’t think expressing a concern about injecting a known neurotoxin into babies is ‘posting anvti-vax crap’

            I provided a few links which I fully admitted were only introductions in a quest to actually learn something

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:48 pm #

            You’ve posted much anti-vax crap on these boards.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:52 pm #

            I’m familiar with anti-vax ‘crap’ from places like facebook – I don’t think that’s what I’m doing here

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:22 pm #

            A “learning quest”, LOL! I suggest you look at Dr. Offit’s stuff on the CHOP website instead of visiting the website of a known quack and falling in love with her.
            http://www.chop.edu/centers-programs/vaccine-education-center#.V8nte610osI

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:23 pm #

            This guy isn’t a fan of Offit

            https://youtu.be/dmjxuGIc06g

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:41 pm #

            Who’s he?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:50 pm #

            He’s the guy that invented chemtrails, in his spare time he’s a flat earther

            There, no need to listen to what he says now

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:58 pm #

            Figured as much.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:41 pm #

            LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL! youtube!

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:49 pm #

            It’s a doctor, he’s saying stuff, it was recorded, we can see it thanks to youtube

            you’re expressing yourself via Disqus – LOLOLOLLOLOLOLL

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:58 pm #

            Lots of doctors have opinions. I have opinions. That doesn’t mean they’re all correct.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:11 pm #

            Amen to that

            What do you think about this guy? Or do you still refuse to watch anything on Youtube?

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 8:00 pm #

            With you now: Doctor you agree with, paragon of virtue and to be obeyed at every turn.

            Doctor you disagree with: dangerously misguided fool.

            Good to know.

            So here’s the question: if your child, despite its wealth related good health is unfortunate enough to catch an illness a vaccine would have prevented, will you take said child to the doctor? Will you insist on asking said doctor loads of questions about their views on vaccines etc before allowing treatment for child?

            Or will you just insist that a passing medical professional FIX IT because you’re so wealthy and healthy you deserve the best and your child, by extension, does too?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:04 pm #

            It works both ways, doctors who question the safety of aluminium are ‘loons’ and ‘human waste’ according to commenters here

            I’ve got no problem with doctors, but I have a lot less faith in them than I did 10 years ago

          • Amazed
            September 3, 2016 at 4:05 am #

            You have a great problems with doctors. Doctors who don’t stroke your ego as an intelligent, caring, better parent.

            That’s what Sears built his model of profit upon – stroking parents’ vanity and as expected, you’re in awe with him. Undoubtedly you take his advice of “hide in the herd but don’t tell the herd you’re hiding” as a great revelation.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 7:39 pm #

            Well, this is the first I’ve heard of Boyd Haley, and within minutes of looking him up, I hated him.

            http://americanloons.blogspot.com/2013/10/737-boyd-haley.html

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:30 pm #

            Here’s a quote from Offit:

            “Aluminum is considered to be an essential metal with quantities fluctuating naturally during normal cellular activity. It is found in all tissues and is also believed to play an important role in the development of a healthy fetus.”

            Big LOLs

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:36 pm #

            Let me tell you, bub, Offit knows way more about kids than Humphries.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:46 pm #

            I’m sure he does know a lot, it’s what he tells people that I’m concerned about

          • Azuran
            September 2, 2016 at 5:38 pm #

            And here you miss the most basic rule of toxicology. It’s the dose that make the poison. EVERYTHING is toxic in high enough dosage. I can easily kill someone with water or oxygen, table salt or even by giving them blood.
            Yes, posting about ‘injecting a known neurotoxin’ IS posting anti-vaxx crap. You just showed up how uneducated you actually are.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:35 pm #

            You don’t have to be around measles very long to catch it if you’re not immune. I don’t know the exact time period. AND, the virus can linger in the airspace for two hours after the person leaves. Measles is pretty much the most infectious disease on earth.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:43 pm #

            Yeah, I agree

            However, these stats are still pretty incredible

            I feel like you wouldn’t normally accept such dubious anecdotal evidence

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 4:49 pm #

            It’s not anecdotal, you idiot! These are the stats from numerous studies. I happen to know this stuff. It was my JOB to know it!

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:21 pm #

            I feel like you’re trying to insult me.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 6:32 pm #

            The incubation period for measles is 14-21 days. This is the period after you have been exposed to the virus but before symptoms develop. Once the first symptoms of fever, cough and runny nose develop, the person is then contagious. This is the time that some will go to the doctor, thinking they have the flu or some other upper respiratory issue. The rash does not show up until 4-5 days after the fever, cough and runny nose develop and they continue to be contagious until 4-5 days AFTER the appearance of the rash.

            Transmission of the measles virus is airborne and it can stay airborne for two hours after an infected person coughs or sneezes in an airspace. Or if they wipe their eyes/nose/mouth and touch a surface, it can be caught for up to two hours.

            The unvaxxed kid who went to the doctor with what turned out to be measles sat in the waiting room, probably coughing and sneezing, with a runny nose, thus spraying the entire waiting room with virus-laden droplets. Measles is so contagious that 90% of those not immune to it will catch it from someone who does. These unvaccinated babies, too young for the MMR vaccine, breathed in the virus-laden drops so recklessly sprayed into the air by this unvaxxed kid and subsequently came down with measles. Two died as a result.

