The nonsense that is “Vaccine Injury Awareness Month”

I heard about this shortly before October, and in response I decided to put up at least one post a week on vaccines and vaccine preventable diseases.

Good morning y’all.

Over at the Wretched Hive, I attracted an anti-vax comment from “ddanimal” that mentioned studies in the Patterson lab at Caltech that suggest that immune reactions in pregnant women may harm neural development in their fetuses. The cited link was dead but it appears to be linked to this page:

http://www.its.caltech.edu/~phplab/phplab.html#

It’s work by Elaine Hsiao, with link titles such as

Prenatal programming of immune dysregulation in the offspring of immune activated mothers

Given the sources, my guess is that (a) the work is legit and (b) it’s being hijacked by anti-vaxers who don’t understand it. However, I am not a biological scientist (IANABS), so I wouldn’t presume to say that authoritatively. Would anyone like to take a look and see if my hunch is right?

Incidentally, this is the original tiny dustup on the Hive:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/palindrom/twitter-flu-shot-vaccinations_n_1010899_113653241.html

October is the month to acknowledge and honor those families whose loved ones have been injured by vaccines. These faceless (in many cases), nameless and numerous families are hurting and they need our help.

One of the ways we can assist them is by spreading the word that vaccine injuries are real and they are far more common then we have been led to believe.

How exactly does “spreading the word” assist these alleged “vaccine injured” people who are “hurting and need help”?

Months after I first discovered that video, I find it amazing that Dr. Eisenstein appears not to be the least bit embarrassed by it.

Given his propensity for absurd claims and multiple malpractice suits he has lost, I think his pirate shtick pales in comparison. Ergo, I doubt he is prone to embarrassment.

I’m surprised that “anti-vacciners” are trying to steal attention from breast cancer in October (a losing proposition if there ever was one).

If they’re going to compete with the big dogs, they need a hook. Idea: move Antivax Lunacy Month to February to complement Black History Month. They could play up their eugenics claims and try to gain support from minorities supposedly targeted for extinction through vaccines.

This could be the tool that jumpstarts the campaigns of the GOP’s best-known antivaxers (Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul).

(In case I’m scaring you, consider that my record for prognostication rivals that of Harold Camping).

palindrom #3, I went to a talk by Patterson on autism and the role of the immune system on neurodevelopment. He mentioned that if all flu in pregnant women were prevented, that the incidence of schizophrenia would go down by ~20%.

It was purely an immune response, it had nothing to do with any toxins, or any toxic response.

He was asked about flu vaccine for pregnant women and he mentioned being at a conference with people who did research on the connection between flu and schizophrenia and to a person they all said they would get vaccinated or have their wife/daughter vaccinated for flu if pregnant during flu season because getting the flu while pregnant is so bad. They felt it was better to risk a small effect from a vaccine than a gigantic effect from getting the flu.

daedalus2u @9 — Thanks very much. That’s what I’d figured — surely the immune response from the disease would be more damaging than from the vaccine!

The twisting of legitimate science to fit a pre-conceived agenda reminds me a lot of the global warming “debate”. The recent CERN cloud study of cosmic-ray induced cloud nucleation was an example; it was immediately picked up by the denial-o-sphere as still more “proof” that anthropomorphic global warming theory was “on its last legs”, when in reality it had essentially no bearing on the question. I think the anti global warming people are, in the main, more loathsome than the antivaxers. The energy-interest PR people are deeply cynical as they feed nonsense to their army of zombie dittoheads, but my impression is that most of the antivaxers are sad cases, mostly parents who need to find someone to blame for their child’s afflictions. Then there’s folks like Eisenstein, who appears to be off his rocker.

