Are those who want to mandate vaccines completely clueless?
by Meryl Dorey
Anti-choice campaigner, Alison Gaylard My local newspaper, The Northern Star, ran the following article regarding the proposed punishments of law-abiding Australians trying to make informed choices for the protection of their children. These parents — the majority of whom are (according to numerous Australian government studies) highly educated and well-researched on this subject — believe that:
1- Vaccines carry serious risks including the risk of lifelong disability or death.
2- Vaccines are not as effective as doctors have claimed them to be.
3- Healthy unvaccinated children do not carry or transmit diseases to others, though their vaccinated counterparts do (e.g. those who have received live virus vaccines and those who have been vaccinated against pertussis (whooping cough), who recent studies show may be more likely to infect others with the illness)
4- In a democratic nation such as Australia, that is a signatory to the Nuremburg Code, personal informed choice is sacrosanct and must never be abridged in any way.
Many of you may not know this, but the AVN was instrumental in the lobbying efforts to introduce a conscientious objector clause into Federal legislation so that a generation of parents between then (the late 1990s) and now was able to access all government benefits. Now, moves are afoot to wipe out our hard work on your behalf. Below are my responses to this article (the original article is in block quotes below). I would love to hear your feedback on what you are willing to do to protect your rights. Please suggest ideas (visits to politicians, protest marches, letters, petitions, etc.), and let me know whether you would be prepared to be one of those who takes action against these tyrannical moves by our pharma-controlled government, by clicking here to send me an email with your contact details and ideas.
Vaccination supporters welcome government crack down Luke Mortimer Northern Star 11 April, 2015 NORTHERN Rivers Vaccination Supporters has welcomed moves by the Federal Government to crack down on parents avoiding vaccinating their children.
Well, this is no surprise! The Northern Rivers Vaccination Supporters is a small group of people involved with Stop the AVN (SAVN). They have always favoured compulsory vaccination. I would be very surprised if they were ever quoted as being supportive of health rights or the right to freedom of choice or speech. That is not their way.
ALISON GAYLARD: Everyone’s entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. And science is factual.
No, Alison; I'm sorry to have to tell you that science is neither factual nor wrong. Science is a process by which hypotheses are tested. And there are few hard and fast rules in science. Some examples of indisputable facts are: yes, the sun always rises in the east and sets in the west; yes, living things respire, reproduce, and die. Scientific conclusions are, by their very nature, open to debate, interpretation, and testing. That process is what we call science.
In recent days, Social Services Minister Scott Morrison confirmed to media outlets the government was reviewing ambiguous legislation that allowed parents to object to immunisations for personal or philosophical reasons.
It's strange that Minister Morrison describes this legislation as 'ambiguous'. It is anything but. The legislation describes exactly how those who object to getting their children vaccinated can still access government entitlements. And the important word there is 'entitlements' — because these are things that ALL citizens and residents of Australia are entitled to. Our Federal Government is signatory to many international treaties and codes that enshrine our right to make free, informed health choices. In fact, the Australian Medical Association (AMA), the National Health and Medical Research Council (NH&MRC), and various other government and medical industry bodies all state — quite unambiguously — that they support this right and that it is one of their core values. So is Minister Morrison unaware of these facts? Or was he elected into public office to protect a multi-trillion-dollar international business model (that of Big Pharma) instead of the rights and needs of his constituents?
Mullumbimby's Alison Gaylard, a founding member of Northern Rivers Vaccination Supporters, hoped the review would go some way towards improving the North Coast's immunisation rates, which were the worst in the country in 2014.
The vaccination rates may or may not be "the worst in the country", but no matter how bad they are, they are still orders of magnitude higher than they were in 1991, when our rate of infectious diseases such as whooping cough was far lower than it is today. So we have had an overall increase in vaccination rates along with a concomitant increase in disease. How, then, is it possible to blame the unvaccinated? And yet, read on and see that Ms Gaylard does just that!
Ms Gaylard helped start the group after her two daughters became ill with whooping cough.
Please note that both Ms Gaylard's daughters had been vaccinated against whooping cough. Read that again: they had been vaccinated. The vaccine failed them both. But Ms Gaylard, rather than face up to the known ineffectiveness of the vaccine (not conjecture on my part: many, many studies have and still do demonstrate that the vaccinated may be unprotected), Ms Gaylard blames some nameless, faceless unvaccinated people for the failure of the vaccine to protect her children. If I go out for a drive today and run into a light pole, I have as much right blame the full moon or the orange juice I had for breakfast as Ms Gaylard has to blame the unvaccinated for the failure of a vaccine. In fact, I would go further and state that placing the blame on the unvaccinated is not only unscientific and without any evidence; it is plain dumb.
"We have a high number of conscientious objectors in this area, especially in Mullumbimby. I think it will (improve immunisation rates)," she said.
Well, no doubt there are some families who will vaccinate their children because they rely on government payments to put food on the table, a roof over their head, and clothes on their children's backs. It is those least able to afford these financial penalties who are being targeted and who will be most likely to make the decision to vaccinate purely for financial reasons. Do we really want to live in a society in which people are forced to give their children medical procedures that — let's face it — have real and (in some cases) quantifiable risks, against the informed choice of those who love them most, their parents? In my case, the answer is, no: I do not want to live in such a society. It is immoral, unethical, undemocratic, and just plain wrong. If there is a risk, there must always be a choice.
"We have a high number of people who've bought into the anti-vaccination stance, so as to whether they'll be concerned about whether they'll lose childcare benefits or facilities, I'm unsure how it'll impact here. We'll be watching with interest. Our demographic here is so diverse."
Those who have "bought into the anti-vaccination stance" — which is how Ms Gaylard and her ilk characterise anybody who doesn’t buy into their peculiar brand of magical thinking — have generally made their choice after:
1- having a child who was injured or killed by a vaccine or vaccines;
2- knowing someone who was injured or killed by a vaccine or vaccines; and/or
3- spending many hours (commonly in the hundreds or thousands of hours) researching this issue for themselves.
After all, it is so easy to say yes to vaccination; it is far harder to say no in today's society. So that decision must be respected by a government that is truly representative of its citizen's rights.
Ms Gaylard said there was indisputable evidence regarding immunisation's benefits.
I would welcome Ms Gaylard’s providing such "indisputable evidence" of vaccination's benefits. Calling vaccinations immunisations is the first clue that Ms Gaylard has no idea what she is talking about since even immunologists and paediatricians admit that vaccines don't immunise and therefore, the words cannot truthfully be used interchangeably. If Ms Gaylard is a woman of her word, I would like to challenge her to a public debate on this issue. Since she is so sure she has this "indisputable evidence", let her present it in a fair and open forum to allow those in attendance to hear and see it and decide that for themselves. If she feels that she is not qualified to present the facts behind the benefits and safety of vaccination, she is more than welcome to find a medical professional, government health official, or anyone else to take her place. Come to the party, Alison. If you really are firm in your convictions, support them with the evidence.