Reblogged: An Anti-Vaccination Victim Speaks

[Gus Van Horn blog]

The "'70s child of a health nut" (HT: Snedcat), whose childhood bore the brunt of anti-vaccination hysteria questions some of her mother's wisdom:

I find myself wondering about the claim that complications from childhood illnesses are extremely rare but that "vaccine injuries" are rampant. If this is the case, I struggle to understand why I know far more people who have experienced complications from preventable childhood illnesses than I have ever met with complications from vaccines. I have friends who became deaf from measles. I have a partially [blind] friend who contracted rubella in the womb. My ex got pneumonia from chickenpox. A friend's brother died from meningitis.

Anecdotal evidence is nothing to base decisions on. But when facts and evidence-based science aren't good enough to sway someone's opinion about vaccinations, then this is where I come from. After all, anecdotes are the anti-vaccine supporters' way: "This is my personal experience." Well, my personal experience prompts me to vaccinate my children and myself. I got the flu vaccine recently, and I got the whooping cough booster to protect my son in the womb. My natural immunity--from having whooping cough at age 5--would not have protected him once he was born.

I am not so sure that even Amy Parker's words will sway someone for whom facts "aren't good enough", but what she is saying could well give pause to some parents who are genuinely confused on the issue of vaccinations.

-- CAV

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