            Incubation time of 14-21 days BEFORE symptoms start. Symptoms of fever, cough, and runny nose show up 4-5 days BEFORE the spots show up. The patient is contagious from the time the fever starts until 4-5 days AFTER the spots show up. That is plenty of time to spread the disease around to vulnerable people. Especially since the spots show up late in the game to announce that this upper respiratory bug is, in fact, the measles.

            So an infected kid sitting in a waiting room for even 30 minutes can infect a lot of people.

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 5:42 pm #

            You are really ignorant (no that’s not an ad hominem, it’s stating a fact) if you think that because the incidence is 1/2000 that there have to be 2000 cases to see a case of SSPE.

          • September 4, 2016 at 9:05 am #

            How about Baby Riley, for that matter? Baby Riley was too young to be vaccinated for pertussis. His parents thought they could take some small amount of solace by donating his organs (not enough, obviously.) but sadly, the actual real toxins in pertussis infection meant they couldn’t. How many deaths is this in terms of lost opportunity costs from the toxins besides the original death?

          • Sue
            September 2, 2016 at 2:31 am #

            Parents of kids who have genuine (rare) reactions to vaccines are generally much more rational – and supportive of vaccination – than anti-vaxers who blame all manner of irrational conditions on “vaccine damage”.

            If no-one ever “took one for the team”, there would be no team.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 10:30 am #

            Define “vaccine damaged” for us please. Those people who have had, or whose children have had a genuine, adverse vaccine reaction are a very, very small percentage of the population.

            Some people will have a bad reaction to a vaccine. Someone has to be the statistic and there are ways to report and recover damages from a true adverse reaction. These are the things that will win you a legitmate medical exemption from vaccinating, so these people truly need the herd immunity to stay safe from VPD’s.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 11:10 am #

            Luckily I don’t need to ‘win’ an exemption – luckily I live somewhere where the right to decide is sacrosanct – here’s hoping it stays this way

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 12:24 pm #

            Oh, it is not mandatory here. You have the right to refuse vaccines. Nobody is being strapped down and injected against their will. You do, however, have to live with the consequences of your choice, and this is the part that causes all the squawking, belligerence and indignation.

            You can choose to not vaccinate your children. That’s your choice as a parent. In doing so, you will not be allowed to enroll in public school, as well as some private schools. You will not be welcomed in places like hospitals and nursing homes (visiting friends or relatives in the hospital or Grandma and/or Grandpa in the nursing home) and maybe even activities like Scouting (not sure if they ask about vaccination status). You (general) then scream to high heaven about how your rights are being trampled on and you are being oppressed and “forced” into vaccination. Not so. You are simply being held accountable for your decisions and that is what is pissing you (general) right the hell off.

            There are rules. If you choose not to follow the rules, then you don’t get to play. Or, you can ignore the rules (not vaccinate), but when you are caught (trying to enroll kid in kindergarten, say), you then have a conniption if a “personal belief exemption” is not accepted as a valid reason for not vaxxing. Medical exemption signed by a doctor, no problem, enroll away. “I don’t believe in them” or “it is against my religion”, sorry. No school for you.

            You just don’t like the consequences of your choice.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:36 pm #

            Thankfully I live in a country (Switzerland) with a far higher standard of living than the US and where no one cares if you are vaccinated or not – schools don’t even think of asking

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 12:56 pm #

            Bully for you, but if nobody cares if you are vaccinated or not in your neck of the woods, why do you care about what is required or not in the US?

            Do you travel? Vaccines are required for out-of-country travel. To go to Europe, US travelers are required to have: MMR, DTaP and a current flu shot. France also requires Hep A & B and rabies. Russia also requires Hep A and Japanese Encephalitis and Turkey requires Typhoid and rabies. To go to South America, you are required to have: Hep A & B, Typhoid, rabies and yellow fever. Asia requires: Adult polio booster, tetanus, diphtheria, Hep A and yellow fever. Obviously SOMEONE, SOMEWHERE is concerned about outsiders bringing in diseases…

            Strangely, if you are traveling to the US (not immigrating), vaccines are not required to enter the country.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:00 pm #

            I’ve never been vaccinated and have been to most of those countries

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 1:12 pm #

            But if you are in the Schengen area of the EU, you don’t have to use a passport to move from country to country and they don’t/won’t check for immunizations.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:23 pm #

            I’ve been all through South and Central America, quite a bit of Asia and North America and a little bit of Africa

            Never had to have a vaccination or prove I had had one

            The only one I can think of is Yellow Fever – technically you need to have that before going to a few countries, although I think enforcement is lax

          • Box of Salt
            September 2, 2016 at 3:10 pm #

            And thank goodness you live in a country that hasn’t experienced any outbreaks of vaccine preventable diseases over the last decade or so!

