Hello –––––,
Thank you for the response! I don't know if I'll be able to get this published since trying to put any information out there that is not completely pro-vaccine is near impossible.
However all the data I present in this piece is mined the same way I pull data for any research piece- carefully culling from reputable and documented sources, from experts
like Dr. Aaby, who I quote here, and who is one of the most highly respected vaccine scientists in the world. If editors had to be experts on every piece they ran, only niche
magazines would exist, instead of magazines and publications which publish journalism that presents research in an interesting way. I hope in the future you will reconsider
placing some well-researched pieces about both the benefits and concerns of vaccines, for I believe deeply that journalism is at its finest and most crucial place in history when
it illuminates subjects that are silenced, difficult and important.
Thank you,
Maggie Ethridge
From:
Sent: Monday 10:21 AM
To: Maggie
Subject: Re: Freelance Pitch: SB-277
Sent: Monday 10:21 AM
To: Maggie
Subject: Re: Freelance Pitch: SB-277
Hey Maggie, thanks for following up. We're going to pass on this—we tend to steer clear of the vaccine debate since none of our editors on staff feel qualified to pass medical judgements.
Best,
Meredith
_________________________________________________________________________________
On Mon 1:14 PM, Maggie <beezus74@hotmail.com> wrote:
Hello ____,
Good morning! I am wondering if you had a chance to review my below pitch and attached piece. I'm happy to answer any questions.Thank you,
Maggie
After the third or fourth refusal to even consider publishing something that is not entirely pro-vaccine, I am publishing the below piece myself.
SB-277
“There are movements in almost every state to mandate
vaccines and rob parents of their constitutional rights. Parents must retain
the right to be informed first, and then consent to medical treatment for their
children free of coercion, manipulation or fear of Government intrusion.
I have two beautiful granddaughters, both vaccinated, I
vaccinated all three of my children…but I made the decision, not the State.
The current voluntary vaccination program is already proven
effective at protecting Californians against life threatening complications and
death associated with vaccine preventable illnesses.
There is no medically defined epidemic in or near California
that warrants such legislation. The language of California Senate Bill 277
gives the government unlimited power to add new vaccines to the currently
mandated school entry immunization battery without hearing or oversight, and
removes the right of parental objection based upon sincerely held religious or
personal beliefs.
I fight against Federal Preemption… I fight against
Government loop holes for polluters… I fight against the use of the Public
Drinking Water systems as medical dispensaries…and therefore, in order to be
consistent… I am against Government mandated medical decisions for my children.”
-Erin Brockovich on SB 277
When There is Risk, There Must Be Choice
SB 277 is a bill that passed June 30, 2015 which enforces
mandatory vaccinations for all children attending public and private school,
child care center or nursery, family day care or development center in
California. Introduced by Senators Pan and Allen, this bill erases parents's
right to informed medical consent in order to be permitted to participate in
what is legally every child's right: a free public education.
It was the small measles outbreak stemming from a California
Disneyland that launched SB 277. Headlines across media channels were
unavoidably hyperbolic: here's one from The Washington Post: Disneyland
Measles Outbreak Strikes In Unvaccinated Hotbeds. US Measles Outbreak
Reaches Critical Point- that one from CNBC. And anti-vaxxers ( that lumpy,
lazy term ) are even to blame for Mickey Mouse being Stricken With Measles,
according to Mother Jones. Or this: Vaccine Deniers Go To Disneyland, It's
Pure Mayhem, from Healthline.
Collecting hell in a hand-basket from these headlines, we
find the words: strikes, hotbeds, critical, stricken, and mayhem. These words
for a disease that sickened just over 200 people and ended in zero deaths. The
measles vaccine has been a life saver. Yet the headlines act as if the small
portion of unvaccinated or delayed vaccinators were single handedly bringing something
akin to ebola directly at our doorstep. The progoganda was swift and effective
in whipping up fear:
Measles in California.
Measles possibly spreading in hotbeds, striking mayhem.
Will anyone die?
We have to act now, and create a law, forcing parents to
vaccinate their children in order for their children to obtain a free
educuation.
The online magazine SafeBee
wrote what I saw repeatedly in my Facebook feed: "The bottom line is that
children or adults shouldn't have to die from the measles in the U.S." And
despite the fact that California's current vaccination schedule is working, and
no children nor adults did die from the measles, SB 277 was created- as
the answer to a problem that didn't exist, but a fear that most certainly did.*
The basis for SB 277 is coercion, via the removal of a
right (the right to a free public education) unless following the vaccination
schedule set out. The American Medical Association speaks to coercion as
'threatening or causing harm through physical or mental suffering'. Guidelines
from the AMA supports patient rights, and condemn the use of legal intervention
to force compliance with treatment.
