Anti-vaccination nuts picking up where the religious ones left off.

whoop

With most conspiracy driven crackpots I generally roll my eyes and let them go on with their imagined world ills. Reasoning with the conspiracy-inclined is an exercise in futility and only invites a barrage of links to youtube videos and blogs that are poorly sourced and created by other conspiracy types as they feed from each other’s paranoia and delusions.

With folks who feel that aliens are among us I can laugh or even those offensive ones who claim 911 was an inside job can be ignored. When the conspiracy kooks get into the realm of healthcare however they can become terribly dangerous to people at large as they try and occasionally succeed in spreading their misinformation.

One dangerous conspiracy theory is the one claiming that a cure for cancer is being suppressed by evil big pharmaceutical companies which is always rationalized by the profoundly simplistic, standalone statement of: “They make more money treating cancer than they would curing it.” Yes folks, tens of thousands of researchers, company presidents and doctors are all in on this and none leak while their friends, family and even they themselves die of cancer. Just take a short trip into the world of capitalism and project what really would happen if a pharmaceutical company came out with a cure for cancer. I assure you that every senior person in that company and investor would become quite rich as shares explode and the company moves to the top of the very competitive pharmaceutical ladder.

Those folks who believe that the cure for cancer is being hidden tend of course to feel that conventional treatment for cancer is a sham. These folks then can be prone to telling vulnerable and frightened, newly diagnosed cancer patients to seek alternative treatments. This is where a huge line has been crossed by these assholes. Mexican clinics and countless other sham herbalists and “alternative” providers are more than happy to suck the money from a person with cancer while that person dies in need of real treatment. While conventional cancer treatment can be ugly and awful to endure, the cure rates are quite good with many cancers as compared to those God damned Mexican herbal clinics with a near 100% mortality rate.

Now on to the anti-vaccination nuts. Despite overwhelming evidence showing the benefits of vaccination, an enduring movement still exists that wants to take us back a couple centuries where the life expectancy was around 30 years or so. While science does not support this movement (or even simple common sense), celebrities often do and they are given a platform to spew their dangerous nonsense on vapid daytime shows such as Ophrah Winfrey which unfortunately lends an air of credibility to their crap. Playmate model Jenny McCarthy has championed anti-vaccination pap for years and now has a seat among the hens on The View where she doubtless will be spreading more of her garbage.

Diseases like measles, whooping cough and even tetanus are harming children in the developed world again when they had been nearly wiped out by vaccination due to fools listening to air-headed celebrities rather than their doctor.

The HPV vaccine has been found to be more important than ever in preventing a whole host of cancers in both men and women if it can be applied early enough. This vaccine was fought vigorously by hardcore socially conservative groups and fools who feel that this vaccine would somehow encourage promiscuity. This nonsense has been losing steam and HPV vaccinations have been becoming more widespread and among both genders. I wrote awhile ago on my cousin Shawn’s battle with a cancer caused by HPV. The shot years ago would have saved him much more agony than any misguided efforts to preserve his chastity could have. Shawn and his wife have been working tirelessly to get the HPV vaccine extended to boys in Alberta as it had been predominantly given to girls.

The anti-vaccination gang while stinging from being utterly and totally discredited in their “vaccinations cause autism” bullshit have now put HPV solidly in their sights so that they may fill the void of idiocy left as the social conservatives gave up their opposition to this important vaccine. Armed with more links to conspiracy sites, youtube videos and other unfounded bullshit sites the anti-vaccination crowd is working hard to ensure cancers caused by HPV continue to harm people in the next generation. New conspiracies are being created along with more fabricated risks from vaccination.

I am long winded enough and I think I have made my thoughts pretty clear on the anti-vaccination bunch. I will save you some google time and provide two links below that put lie to this latest wave of idiocy and battling against beneficial medicine.

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2013/08/09/antivaccinationists-against-the-hpv-vaccine-round-5000/

http://www.skepticalraptor.com/skepticalraptorblog.php/gardasil-researcher-against-vaccine-myth-debunked/

Don’t let the anti-vaccination conspiracy gang get a toehold on HPV vaccines. Let’s nip their misinformation in the bud and folks, get yourself and your kids vaccinated. You need only visit an old cemetery to see the young deaths that were so common prior to vaccination to see how it was. If you really want a dose of reality, ask some polio survivors what they think of people opposing the vaccines that would have saved them from childhood agony and a lifetime crippled.

vaccination

 

A picture does indeed say a thousand words.