            Oh, wait. Geneva, 2011 http://www.eurosurveillance.org/ViewArticle.aspx?ArticleId=20395

            Then there’s 2006-2009, with 4415 cases reported http://www.eurosurveillance.org/ViewArticle.aspx?ArticleId=19443

            And that outbreak spread to the United States: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2010/03/22/peds.2009-1653
            “In January 2008, an intentionally unvaccinated 7-year-old boy who was unknowingly infected with measles returned from Switzerland, resulting in the largest outbreak in San Diego, California, since 1991.”
            How is it that you can think allowing children to suffer preventable diseases is a higher standard of living?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:18 pm #

            The health outcomes here are better in just about ever measurable way – although that’s probably mostly to do with wealth

            Whatever, just to repeat, I’m not against vaccinations, I just want safe vaccines

            Injecting kids with aluminium isn’t an option for me

            https://youtu.be/_b6tqVSdotE

          • Barzini
            September 1, 2016 at 1:43 am #

            well now I should show you a pic of a baby severely harmed by a vaccine next to a distraught mother

            but I won’t, because it would just be an appeal to emotionalism

          • Nick Sanders
            September 1, 2016 at 1:44 am #

            Yeah, I stopped giving a damn when you moved from bad arguments to victim blaming. You can fuck yourself, for all I care.

          • Barzini
            September 1, 2016 at 1:59 am #

            Sorry, I must have missed the bit where I blamed dying for children for being sick

            I’ll make a note to improve my character

          • Who?
            September 1, 2016 at 7:23 am #

            Good luck finding that one-in-a-million picture!

          • Sue
            September 2, 2016 at 2:28 am #

            But you won’t find one, just like you couldn’t find any evidence for your other assertions.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 2:36 am #

            Are you serious, there are thousands

          • Who?
            September 1, 2016 at 7:25 am #

            Oh dear the ‘poor people don’t matter’ trope. How tiresome.

            And predictable. You can’t imagine a world where you’re not part of the (self styled) elite, can you?

          • Sue
            September 2, 2016 at 2:27 am #

            “a healthy person has less to worry about than a weak person when it comes to things like chicken pox”

            Nope. I’ve seen strong, healthy people die from varicella pneumonities and respiratory failure. Sometimes, the immune response to the infection causes more harm than the organism itself.

            Measles commonly causes encephalitis, and rarely delayed SSPE.

            Mumps can cause sterility in men.

            We’re not talking about people “close to starvation” – we’re using vaccination to minimise morbidity and mortality across the whole population.

            For someone with such strong ideas, you don’t seem to know much about this stuff.

          • Amazed
            September 2, 2016 at 8:29 am #

            A perfectly healthy baby should just suck the chicken pox because you so choose? OTHER people’s perfectly healthy baby?

            I guess you don’t worry about those not perfectly healthy kids and adults you knowingly or unknowingly expose to your little disease vectors either.

            The two German kids who died because a pair of assholes like yourself prided themselves on their perfectly healthy child didn’t hesitate to rush the kid into a waiting room full of babies when their special healthy snowflake had measles were perfectly healthy babies as well, by the way. I guess you feel indignant that I call them assholes.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:53 am #

            You are engaging in wild anecdotal stories

            Remember, anecdotes aren’t allowed round here

            If they were, I would provide you a never ending supply of them from the tens of thousands of mothers all around the world of vaccine injured children

          • Amazed
            September 2, 2016 at 9:09 am #

            No anecdote, sorry. And since the words don’t come from deluded mothers, they bear more weight than the tripe you promote.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 9:13 am #

            ‘deluded mothers’

            Just look at the language you use – even though you know that vaccine injury does actually happen

            I fully admit that the typical anti-vax site is full of nonsense – but so are your posts, you are engaging in exactly the same emotional and anecdotal hysteria that they are, just from the other side

            I suggest you stop insulting concerned parents and find a way to address their concerns – or just leave them alone, but definitely drop the abuse

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 10:24 am #

            My son had chickenpox when he was NINE MONTHS OLD. He was perfectly healthy, well fed, got plenty of sleep, all things that your ilk tout as being uber-preventative for illnesses.

            No idea where he caught it. None whatsoever. Nobody in his small, private day-care (him plus 2 other babies) had chickenpox or had come into contact with the chickenpox. The other 2 babies were not old enough to have received the vaccine either, nor did they develop the chickenpox after DS was diagnosed.

            His was not a particularly bad case, but he has scars from the chickenpox. He caught it because someone who didn’t vaccinate their child for chickenpox let their little disease vector out and about during the incubation period where they can infect others BEFORE THEY THEMSELVES GET SICK and are kept at home (hopefully). His pediatrician says that DS is the only one of his patients who actually got the chickenpox, because of the vaccine and the fact that it is 98%+ effective when given 2 doses.

            His practice group does not allow anti-vaxxers at all. They will not risk the health of babies and children who may be too young for a vaccination or those who are immunocompromised or have a valid medical reason to NOT vaccinate (allergies, adverse reaction, etc). I was quite pleased to hear that.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 11:12 am #

            I’m not arguing against vaccination – I got chicken pox also

            I’m arguing against vaccines with things like aluminium in them

            I want safer vaccines, not no vaccines

          • Sonja Henie
            September 1, 2016 at 9:45 am #

            Yes, he’s being serious. He actually believes this tripe.

