600 Shots? Poor Babies!

News:  New research from the Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology at Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC) identifies a potential biomarker that predicts atypical development in 1- to 2-month-old infants at high versus low familial risk for developing autism spectrum disorders (ASD).   See this review of the study, with a link to the original article in Nature.

Why is this important?  Because gullible people think that babies receiving their first vaccinations at 6 months are somehow becoming autistic because of the shots.  This study is just adding to the data that autism is genetic.

In 1998, Andrew Wakefield was a medical doctor in the United Kingdom.  He

Former Dr. Andrew Wakefield
at Trump Inauguration Ball

was making a lot of money as an “expert witness” in lawsuits involving childhood vaccines.

People whose children were autistic were upset and looking for someone, preferably someone with deep pockets, to blame and sue.  Andrew Wakefield helped them with their law suits.

Needing some scientific backup for his testimony, Wakefield faked a research project where he claimed to prove that childhood vaccines somehow made children autistic.  He wrote up his results in the UK medical journal The Lancet.

Immediately other researchers retried Wakefield’s fraudulent study.  No one could reproduce his results.  Further investigation showed that six of his test subjects had shown autistic tendencies before vaccination.  His test sample was only 12 children.

For his imaginative work, Wakefield made a lot of money and was stripped of his medical license.  The Lancet retracted his article.  Wakefield still makes lots of money speaking to the gullible.

Unfortunately, the damage was done.  “Celebrities” (There’s an interesting and self-serving word.  I’ve never “celebrated” Jim Carrey or Jenny McCarthy) jumped on the wagon and tried to get attention by “protecting” babies. 

The result:  babies are dying.  Children who do not get vaccinated can get sick and die.  Children under the age of 6 months, too young to get vaccinated, are exposed to diseases and dying.

Dana Mccaffery, dead at 4 weeks -
because her neighbors were not vaccinated.

Nonsense:  These are “childhood diseases” so they are not harmful. 

Before vaccines, “childhood diseases” killed almost half of children under the age of 5.  I had measles before the vaccine became available in 1963.  I nearly went blind.  To this day I have vision problems.  Mumps can cause sterility.  Whooping cough merely kills.

Nonsense:  There are no tests proving that the vaccines are safe.

Truth:  There have been many, many tests of vaccine safety over the last 70 years.  Millions of children around the world have been vaccinated in the 65 years since the measles vaccine became available.  Very few have had adverse reactions of any kind.  Don’t cherry-pick your data.

Nonsense:  There is formaldehyde in vaccines and formaldehyde is bad.

Truth:  Yes, large doses of formaldehyde are harmful.  Each vaccination has 1/600 as much formaldehyde as a large apple. 

Nonsense:  The mercury in vaccines will kill you. 

Truth:  Yes, methyl mercury is dangerous.  On the other hand, the ethyl mercury once used in the preservative Thiomersal is much less dangerous.  Thiomersal  is no longer used in vaccines, so those “warnings” are outdated.  Back when Thiomersal was used (by the way, it is also used in tattoo ink), there was less mercury in a shot than in 3 ounces of canned tuna.

Scare tactic:  Poor babies are given 600 shots!!  Poor babies!

Truth:  Fortunate American children do receive a total of 60, not 600, vaccinations between the ages of 6 months and 18 years.  That’s an average of 3 shots per year.

Nonsense:  Big Pharma makes millions selling vaccines.  I’m not going to give them my money for those government-tested drugs. 

Truth:  So I’m going to give all my money to “alternative drug” manufacturers for chemicals which have never been tested for safety or effectiveness?  "Natural" medicines that have been tested and found effective are called "medicine".

The human cost of Andrew Wakefield's fraud

What it comes down to is, if you don’t get vaccinated, you are a health threat to yourself and your neighbors.  There is no good reason not to get vaccinated.  Do it.