If you look closely at well-known anti-vaxxers’ recent activities ( post- Wakefield being struck off), you will find a variety of attention-seeking events : conferences, lectures, protests, political manoeuvres, blog posts dissecting research, announcements, book releases/ signings, and appearances on television and radio ( this week BLF on “The Doctors”) as well as appearances on woo-ful websites/radio- all of these are predicated on the lack of any real news that supports their position. Manufacturing news like AW manufactured data. All of it is “reaching”: beating the proverbial dead horse ( as a commenter of PALMD once noted) until only its outlines remain- and I would add, continuing even after those outlines have completely disappeared and you have to re-paint them in so you can keep on beating something.

If you need to rely upon PR and networks so desperately perhaps you need to ask yourself, “Why is that?”

When I went to get my flu vaccine, they let me know I needed my Tdap booster; I’m pleased I got both vaccinations in Vaccine Injury Overblowing Month!

If it were just about me, I’d be less motivated; I rarely get the flu, and when I have, it’s invariably been mild. But my workplace is full of people with young children, many less than a year old, and I have a new nephew, so I consider it my responsibility to do my part.

@RS You do know that those statistics are INCREDIBLY uninformative, right? First, they DO NOT talk about deaths. Second, they don’t break down the pop. by age – what are the deaths due to flue vs. inoculation rates amongst those MOST AT RISK. Third, what are the demographics of the nations to begin with? Fourth, how was the data collected? Finally, these stats only compare percent inoculated vs. total pop. What the hell, can’t you even cite correctly you idiot?

RS, why should we take the pretty tables and plots of a random blog post? Where are the references? Where are the cites? Who created the plots? How do we know they were not amateur manipulations like those described here:
http://www.software3d.com/Home/Vax/Graphs.php

Here’s another one for “Vaccine Injury Awareness Month”

Blending of flu viruses to blame, says pharma giant, 18 months after children suffer fits

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/health-science/blending-of-flu-viruses-to-blame-says-pharma-giant-18-months-after-children-suffer-fits/story-e6frg8y6-1226128454130

Dear Newbies, the “Th1Th2” person is a troll that we call “Thingy.” This troll is notorious for redefining words, not giving straight answers and misquoting others. Please do not engage with this troll.

Please ignore the troll.

When is Orac going to trade fire with fire? He just keeps swirling around it and I wonder why. I think he’s scared to get burned. He knew for the fact that if he could just continue with the “gambit” gambit/tactic/ruse/ploy long enough, the herd would be convinced. Of course, we knew who are these people–non-native English speakers and the less intelligent.

Regarding breast cancer awareness, there’s definitely some kind of quackery making the circuit because I have been receiving emails from my 2 quack sisters (whom I dearly love otherwise). I have been warned against mammograms because it “radically increases the number of women who will be misdiagnosed and plugged into a system designed to cut, poison, and burn them unnecessarily without addressing the underlying reasons of what caused the cancer.”

Included in their warnings was a list of places I could get my life-saving thermogram in my state, and there are a lot.

The irony is that one of them had stage IV breast cancer (detected by a mammogram), underwent modified mastectomy, chemo and radiation, and is now enjoying a full, rich life because of it.

Dear Newbies, the “Th1Th2” person is a troll that we call “Thingy.” This troll is notorious for redefining words, not giving straight answers and misquoting others. Please do not engage with this troll.

Oh I am so sorry Chris for not making myself clear. Well, here it is again.

And you know the best way to get the immune system to fight off the flu effectively? The vaccine!

Yes indeed infection promoter. Give the immune system something to fight off. Duh.

Yes indeed infection promoter. Give the immune system something to fight off. The vaccine!

Yep Thingy, you sure have everyone convinced with all that super-sercret knowledge you’ve got there. Kept in the mysterious sub-basement of the Cheesecake Factory in an undisclosed town in the mid-west, these secret knowledge files only available to you are all the citation we need. It is enough that we know you have access to such information, whatever it may be and wherever it may have originated. Sure, to those who don’t know you have such super-secret knowledge, you come across as an abysmally ignorant crank, but since we know you do have this knowledge that you keep in trust for the benefit of all mankind, how can we do anything but take your word for it all as the absolute truth?

