Pro-vaccine columnist won’t give her kids flu shots, by Dr Douglass
Pro-vaccine columnist won’t give her kids flu shots
Dear Friend,
I read an interesting column in a recent issue of U.S. News and World Report by a self- professed “pro-vaccination” person… and it sounds as though there’s a hefty degree of doubt (truth?) that’s sneaking into the thoughts of even the most ardent vaccination supporters.
“After interviewing about two dozen experts for a feature I’m writing on vaccines, I’ve come to question the wisdom of the new government recommendation that all children be vaccinated against the flu,” writes Deborah Kotz in U.S. New and World Report’s “On Medicine” column. She follows this statement by reiterating in bold-face type that she is “very much pro-vaccines,” and yet she will not take her three children for their flu vaccination shot this fall.
Hmmm… I wonder what it is that those two-dozen vaccine experts said. It must’ve been convincing. Sound like anyone you know?
Kotz points out exactly what changed her mind: the fact that she no longer views vaccines as “100 percent risk free and completely necessary” as she once did. Now, she sees them as “very safe medicines.” That’s debatable, of course. But what I find fascinating about this column is that it catalogues a pro-vaccination person’s confrontation with the very questionable nature of the vaccination process.
Unfortunately, it took this medical journalist 24 in-depth discussions to overcome the years of pro-vaccine nonsense that had been pumped into her head. And this is a journalist who, I would hope, has a naturally curious mind that’s willing to view most government recommendations with a grain of salt. That makes me realize what a monumental fight the anti-vaccine groups have on their hands – Ms. Kotz had access to a depth of knowledge and expertise that the average citizen never will.
In the column, Kotz takes issue with the age-old pro-vaccine argument as spelled out in a Boston Globe article. It says that in “one in a million cases” vaccines can cause a deadly allergic reaction, or is linked to a case of paralyzing Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS), but that the odds of dying from flu are very great. Kotz correctly points out that a child’s risk of dying of flu is, in fact, just remote: “About one in a million.”
“Compare that to the risk of suffering anaphylactic shock from an allergy to the vaccine or total paralysis from GBS, and suddenly the benefits don’t seem to add up to much,” Kotz writes.
I couldn’t have put it better myself. It’s the most succinct anti-vaccination argument I’ve heard in a long time. How ironic that it was written by a self-professed pro-vaccination person. Go figure.
Kotz also points out that “several of the children who died from the flu last year had been vaccinated against it.”
It’s hard to make the pro-vaccine argument with that little nugget of truth, right? And I’d find it difficult to be properly motivated to expose my children to the risks of flu shots when, as Kotz writes, “The vaccine is 75 percent effective at preventing flu.” So for all that exposure to anaphylactic shock and paralysis, there’s still a one in four chance that you’ll still get the flu. And it could still kill you.
Makes you want to keep your kids’ sleeves rolled down, doesn’t it?
William Campbell Douglass II, M.D.
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