          • momofone
            September 1, 2016 at 7:03 am #

            Of course you don’t. I wonder why.

        • Linden
          September 1, 2016 at 7:24 am #

          You’re very bad at weighing up risks.

          You’re also massively bad at figuring out that viruses can kill and harm your children even if they are previously healthy and well fed.

          You also don’t seem to know that the likelihood of catching VPDs are much higher when you live in a neighbourhood of idiots like you.

          Not only that, catching, say, measles, doesn’t make you stronger, it makes you weaker:
          http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/the-measles-vaccine-protects-against-more-than-just-the-measles/

        • Who?
          September 1, 2016 at 7:26 am #

          ‘…(especially if one is healthy, eating well, and surrounded by socially responsible people unlike myself)’

          Fixed it for you.

          That was a lot of weight on that ‘etc’ there.

    • Nick Sanders
      September 1, 2016 at 12:01 am #

      http://imgur.com/XTcZ0

    • Amazed
      September 2, 2016 at 8:24 am #

      The reason you don’t vaccinate is because you’re a leech. As simple as that.

      • Barzini
        September 2, 2016 at 8:34 am #

        Charming – hell of a lot of leeches where I live in that case (Switzerland)

        I’ll tell all these perfectly intelligent and caring people who also have concerns about vaccination safety that they are actually conspiracy loons and leeches – that’ll surely bring them over to your side

        It’s this utter contempt being shown to caring parents which is fueling anger and distrust – I’d adopt a different strategy if I were you

        Lowest measles vaccination rate in Europe last time I checked, schools here don’t even think to ask if your kid is vaccinated

        You best not come here on holiday either, or many many other countries in the world

        • Amazed
          September 2, 2016 at 9:08 am #

          Tell them whatever the hell you want.

          You want to mooch off our herd and then you want us to applaud you on the wisdom of your choices? It’s amazing what sensitive souls anti-vaxxers have. Everyone should cater to them, taking the risks AND being careful not to upset their fragile fee-fees.

          Your appraisal of someone as being perfectly intelligent and caring doesn’t carry much weight. It’s just that the person making it is incompetent, you see.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 9:15 am #

            Trust me, I don’t want to mooch of your herd, if I did I’d live in a state where vaccination is mandatory for school children – I would never live in such a state

        • Maud Pie
          September 2, 2016 at 11:07 am #

          You are really laying on the self-righteousness thickly. Your self-serving characterization of yourself as intelligent, caring, etc does not persuade anyone outside your anti-vax cult. The most charitable descriptors I can use are misguided and gullible.

          If you truly had your children’s best interests at heart you would seek the most objective and most scientifically reliable information. Instead, you just chant over and over your catch phrase “life-altering vaccine injury” to rationalize your travesty of a risk benefit analysis.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 11:17 am #

            I know a lot of people who don’t vaccinate, I can guarantee to you that they are caring and intelligent – wrong perhaps, but definitely caring and intelligent

          • rosewater1
            September 2, 2016 at 12:12 pm #

            Some truly awful and misguided things have been done in the name of love. Not vaccinating because you love your children does NOT give you a free pass.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:13 pm #

            Feel free to inject your baby with aluminium, I’m not going to

            Here’s an abstract from a PubMed paper

            “Aluminum is an experimentally demonstrated neurotoxin and the most commonly used vaccine adjuvant. Despite almost 90 years of widespread use of aluminum adjuvants, medical science’s understanding about their mechanisms of action is still remarkably poor. There is also a concerning scarcity of data on toxicology and pharmacokinetics of these compounds. In spite of this, the notion that aluminum in vaccines is safe appears to be widely accepted. Experimental research, however, clearly shows that aluminum adjuvants have a potential to induce serious immunological disorders in humans. In particular, aluminum in adjuvant form carries a risk for autoimmunity, long-term brain inflammation and associated neurological complications and may thus have profound and widespread adverse health consequences. In our opinion, the possibility that vaccine benefits may have been overrated and the risk of potential adverse effects underestimated, has not been rigorously evaluated in the medical and scientific community. We hope that the present paper will provide a framework for a much needed and long overdue assessment of this highly contentious medical issue.”

            You can also search ‘aluminium’ and ‘Alzheimers’ in Pubmed – lots of hits

            Or more specifically, you can go to:

            Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, Volume 29, Number 2 / 2012, pages 255-273

            Injecting aluminium, no thank you

    • Dr Kitty
      September 2, 2016 at 8:56 am #

      The tiny risk of catching VPD only remains tiny if herd immunity protects you.

      You depend on other people to take risks that you aren’t willing to take in order to be protected. Which is selfish and opportunistic.

      Which works provided fewer than 10% of a population feels as you do.

      As soon as a large minority stop vaccinating, herd immunity disappears, VPD comes roaring back and the tiny risks of vaccination suddenly become less scary than the real risk of VPD.