Forbes, when
summing up the core message of a bill like SB 277, wrote "Want to send
your kid to school? Make sure he gets his shots, or have a very, very, very
good reason not to have." And there is the core problem with this
bill, and what should be every parent's most pressing concern: who gets to
decide what a 'very, very, very good reason' is, and is it legal that if you-
the parent- strongly disagree with a doctor who concludes your reason is not
one of the very, very, very good reasons, you have to choose between
allowing your child to have a vaccination that you believe may seriously harm
your child, or losing your child's right to a free education?
SB 277 is coercive, as home-schooling or charter school is
not a viable option for most parents, for a variety of reasons, including
financial. That a parent who is being forced to choose between their child's
education and a vaccine that they believe will seriously harm their child is
experiencing 'mental suffering' can be proven through the stories of invidual
families, families like the Aquinos.
Elizabeth Aquino is a Los Angeles mother of three and the
author of the memoir Hope For A Sea Change, the chronicle of
her daughter Sophie’s idiopathic seizure disorder that she- and her current
pediatrician- believe was triggered by her initial DPT shot in March of 1995
when Sophie was two months old, and then exacerbated by additional vaccinations
at four and five months.
“Our daughter has had refractory epilepsy and severe
developmental disability and is now 20 years old. She requires 24 hour care, is
non-verbal, incontinent and is completely dependent on caregivers. She has been
on 22 different medications and only recently found partial relief from daily
seizures with cannabis oil. Her brothers, now 14 and 17, have been partially
vaccinated in the last two years. As a seasoned parent of a child with severe
special healthcare needs, I am appalled at the coercive nature of SB277 and
believe emphatically that medical decision-making should be shared by caregivers
and their pediatricians. I do not believe that my child should be the
"rare" sacrifice for the "greater" public, and we need more
and better research on current vaccine policy and scheduling.”
Luckily for the Mrs. Aquino, she is able to obtain exemptions
for her sons. However, another doctor may not have signed off on this
exemption, as Sophie was never proven to be vaccine injured through the Vaccine
Injury Compensation Funds courts- courts that Mrs. and Mr. Aquino didn’t even
know existed at the time of Sophie’s decline.
Many doctors would not allow exemptions without a specific
diagnosis for the child in question, and this is the concern of D.K., a San
Diego mother of two young boys. Her oldest son, now four, was fully vaccinated
at two years old. He was struggling with severe aggression, sensory issues,
hyperactivity, and inability to focus- despite the family’s healthy eating and
lifestyle, which included strict media restrictions and plenty of outside play.
After becoming increasingly concerned about the causation
behind her son’s health issues, D.K. began researching the vaccines that her
son had received, and decided to abstain from further vaccinations. She was
able to obtain an exemption for her older son despite lacking a clear diagnosis
for his health issues, which have included severe sensitivities to environment
and food, and have ended with D.K. implimenting the Fiengold diet for her son
(a popular diet that claims to address various health ailments)
She explains, “If a single M&M caused a three day
reaction, what issues might vaccine cause? Perhaps already had? Considering the
amount of vigilance required for us to a achieve a livable level of calm in our
home, I decided not to risk an irreversible cascade of more issues. I know and have seen over and over again that
chemicals and certain preservatives cause neurological and behavioral issues
for my son, and I know vaccines contain those same chemicals and preservatives.
How can I knowingly cause him harm?
Because of the issues with my first son, I have not
vaccinated my second son per schedule. He has exactly none of the issues of my
first born. My family, including me, has a history of autoimmune disease.
Perhaps our immune systems react in a way that most normal kids don't? I am not
sure what the answers are, but I do know that I vehemently disagree with the
passage of SB277. I believe, thankfully, very few family need access to
personal exemptions, but it is extremely important for those families that
desperately do, to retain those rights. I know my child best, and as I respect
the medical profession, they are partners in my child's health, not the
directors.
To deny my {youngest} child's right to a free public education in order to force blanket vaccinate,
despite having legitimate concerns based on health history and a family history
of autoimmune issues, is frankly shocking.”