It all concludes with a plea to “educate before you vaccinate.”

The thing Orac fears most.

Whoever made that first video knew all about propaganda techniques. The serious music with a harsh beat, the photos of sick children, and the list of scary words showing what’s in vaccines can be very effective.

But propaganda is just a slick way of lying. So here’s an explanation of what those scary-sounding words mean, for anyone who doesn’t know:

Antigens. This is the thing that makes the vaccine work. It isn’t harmful. In fact, the whole point of a vaccine is that it has that antigen in it. The antigen tells your body that the next time it encounters a germ with the same antigen, it should kill it so you don’t get sick.

Vaccines actually just mimic what your body does naturally; this is why no one ever got smallpox twice. Vaccines just let you skip the part about getting sick.

Buffers, Diluents. Water or salt water.

Antibiotics. Antibiotics are one of the major breakthroughs of 20th century biomedical science. Many people alive today (and their children and grandchildren) are here because of antibiotics.

Biological material from animals. If you think this is too scary, stop eating meat, fish, ice cream, or butter. Don’t drink milk and get rid of your leather shoes. Don’t ever kiss anyone again either.

“Preservatives, stabilizers, excipients, residuals, etc.” Pretty much the same stuff. These things can be commonly found in foods (e.g. salt, iron, glycerin, citric acid [aka vitamin C]. They’re all there in trace amounts.

Formaldehyde. Formaldehyde sounds scary, but there are two things to remember: 1. If present, it’s there in trace amounts. 2. More importantly, formaldehyde occurs naturally in many foods, including fruits. It’s also produced by wood fires and is in many liquids (e.g. instant coffee some water). So if you don’t want any formaldehyde in your body, you’ll have to stop eating, drinking, and breathing. But don’t worry! Small amounts of formaldehyde are rapidly broken down by your body, so you can start eating again. Google it, or: http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/phs/phs.asp?id=218&tid=39

The anti-vaccine loopers don’t want you to know any of this (or they just don’t know themselves).

Aborted babies!!! I am s-o-o-o tired of this one. In the 1960s, some fetal tissue (from legally performed abortions) was used to grow viruses for use in vaccines. This tissue was never put into the vaccines. It may not be a pleasant idea to grow the viruses in cells from this tissue but NO FETAL TISSUE WAS USED FOR THE VACCINES AND NO NEW FETAL TISSUE HAS BEEN USED TO GROW THE VIRUSES FOR VACCINES SINCE THE 1960s.

There are no dead babies in vaccines.

I have to go back to work now.

I notice Thingy deliberately wanted us to know there’s nothing specifically wrong with Valerie’s comment, just his fiat declaration that it’s wrong for unspecified reasons.

If he had a meaningful counterpoint, he would have raised it. Of course, this absence is not a surprise to anyone who’s paid attention to him.

I notice Thingy deliberately wanted us to know there’s nothing specifically wrong with Valerie’s comment, just his fiat declaration that it’s wrong for unspecified reasons.
If he had a meaningful counterpoint, he would have raised it. Of course, this absence is not a surprise to anyone who’s paid attention to him.

BTDT. If I counter the first item: “Antigens”, this thread will end early. We wouldn’t want to spoil the party, would we?

That’s ok Thingy. You don’t need to bother. Just remind us that you have super-secret knowledge that says “antigens” are actually Pez and you’ll have us on the ropes. Since your knowledge was passed to you by the Ninja-Pope of Smarts, how could we possibly argue?

I got very sleepy after my flu shot this year. Can I sue somebody?

Me too! but it also makes my shoulder hurt so I have trouble sleeping. OMG –Vaccine injury!!

lsm (#25) comments:

“I have been warned against mammograms because it ‘radically increases the number of women who will be misdiagnosed and plugged into a system designed to cut, poison, and burn them unnecessarily without addressing the underlying reasons of what caused the cancer’.”

