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Some babies aren't old enough to have been vaccinated. Some people are immunocompromised, including children. Some of these people are unable to be vaccinated.

• unclebucknasty 10y ago
  >Some of these people are unable to be vaccinated I don't know how the count of these "unvaccinatable" people compares to those who suffer adverse reactions from vaccines, but it grows even stranger to demand that everyone assume risk for even smaller segments of the population; especially if the primary argument is a common welfare numbers game. BTW, FWIW, some pretty heinous activities have been conducted in the name of the common welfare, including human experimentation. I'm obviously not saying this is happening here; only that "because common welfare" is not an ipso facto rationale. We've all benefitted from experiments, etc. at the expense of others. But, we later acknowledged that some of these things were completely unethical because, at some point, the rights of the individual trump even the common welfare. Anyway, clearly the government has decided. My question was who should decide? More specifically, I was speaking to the parent comment's acknowledgement that some discrimination among vaccines is prudent. At the same time, the commenter expressed anger over parents opting out of vaccines. Well, if discrimination is warranted but the commenter is angry about someone else's manner of discrimination, then that boils down to the commenter believing he/she should be the one who decides. Again, I believe vaccines are generally beneficial, however, I also believe it's wrong to berate parents who don't blindly follow the vaccine schedule. The relatively low percentages of serious adverse reactions are little comfort when you're the one who is impacted. I'm just not prepared to demand that someone else do anything to their bodies for my sake, at any risk to him/her.
  • dalke 10y ago
    Parents have also done pretty heinous activities in the name of parental discretion. Simply pointing out that heinous activities have occurred is therefore meaningless. Government policies also agree "that some discrimination among vaccines is prudent". That why some are mandatory and some are voluntary. That's why the polio vaccine switched from using attenuated live viruses to dead ones, even though the latter isn't as effective. There is no requirement that everyone follow a vaccination schedule. As I pointed out, there are good medical reasons for why someone might not be vaccinated. The question is, should non-medical reasons be enough to justify a variance? Should a general sense of malaise be enough? Or, if someone expresses a concern that their child might get ill as a result of a vaccine, and that concern - based on knowing the counts rather than expressed by people who don't - has already been factored into the decision to require vaccination, then should the opinion of one non-expert parent overweigh the opinions of thousands of experts made as the result of decades of study, with open publications and public participation, and repeated in scores of countries? Any absolute statement like yours, which says the parent's discretion comes first, means there is no way to keep a parent from heinous activities, nor for that matter can children be required to go to school. We see this tension already for Jehovah's Witnesses, where doctrine prohibits the use of blood transfusions. If a 2 year old needs surgery which requires a blood transfusion, should the JW parent have a right to let the child die in order to follow the faith? The US says (as do other countries) the doctor has the right to overrule the parent's wishes in that case. Do you want otherwise?
    • unclebucknasty 10y ago
      >Parents have also done pretty heinous activities in the name of parental discretion Actually, it's that counter-argument that's meaningless. The (rather obvious and enormous) difference is that no one is demanding that everyone else do something according to those parents' discretion. It's actually the point here. >Government policies also agree "that some discrimination among vaccines is prudent". It's odd that people are so trusting of "the government" in this one area. The mandatory vaccine schedule most certainly features vaccines for illnesses that are generally self-limiting, and for which the benefits are arguable, even for "experts" (gasp!). >There is no requirement that everyone follow a vaccination schedule. Huh? Your previous comment stated that I might not like it, but the government decides; then it painstakingly laid out supporting case law. Don't know what you're trying to say. >The question is... That whole paragraph progresses into a slippery-slope of increasingly discretionary rationale that highlights why people should have ultimate control over their own bodies. Yes, we could keep listing rationales until, eventually, even you might find a reason for pause. And, your trust in the purity of the process is interesting. >and repeated in scores of countries? The schedule is not uniform and countries disagree over specific vaccines. Kind of blows your whole theory. Now, which "experts" do you trust to decide what you must pump into your kids? >*We see this tension already for Jehovah's Witnesses...Do you want otherwise? False equivalence.