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posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday August 08 2018, @07:04PM   Printer-friendly
from the seriously? dept.

An amendment from Italy's anti-establishment government that removes mandatory vaccination for schoolchildren is sending shock waves through the country's scientific and medical community.

It suspends for a year a law that requires parents to provide proof of 10 routine vaccinations when enrolling their children in nurseries or preschools. The amendment was approved by Italy's upper house of parliament on Friday by 148 to 110 votes and still has to pass the lower house.

The law had originally been introduced by the Democratic Party in July 2017 amid an ongoing outbreak of measles that saw 5,004 cases reported in 2017 -- the second-highest figure in Europe after Romania -- according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC). Italy accounted for 34% of all measles cases reported by countries in the European Economic Area, the center said.

Italy's Five Star movement and its coalition partner, the far-right League, both voiced their opposition to compulsory vaccinations, claiming they discourage school inclusion.

English Language Source: https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/07/health/italy-anti-vaccine-law-measles-intl/index.html


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  • (Score: 2) by Arik on Wednesday August 08 2018, @11:14PM (10 children)

    by Arik (4543) on Wednesday August 08 2018, @11:14PM (#719099) Journal
    "I'm pretty sure most kids are scared of needles."

    And what does that have to do with it?

    "Should we make a little grave in front of your door for all the kids who will die of simple ailments that modern medicine has solved, if we start listening to them saying no to injections and transfusions ?"

    Well first off, let's be clear, I'm not telling you to say no to modern medicine, I'm not even telling you to say no to vaccinations. I'm just saying you should get to make that choice.

    Second, if we are going to do as you suggest, then we should also make a little grave for your door; for all the people killed or mangled because we listened to you, and decided it was ok to force people to do what (we decided) is best for them. Only fair.

    --
    If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
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  • (Score: 5, Touché) by bob_super on Wednesday August 08 2018, @11:30PM

    by bob_super (1357) on Wednesday August 08 2018, @11:30PM (#719106)

    I choose to drive my semi in the left lane, because fuck your civilization and its rules designed to save lives. I know better than to drive on the right with all the morons.

  • (Score: 4, Informative) by SemperOSS on Thursday August 09 2018, @12:05AM

    by SemperOSS (5072) on Thursday August 09 2018, @12:05AM (#719129)

    The problem with immunisations is the so-called herd effect (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herd_immunity). You have to have a minimum percentage of people immunised to avoid a possible epidemic outbreak and if enough people choose not to have their children inoculated it will become a problem as they will no longer be protected by the herd effect. So for the greater good of protecting the few that cannot, for medical reasons, be inoculated and to, in general, avoid unpleasant and possibly dangerous diseases for as many as possible, we should insist that the parents get their children inoculated.

    An analogy is the effect of mandatory seat belt use on road traffic deaths. You may disagree on this too, but if people are maimed on the roads, it has a cost to society as a whole. One person's tosh costs many people's dosh.

    --
    I don't need a signature to draw attention to myself.
    Maybe I should add a sarcasm warning now and again?
  • (Score: 3, Informative) by tangomargarine on Thursday August 09 2018, @03:01PM (7 children)

    by tangomargarine (667) on Thursday August 09 2018, @03:01PM (#719400)

    Should we make a little grave in front of your door for all the kids who will die of simple ailments that modern medicine has solved, if we start listening to them saying no to injections and transfusions ?

    Well first off, let's be clear, I'm not telling you to say no to modern medicine, I'm not even telling you to say no to vaccinations. I'm just saying you should get to make that choice.

    You're being disingenuous. Kids hate needles, and 90% of them are going to keep saying 'no' even after you explain why they need the shot.

    So you can whine about (emotional, uninformed) choice all you want, but the GP is pragmatically correct.

