Jenny McCarthy and Holly Robinson Peete speak out

Thanks to Kate, who posted a comment leading to this information on a recent Oprah Winfrey Show. Maybe if we can get enough Hollywood in the mix something may change regarding vaccinations.

From an article recapping Oprah's interview with Hollywood mothers Jenny McCarthy and Holly Robinson Peete:

In recent years, the number of children diagnosed with autism has risen from 1 in every 500 children to 1 in 150—and science has not discovered a reason why. Jenny says she believes that childhood vaccinations may play a part. "What number will it take for people just to start listening to what the mothers of children who have seen autism have been saying for years, which is, 'We vaccinated our baby and something happened."

Jenny says even before Evan received his vaccines, she tried to talk to her pediatrician about it. "Right before his MMR shot, I said to the doctor, 'I have a very bad feeling about this shot. This is the autism shot, isn't it?' And he said, 'No, that is ridiculous. It is a mother's desperate attempt to blame something,' and he swore at me, and then the nurse gave [Evan] the shot," she says. "And I remember going, 'Oh, God, I hope he's right.' And soon thereafter—boom—the soul's gone from his eyes."

Despite her belief, Jenny says she is not against vaccines. "I am all for them, but there needs to be a safer vaccine schedule. There needs to be something done. The fact that the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] acts as if these vaccines are one size fits all is just crazy to me," she says. "People need to start listening to what the moms have been saying."

The recap goes on to say:

We contacted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about whether there is a link between autism and vaccines and they gave us the following statement:

"CDC places a high priority on vaccine safety and the integrity and credibility of its vaccine safety research. This commitment not only stems from our scientific and medical dedication, it is also personal—for most of us who work at CDC are also parents and grandparents. And as such, we too, have high levels of personal interest and concern in the health and safety of children, families and communities. We simply don't know what causes most cases of autism, but we're doing everything we can to find out. The vast majority of science to date does not support an association between thimerosal in vaccines and autism. But we are currently conducting additional studies to further determine what role, if any, thimerosal in vaccines may play in the development of autism. It is important to remember, vaccines protect and save lives. Vaccines protect infants, children and adults from the unnecessary harm and premature death caused by vaccine-preventable diseases."

Read more of this article here.

The CDC is short sited to reference a concern with only a link between thimerosal and vaccines. This has been the primary debate exposed in the public venue regarding vaccines, but there are many other possibilities as to why vaccines may be leading to autism spectrum disorders among other serious effects. As Tim O'Shea writes in The Sanctity of Human Blood:

This fragile, unknown universe within the forming infant brain is exceedingly delicate. It is literally struggling its way into existence. If left to itself for the first two years, nature pulls most of us through. But here's the problem. We've stopped leaving the brain to itself, in this most critical period. First with the additives in vaccines like aluminum, mercury, formaldehyde, phenol, radiator fluids - proven beyond controversy to be neurotoxic (nerve-destroying.) [(16) Blaylock] As these toxins are allowed to freely circulate in the blood environment of the brain, nerve cells are killed. Half-formed nerve cells stop forming. Connectors never get made. Worse, the damage is random, because every infant brain is unique, developing at its own pace, like flowers in a field. There is no predicting when the damage will show up. Maybe the child drops dead, or goes into shock, or turns autistic 2 weeks later, or can't learn to read at age 5, or has "ADD" in adolescence, or Parkinson's at 28, or any other neurologic disorder. Or maybe is simply a little dumber than his parents. Over and over and over.

Returning to the Oprah article once more:

Holly says the CDC's statement about vaccinations has given her hope that parents and medical professionals can lay down their arms and open the lines of communication. "I would just say to the pediatricians, listen to [mothers] sometimes and give us a little bit more respect," Holly says. "Our gut is really dead on."

It's true. Follow your gut. Do the research and don't be afraid to stick with your decision. Doctors will treat you like you are an idiot and they will use scare tactics to convince you otherwise, but if you have looked for information on both sides of the issue and have determined your course of action based on research, be confident in that decision.

A follow-up to the last post

From Kids Health by the Nemours Foundation:

"Will the immunization give my child the very disease it's supposed to prevent?

This is one of parents' most common concerns about vaccines. However, it's impossible to get the disease from any vaccine made with dead (killed) bacteria or viruses or just part of the bacteria or virus.

Only those immunizations made from weakened (also called attenuated) live viruses - like the chickenpox (varicella) or measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine - could possibly make a child develop a mild form of the disease, but it's almost always much less severe than the illness that occurs when a person is infected with the disease-causing virus itself."

New Edition of The Sanctity of Human Blood

Did you know?