Oddly enough, it is true that mammograms lead to a dramatic increase in the number of women who will be initially misdiagnosed with possible breast cancer. I don’t know what the current false positive rate for mammograms is, but the number that was last quoted to me was 10% – I’m sure our host has more up-to-date numbers. Comparing this with a 12% lifetime risk of breast cancer and a 3% lifetime risk of dying from breast cancer (American Cancer Society), you’ll see that the risk of having a false-positive mammogram is – on average – significantly higher than the chance of having breast cancer.

[Note: if the false-positive rate is 10%, the “average” woman’s risk of having at least one false-positive result reaches 52% by the seventh mammogram; this assumes that all women have an equal chance of false-positive results (not necessarily true) and that the risk of false-positive results is independent of previous results (ditto).]

So, of 100 women getting a mammogram, 10 will be told that there is “something odd” and will need to go back for more diagnostic work – repeat mammogram, MRI, ultrasound or whatever (again, our host would know the current process much better). However, not all of these 10 will get surgery (e.g. a biopsy) and none of them (since they are false positives) will get radiation or chemotherapy, so the rest of the “warning” is absolutely false.

By the way, the “underlying reasons of what caused the cancer” is irrelevant for those women who get false-positive mammograms, since they don’t have cancer.

The underlying false premise of this “warning” is that women go directly from a “positive” (true-positive or false-positive) mammogram to radical surgery, radiation or chemotherapy. This may be how things work in the world of Mike Adams and Joseph Mercola, where a single diagnostic test (e.g. applied kinesthesiology or hair metal analysis) is used to trigger “therapy”, but real doctors don’t operate (let alone irradiate or administer chemotherapy) based on a single screening test.

The point is that mammography is a screening test; it is designed to be easy to administer, (relatively) inexpensive and fairly sensitive (although the false-negative rate for mammograms is not as good as I’d like it to be). It is meant to select a group of women who are at elevated risk of having breast cancer and need further, more expensive and potentially more invasive testing.

Of course, if you don’t get a mammogram, there is no way you’ll get a false-positive result – that’s a trivial leap of logic. However, not getting a mammogram does increase the chance that, when detected, the breast cancer will be more extensive and more widely disseminated. It’s all about choices.

Prometheus

While the anti-vaxers are screaming about toxins and uncorrelated maladies, the good scientists of the world continue to make strides in ridding the world of crippling and deadly diseases:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44947187/ns/health-infectious_diseases/

That’s ok Thingy. You don’t need to bother.

It wants to hijack the thread. The time to ignore it is early on.

Sid, are you aware people have died from measles?

Lisa J, if you’re going to rant about something off-topic, make your own weblog.

So, Sid – since there hasn’t been a fatal accident at that stop light in years, the stop light isn’t necessary?

There is almost no risk of catching any of the illnesses prevented by the MMR. Shots are therefore, at this point in time, not safer than the risk of illnesses they prevent.

Schechter, inserting the word “therefore” does not actually complete a proof of your assertion. (And what’s the R_0 of measles, again?)

@ Lisa:

You have a point there. Breast cancer gets a much larger fraction of public attentiveness than the fraction of cancer it represents (either diagnoses or fatalities), much less the fraction of disease.

It’s pretty natural for Orac to focus principally on it, since that’s the particular sort of cancer he specializes in. The broader public discourse has no similar rationale.

Here’s a hint, why is measles not even endemic to this continent anymore?

HE ALREADY STIPULATED THAT THAT’S IRRELEVANT!

@Sid

Here’s another question. We’ll stick with just one state, Minnesota. What percentage of measles cases this year have resulted in hospitalization? How does this compare to the rate of hospitalization due to MMR this year in MN?

No, we think that a small risk is safer than a large one.

How does this compare to the rate of hospitalization due to MMR this year in MN?

Surely you already know the stock response to this one.