      As for your “healthy people have nothing to worry about”- the worst chicken pox complications I have seen have been in previously healthy people.

      • Amazed
        September 2, 2016 at 9:02 am #

        “She stands before us like a living child.”

        Those are the words engraved over Olivia Dahl’s grave. She was a healthy child. She still died of measles.

        • Fleur
          September 2, 2016 at 4:00 pm #

          So sad. Roald Dahl was one of my favourite authors as a child. I also loved Michael Rosen’s comic poetry, especially his poems about his son, Eddie, as a toddler. I was gutted a few years back to read that Eddie Rosen died of meningitis as a teenager. I gather that his father, for obvious reasons, now campaigns for vaccination against preventable diseases.

      • Barzini
        September 2, 2016 at 9:02 am #

        I agree, that’s why I’m hoping the research into safer vaccines bears fruit

        As soon as they are available I’ll reconsider

        • Charybdis
          September 2, 2016 at 10:10 am #

          All right, I’ll have a go. Safer how, exactly? Seriously. People keep trotting out that tired old line, but don’t have any concrete ideas on how to go about it.

          Vaccines are already very safe. They are not 100% safe, but nothing is 100% safe. They have a long record of safety testing and will even be proactive in asking you if you are allergic to certain things or if you have ever had an adverse reaction to a vaccine. When I got my Hep B series, I had to stay in the doctor’s office being monitored for a half hour after the first shot in case I had a reaction.

          If you do have an adverse reaction, then you can get a medical exemption waiver, due to your adverse reaction. Mind you, this generally includes things like severe allergic reactions, not “The injection site was sore, I ran a low-grade fever for a day or so and I didn’t feel very well” or “I got a headache and felt achy for a day or so”.

          So then, what are your ideas on how to make vaccines 100% safe? It’s a cop-out if you claim it is “someone else’s problem to figure out, you know, those Big Pharma Scientists whose job it is”. Present a possible solution or you are just bitching to be bitching.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 11:13 am #

            I’d start with taking aluminium out

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            September 2, 2016 at 11:19 am #

            Why?

            It’s not causing any problems, and it has benefit to have it there. So why take it out?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 11:23 am #

            Well that’s why freedom and choice are great things

            You are free to inject yourself and your family with aluminium (and ethyl mercury in some cases) and I’m free not to

            Awesome, enjoy the ride

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            September 2, 2016 at 11:26 am #

            Oh please. Why don’t you answer my question?

            YOU said you’d take out aluminum. I asked you why. It’s a simple question. You must have some reason why you think aluminum should be taken out, besides “freedom.”

            Of course, it means putting your ignorance on display.

          • corblimeybot
            September 2, 2016 at 11:50 am #

            He’s a genius who’s about to rock the entire world of medicine with questions that no one has ever, ever heard of. He is smarter than the thousands of people who have devoted their careers to creating safe and effective vaccinations. It’s this guy right here. We’ve all been waiting for this legendary hero, and finally he arrives.

          • Heidi
            September 2, 2016 at 12:57 pm #

            Well, to be fair he’s going to have to share his legendary hero status with Brooke, Laura J and Diet Dee. He and Diet Dee can head the Cabinet of Googling Study Abstracts that Don’t Say What I Think They Do or Were Rejected or Withdrawn by Any Reputable Scientific Journal.

          • rosewater1
            September 2, 2016 at 12:10 pm #

            I’m honestly curious…were you vaccinated as a child?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 11:30 am #

            It’s a neurotoxin…..

            Here’s an abstract from a PubMed paper

            “Aluminum is an experimentally demonstrated neurotoxin and the most commonly used vaccine adjuvant. Despite almost 90 years of widespread use of aluminum adjuvants, medical science’s understanding about their mechanisms of action is still remarkably poor. There is also a concerning scarcity of data on toxicology and pharmacokinetics of these compounds. In spite of this, the notion that aluminum in vaccines is safe appears to be widely accepted. Experimental research, however, clearly shows that aluminum adjuvants have a potential to induce serious immunological disorders in humans. In particular, aluminum in adjuvant form carries a risk for autoimmunity, long-term brain inflammation and associated neurological complications and may thus have profound and widespread adverse health consequences. In our opinion, the possibility that vaccine benefits may have been overrated and the risk of potential adverse effects underestimated, has not been rigorously evaluated in the medical and scientific community. We hope that the present paper will provide a framework for a much needed and long overdue assessment of this highly contentious medical issue.”

            You can also search ‘aluminium’ and ‘Alzheimers’ in Pubmed – lots of hits

            Or more specifically, you can go to:

            Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, Volume 29, Number 2 / 2012, pages 255-273

            Injecting aluminium, no thank you

          • Amy Tuteur, MD
            September 2, 2016 at 11:41 am #

            And sodium is spectacularly explosive. Does that mean you don’t use table salt?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 11:44 am #

            You’re making flippant comments whilst serious researchers are investigating the strong possibility of a link between alzheimers and aluminium

            Try searching for ‘alzheimers’ and ‘aluminium’ on Pubmed – lots of hits
            or
            Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, Volume 29, Number 2 / 2012, pages 255-273

            Fell free to inject yourself and your family with aluminium – I’ll wait until we know more

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 12:09 pm #

            The amount injected is far below the toxic level. You will absorb more aluminum from eating and drinking than you will from getting vaccines.

