I should have noted this earlier, but the last month has been pretty busy. Turns out that the original research used to support the idea that vaccinations cause autism was based on falsified data.
That’s right. Made up out of whole cloth.
I feel tremendous empathy for the health-care professionals in places like the UK and Minnesota, where childhood diseases are making a comeback due to the idiocy of anti-vaccinators.
In case you wondered why we vaccinate, Jim McDonald has a whole list of reasons:
- Hepatitis B
- Polio
- Diptheria
- Pertussis
- Tetanus
- Haemophilus influenzae type B
- Measles
- Mumps
- Rubella
- Chicken Pox
You may not even have heard of these diseases, because we were this close to wiping them out. Now, thanks to a few noisy idiots, you may come accross them all to often in the future.
On tiny little gravestones.
And not only was it made up, it was unethical as well.
That being said, some researchers still have some questions about vaccines and autism; not about mercury, that’s been disproven quite conclusively. But there are some questions about cross-reactivity between some vaccine proteins and neural tissue that can set up an autoimmune reaction in the brain; especially with the measles vaccine. That being said, the epidemilogical picture is one of a complex disorder with a number of contributing factors. Unfortunately, it’s hard to discuss these sorts of ideas in the highly polarized climate that is the vaccine/autism debate.
And frankly, give me a vaccine over small pox any day. And measles, too, for that matter.