Sid is a troll. Ignore him.

The whole point of the games trolls play is to distract attention from the point at hand. In this case, it’s the backwards logic of loopy ignorant people who lie about the “dangers” of vaccines while ignoring the very real dangers of the diseases they prevent.

Percentage is entirely irrelevant. Lets say 100% of 20 cases were hospitalized. You’d have 20 measles hospitalizations – against hundreds of thousands of painful and potentially risky injections. Risk of vaccination > risk of measles in America 2011

There was a death due to measles in the USA as recent as 2005 according to the CDC Pink Book Appendix G. Considering that California leads this country in measles cases, it probably won’t be long before there is one near where Schechter lives.

Schecter

Risk of vaccination > risk of measles in America 2011

Let us ignore the deliberately incommensurate semantics and take this as a given. Your brilliant idea is to do nothing until that turns into a less-than sign? What do you imagine the period of oscillation would be? For extra credit, separately integrate the competing inputs.

@Sid

So, we have, then, zero deaths due to MMR since the vaccine was approved? And at least one death from measles in the last 6 years?

Now, back to the hospitalization question, what percentage of children that received the MMR this year were hospitalized as a result?

And are you really comparing the pain of a needle stick to the complications from measles? Perhaps you should take a look at what is happening in Europe right now for a preview of what will happen in the U.S. in about three years, if vaccination rates don’t improve.

Orac’s Encyclopedia of Fallacy:

1.

Of course. But no one says that vaccines never cause injury.

You did when you claimed this:

2.

“vaccines damage the immune system” gambit (they don’t)

@Narad

My brilliant idea is to observe the conditions as they exist and act as an individual. I’d encourage others to do the same. But since most are happy to be ordered to vaccinate, I don’t expect that sign to flip anytime soon. Either way, even in the pre-vaccine era, it’s unlikely I’d play around with the immune system of a healthy child to keep mild illnesses such as the measles at bay. But as long as mandates are in place, my decision is much easier.

I am at risk when bleeding profusely = act

I am not at risk when there are on average 80 cases of a mild illness each year in a population of over three hundred million people = don’t act.

There was a death due to measles in the USA as recent as 2005 according to the CDC Pink Book Appendix G.

And how many got infected with measles that should have died of the disease? Are you disappointed Chris?

Some more interesting numbers from the link Chris provided: for the same 2005-2009 period, there was also 1 death from mumps and one death from rubella, as well as 4 cases of congenital rubella syndrome, a known cause of autism.

Todd W@67

@Valerie

I know Sid’s a troll, but I engage him for the sake of lurkers and other readers that might find some measure of credence in his posts.

Your efforts (and those of the other commenters who challenge the trolls) are appreciated by non-scientist readers like me, even if it gets tedious for the other regulars. All your questions make it very easy to see how weak the anti-vax arguments are.

@Sid:
that

one big, extremely rare (especially in healthy kids)risk

which you are talking about is rare precisely because of the excellent coverage of measles immunization. Remove that coverage and the risk is no longer

one big, extremely rare (especially in healthy kids)risk.

It is analogous to saying, “why do people have to go through the trouble of eating when the risk of dying from starvation is extremely rare, especially in healthy people?”

Also, you are looking at the statistics for deaths directly caused by measles. If you consider the nature of measles and what it does to the body, you will realize that measles can be fatal indirectly too. A bout of measles ravages and weakens the immune system of the child such that post measles (till the immune system recovers) there is a high risk of infections and the mortality and morbidity due to those infections also rises.

So the discomfort of millions of babies is what keeps that

one big, extremely rare (especially in healthy kids)risk

just that.

@Lisa

“with Lance Armstrong bringing SOME knowledge of testicular cancer to the front it is nowhere near the same level and most would struggle to come up with the “color” for that one”

It’s blue (of course). It might be a local thing, but here (NZ) we have Blue September for prostate cancer with events and celebrities in face paint (slogan is ‘facing up to prostate cancer’).