            The amount of aluminum in the vaccines a baby gets in it’s first year is 4.225 mg, total. A baby will ingest 7-ish mg of aluminum if it is EBF, ~38 mg if EFF and ~117 mg if it is eating soy formula in the first six months of life. So for one year, it is 14 mg Al if EBF, 76 mg Al if EFF, and 234 mg Al if using soy formula as opposed to 4.225 mg in all the required vaccines.

            4.225 mg is lower than all of those “Aluminum in baby’s food” levels that people AREN’T concerned about.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:19 pm #

            There’s huge difference between eating a substance and injecting it as an adjuvant designed to stimulate the immune system

            The fact that researchers are also working on a hypothesis that aluminium causes alzheimers is also of concern

            I’m going to wait, more work obviously needs to be done…

            You go ahead and inject your family with aluminium though

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            September 2, 2016 at 12:28 pm #

            There’s huge difference between eating a substance and injecting it as an adjuvant designed to stimulate the immune system

            But the paper you keep citing over and over doesn’t make that distinction, so this is nothing more than special pleading.

            Yes, they are different. That doesn’t mean that one is necessarily better or worse.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 12:31 pm #

            The problem is in the absorption and elimination of aluminum. 4.225 mg of aluminum in the required vaccines in the first year of a baby’s life is not “super absorbed” or otherwise more potentially harmful than the aluminum that is consumed in food and drink or is present in antacids, cosmetics, etc.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:48 pm #

            When you eat aluminium, on average 99.7% is eliminated as waste – none of it passes the blood brain barrier

            When you inject aluminium, 100% stays in the body (in rabbits 6-22% comes out over 28 days, but immediately it all stays in) – the forced immune response results in the aluminium crossing the blood brain barrier

            Eating and injecting isn’t the same

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:25 pm #

            Quick question: is aluminum a cause or a consequence of Alzheimer’s?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:36 pm #

            No idea, I do know it’s a neurotoxin and crosses the BBB when injected as a vaccine

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:38 pm #

            You still haven’t sourced that claim about the blood-brain barrier.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:51 pm #

            I got it from a youtube presentation by doctor Suzanne Humphries – I’m not sure where she got it from (I assume she didn’t make it up)

            You need to fast forward to 48:05

            Here’s the link: https://youtu.be/PWP6e2CYPo8

            You need to fast forward to 48:05

            Here is another link related to what we are talking about: http://vaccinepapers.org/debunking-aluminum-adjuvant-part-1/

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 2:57 pm #

            Humphries is a nephrologist. Asking her about the blood-brain barrier is like asking a dermatologist to set a broken bone for you. Or asking a cardiologist for advice on chemotherapy.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:01 pm #

            What is it about the presentation you disagree with?

            Or is it just who it’s by that concerns you?

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 3:11 pm #

            Well, there’s the fact that it’s 110 minutes long, and the first lie comes out at around the 1 minute mark. That’s a pretty bad sign right there. And she follows it up by stating two very mistaken beliefs in less than 30 seconds.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 5:41 pm #

            You know what they say about assuming….

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:49 pm #

            I would genuinely like to know the truth on this

          • Heidi
            September 2, 2016 at 12:11 pm #

            Have you researched the people who did this research, Shaw and Tomljenovic? Looks like they used cell lines to do their “research” which according to people who know a lot more than me about such stuff, isn’t going to have the same reaction the real human body does. Bodies flush out toxins effectively, cells in a culture don’t. They also used a concentration much higher than what the aluminum concentration would be after injection, and they cultured blood cells, not muscle cells where real injections are given.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:15 pm #

            Inject away then

            My concerns have not been taken away by your six line Disqus reply

          • Heidi
            September 2, 2016 at 12:25 pm #

            So the answer is no, you haven’t, and you can’t be bothered to.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:33 pm #

            There are many many papers investigating the link between aluminium and alzheimers

            Aluminium is a proven neurotoxin – I’m not going to start injecting it because of your reply above

            I don’t even know who you are

          • Heidi
            September 2, 2016 at 12:39 pm #

            I’m not asking you to inject anything. I don’t care if you know who I am. I have something to tell you: you are on the internet in a public blog and I can see what you type! I can then respond. That’s just how it works. You could merrily go about your non-vaccinating ways and I would never know, but you came here for some reason.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:50 pm #

            Cool, keep on injecting that aluminium into yourself and loved ones

            I’m not going to, not because I’m a Chemtrail believing loon – but because I’m a concerned parent who thinks injecting aluminium (especially into a baby) is insane

            Let’s leave it there, good luck

          • rosewater1
            September 2, 2016 at 1:05 pm #

            And we don’t know who you are!!! What’s your point?

            You surely didn’t think you’d come here, say your say, and we’d all agree with you?

            Anyone who looks in ONE discussion here can tell what sort of reception they may get when they post.

