[See comment by Dr Buchwald: "The reason vaccinations are promoted with such intensity is to prevent people from realising that vaccines do not protect and also in the event of an outbreak or an epidemic the vaccinated are as much at risk of becoming infected as the unvaccinated. The truth can be kept hidden if people's vaccination status remains unknown and if everyone is vaccinated, making a comparison with unvaccinated people impossible. This is also the real reason for the relentless push to vaccinate as many children as possible."-- Dr Buchwald (The Decline of Tuberculosis despite "Protective" Vaccination by Dr. Gerhard Buchwald M.D. p101)]
[NVIC] Taking Away Vaccine Exemptions
National Vaccine Information Center Newsletter
e-NEWS
October 11, 2006
:: <#leftarticle1>Nonmedical Exemptions to School Immunization Requirements
:: <#rightarticle1>Vaccine exemptions may boost whooping cough cases
:: <#rightarticle2>Whooping cough cases on the rise
"Permitting personal belief exemptions and easily granting exemptions are
associated with higher and increasing nonmedical US exemption rates. State
policies granting personal belief exemptions and states that easily grant
exemptions are associated with increased pertussis incidence. States should
examine their exemption policies to ensure control of pertussis and other
vaccine-preventable diseases. " - JAMA, October 11, 2006
"Concerns about vaccine safety seem to be the main reason parents claim
such exemptions, Salmon told Reuters Health. In an earlier study, he and
his colleagues found that 69 percent of parents who sought exemptions did
so because they feared vaccination did more harm than the diseases it
prevents. Salmon and his colleagues argue that states should have
"administrative controls" that make non-medical exemptions more difficult
to obtain. This, Salmon said, could look something like the process of
becoming a conscientious objector to the draft. Parents would apply for an
exemption and have to show a "strongly held belief" against vaccines, he
explained. Then the government would either have to demonstrate an
"overwhelming need" for universal vaccination or grant the exemption. " -
Amy Norton, Reuter's Health
"Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine
Information Center in Virginia, said exemptions allow people to make
choices about health care for themselves and their children. In some cases,
risks are real and science has not caught up with vaccine policy, she said.
"The principle of informed consent is, you're able to make a voluntary
decision. It applies to every other medical intervention," Fisher said." -
Misti Crane, Columbus Dispatch
Barbara Loe Fisher Commentary:
Are more American citizens standing up for their right to make voluntary,
informed decisions about vaccination which do not conform to
one-size-fits-all forced vaccination policies endosed by CDC officials and
the utilitarians at Johns Hopkins? Apparently they are and it is making the
government and industry funded M.D./Ph.D./MPH employees at the CDC, Johns
Hopkins and other academic institutions determined to take away all
exemptions to vaccination except those they and their colleagues personally
grant to citizens.
In the past 25 years, as the CDC has increased the numbers of vaccines
recommended for "universal use" by all children from 23 doses of 7 vaccines
to 48 doses of 14 vaccines by age six, more and more children have been
getting sick and regressing physically, mentally and emotionally after
vaccination. In the past two decades, there has been a tripling of the
numbers of highly vaccinated children who are now chronically ill and
disabled and suffering with learning disabilities, ADHD, asthma, diabetes,
and autism. America's children are in the middle of a chronic disease and
disability epidemic and the only solution government health officials and
professors of public health offer is to suggest ways to force more vaccines
on sick children.
The most common reason that parents exercise a philosophical or
conscientious belief exemption to vaccination for a child is because the
child or a close relative has a history of vaccine reactions and health
deterioration after previous vaccinations. Unfortunately, in the past two
decades, government health officials have so severely restricted the
medical criteria for contraindications to vaccination that few individuals
qualify. Doctors who write medical exemptions which do not fit the strict
federal government criteria, are often second-guessed and harrrased by
state government health officials. Because medical exemptions to
vaccination have become virtually non-existent, the only exemptions
available to parents acting to protect their children from vaccine injury
and death is the religious and philosphical exemption.
What is becoming more evident to more parents is that unvaccinated or
partially vaccinated children move through illness and heal more quickly
and are getting better grades in school because they do not have difficulty
concentrating or learning like their more sickly, lower functioning highly
vaccinated classmates. Empirical evidence and personal experience always
trumps methodologically flawed scientific studies and the words and actions
of government health officials employing strong-arm tactics to force their
ideology on others.