    More evidence for my "every argument can be reduced to idealism vs. pragmatism" theory

    --
    "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
    • (Score: 2) by Arik on Thursday August 09 2018, @04:48PM (6 children)

      by Arik (4543) on Thursday August 09 2018, @04:48PM (#719457) Journal
      I'm not being disingenuous at all. Kids hating needles isn't some bizarre irrational anomaly, it's perfectly consistent with human psychology. Our sense of bodily integrity is important, and we wouldn't survive very well without it, frankly. Nonetheless we also have a rational mind, even as young children, and an immunization doesn't have to be a trauma; but it will be if it's forced. Instead, what needs to happen is the parents or guardians, the people who the child trusts, explain the need and prepare the child and for this to all happen willingly. Then it's just a little pinch, over in a moment.

      The law doesn't make that happen, it doesn't even help that happen, if anything it might undermine that process. The law isn't about the people that are already doing this. What it does is stigmatize and penalize anyone who second-guesses their doctors. And that's a VERY dangerous sort of a precedent to make. Doctors already have well documented problems with megalomania. And their diagnoses are not divine writ, they're human guesses. Doctors should work for the patient, not see themselves as some higher class entitled to dispose of us as they will.

      A friend of mine years ago got sick suddenly, her mom took her to the very first doctor she could. It was one they'd never seen before, and he wanted to operate immediately, he was condescending and insistent. This didn't seem right to my friend or her mom, so they declined and left the building. They called their family doctors office and had him paged to come in ASAP for a second opinion, and they drove his way.

      At the same time, the other doctor, the one who wanted to operate, called the police. Her family doctor confirmed their hunch - the first doctors diagnosis was wrong, the surgery he wanted to perform unnecessary. But now the cops are on their trail!

      She had to go into hiding for two days till their lawyer managed to straighten out the stupidity. If they'd been poor, not been able to afford a lawyer, and a good family doctor? The mother would have gone to jail for child abuse, the child would have been forcibly held down and subjected to unnecessary surgery, and the incompetent doctor would have gotten paid for it. All courtesy of our tax dollar.

      No, the principle is important here. Medicine is done for the patient, with the patients consent. Medicine performed upon the unwilling is not medicine, it is abuse.

      "More evidence for my "every argument can be reduced to idealism vs. pragmatism" theory"

      If you think an argument reduces to idealism vs pragmatism, you need to re-examine your ideals. There's something wrong with them.
      --
      If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
      • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday August 09 2018, @05:10PM (1 child)

        by tangomargarine (667) on Thursday August 09 2018, @05:10PM (#719470)

        I'm not being disingenuous at all. Kids hating needles isn't some bizarre irrational anomaly, it's perfectly consistent with human psychology. Our sense of bodily integrity is important, and we wouldn't survive very well without it, frankly. Nonetheless we also have a rational mind, even as young children, and an immunization doesn't have to be a trauma; but it will be if it's forced. Instead, what needs to happen is the parents or guardians, the people who the child trusts, explain the need and prepare the child and for this to all happen willingly. Then it's just a little pinch, over in a moment.

        I suspect that you don't have kids. Neither do I, but expecting a 5-year-old to make a rational decision in this circumstance seems to be asking a lot to me.

        No, the principle is important here. Medicine is done for the patient, with the patient's consent. Medicine performed upon the unwilling is not medicine, it is abuse.

        Exactly. 5-year-olds can't legally give consent; their parent is doing it for them.

        story about doctors and consent

        Okay, but this is herd immunity we're talking about here. Unless they can prove the shot is getting people sick (more than the 5% or whatever that naturally happens anyway), the good of society outweighs the individual choice in this case,* because giving people the choice immediately degrades the entire system.

        *You're not going to hear me say this often, but this warrants it.

        --
        "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
        • (Score: 2) by Arik on Thursday August 09 2018, @05:58PM

          by Arik (4543) on Thursday August 09 2018, @05:58PM (#719512) Journal
          "I suspect that you don't have kids. Neither do I, but expecting a 5-year-old to make a rational decision in this circumstance seems to be asking a lot to me."