            If you don’t WANT people to debate your choices, challenge your assertions, etc. then why are you here?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:07 pm #

            fair point, I agree

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:21 pm #

            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26446142

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:17 pm #

            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27139352

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 12:00 pm #

            What adjuvant would you use in it’s place? Because unless you are going to use a less safe vaccine (one with the entire bacteria/virus instead of a small part of the germ) you need an adjuvant to help boost the body’s immune response so that it will recognize the virus/bacteria.

            Plus, not all vaccines contain an aluminum adjuvant.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:06 pm #

            I’m not going to inject myself with aluminium full stop

            If we come up with a safer option, I’ll certainly look into it – there’s a lot of research in this area, I look forward to a time when we know more

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 12:27 pm #

            Again, unless you are offering a potential solution, you are just bitching to be bitching and not actually helping to solve the perceived problem.

            What would you like to see used as a safe, effective adjuvant to replace aluminum in vaccines?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:31 pm #

            No idea

            Doesn’t mean I’m going to start injecting aluminium

            If so one comes up with an alternative, I’ll look into it

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 12:38 pm #

            You make it sound like they pump you full of liquid aluminum like the way they pumped Wolverine full of liquid adamantium to reinforce his skeleton.

            So it is “someone else’s job/responsibility” to reformulate vaccines that have already been proven safe and effective for decades? You, of course, are TERRIBLY CONCERNED about the amount of aluminum in current vaccines, but aren’t concerned enough to try and find an alternative, or even suggest a place to start?

            Right.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 12:40 pm #

            You want me to design a new adjuvant for vaccines – seriously?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:21 pm #

            When you eat aluminium, 99.7% is eliminated as waste – the o.3% that stays doesn’t cross the blood brain barrier

            When you inject aluminium in a vaccination, 100% stays (6-22% is very gradually eliminated over 28 days in rabbits, but it all stays at first) and it crosses the blood brain barrier

            There are serious researchers investigating this – keep the pics and memes for facebook

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:27 pm #

            Sources, please.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 8:29 pm #

            People aren’t rabbits.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:30 pm #

            ban all animal experimentation?

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 9:25 pm #

            Nope.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:08 pm #

            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12828588

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:26 pm #

            So you’re satisfied?

            I’ll await the development of the research into the link between aluminium and alzheimers

            But you go ahead

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:07 pm #

            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22001122

    • Amy Tuteur, MD
      September 2, 2016 at 11:40 am #

      Ahh, more anti-vaxxer “logic” like this:

      • Barzini
        September 2, 2016 at 11:42 am #

        Here’s an abstract from a PubMed paper
        Abstract from Pubmed

        “Aluminum is an experimentally demonstrated neurotoxin and the most commonly used vaccine adjuvant. Despite almost 90 years of widespread use of aluminum adjuvants, medical science’s understanding about their mechanisms of action is still remarkably poor. There is also a concerning scarcity of data on toxicology and pharmacokinetics of these compounds. In spite of this, the notion that aluminum in vaccines is safe appears to be widely accepted. Experimental research, however, clearly shows that aluminum adjuvants have a potential to induce serious immunological disorders in humans. In particular, aluminum in adjuvant form carries a risk for autoimmunity, long-term brain inflammation and associated neurological complications and may thus have profound and widespread adverse health consequences. In our opinion, the possibility that vaccine benefits may have been overrated and the risk of potential adverse effects underestimated, has not been rigorously evaluated in the medical and scientific community. We hope that the present paper will provide a framework for a much needed and long overdue assessment of this highly contentious medical issue.”

        You can also search ‘aluminium’ and ‘Alzheimers’ in Pubmed – lots of hits

        Or more specifically, you can go to:

        Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, Volume 29, Number 2 / 2012, pages 255-273

        Injecting aluminium, no thank you

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 1:27 pm #

            FDA – you serious?

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 1:28 pm #

            Knee-jerk FDA rejection – are you?

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            September 2, 2016 at 2:38 pm #

            I notice you ignored the “pubmed” references that Nick posted below that said the same thing. Let me quote from one of them

            Using these updated parameters we found that the body burden of aluminum from vaccines and diet throughout an infant’s first year of life is significantly less than the corresponding safe body burden of aluminum modeled using the regulatory MRL. We conclude that episodic exposures to vaccines that contain aluminum adjuvant continue to be extremely low risk to infants and that the benefits of using vaccines containing aluminum adjuvant outweigh any theoretical concerns.

            If you are in love with “pubmed” then that addresses your concern.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 2:47 pm #

            Just to be safe, I won’t be injecting myself with neurotoxins just yet

          • The Bofa on the Sofa
            September 2, 2016 at 3:06 pm #

            Why? As this paper describes, “the body burden of aluminum from vaccines and diet throughout an infant’s first year of life is significantly less than the corresponding safe body burden of aluminum”

            And that is for INFANTS, much less for adults. Did you know there is currently more than 30 mg of aluminum in your body? Adding a couple of mgs in a vaccine is not going to affect anything (which you can understand if you know anything about chemical equilibrium)

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 3:07 pm #

            The Great Barzini himself cited a paper in this thread showing that the aluminum burden of vaccination is negligible for _pre-term_ infants.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 3:12 pm #

            Eating and injecting aluminium is completely different

            When you inject it as a vaccine it crosses the blood brain barrier for a start

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 3:16 pm #

            You have stated this baseless assertion many times now. Give a citation, or even basic biological plausibility, because it’s lacking that right now.