* that there are now some 36 vaccines mandated by the time your child is 18 months old? And 68 by age 18?
* that the 2007 Mandated Schedule contains the Rotateq and Human Papilloma Virus vaccines in multiple doses?
* that U.S. children are the most vaccinated group not only in the world, but in all of history?
* that vaccines are not thoroughly tested before they are put on the market?
* that most infectious diseases had already declined 90% by the time vaccines became mandated?
* that only one country in Europe still has mandatory DPT vaccination, whereas the U.S. requires five separate shots?
* that Hepatitis B vaccine was halted in France after 15,000 citizens filed a class action suit against the government?
* that there is a simple exemption form in most states, which when signed by a parent exempts the child for life?
* that all 696,000 Gulf War personnel were inoculated with three completely untested vaccines, resulting in 80,000 of them contracting a permanent disease known as Gulf War Syndrome?
* that many pediatricians will not inoculate their own children?
* that vaccines are a multibillion dollar business in the U.S.?
* that vaccination is not immunization?
* that mercury in vaccines is dozens of times in excess of EPA safety levels?

To learn more about these and other topics related to vaccination, read The Sanctity of Human Blood by Tim O'Shea. To find out more about how to order your copy, send us an email and we'll get you the info.

Why we've declined

My son is 4 months old. At this point in his life he should have received 13 inoculations according to the 2007 immunization schedule released by the Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). He hasn’t received any, however, because my husband and I have chosen not to have him vaccinated. The short answer as to why we have made this decision is because we believe that the risks of vaccination outweigh the benefits. We continue to research and formulate our opinion on vaccination but thus far continue to find further evidence to support our decision and have not found reason to reverse it. What follows are some of the reasons that we see vaccination as a greater risk than a benefit.

According to the CDC fact sheet on the DTaP vaccine (which children are to receive 4 times before age 18 months), your child has a 1 in 14,000 chance of experiencing seizures caused by fever as a result of receiving that vaccine; and a 1 in 3,000 chance from the MMR vaccine (which a child is to receive twice before age 6)—that means your child is more likely to experience a convulsion from either of these vaccines than that they would die in a motor vehicle accident or by drowning (see childstats.gov). We do everything we can to prevent our child from dying in this manner (wearing seat belts and life preservers, only playing by the water when supervised, etc.) and yet we are willing to risk our children experiencing convulsions, which could potentially lead to life altering illnesses? According to a study on febrile convulsions published on pubmed.gov: “The results of this study indicate that even a single experimental febrile convulsion during infancy can exert a long-lasting, if not permanent, enhancement in seizure susceptibility.” Recurrent, unprovoked seizures are what define epilepsy, a chronic neurological condition that cannot be cured.

Additional potential side effects of the MMR vaccine include (as taken from the CDC Fact Sheet on the vaccine): fever (up to 1 person out of 6); mild rash (about 1 person out of 20); swelling of glands in the cheeks or neck; temporary pain and stiffness in the joints, mostly in teenage or adult women (up to 1 out of 4); temporary low platelet count, which can cause a bleeding disorder (about 1 out of 30,000 doses); and serious allergic reaction (less than 1 out of a million doses). The Fact Sheet goes on to say: “Several other severe problems have been known to occur after a child gets MMR vaccine but this happens so rarely, experts cannot be sure whether they are caused by the vaccine or not. These include: deafness, long-term seizures, coma, or lowered consciousness, and permanent brain damage.” It is important to note here that though the CDC makes the statement that “experts cannot be sure whether they are caused by the vaccine or not” (referring to the most life-altering side effects listed) there is apparently enough of a correlation that the CDC feels they should include the possibility in the list of side effects. That alone gives me great pause. In addition, many of the mild side effects that occur frequently such as fever or rash, are symptoms that are generally considered cause for visiting a doctor because they indicate illness, not something that should be considered temporarily “normal.” If the body is responding to a vaccination in the same way that it responds to illness, is the presence of the foreign material found in the vaccine really to the body’s benefit?

This question leads me to another primary reason that I question the benefit of vaccination specifically in regards to its role in causing immunity. As Tim O’Shea writes in The Sanctity of Human Blood, “We're programmed to think of immunization and vaccination as synonyms…In actuality, there's a big difference. Immunization means to make someone immune to something. Vaccination, by contrast, just means to inject something into the bloodstream…True natural immunity happens only after one recovers from the disease itself. With the actual disease, the microorganism had to pass through many of the body's natural immune defense systems in the nose, throat, lungs, and digestive tract before it ever gets as far as the bloodstream.” By bypassing the body’s natural immune response we are risking creating strains of disease resistant to the body’s natural defenses and compromising a healthy system with the injection of foreign material including but not limited to: disease strains from animals and other toxins such as formaldehyde, aluminum, and mercury. As Tim O’ Shea goes on to write, “The thinking behind vaccination is that if the person gets a "minor" case of the disease under the "controlled" conditions of vaccination, he will produce his own antibodies to the disease agent, and this will confer immunity, since his immune system will remember what the "bad bug" looks like. The next time the bug shows up, immune defense cells will be ready to kill it. Unfortunately there is no general agreement that this is what vaccination really does.”

