The reality of “informed” consent in New Zealand - Immunisation Awareness Society, Inc., New Zealand, Press Release

23 September 2002

PRESS RELEASE FROM THE IMMUNISATION AWARENESS SOCIETY INC., NZ

The reality of “informed” consent in New Zealand

Last week the Ministry of Health (MoH) admitted that generations of Maori children and state wards were vaccinated without their parents’ consent. Two MoH officials claim that this would never happen today and that informed consent is obtained before children are vaccinated.

While health professionals in New Zealand may consider that they obtain informed consent, many parents are not given all the information that they need to make an informed decision. Some doctors have told the IAS that they have been threatened with the loss of their contracts if they do not promote vaccination (Pers. comm.). Recently Dr Colin Tukuitonga, the Director of Public Health, said that he believed that midwives who did not promote “immunisation” were in breach of their contracts as lead maternity caregivers (1), despite their clear obligation to provide information on the risks as well as the benefits of vaccination.

There is pressure on health professionals to provide only information that is sanctioned by the MoH. However, “official” information is incomplete and it is recognised by New Zealand consumer advocacy and health organisations that further information is necessary in order for people to be able to make an informed decision (Parents Centre Press Release, June 2002; Maternity Services Consumer Council, Pers. comm., June 2002).

The following excerpt from the journal Pediatrics clearly illustrates the intention of the Medical Establishment to not provide parents with all the information that they need to assess the safety and desirability of vaccination.

“Pamphlet authors should determine the key points that the patient (or parent) needs to know to achieve the behavioural objective. Non-essential concepts can then be deleted. The key is to write for the desired health behaviour, rather than for high-level knowledge.”

Parent Comprehension of Polio Vaccine Information Pamphlets,
Paediatrics, Volume 97, no 6, June 1996, page 809.

“To achieve the behavioural objective” means to get as many parents to vaccinate as possible. “Non-essential concepts” does not mean information which a parent doesn’t need to know; it means information that will not achieve maximum vaccination. In other words ‘do not provide parents with information which may cause them to make a decision not to vaccinate their children. Provide parents only with information which will lead to a decision to vaccinate.’

How many doctors tell parents that vaccination has not been responsible for the major decline in infectious diseases (2), that the death rate from infectious disease in New Zealand declined by up to 98% before the introduction of vaccination (statistics from the New Zealand Official Year-book (3)). For example:

Measles - death rate dropped 98% before vaccination was introduced in 1969.
Whooping cough - death rate dropped 83% before the vaccine became available and 98% before it was put on the vaccination schedule.
Diphtheria – death rate declined by 99% by the time the vaccination was widely available.

These figures are mirrored by the decline in deaths from these diseases in countries such as Australia, US, England and France. Campbell Murdoch, Professor of General Practice at Otago Medical School between 1983 and 1992 states that “immunisation barely figures as a protection against death.” (4) You and your child are many times more likely to be killed in a car accident than to die from an infectious disease.

How many doctors tell parents that 68% of the whooping cough cases in New Zealand in 1998-99 were in fully vaccinated children (N. Turner, Pers. comm.). That 34% of the cases of measles in 1984-85 were in vaccinated children and 67% of the unvaccinated children were too young to be given the measles vaccine. (5) That recent research shows that more than 60% of teenagers and young adults who received three doses of hepatitis B vaccine in childhood have no immunity 3 to 14 years later. (6) That more than 35% of young women vaccinated against rubella in childhood have no immunity in their twenties and thirties when they most need the protection. (7) That it has been estimated that a child is up to 100 times more likely to suffer a serious adverse reaction or die from the hepatitis B vaccine than to contract the disease.(8) That serious adverse reactions to the killed virus polio vaccine, now in use in New Zealand, could be as high as one in 1500 children. (9) That increasing numbers of health professionals around the world are concerned about the lack of adequate safety tests on vaccines, and the administration of vaccines to children without proper informed consent.