The tragedy of forced vaccination policies is that the immoral utilitarian
rationale is used to justify human rights abuses while distorting the truth
about what constitutes good individual and public health. If everybody is
forced to get vaccinated, then there can be no comparison of the long term
health of those highly vaccinated to those who receive fewer or no
vaccines. Public health officials inside and outside of government, along
with their colleagues in the pharmaceutical industry, have a lot of
prestige, power and money to lose if the health differences between the
highly vaccinated and unvaccinated ever become widely known. That is one
reason why they continue are pushing so hard to elminate all exemptions to
one-size-fits-all mandatory vaccination laws.
Nonmedical Exemptions to School Immunization Requirements
Secular Trends and Association of State Policies With Pertussis Incidence
JAMA
Vol. 296 No. 14, October 11, 2006
Saad B. Omer, MBBS, MPH; William K. Y. Pan, DrPH, MS, MPH; Neal A. Halsey,
MD; Shannon Stokley, MPH; Lawrence H. Moulton, PhD; Ann Marie Navar, MHS;
Mathew Pierce, JD, MPH; Daniel A. Salmon, PhD, MPH
Context School immunization requirements have played a major role in
controlling vaccine- preventable diseases in the United States. Most states
offer nonmedical exemptions to school requirements (religious or personal
belief). Exemptors are at increased risk of acquiring and transmitting
disease. The role of exemption policies may be especially important for
pertussis, which is endemic in the United States.
Objective To determine if (1) the rates of nonmedical exemptions differ
and have been increasing in states that offer only religious vs personal
belief exemptions; (2) the rates of nonmedical exemptions differ and have
been increasing in states that have easy vs medium and easy vs difficult
processes for obtaining exemptions; and (3) pertussis incidence is
associated with policies of granting personal belief exemptions, ease of
obtaining exemptions, and acceptance of parental signature as sufficient
proof of compliance with school immunization requirements.
Design, Setting, and Participants We analyzed 1991 through 2004 state-level
rates of nonmedical exemptions at school entry and 1986 through 2004
pertussis incidence data for individuals aged 18 years or younger.
Main Outcome Measures State-level exemption rates and pertussis incidence.
Results From 2001 through 2004, states that permitted personal belief
exemptions had higher nonmedical exemption rates than states that offered
only religious exemptions, and states that easily granted exemptions had
higher nonmedical exemption rates in 2002 through 2003 compared with states
with medium and difficult exemption processes. The mean exemption rate
increased an average of 6% per year, from 0.99% in 1991 to 2.54% in 2004,
among states that offered personal belief exemptions. In states that easily
granted exemptions, the rate increased 5% per year, from 1.26% in 1991 to
2.51% in 2004. No statistically significant change was seen in states that
offered only religious exemptions or that had medium and difficult
exemption processes. In multivariate analyses adjusting for demographics,
easier granting of exemptions (incidence rate ratio = 1.53; 95% confidence
interval, 1.10-2.14) and availability of personal belief exemptions
(incidence rate ratio = 1.48; 95% confidence interval, 1.03-2.13) were
associated with increased pertussis incidence.
Conclusions Permitting personal belief exemptions and easily granting
exemptions are associated with higher and increasing nonmedical US
exemption rates. State policies granting personal belief exemptions and
states that easily grant exemptions are associated with increased pertussis
incidence. States should examine their exemption policies to ensure control
of pertussis and other vaccine-preventable diseases.
Author Affiliations: Department of International Health (Drs Omer, Pan,
Halsey, Moulton, and Salmon, Ms Navar, and Mr Pierce), Institute for
Vaccine Safety (Drs Omer, Halsey, Moulton, and Salmon, and Ms Navar), Johns
Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Md; National Center
for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, Atlanta, Ga (Ms Stokley); Department of Epidemiology and Health
Policy Research, College of Medicine, University of Florida, Gainesville
(Dr Salmon); and School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC (Ms Navar
Vaccine exemptions may boost whooping cough cases
Reuters Health
Wed Oct 11, 2006 2:39 PM BST
By Amy Norton
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - State laws that make it easy for parents to opt
out of vaccinating their children may be contributing to outbreaks of
whooping cough, researchers reported Tuesday.
In an analysis of U.S. vaccine-exemption laws, investigators found higher
rates of whooping cough in states where parents can refuse to vaccinate
their child due to "personal beliefs."
The disease rate in these states was about 50 percent higher than it was in
states that only allowed exemptions for medical reasons and religious
beliefs, the researchers report in the Journal of the American Medical
Association.
The same was true of states with "easy" exemption procedures, according to
the study authors, led by Saad B. Omer of Johns Hopkins University in
Baltimore.
This includes states such as California, where parents can take a
personal-belief exemption by simply signing a school immunization form.
Other states, such as Maryland, officially allow only religious exemptions;
but again, parents have only to sign a form, making it likely that many
take the exemption for personal reasons.