Proponents for the SB 277 bill cite that fear of 'incredibly
rare' vaccine side effects should not be reason to partially vaccinate or use a
delayed schedule, stating that as you use a seatbelt, so you should use
vaccines they way you are told. This analogy is flawed for two reasons: the
long-term side effects of vaccines (including sex-specific
effects) are not researched and are unknown due to both lack of research
and lack of time passing since the advent of the U.S. current vaccination
schedule, and the the number of children who are reported as vaccine injured do
not accurately reflect the actual number of children injured, due to the
incredibly arduous and time consuming process- years, with endless paperwork
and documentation and burden of proof in court- of vaccine court, all this for parents in the
midst of struggling with their child's sudden and totally devastating health
crisis. As you'd imagine, many parents never follow through with this process,
and the stories of ones who do- even successfully- allow a glimpse into how
unacceptably awful and lengthy the process is.
In a Yahoo
article profiling a series of parents with vaccine injuries, the Lawson
family, whose baby daughter was vaccine injured after the MMRV shot, spent four
years in vaccine court before being awarded $1.5 million dollars. A must-read
article in The New York Times, written in 2011 yet perfectly relevant,
highlights the disasters of our current vaccine court. The family featured in
the beginning of the piece had allowed their baby, Jeffery, to have a
precautionary brain scan due to a car accident, and the MRI results were
normal. Days later, Jeffery had the DPT vaccine. Days after this, he began
seizing. When new MRI’s were done, there was blackness where once there had
been the gray matter of his brain. Jeffery’s family went through the vaccine
court under the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and their claim took eleven years
to resolve.
Jeffery and family were awarded $7 million dollars in cash
and medical care, although it then took another three years for the family to
receive the funds.
The Associated Press did an analysis of 14,500 cases in the
vaccine court, conducted over a 100 interviews, and read hundreds of decisions
made in the vaccine court. Their findings were a collection of serious failures
and flaws in the vaccine court and compensation system, including the fact that
many of the lawyers hired by the government to argue vaccine injury claims have
ties to the pharmacutical industry, and this: “Lawmakers designed vaccine court
to favor payouts, but the government fights legitimate claims and fails its
obligation to publicize the court, worried that if they concede a vaccine
caused harm, the public will react by skipping shots.”
Dr. Peter Aaby is a Danish vaccine scientist who heads the Bandim Health Project . This organization,
located in Guinea-Bisseau, is deeply respected world-wide for their
unprecedented body of research on the non-specific effects of vaccines, or NSE.
The non specific effects of vaccines refers to effects on human beings from
vaccines other than simply preventing the disease they are intended to do. Dr. Aaby speaks and presents at WHO
conferences and other vaccine research conferences, and has spent the large
part of the last 30 years in Africa researching vaccines. All of his important
research is available on line, in the Journal Of American Medical
Association as well as categorized in the Bandim Health Project. A
book which collects the body of research is also available on the website for
free. He is one of the only scientists in the world researching the non-specific
effects of vaccines, and his research shows that there are both surprisingly
negative and positive effects of various vaccines, influenced by the sex
of the child as well as the order in which the vaccines are allocated.
For example, his research finds that giving the measles
vaccine- the singular vaccine- decreases overall cause of death for children.
His work also found that when you give the DTP in conjunction with the measles,
the result is the exact opposite- in fact, the death rate
soars, especially in females. The implications for the U.S. vaccine
schedule are clear: we don't know what the long term effects of our vaccine schedule
are; we are not funding research to find out.
In the comprehensive BBB series, The Vaccine Detectives, Dr.
Aaby’s historical research on the measles and DPT vaccine are chronicled. The
series includes a number of interviews with vaccine scientists working at the
time for WHO- the World Health Organization- as well as scientists working with
Dr. Aaby’s team at the time. When asked why they believe the critical and scary
research conclusions on the harm of the DPT and measles scheduling was not
being actively pursued with follow up research by WHO, they responded with the
same deduction the AP report in the New York Times article came to: that the
scientific community was afraid of revealing or pursuing the information. Why?
Because people might not vaccinate.
The then Dr. Mulholland- now a professor working for the
London School of Hygiene, a widely respected institution- said “It’s
worrying…some years ago I did a calculation of what this could mean in terms of
mortality, locally, and it’s quite alarming. Why is it that the international
community is sitting on their hands and ignoring this, that’s a good question.”
The work Dr. Aaby is doing- in addition to the answers it is
providing- shines a light on all the missing answers, the facts we do not know
about vaccinations’s long term effects on children's mortality and health.