          I actually have a good deal of experience with kids. And I'm not expecting a 5 year old to weigh the factors we would way and come to a rational decision in that fashion. But she'll still make a rational decision at her own level. If she has a guardian who has earned her trust, believes it's necessary, and prepares her properly, it will be fine. If instead her guardian has doubts but is afraid to express those doubts because of this law, then I expect she'll feel those doubts too, they're very good at that, and that alone could turn the experience into an abusive one.

          "Exactly. 5-year-olds can't legally give consent; their parent is doing it for them."

          Never disagreed with that. So?

          "Okay, but this is herd immunity we're talking about here."

          Yes, yes it is. Which means that if you've already been immunized, you've already accepted all the potential drawbacks in order to get the benefit. The benefit, as you well know, is increased if you can get other people on board. You can call it 'herd immunity' but it's very much what is called a 'network effect' in other fields. It's in your interest to convince everyone else to get immunized - whether the case for that particular individual for that particular immunization makes sense from their own perspective or not, it will certainly benefit you personally. This gives you at least the appearance of bias.

          Doctors, in particular, should be especially sensitive to avoid even the appearance of a bias like that. Precisely because the information, the advice, the recommendations they make are taken so very seriously by many - *and also because* when they are right it's critically important that they be listened to. When they use law enforcement or the threat thereof to capture unwilling customers they give everyone a very good reason to downgrade their trust. That just reeks of corruption, of unethical conduct, and no matter how many times I'm told to think of the children or it's for my own good I still smell it.

          The more people smell that stink the more people start to instinctively distrust what they're being told, quite naturally. And this process is exactly what feeds the creation of full blown anti-vaxxers who think all vaccinations are harmful or part of an evil conspiracy or whatever. This is a case where tightening the fist just makes more slip between the fingers.

          And seriously, think of the children. They're not threats, they shouldn't be treated as pawns, and there is serious potential for them to be abused in the process of enforcing this law. You want more people to trust their doctors and immunize? Then let the doctors act like ethical people, who can be trusted.

          --
          If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
      • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday August 09 2018, @05:16PM (3 children)

        by tangomargarine (667) on Thursday August 09 2018, @05:16PM (#719473)

        More evidence for my "every argument can be reduced to idealism vs. pragmatism" theory

        If you think an argument reduces to idealism vs pragmatism, you need to re-examine your ideals. There's something wrong with them.

        How exactly would you say *this* argument doesn't reduce to idealism vs. pragmatism?

        Idealistic argument: the patient deserves the choice to decide what happens to their body
        Pragmatic argument: herd immunity and the health of society overrides the choice that would normally be given these people

        More examples:
        Abortion
        Idealistic: the child's life should be protected because life is the most sacred thing we have and the child can't protect itself
        Pragmatic: unwanted pregnancy is very inconvenient and can be life threatening; also the mother has the right to decide what to do with her body

        Politics in general
        Idealistic: liberals: we should make society better
        Pragmatic: conservative: let's protect what we already have and look out for my own interest rather than experiment

        --
        "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
        • (Score: 1, Troll) by Arik on Thursday August 09 2018, @06:44PM (2 children)

          by Arik (4543) on Thursday August 09 2018, @06:44PM (#719533) Journal
          "How exactly would you say *this* argument doesn't reduce to idealism vs. pragmatism?

          Idealistic argument: the patient deserves the choice to decide what happens to their body
          Pragmatic argument: herd immunity and the health of society overrides the choice that would normally be given these people"

          Here's how;

          Your supposedly "pragmatic" argument is actually deeply flawed. Denying people the most fundamental right of bodily sovereignty, violating their fundamental psychological constraint of bodily integrity against their will, is NOT actually a win from a pragmatic point of view; for many reasons, very prominently the damage that such a policy does to societal relations, to our relationship with our doctors, in the long run. It's only arguably a pragmatic argument if you also constrain it as a very short term argument. If you want an approach that is pragmatic on a real time-scale, rather than adapting "pump and dump" tactics of maximizing the short term then grabbing a golden parachute (and that's the only thing that could make sense here) then you want to preserve, you want to enhance even, the ethical standard, behavior, and reputation of doctors! This then leads to more immunizations done as they should be done - at the patients request, not above his objections!