The elevated rates of whooping cough in these states point to the "very
real consequences" of relaxing vaccination requirements, Omer said in a
statement.
Also known as pertussis, whooping cough is a highly contagious bacterial
infection of the respiratory system that causes fits of severe coughing and
breathing difficulties -- often with a distinctive "whoop" sound on
inhalation. People of any age can become infected, but it's most dangerous,
and potentially fatal, in babies and young children.
Childhood vaccination with the combined diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis
vaccine can prevent whooping cough, but the rate of infection in the U.S.
has been climbing in recent years.
This trend is one reason the current study was undertaken, said Dr. Daniel
A. Salmon, an associate professor of epidemiology at the University of
Florida College of Medicine and the study's senior author.
All U.S. states require children entering school to have proof they've
received standard vaccinations, though all also grant exemptions for
medical reasons. In addition, nearly all states also allow exemptions for
religious beliefs, while 19 grant waivers for personal beliefs.
In these latter states, more and more parents have been opting out of
vaccination in recent years, Salmon and his colleagues found. On average,
the rate of non-medical exemptions grew by 6 percent per year between 1991
and 2004.
Concerns about vaccine safety seem to be the main reason parents claim such
exemptions, Salmon told Reuters Health. In an earlier study, he and his
colleagues found that 69 percent of parents who sought exemptions did so
because they feared vaccination did more harm than the diseases it prevents.
In part, such concerns stem from the proposed link between the
measles/mumps/rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism -- a link that a number of
international studies have since refuted.
Salmon and his colleagues argue that states should have "administrative
controls" that make non- medical exemptions more difficult to obtain. This,
Salmon said, could look something like the process of becoming a
conscientious objector to the draft.
Parents would apply for an exemption and have to show a "strongly held
belief" against vaccines, he explained. Then the government would either
have to demonstrate an "overwhelming need" for universal vaccination or
grant the exemption.
SOURCE: Journal of the American Medical Association, October 11, 2006.
Whooping cough cases on the rise
The Columbus Dispatch, OH
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
By Misti Crane
States that make it easy for parents to send their kids to school without
vaccines have more whooping-cough cases and should reconsider their
policies, according to the authors of a study in today's Journal of the
American Medical Association.
Rates of whooping cough, formally known as pertussis, were twice as high in
states that allowed people to opt out for nonmedical, nonreligious reasons,
the researchers found.
Last year, 1,094 pertussis cases were reported in Ohio, up from 175 a
decade earlier.
But Ohio's numbers don't appear to be linked to a high number of parents
opting not to vaccinate.
The percentage of Ohio children whose parents ask for exemptions is
consistently below 1 percent, said Amy Bashforth, interim immunization
program manager for the Ohio Department of Health.
In Ohio, parents can either send an immunization record to the school
district or provide a written statement describing why they want to opt
out, which means explaining their "reasons of conscience," including
religious objections.
For the 2005-06 school year, 0.6 percent of kindergarten students were
granted exemptions for reasons of conscience and 0.2 percent for medical
reasons.
All states allow exemptions for medical reasons, 48 for religious beliefs
and 19 for personal beliefs.
The researchers who conducted the study found that overall, states that
allow people to opt out for personal beliefs saw an increase in exemption
rates from 0.99 percent in 1991 to 2.54 percent in 2004.
Numbers of whooping-cough cases have increased around the country and have
been attributed to various things, including better disease reporting by
doctors and more cases among adolescents and adults whose vaccinations have
worn off, Bashforth said.
Dr. Dennis Cunningham, an infectious-disease specialist at Children's
Hospital, said he'd like to see no exemptions for personal beliefs.
"Why should only some children get the vaccine? " he said.
Yesterday, Cunningham recalled a 7-month-old girl who spent a week in the
hospital last year with the disease. Her parents didn't believe in
vaccination, he said.
Many parents who choose not to vaccinate are convinced that vaccines can
cause harm, including autism, he said, adding that no major medical
organizations recognize a link.
"It's such a dead horse," he said. "But it's like politics and religion,
you 're probably not going to sway the other side."
Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine
Information Center in Virginia, said exemptions allow people to make
choices about health care for themselves and their children.
In some cases, risks are real and science has not caught up with vaccine
policy, she said.
"The priciple of informed consent is, you're able to make a voluntary
decision. It applies to every other medical intervention," Fisher said.
Diane Peterson, associate director of the Immunization Action Coalition in
Minnesota, said she's always felt that exemptions are reasonable as long as
they aren't too easy.
When she worked for that state's health department, she thought their
policy of requiring a signed and notarized statement was good.
"I thought it was quite workable if it was something that was enforceable,"
Peterson said.
mcrane@dispatch.com
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