Another concern that non-vaccinating, partially vaccinating
or delayed vaccinating parents have is the question of whether the trace
amounts of mercury in vaccines are causing health problems in children. The
movie Trace Amounts highlights one
man's journey with a vaccine injury that led him to investigate the trace
amounts of mercury that remain in vaccines, and campaign for their removal. The
are scientists who speak aggressively about this concern, such as Suzanne
Humphries. Her short
video explaining the concerns about the trace amount of mercury in vaccines
is edifying.
Jennifer Margulis, Ph.D, Co-Chair of Oregonians for Medical
Freedom and the author of Your Baby, Your Way, writes on her website:
"According to research published
in the Journal of Human Toxicology, America has the most
aggressive infant childhood vaccination schedule in the world, and much poorer
infant health outcomes compared to countries with fewer
vaccines. Vaccines are so powerful, with so many long term unknowns, that only a
parent can make this serious choice for their child, and it is is illegal for a
parent to be coerced into compliance with threat of loss of public
education."
Returning to the commonly used seatbelt analogy, we see that
in forcing parents to vaccinate their children on the current U.S. schedule, we
are asking them to disregard all their concerns- including, but not limited to,
the ones I’ve illuminated above- for their child’s health and comply, or lose
their child’s right to public education. We are not asking people the
equivelant of ‘put on a seatbelt’- an
action that is almost universally accepted as safe and greatly reducing harm in
the event of a car accident, accidents which are unfortunately common.
Instead, we are asking people to force an action-
vaccination on the U.S. schedule- on their child that could have serious,
negative effects on their child’s health. An action which has almost no
research on the long-term, nonspecific effects on health, in order to reduce
the chances of getting diseases, not all of which are deadly in modern first
world countries (such as measles), nor proven harmful ( such as chickenpox);
we are asking parents to take what they perceive is a large health risk to
their child- parents like D.K.- for which research is not being conducted in
the U.S. to allay these points of concern. This is a different discussion all
together from debating if vaccines work. Like Dr. Aaby, the majority of parents
I know are not concerned about the overall efficency of vaccines, but are instead concerned with the long-term non-specific effects.
The burden is on the state to provide the least restrictive
measure possible to protect all children, and the burden of proof that this
bill was necessary has not been met. In fact, vaccination rates in California
are over the necessary percentage for herd immunity. Children with communicable
diseases attend public school, protected by the ADA-the Americans With
Disabilities Act- with strict laws that put the onus on the school system and
physicians to handle the disease, including having a physician access the risk
to determine how to avoid transmission. Yet a child who is perfectly healthy
and never left the U.S. would not be able to attend school because they do not
have the chickenpox vaccine.
Another concern those against SB 277 have is the machine
behind the bill: money. This recent
article in The Sacremento Bee highlights the facts:
"Pharmaceutical companies and their trade groups gave more than $2 million
to current members of the Legislature in 2013-2014, about 2 percent of the
total raised, records show. Nine of the top 20 recipients are either
legislative leaders or serve on either the Assembly or Senate health
committees.
Receiving more than $95,000, the top recipient of industry
campaign cash is Sen. Richard Pan, a Sacramento Democrat and doctor who is
carrying the vaccine bill." Senator Pan, who introduced SB 277.
Who led and pushed the creation of this bill? Not parents.
Not even parent's representatives. Pharmacutical lobbyists created SB 277.
And then, we come to number eleven in SB 277, the slipshod
wording allowing the dam to burst when it may. What diseases must your child be
immunized against, according to SB 277? The bill lists ten, and then, this:
(11) Any other disease deemed appropriate by the
department, taking into consideration the recommendations of the Advisory
Committee on Immunization Practices of the US Department of Health and Human
Services, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Academy of
Family Physicians.
Any vaccine, all vaccines, can be added to this bill.
Not only are there immediate problems with SB 277, but the
bill poses serious questions for the future with no current answer. What
measures will the state take to ensure that a child without the full demanded
vaccination count does not attend public school? Will they physically pull
children out of class if they become behind in their shots? What will the
consequences be to parents who bring their child to school? What are the
physician's specific standards of approval required to be to allow for partial
or delayed vaccination? Who is creating oversight on these physicians? Who will
advocate for parental rights when the decisions are debated?
It is not justifiable, neither through statistics of
vaccinations rates for California, nor is it legal for a child being denied a
spot in public school because they are missing a vaccine, or on a delayed
schedule. And it wasn't necessary.
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