Submitted via IRC for Bytram
'It will take off like a wildfire': The unique dangers of the Washington state measles outbreak
[...] "You know what keeps me up at night?" said Clark County Public Health Director Alan Melnick. "Measles is exquisitely contagious. If you have an under-vaccinated population, and you introduce a measles case into that population, it will take off like a wildfire."
[...] Anti-vaccination activists, for their part, contend that state officials are twisting facts to stoke public fear.
"It shouldn't be called an outbreak," Seattle-area mother Bernadette Pajer, a co-founder of the state's main anti-vaccine group, Informed Choice Washington, said of the measles cases, arguing that the illness has spread only within a small, self-contained group. "I would refer to it as an in-break, within a community."
[...] Clements eventually changed her mind, deciding to give her kids the shots after a doctor at a vaccine workshop answered her questions for more than two hours, at one point drawing diagrams on a whiteboard to explain cell interaction. He was thoughtful, factual and also "still very warm," she said.
[...] In Washington, state lawmakers supporting tougher vaccine requirements are mounting their second effort in the past three years to make it harder for parents to opt out of vaccinations.
(Score: 2) by Dr Spin on Saturday February 09 2019, @09:13AM
I don't know about America, but in most of the world, all the related risks are very low, however the risks of delaying the vaccine (and thereby increasing the time you are a potential victim of the disease) are considerably greater than the reduction in risk of the vaccine, at least in part because if you are at risk from the vaccine, you are at much higher risk from the actual disease.
Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!