          You might get more people immunized in a very short term by cannibalizing those things instead, but in the long term that is not a pragmatic course of action, it's a self-destructive course of action. You destroy the relation between the doctor and the patient, and that's worth more than a short term boost in immunizations.

          "Abortion
          Idealistic: the child's life should be protected because life is the most sacred thing we have and the child can't protect itself
          Pragmatic: unwanted pregnancy is very inconvenient and can be life threatening; also the mother has the right to decide what to do with her body"

          Your second example is a counterpoint to the first, the same but different.

          In this case it's your "idealist" argument which is fatally flawed. Life is not sacred at all. We squish it, or disinfect it, we wash it down the drain every day. Unless you're a Jain? Most of us are not. And even they consume dead flesh, only they limit themselves to that of plants, and try to avoid stepping on bugs.

          It is the individual human, child or adult, 'made in the image of G_d' which we are obliged to treat as in some way sacred. You can find the meanest, dumbest, ornieriest old waste of air that ever lived, and if you could get inside of his head, if you could walk a mile in his shoes, you could find something good in him. And you're obliged to remember that. That's what that means. It has nothing to do with embryos.

          You're also using dishonest language to frame this in a completely inaccurate way. Your heading is 'abortion' yet you keep using the word 'child.' It's as if we were having a conversation about a butterfly egg and you kept referring to it as a chrysalis. No, it's not a chrysalis, it's an egg. If everything goes well, it could become a chrysalis a bit later. If everything goes well, a human egg might become an embryo, an embryo might become a fetus, a fetus might become a child, a child might become an adult. If you can call an embryo a child, why not just call it an adult? Why not just call it a corpse, worm food? If all goes well, that is still what it will eventually become.

          "Idealistic: liberals: we should make society better
          Pragmatic: conservative: let's protect what we already have and look out for my own interest rather than experiment"

          Your third example is a bit different. Both of these arguments are correct, the problem is the implied fallacy of the false dilemma. Both of these arguments have merit, but in this case there is no requirement to choose one or the other, and in fact it seems extremely likely that pursuing *either* monomaniacally, to the exclusion of the other, would probably have catastrophic consequences. "We should make society better" is true as it stands, and an important truth - but it can't be your supreme value overriding all others. All of the great mass murders can be traced to doing just that. The Nazis wanted to make their Volkish paradise, that was what they thought would make society better - and they were willing to sacrifice way too much and too many to achieve that value. The Soviets did the same, to create the Workers paradise, the Khmer Rouge, etc. Surely you're familiar with the history.

          Nor is what you call 'pragmatic' here a non-idealistic statement. You do try to phrase it as one, let me rephrase.

          "First, do no harm."

          Oh, hey, where did that come from?

          That's the essence of conservativism qua conservativism. "You want to make society better? Ok but first you have to *prove* that your change isn't going to backfire and make things worse in some way or another. Until you can do that, I oppose."

          That's not a purely pragmatic position at all, it's very much an ideological tendency, even an emotional tendency at root. It relates to the spectrum between maximizing potential gain and minimizing potential risks, and that's not a spectrum where the extremes are nice places. The extremely conservative nation rots in place until it collapses or is overrun, while the extremely radical (I won't say liberal here, liberal actually means something very different, the opposite of conservative is radical) society is too unstable to persist. We must try to improve the world, but we must also remember that we are fallible, that we're capable of doing immense harm out of good intentions, and that other people are not our toys, our pawns, our property. We must balance being conservative and being radical.