          • swbarnes2
            September 2, 2016 at 4:25 pm #

            Okay, then you should have no problem sequestering your potentially infectious self away from the world. Because the rest of use have a right to be safe too.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:27 pm #

            I live in Switzerland – no one cares here, schools don’t even think of asking, everyone respects one’s right to decide

            Very healthy country Switzerland by the way

          • swbarnes2
            September 2, 2016 at 4:30 pm #

            “Switzerland suffered a three-year measles epidemic which finished in summer last year, in which there were more than 4,400 cases, with 339 hospitalisations and one death. ”

            http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/measles-is-still-a-sore-spot-for-the-swiss/8736280

            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3929760/

            “In Switzerland, clusters of pertussis must be reported to the government, and current incidence of pertussis is both high (2012: 94/100’000) and increasing”

            So not so healthy after all.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:32 pm #

            Yeah, it’s got one of the lowest measles vaccination rates in Europe, that’s why

            I’m not against vaccination, I just want safe vaccination – which for me means no aluminium for a start

            Yes I would rather take the measles risk than the aluminium one

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 4:41 pm #

            It has one of the lowest measles vaccination rates in Europe – and yet one of the higher rates of Alzheimer’s Disease, above the overall average for Europe:
            http://www.alzheimer-europe.org/Policy-in-Practice2/Country-comparisons/2013-The-prevalence-of-dementia-in-Europe

            Explain that one, since by your logic, it should have far less AD as a tradeoff for all of the preventable suffering and death due to measles.

          • Charybdis
            September 2, 2016 at 5:36 pm #

            That should definitely NOT be happening in Barzini’s world because ALUMINUM!!!!

            If the Swiss are not OD’ing on aluminum in the vaccines because they have the lowest measles vaccination rate in Europe, then how are all those people developing Alzheimer’s?

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 10:27 pm #

            No aluminum in measles vaccine, Barz!
            http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/adjuvants.html

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 4:31 pm #

            Switzerland – the place that gave California one of our recent measles outbreaks. Patient 0 caught it on a trip over there.

            ETA citation:
            http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20308208

          • swbarnes2
            September 2, 2016 at 4:38 pm #

            Right, a thousand babies can be hospitalized, but what matters is that Barzini keeps himself pure. There will always be something in a vaccine in an infinitesimal amount that will make him sacrifice any number of babies to avoid it.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 4:45 pm #

            Yeah, Switzerland has one of the lowest measles vaccination rates in Europe, so I guess it’s to be expected

            I’m not against vaccination, I want safer vaccinations

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 5:19 pm #

            Define ‘safer.’ And don’t go back to your factless bleating about aluminum and AD, because you manage to keep nicely high rates of AD in der Schweiz despite all of the measles.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 5:27 pm #

            Safer as in less dangerous

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 5:47 pm #

            It’s not dangerous by any definition of the word that reasonable people use. Trace amounts of materials that even the body of a pre-term infant doesn’t notice, lots of downstream positive effects – humanitarian and economic. Hey, we’re done!

            Stop sending measles over here, BTW. That’s definitely very dangerous by any definition of the word.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:03 pm #

            These guys disagree

            https://youtu.be/_b6tqVSdotE

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:06 pm #

            Dear sir or madam.

            For the umpteenth time.

            I can’t watch YouTube videos at work, and one of the reasons for that is that YouTube videos are not how science is done.

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 6:17 pm #

            Truly bizarre – you are attacking a medium

            Is the internet OK? Or does it have to be leather bound books?

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 6:22 pm #

            Any human with a working brain should have been able to figure out by now that after a: multiple requests for PubMed or direct links to papers and b: multiple uses of PubMed and direct links to papers ourselves, that PubMed and papers are generally considered a productive opening to discuss science.

          • Nick Sanders
            September 2, 2016 at 6:32 pm #

            It’s like they’ve never heard of workplaces filtering web usage.

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 7:50 pm #

            But are you in favour of less dangerous measles?

          • Barzini
            September 2, 2016 at 8:00 pm #

            yes, that would be nice

          • Sonja Henie
            September 2, 2016 at 10:25 pm #

            Yes, Jenny McCarthy!

          • September 3, 2016 at 8:26 am #

            Botulin Toxin and all….

          • Roadstergal
            September 2, 2016 at 4:38 pm #

            So ‘very healthy’ means susceptible to measles – and with ~1.73% of the population having Alzheimer’s Disease according to Alzheimer Europe, which is about the rate in the US (1.6%, by my back-of-the-envelope jotting).

          • Who?
            September 2, 2016 at 7:49 pm #

            ‘Very wealthy country, Switzerland…