Measles is deadly. Vaccines are not. We need our laws to reflect this reality

[workinclasszero]

By WENDY ORENT FEB 10, 2019 | 3:05 AM

In American political life, the right and the left exist in largely separate spheres. But there is at least one place where the two sides of the divide overlap: the anti-vaccination movement.

Take my recent conversation with Becky Johnson, a left-of-center, 65-year-old mother of three in California, who attributes her chronic health issues, including migraines and the skin condition vitiligo, to the vaccines she received as a child.

When she and her husband had children, “I felt bullied by our pediatrician” to vaccinate, she said. But she resisted.

The recent measles outbreak doesn’t bother Johnson. “I’m not afraid of measles,” she says.

What she and many of her fellow anti-vaxxers in California fear is state-enforced vaccination because of SB 277, a California bill jointly written by state Sens. Richard Pan (D-Sacramento), a pediatrician, and Benjamin Allen (D-Santa Monica). The bill, signed into law in 2015, abolished personal choice exemptions from vaccination requirements for children in public schools, although medical exemptions remain. The law has so far withstood court challenges.

“I see that as medical fascism,” says Johnson. “I’m the one who is going to make medical decisions for my kids.”

And then there’s Philippe Lecoin of Georgia, a Ted Cruz supporter with a degree in engineering. He might not agree with Johnson on a range of political issues, but shares her belief that vaccines are being pushed by greedy pharmaceutical companies and physicians. He told me he trusts in natural immunity; his daughter was vaccinated until age 3, but not after that because of his evolving beliefs.

It’s strange that Lecoin and Johnson fear vaccines, but not measles. The disease is both deadly and the most contagious virus known. When measles-infected foreign sailors landed on Fiji in 1875, they sparked an epidemic that killed a third of the population — the same mortality rate as the plague Black Death in 14th century Europe.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-orent-measles-vaccinations-20190210-story.html

[beachbum bob]

1. schoolboards are too easily manipulated by a small group of anti-vaxxers who don't

care if they endanger other people's kids.

[Ferrets are Cool]

2. What are the penalties for not following the law?

And are they being applied?

[hlthe2b]

3. It will not be long before subtle DNA changes identify the specific source of spread to individuals

and THEN there may well be civil litigation available to victims to hold irresponsible parents (i.e., those who refused to vaccinate their child sans any MEDICAL contraindication) accountable.

Just sayin... it is likely coming...

[KitSileya]

4. If parents refuse to vaccinate their children,

and there's no medical indication the child should not receive vaccinations, the parents should lose medical power of attorney for their child, and the state should step in and have the kids vaccinated.

With one close family member who cannot get vaccinations because of a severe allergic reaction to their first immunization, and another who is being treated for cancer and who regularly ends up in hospital because their immune system goes down to zero, as in non-existent, I have lost any and all respect for parents who refuse to vaccinate their kids as a personal choice. Vaccines should be free and offered everywhere, and mandatory.

[ck4829]

5. K&R