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posted by martyb on Friday January 18 2019, @07:52PM   Printer-friendly
from the how-many-more-will-suffer dept.

Anti-vaccine nonsense spurred NY's largest outbreak in decades

Health officials in New York are cautiously optimistic that they have a large measles outbreak under control after tackling the noxious anti-vaccine myths and unfounded fears that fueled the disease's spread.

Since last fall, New York has tallied 177 confirmed cases of measles, the largest outbreak the state has seen in decades. It began with infected travelers, arriving from parts of Israel and Europe where the highly contagious disease was spreading. In New York, that spread has largely been confined to ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities. As measles rippled through those insular religious communities, health officials ran into members who were wary of outsiders as well as those who harbor harmful myths and fears about vaccines. This included the completely false-yet-pernicious belief that the measles vaccine causes autism.

To quash the outbreak, health officials met with rabbis and pediatricians in the community, who in turned urged community members to be vigilant and, above all, get vaccinated, according to The New York Times. "Good people, great parents were terrified," Rabbi Yakov Horowitz, founder of Darchei Noam yeshiva in Monsey in Rockland County, told the Times. Despite the fears, he insisted parents vaccinate their children. "They felt that I was asking to give their children something that would harm them."


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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by edIII on Saturday January 19 2019, @01:10AM (8 children)

    by edIII (791) on Saturday January 19 2019, @01:10AM (#788488)

    It's not about the science. I'm not arguing that vaccines as a concept are not proven. What I'm arguing is that you cannot trust a corporation, or the entire system around vaccine production, for chemically identical vaccines, inside broken countries like the United States. Likewise, you cannot blindly trust their research, as they haven't earned that level of trust. In fact, they've widely earned the distrust placed in institutions that ostensibly serve our healthcare needs.

    Yes, good people in good systems can produce good vaccines that are chemically identical (WRT formula), and bad people in bad systems can produce low quality and inferior vaccines. I would trust the manufacturing process, and the selection of chemicals (that can be substituted), in a place like Norway, Japan, or even China, much more so than places like the USA. It's because the regulations and culture itself are better (China will fucking shoot those bastards), and I believe I can trust that the vaccine was made properly. In the specific case of Thimerosal, I would trust good people to choose something different. That compound is not fundamental to the vaccine, or how they work. It's an additive used during manufacturing akin to HFS in a fucking drink. Just like you can replace HFS with Stevia or some other sweetener, Thimerosol was replaced after uproar in 2001. That was a good thing. It was only ever there because it was a cheaper and execu-fucks don't care about statistics, or whose kids get hurt. Only profit. Profit makes everything ethically and morally correct to the bad people. Again, there is no safe level of mercury, and absolutely zero scientific justification to inject it into a child. Period.

    In short, I wouldn't trust my kids in the US medical system to receive proper care that is void of the corrupt influences caused by avarice. How can I when people have died (becoming the unfortunate statistics) because some execu-fuck conspired to hide/alter studies/data showing that there was a problem? Hence, why I wouldn't trust vaccine research that came from the USA, unless it was reproduced and verified by an EU country that is highly rated for medical. Vaccines are more or less a settled science, so whatever research is going on would seem to be material sciences for supporting chemicals like preservatives, and not a fundamental paradigm shift with a new type of vaccine that operates differently. Meaning, they're always searching for cheaper chemicals to make more profit, and the vetting of those chemicals is weak as single-ply toilet paper.

    Science itself isn't the problem here, and it's human beings that are the fundamental problem. I trust science, but I have zero trust for the people claiming to be performing "science" in systems that reward sociopathic behavior with zero accountability. The FDA has earned our distrust, and Big Pharma more than deserves all of the distrust it receives.

    I wholly reject fucking assholes like ikanreed that completely dismiss these very real arguments about the human behavior behind vaccine production as anti-science when they are most certainly not. Unlike you, he resorted to character attacks that are extremely offensive. None of these people, including the orthodox communities in the article, hate their children. That was trolling, and ikanreed deserves being called out for the asshole he is being.

    People love their children, but don't know who to trust. If we are really being honest, has science earned our trust lately? Really earned it with impeccable behavior and integrity? Likewise, has Big Pharma engendered distrust, or trust with it's complete lack of accountability with people having died to serve greater profits? Same goes for the institutions that are supposed to protect us by evaluating these drugs properly, and are supposed to punish those that game the system to hide problems to bring faulty "products" to market. That, in of itself, truly highlights the problem; Medicines seen as products that must receive ROI, even though they are highly suspect during testing and have killed people.