The MoH intend to introduce yet another vaccine – for meningococcal disease. They already know that this vaccine carries an 80% adverse reaction rate and they intend to start vaccinating New Zealand children before the safety tests are completed. (10) With which ethical guidelines does this practice conform and how will parents be able to provide informed consent for this vaccine? Just how much are they really going to tell parents about the risks and side-effects of this vaccine? They are going to use the vaccine, no matter the results of trials, and if they have to massage the data, and persuade doctors to carefully manage the fall-out, they will.

Vaccinating children in New Zealand is not about truly informed consent. It is about money and profit, getting children through the door of the doctor’s offices and obtaining the highest possible vaccination rate irrespective of the mounting evidence which suggests that vaccines are neither safe nor effective. It seems that little has really changed since the days in which Maori children were lined up and vaccinated because someone else “knew” what was best for them. The rights of New Zealand children and their parents to make truly informed decisions about their health and welfare are still being ignored.

For more information on this issue or about The Immunisation Awareness Society, phone 09 3030187, email info@ias.org.nz or visit www.ias.org.nz.

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References:

1. Angela Gregory, 2002: Midwives accused of threat to babies, The New Zealand Herald, 19 June, 2002.
2. McKeown, T., 1979: The Role of Medicine – Dream, Mirage or Nemesis?, Basil Blackwell, Oxford.
3. McKinlay, J.B. and McKinlay, S.M., 1977: The questionable Contribution of Medical Measures to the Decline of Mortality in the United States in the Twentieth Century, Milbank Memorial Fund Quarterly, Summer 1977 pg 405 – 428.
4. New Zealand Official Year-books, 1893 to 1985, Department of Statistics.
5. Legat, N., 1991: Measles on Elm Street, Metro, December 1991.
6. Dew, K., 1995: The Measles Vaccination Campaigns In New Zealand, 1985 and 1991: The Issues Behind the Panic, Working Paper No. 10, Victoria University,   Wellington.
   Whittle, H., Jaffar, S., Wansbrough, M. Mendy, M., Dumpis, U., Collinson, A., Hall, A., 2002: Observational study of vaccine efficacy 14 years after trial of hepatitis B   vaccination in Gambian children, BMJ, 325: 569.
   Street, A.C., Weddle, T.Z., Thomann, W.R., Lundberg, E.W., Jackson, G.W. and Hamilton, J.D., 1990: Persistence of antibody in healthcare workers vaccinated against hepatitis B, Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol, 11 (10): 525-30.
   Pasko, M.T. and Beam, T.R. Jr., 1990: Persistence of anti-HBs among health care personnel immunized with hepatitis B vaccine, Am J Public Health, 80 (5): 590-3.
   Krugman, S. and Davidson, M., 1987: Hepatitis B vaccine: prospects for duration of immunity, Yale J Biol Med, 60 (4): 333-9.
7. Trier, H. and Ronne, T., 1992: Duration of immunity and occurrence of secondary vaccine failure following vaccination against measles, mumps and rubella, Ugeskr Laeger 13; 154 (29): 2008-13.
8. Orient, J., 1999: Statement of The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources of the Committee on Government Reform U.S. House of Representatives, Washington DC.
9. Wattigney, W.A., Mootrey, G.T., Braun, M.M., Chen, R.T., 2001: Surveillance for Poliovirus Vaccine Adverse Events, 1991 to 1998: Impact of a Sequential Vaccination Schedule of Inactivated Poliovirus Vaccine Followed by Oral Poliovirus Vaccine, Pediatrics, 107, 5.
10. 2002: GP buy in needed, New Zealand Doctor, 17 July 2002.

ALL INFORMATION, DATA, AND MATERIAL CONTAINED, PRESENTED, OR PROVIDED HERE IS FOR GENERAL INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY AND IS NOT TO BE CONSTRUED AS REFLECTING THE KNOWLEDGE OR OPINIONS OF THE PUBLISHER, AND IS NOT TO BE CONSTRUED OR INTENDED AS PROVIDING MEDICAL OR LEGAL ADVICE. THE DECISION WHETHER OR NOT TO VACCINATE IS AN IMPORTANT AND COMPLEX ISSUE AND SHOULD BE MADE BY YOU, AND YOU ALONE, IN CONSULTATION WITH YOUR HEALTH CARE PROVIDER.