          My ideological (but not at all impractical) position is that the state should not attempt to make society more, or less, conservative, but should confine itself as much as possible to simply providing watchman state services as efficiently and unobtrusively as possible. Legalize freedom. Let society function.

          Cheers!
          --
          If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
          • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday August 09 2018, @09:13PM (1 child)

            by tangomargarine (667) on Thursday August 09 2018, @09:13PM (#719622)

            In this case it's your "idealist" argument which is fatally flawed. Life is not sacred at all. We squish it, or disinfect it, we wash it down the drain every day.

            I'm not commenting on which view is "correct." I'm just saying the main argument is idealism vs pragmatism.

            Pro-Lifers value life. That is their position. It's in the name they chose for their position, FFS!

            You're also using dishonest language to frame this in a completely inaccurate way. Your heading is 'abortion' yet you keep using the word 'child.'

            Well I didn't want to keep typing "child/fetus." I'm listing both sides of the argument. Fuck off.

            Your third example is a bit different. Both of these arguments are correct

            Again, missing the point.

            Words words words words oh god I'm not reading all this because you're just going to come to some dismissive conclusion about which is "right" anyway. I don't even come down consistently on the same side depending on the topic.

            Arguing that I explain one or the other side of the argument poorly, or that one side of the argument is weaker than the other, aren't arguments against the observation itself. Counterexamples would be.

            --
            "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
            • (Score: 2) by Arik on Thursday August 09 2018, @10:11PM

              by Arik (4543) on Thursday August 09 2018, @10:11PM (#719652) Journal
              "I'm not commenting on which view is "correct." I'm just saying the main argument is idealism vs pragmatism."

              And I'm telling you that's simply not correct. It's not idealism vs pragmatism. When pro-choice people accept that formulation they've effectively given up the battle, and for no reason - it's simply not true. The so-called "pro-life" position is not only problematic practically, it's also absolutely bankrupt in terms of ideology. When you frame it as ideology vs pragmatism you're implicitly conceding the opposite, and that is simply not true.

              "Well I didn't want to keep typing "child/fetus.""

              Why would you list child at all? We're talking about abortion. An abortion cannot be performed on a child. (We joke about retroactive abortion but of course that would actually be murder - and not abortion in any sense. Jokes are not always a good basis for policy.)

              "I'm listing both sides of the argument. Fuck off."

              You're listing both side of the argument - using inaccurate and dishonest terminology specifically invented to make an insane position seem reasonable and correct. Simply 'listing both sides of the argument' doesn't mean you're being objective, or even just balanced. You weren't able to simply give a simple, single-line summation of the issue without couching it in loaded terms that betray your bias. Also you too.

              "Arguing that I explain one or the other side of the argument poorly, or that one side of the argument is weaker than the other, aren't arguments against the observation itself. Counterexamples would be."

              Counterexamples to what?

              Your examples all proved my point. In not one of those cases did you have a real conflict between ideology and pragmatism. What you did instead was select certain points then construct a possible counterargument of the other sort - an ostensibly ideological counterargument to a pragmatic point and vice versa. No one doubted you could do that. That proves nothing. My point, perhaps you misunderstood, was that when you see *apparent* contradictions between ideology and pragmatics, you need to look closer, your analysis is flawed - and in each and every one of YOUR examples that was easily shown to be the case. You say the ideology of patients rights is contrary to the practicality of herd immunity - but in fact respecting patients rights is key to building the good relationship between patients and doctors that leads to ALL the good outcomes we want from medicine - including that herd immunity! You say childrens rights conflict with the pragmatism that pregnancy is inconvenient(!?!?!) yet this is just utter nonsense, as abortion is by definition not a procedure that involves children! That's just gibberish. And finally you point to the basic dialectic between the conservative and the radical, but again neither is particularly ideological, or particularly pragmatic, in comparison to the other. You can choose to make a more ideological argument for one or a more pragmatic argument for the other but it is ultimately your choice, not a feature of the positions themselves. Both are supported by arguments of both types.
              --
              If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?