MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT July 6, 2007 at 9: 28 AM EST But a U. S. researcher is advancing a controversial hypothesis: that autism is related to vitamin D deficiency during fetal development and early childhood. The evidence for such a link is circumstantial…

But is that true “if vaccines are doing their jobs, those of us who don’t vaccinate aren’t doing any harm to those who get them.”

Are we safe to assume this?
And do we stop vaccinating until the studies are conducted? I would say “no/no”, but that is my best guess. I claim no authority.

Commercials on television have to be up front with documentation, we should expect the same with vaccines that are mandatory if we want our children to go to school or participate in sports, or go to camp, or daycare, etc.

In my day we complied or our kids stayed home. I never had a problem doing this either but I did vaccinate them, in part, to put the needs of others ahead of our own needs but I expected others to pull their weight too. The good old days, were they good? Have the adjuvants changed over the years? When were they introduced into the vaccines by year? Did the numbers of autism syndromes disorders actually increase exponentially with the population increase? Did more awareness account for the rise (or fall)? If the children who develop the syndrome for purportedly a vaccine receive, chelation therapy, for lack of a better way to put this type of detox, do they recover? If there is a treatment, could parents then find themselves without a choice?

As for us, as far as being forced into disobedience, we will not cross that line unless there is a compelling reason. We haven’t been faced with that situation.

Kids now are in day care, in school at an earlier age, they come in contact with each other more at an age when hygiene probably isn’t at its best. They share toys, put things in their mouths, sneeze on each other.

Unvaccinated? What a choice.

Do we want our unvaccinated children and grandchildren walking around with all the other unvaccinated children? Are we THAT afraid of the ingredients that we want to allow these serious childhood illnesses to come back in full force? And they will.

While we are at all of this we also have not been good stewards with antibiotics, allowing for more resistance to them as a result of starting courses of treatment and not completing them, and over prescribing. Now, physicians are holding back on their use. When our children do become ill and develop secondary infections from childhood illnesses that we have allowed to become rampant because we don’t vaccinate as much, referring to a future time, will our arsenal of antibiotics even work?

We may have to tough out these old fashioned illnesses the old fashioned way.

It seems that our world is more complicated than we thought and we didn’t anticipate some of these rebound effects. I still trust that God is in control, old fashioned as that may sound. I want to make wise decisions for all concerned.

The increased hype (either way) can and will impact many people.

Based on the first-hand information that I have, I trust vaccines up to my flu shot a few weeks ago. I have also had three pneumovax in my life and my husband has also. No problems that we can tell so far, so far, so far, so far.

Sorry, I couldn’t resist a little levity.

One other question that I think about…

Do we fuel viral antigenic drift by not vaccinating?
It would make sense to me that the more potential “mixing bowls” of unvaccinated individuals walking around the more opportunity for circulating viruses to encounter each other as people are co-infected with what is in the environment. A question from possibly some faulty understanding of the science, but it is what I think about.

It seems to me that we need to keep in mind the entire picture of what is ahead of us in this world when we consider what we do. Not that we haven’t done that in the past, and it is inevitable that we won’t see all of the repercussions but when something is wrong we should admit it and correct it.

People are afraid of vaccines and this may be a needless over-reaction because of the relatively rare occurrence of the disorder. One child harmed is too many, and a heartbreak to be sure. Does the question also come down to the amount of potential harm?

If 10 people will be harmed by approach A and 100 people will be harmed by approach B, which approach do we take, making allowances for those who are truly convinced that approach B is wrong, but there are repercussions, though not “punishment”, for opting out. I think that this is the situation that we have now.

There always should be a choice, but there has to be more information and honest discussion.

As a parents with grown children I am doing more to encourage them to reason through these great debates.

Moral and ethical considerations will increase, I suspect, when the world is infused with science and technology.

These adults will be taking the helm soon enough.

And I just thought of one more question…

Those who do not vaccinate, are they potentially causing harm to the aging population who cannot vaccinate any longer but have been lifelong users of vaccines. As we age our immunity wanes putting again at some risk for childhood diseases. Do we owe something to the older generation?

I think that when we come right down to it the question becomes, do the rights of a few outweigh the rights of the many? And without knowing what is in the vaccines, do we have a right to demand to know? I think “no/yeah”

The older I get the more I question what “rights” I can truly claim.

So I just keep asking questions.