    Recognizing the corruption that human filth bring to the equation is not anti-science, nor deserving of the derision it quite often receives. ikanreed can stick a cactus up his ass sideways today.

    --
    Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +4  
       Insightful=1, Informative=2, Touché=1, Total=4
    Extra 'Informative' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   5  
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by AthanasiusKircher on Saturday January 19 2019, @04:11AM (2 children)

    by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Saturday January 19 2019, @04:11AM (#788545) Journal

    Science itself isn't the problem here, and it's human beings that are the fundamental problem.

    No True Scotsman fallacy. Science IS a human endeavor. It will always be tainted by social dynamics. Acting like some sort of "pure science" exists that is immune to such forces isn't very reasonable given that science is always performed by humans.

    I actually agree with a lot of your criticism of the corporate medical systems in the U.S. and elsewhere. But your conclusions are just wacky. You really think medical research is immune to things like profit motives and ambition elsewhere? I agree the U.S. system is out of control, but crappy science can and has come out of all of the countries you say you'd "trust."

    Anyhow... I'm not trying to engage in whataboutism, but it's important to note flaws can be found everywhere, and thus one needs to find pragmatic solutions... which yours is not.

    I wholly reject fucking assholes like ikanreed that completely dismiss these very real arguments about the human behavior behind vaccine production as anti-science when they are most certainly not.

    Yes, they most certainly are. Whether you want to define "science" as your lofty idealistic vision that cannot exist in the real world (where there is no corporate influence, no individual ambition, no motives other than bettering knowledge) or whether you want to define "science" to mean what actually exists in the flawed human sphere -- the anti-vaxxers are most definitely ANTI- both of those definitions of "science."

    You have some stuff that makes sense (which I assume is why you've been modded up), but you throw all of that in service of defending anti-vaxxer behavior! Absurd! Even if I am to accept your assumption that the corporate medical system in the U.S. is so utterly screwed up, it would still be a rational choice to vaccinate given statistics!

    If you and your anti-vaxxer friends really want to behave like this, we should make a special place for you and all of them to go, where your kids can slowly die off in droves from all the childhood illnesses that used to run rampant throughout human civilization. What's that? You want modern medical treatment to help lower that deathrate?? Sorry, but you can't make use of any materials or supplies or services from the corrupt medical/scientific/corporate system you've rejected your vaccines from.

    In sum -- you are correct that the system is screwed up. You are correct that it is perfectly valid and important to recognize this, to fight it, to criticize it, to call it out and yell about it. But to do so in the context of defending anti-vaxxers as if their choices were somehow rational and not anti-science!?! If you truly believe that, icanreed's criticisms of you are wholly justified here -- you must hate your children and wish them to die. That's the only rational conclusion, based on statistics and scientific empirical evidence of what would happen were people to adopt your philosophy.

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by edIII on Saturday January 19 2019, @04:53AM (1 child)

      by edIII (791) on Saturday January 19 2019, @04:53AM (#788552)

      No True Scotsman fallacy. Science IS a human endeavor. It will always be tainted by social dynamics. Acting like some sort of "pure science" exists that is immune to such forces isn't very reasonable given that science is always performed by humans.

      You're arguing semantics here. Science is a METHODOLOGY, or framework. It can exist wholly separate from humanity, and for that matter, you presume only human life in the universe, and that science as a methodology and process only occurs within humanity. I do not. The "pure science" I alluded to is not unreasonable at all, and entirely possible. However, just like you pointed out, it's tainted by social dynamics. It doesn't have to be, and saying that it can't is tantamount to just giving up and settling for shitty non-reproduced poorly reviewed agenda driven science. There are many things that can be done to improve how human beings perform science.

      I reject your conclusion and see science just like math, in that both most certainly exist beyond humanity.

      You really think medical research is immune to things like profit motives and ambition elsewhere? I agree the U.S. system is out of control, but crappy science can and has come out of all of the countries you say you'd "trust."

      I never alluded to perfect. What I said was better, which isn't hard since the USA sets the bar so damn low. I believe they are more accountable, and their culture is better, meaning the executives are less sociopathic or willing to engage in bad behavior.