I also have concerns to the validity of vaccines serving to protect the population. According to a publication in Pharmaceutical News in May 2005: “The Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, estimates there were almost 20,000 pertussis (whooping cough) cases in 2004 - the highest number of reported cases in more than 40 years.” And yet the pertussis vaccine has been around since the mid-1940’s and the DTaP vaccine specifically has been used readily since 1991. Other evidence also comes directly from the CDC in an article related to the mumps outbreak in Iowa in 2006. According to the article, of the individuals whose vaccine records could be assessed, 65% had been fully vaccination against mumps, while only 6% had not been vaccinated at all. How can one claim that vaccines are eliminating these diseases or at minimum, immunizing against them, with statistics like these direct from the primary proponent of vaccination?

Finally, I question whether it is the responsibility of my child to protect the population from diseases that result from lifestyle choices such as Hepatitis B and HPV? According to the CDC fact sheet on the Hep B vaccine, Hepatitis B is spread by “having unprotected sex with an infected person, sharing needles when injecting illegal drugs, being stuck with a used needle on the job, or during birth when the virus passes from an infected mother to her baby” and yet we administer this vaccine to children 3 times before the age of 6 months. I don’t know about you, but my four month old is not having unprotected sex or using illegal drugs. And the newly released HPV vaccine is another example. According to the CDC website: “Abstaining from sexual activity (i.e., refraining from any genital contact with another individual) is the surest way to prevent genital HPV infection. For those who choose to be sexually active, a monogamous relationship with an uninfected partner is the strategy most likely to prevent future genital HPV infections.” Perhaps instead of spending tax money passing laws that require all women to have the HPV vaccine we should spend our money educating people about the risks of risky behavior? We cannot eliminate immoral behavior or the consequences of that behavior by vaccinating an entire population.

As I mentioned earlier, these thoughts are gathered from the research that we have begun in earnest regarding vaccination. We intend to continue seeking information for and against vaccination and will continue to formulate our opinion as we grow more educated.


References:

Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2006). MMWR Weekly: Mumps Epidemic --- Iowa, 2006. Retrieved 22 April 2007 from http://www.cdc.gov/MMWR/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5513a3.htm.

Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Immunization Program (2001). Diphtheria, Tetanus, & Pertussis Vaccines: What You Need To Know [Electronic version]. Retrieved16 February 2007 from http://www.cdc.gov/nip/publications/VIS/vis-dtp.pdf.

Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Immunization Program (2001). Hepatitis B Vaccine: What You Need To Know [Electronic version]. Retrieved 16 February 2007 from http://www.cdc.gov/nip/publications/VIS/vis-hep-b.pdf.

Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Immunization Program (2007). Human Papillomavirus [Electronic version]. Retrieved 24 April 2007 from http://www.cdc.gov/nip/publications/pink/hpv.pdf.

Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Immunization Program (2003). Measles, Mumps & Rubella Vaccines: What You Need To Know [Electronic version]. Retrieved 22 April 2007 from http://www.cdc.gov/nip/publications/VIS/vis-mmr.pdf.

Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Immunization Program (2007). Recommended Immunization Schedule for Ages 0-6 Years, United States, 2007 [Electronic version]. Retrieved 22 April 2007 from http://www.cispimmunize.org/IZSchedule_Childhood.pdf.

Forum on Child and Family Statistics (2006). America's Children in Brief: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2006 - Child Mortality. Retrieved 16 February 2007 from http://childstats.gov/americaschildren/hea8.asp.

McCaughran JA Jr, Schechter N. (1982). Experimental febrile convulsions: long-term effects of hyperthermia-induced convulsions in the developing rat. Retireved 16 February 1007 from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/

O’Shea, Tim. (2001). The Sanctity of Human Blood excerpted from the third edition of The Sanctity of Human Blood: Vaccination Is Not Immunization by Tim O'Shea. Retrieved 22 April 2007 from http://www.mercola.com/2001/may/30/vaccine_safety.htm

Pharmaceutical News. (2005). Vaccine for whooping cough in teens. Retrieved 16 February 2007 from http://www.news-medical.net/?id=8476.