http://www.mercola.com/2000/apr/30/chickepox_vaccine.htm
Americans of
a certain age can remember what it was like when polio ran rampant through the
land. Swimming pools and play lots occasionally were abandoned, as people
feared transmission of the devastating virus from which there was no
protection. Healthy children would suddenly end up crippled--or worse--as a
result of the disease. Our language contained terms like "infantile paralysis"
and "iron lung."
Then, in the mid-1950s, came Dr. Jonas
Salk's vaccine and the scourge of polio began to be lifted from this nation
and, subsequently, from most of the human race. And in one of the greatest
public health triumphs in human history, the disease has been kept in check
ever since, largely because immunization against the polio virus is required
virtually everywhere in the United States as a condition of entering school.
Most Americans also have memories of
chickenpox, but they are personal memories, not social history. That's because
chickenpox has never had the devastating social effects that polio did. It is
not a public health crisis--maybe not even a public health problem.
For all but a tiny percentage of victims,
chickenpox means several days of itching and discomfort, and an indelible
signature--a pock mark--somewhere on the body. The social effects generally
amount to nothing more than a few missed days of school.
Nevertheless, a state immunization
advisory committee has recommended that a chickenpox vaccine be added to the
battery of nine vaccines already required for admission to schools in Illinois.
No question the recommendation is well-intentioned. But it also is ill-advised.
Not everything that is desirable deserves to be mandated by the state. Such
mandates ought to be reserved for matters of genuine public peril.
As Fran Eaton, the sole dissenting member
of the immunization advisory committee, put it: "Chickenpox is not running
rampant in our state. Save . . . the mandates for emergency, life-threatening
crises."
The chickenpox vaccine was licensed for
use in the U.S. relatively recently, in 1995. Before that, an estimated 4
million cases annually resulted in 11,000 hospitalizations and 100 deaths.
So far, according to the head of the Illinois Department of Public Health,
there have been no deaths or hospitalizations as a result of the vaccine.
Eventually, there probably will be some--the law of averages virtually
guarantees it.
But what is crucial is that, for all but the
tiniest percentage of the population, the disease will be nothing more than a
source of discomfort and annoyance. Now a state mandate certainly would
inoculate the majority against that discomfort and the infinitesimal minority
against hospitalization or death from the disease. But is that the sort of use
to which we want to put the coercive power of the state?
We think not.
Let parents, in consultation with their
family doctors, decide whether to have children immunized for chickenpox. And
save the mandates for emergencies.
Chicago Tribune April 25, 2000
COMMENT: It is great to find the
traditional media starting to recognize the sheer lunacy of some of these new
vaccine recommendations. You can search the vaccine links
on this site for more information regarding the vaccine issue.
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