In this case the picture is a cartoon. My better-half posted this on my facebook page and in one image the point of many of my long-winded postings has been encapsulated.

 

Now I have a page that I can link to every time I hear somebody on social media going on about the ills of vaccination, modern medicine, industrialization, non-organic food, energy, pesticide, fertilization, radio communication, trade or just progress in general.

Thanks Jane. 🙂

She’s just a celebrity folks.

 Medicinal quackery knows no bounds. There are people who swear by crystal healing, ear candling, touch therapy, a frightening variety of enemas and herbs that cure everything from the sniffles to brain cancer.

 Hey, if people feel better trying such methods to cure disease and they want to pay for it themselves; go to town. I only become annoyed when the “alternative medicine” crowd does two things; ask for public funding for unproven therapies, and encourage people to eschew the use of conventional medicine for real conditions.

 A common thread for those who are locked in the world of witch-doctory is an irrational distrust of scientifically proven medicine and an almost evangelical compulsion to try and spread the word on their chosen conspiracy theories.

 The anti-vaccination group is one of the most kooky and dangerous out there. I say kooky as the evidence of the benefits of vaccination is rather overwhelming. How many people have we seen suffering from smallpox lately? Where did the polio epidemic go? What has happened to general life expectancies since inoculation became a broad practice? These people drift into the realm of dangerous when they lobby against such a clearly beneficial practice and they truly do put our children at risk with their odd notions.

 Most of the anti-vaccination nuts simply roam the internet spamming discussion forums with baseless links and youtube videos that they feel proves that the medicinal community is trying to kill us all with vaccinations. These cranks are easily dismissed as their case holds no merit. Unfortunately, now and then a celebrity jumps into the mix and gives a degree of perceived credibility to the baseless claims against things such as vaccination. Jenny McCarthy has been working hard on this one.

jenny mccarthy

 As we can see in the picture above, Jenny is well qualified for the role of being a former Playboy bunny as she is. McCarthy’s nude modelling hardly qualifies her as a medical expert however.

 It is a sad reflection on society that celebrity status often holds such weight with public opinion. The army of researchers and physicians who constantly demonstrate the scientifically proven benefits of vaccination are ignored by some as they take the medical council of a person who has only proven to be qualified to flash her boobs in a widely circulated magazine. Wake up people!!

 In Time magazine this month, Jenny spouted the profanity laced wisdom below:

I do believe sadly it’s going to take some diseases coming back to realize that we need to change and develop vaccines that are safe. If the vaccine companies are not listening to us, it’s their f___ing fault that the diseases are comingback. They’re making a product that’s s___. If you give us a safe vaccine, we’ll use it. It shouldn’t be polio versus autism.

 

 How profound. Never mind that the link to autism caused by vaccination has been repeatedly and completely debunked. Unfortunately Time magazine has a wider circulation than medical journals and McCarthy is easier on the eye than a pale researcher who is pointing out scientific fact.

 Jenny McCarthy would rather see massive outbreaks of diseases that kill children than accept the proven fact that there is no link between vaccination and autism.

 McCarthy’s crusade against science, common sense and fact has been going on for a couple years now. A website calculating the sickness and death potentially caused by Jenny’s vapid actions has been formed. I hope the count does not grow much more.

 Most people can rationally dismiss the kinds of claims that Jenny is making. Unfortunately, those few who have been listening to nuts like Jenny are not only putting their children at risk, they are putting all children at risk. Vaccination needs to be in broad use in order for it to be most effective. We can look forward to outbreaks of diseases that we had previously thought conquered if enough people listen to the pap McCarthy is spewing and the price will be dear.

 Keep in mind, many celebrities have fallen for and are promoting Scientology as well. That religion was created by a science fiction writer for crying out loud.

 Mass exposure does not mean instant credibility. I wish more people could understand that. Vaccinate your kids.