      You have some stuff that makes sense (which I assume is why you've been modded up), but you throw all of that in service of defending anti-vaxxer behavior! Absurd! Even if I am to accept your assumption that the corporate medical system in the U.S. is so utterly screwed up, it would still be a rational choice to vaccinate given statistics!

      You've fallen into the same damn trap as the rest. Denigrate and call these people stupid, when the base issue is the lack of trust, and then blame them for the problems that exist in science and corporate culture that cause the very same lack of trust. That's what I'm pointing out. If you really want to reach people, then science and corporate culture needs to change and become better. You've given up and are willing to settle for shitty science, which will only ever perpetuate the problem.

      EARN their trust back, and that happens by the FDA actually dissolving bad pharma companies (regardless of size), selling their IP to compensate the victims, and then moving forward. Executives MUST be imprisoned for murder when it comes out that they knew people were going to die, but allowed it to happen to push a product to market. This has happened, and the Too-Big attitude allows them to be unaccountable.

      But.. Yeah... let's blame the least sophisticated here for their fully justified levels of distrust in the system.

      If you truly believe that, icanreed's criticisms of you are wholly justified here -- you must hate your children and wish them to die.

      Go fuck yourself.

      --
      Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @08:54PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @08:54PM (#788757)

        No humans, no scientific discovery. Kinda that simple.

        Is there still objective reality that science and math attempt to describe? As far as I can tell, sure. But you've acknowledged science is a process, a methodology or framework is what you said. It is not the reality itself. Science is the description used by humans for that reality, and without humans you have not science.

        And it matters because otherwise you're holding humanity up to a standard it can never reach. (A perfect modeling of that objectivity). No wonder it won't meet your standards.

        Aside from that I also think you have one of the worst cases of the grass being greener in a different country that I've ever seen. But I could be wrong. Either way I'm satisfied with the vaccines I've received and promote others to have. Then again, international travel is out of my economic reach.... And the reality is that many of the largest drug recalls in history were from countries other than the U.S. Many were inside the U.S. also, of course. But nowhere near universally. It would be interesting to look and see how many recalls of medication actually originated from work done in countries outside the U.S. (i.e. why is it always in the U.S. that the bad drugs seem to be discovered, but I might be wrong there, too). Greed does not know boundaries, and nor does government corruption (if that is what it be).

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by AthanasiusKircher on Saturday January 19 2019, @04:28AM (1 child)

    by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Saturday January 19 2019, @04:28AM (#788549) Journal

    Oh, and before you accuse me of trolling like you did to others, note that I don't actually think most anti-vaxxers hate their children and want them to die. I'm saying that's the logical conclusion of your argument. To wit, either:

    (1) Anti-vaxxers love their children but are fundamentally anti-science.

    OR

    (2) Anti-vaxxers are pro-science but must hate their children and want them to die.

    You can't be pro-science and advocate the actions of the anti-vaxxers unless you want kids to die. Simple as that. Complaining about the medical system and even pushing it strongly toward better action is one thing -- but anti-vaxxer rhetoric and action goes far beyond that into anti-science BS.

    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @01:36PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @01:36PM (#788618)

      OR

      (3) Anti-vaxxers are pro-science but hate big pharma more than they love their kids

  • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @06:23PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @06:23PM (#788719)

    these anti-anti-vaxxers are ignorant, arrogant sycophants. they think by sucking up they are in the know when in fact they are the ones making people's kids invalids, for lack of a better term. if they really cared about science or people they would demand clean, third party tested vaccines with full accountability for the harm that is done. the numbers/rates of vaccine damage are not being reported/tabulated and people don't realize how many people's kids are being fucked up by their blind trust in these scum. it's not just about one doctor or one ingredient. this is about many things, none of which are being dealt with. just boot licking authoritarians trying to tell people what to do with their kids. let me explain something to you motherfuckers. i'm stockpiling ammo for you bitches and i'll have plenty of vaccines for your disease.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @06:30PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @06:30PM (#788722)

      I bet you are one who spreads fear that infants cant be vaccinated. Thus making it politically impossible to deal with the earlier waning maternal antibodies from vaccinated mothers. The age needs to be moved up to at least 9, if not 6 months.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @08:56PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @08:56PM (#788758)

      I am reminded of the words of Luke Skywalker. It is amazing. Every single thing you said in that paragraph is wrong.