That’s false. For example, repeated painful injections with the MMR cause millions of children to suffer.

You’re being dramatic at the expense of accuracy. There are two recommended doses approximately 4 years apart and are mildly painful for mere seconds. Where are your sources for all of these “millions of suffering children”?

There is almost no risk of catching any of the illnesses prevented by the MMR. Shots are therefore, at this point in time, not safer than the risk of illnesses they prevent. Whether or not the absence of illness is a result of forced vaccination is irrelevant – as is the argument that if everyone stopped vaccinating the mumps would again rage across America like a blistering wildfire

How can mass vaccination be irrelevant? Do you have any idea what the infectivity rates are for measles, mumps and rubella? And yes, as a result of the R^O, they would come raging back if vaccination ceased.

This is like shooting fish in a barrel. How many total cases of the measles went to the hospital? A handful? Then compare that to the number of children (hundreds of thousands) hurt by the MMR injection in Minnesota (and that’s just the injection, never mind the side effects) each and every year and tell me where the real risk lies.

So Sid, how would you like to have been the parent of
Mahi Abdalla or is he irrelevant too because he’s just a dirty brown baby? There have been more than 10,000 cases of measles in France with 6 deaths and even more cases of encephalitis. All due to reduction in vaccine uptake. Is France an undeveloped country? And again, you’re being ridiculously dramatic by using injection pain as a factor. My children hurt themselves far worse every week just being children.

Schecter in a nutshell: If you’re quick with a knife, you’ll find the invisible hand is made of invisible tasty meat. http://xkcd.com/958/.
Th1Th2 in a nutshell: I hear its amazing when the famous purple stuffed worm in flap-jaw space with the tuning fork does a raw blink on Hari Kiri Rock. I need scissors! 61!

(which is a monumentally stupid comment… since normal kids, not those that stay in sterilized padded rooms indoors, actually get skinned knees, paper cuts, bug bites, nicks and bruises — and much more often then they get vaccines)

Straw man. Unless of course, Chris can support her assertion that those are intentional, planned and recommended like vaccination.

For the lurkers: Measles is a disease spread by droplets i.e. every time an infected person coughs, sneezes or speaks, droplets containing the virus are released into the atmosphere.
when these droplets inhaled by others around, the virus comes in contact with the a new host.
If the host has immunity to the virus, nothing further happens. But if the person is not immune to the virus, the person gets the disease.
Measles also has a very high attack rate i.e. a non-immune person coming in contact with the virus has a very high chance of getting the disease.

So, considering this knowledge about the disease, an effective strategy would be to avoid those persons infected with the measles virus.

BUT, here’s the catch: a person infected with measles begins to shed infectious droplets from 3 days before the symptoms appear i.e. a part of the period during which an infected person can transmit the virus is marked by no symptoms. The danger of transmission is at this phase because one has no means of telling who is infectious and thus no means of telling whom to avoid.

Notice here: the virus is transmitted when the patient is apparently healthy i.e. not hospitalised. Thus it goes to follow that the level of hygiene of a hospital has not much bearing upon the transmission of the disease.

Your efforts (and those of the other commenters who challenge the trolls) are appreciated by non-scientist readers like me, even if it gets tedious for the other regulars. All your questions make it very easy to see how weak the anti-vax arguments are.

Fair enough. Along those lines, then:

@Sid For example, repeated painful injections with the MMR cause millions of children to suffer.

I figure “suffering” here refers to the little pokey from the needle. I’ve always wondered if some of the anti-vaxers are avoiding the shots in part because they don’t want to watch their kids cry.

When my eldest was almost five, he asked me if the doctor was going to give him shots at his upcoming checkup. I told him yes. He didn’t like that idea. I told him about polio and the damage it can cause. I showed him pictures of people wearing braces or living in iron lungs. I asked him which one he preferred: the little pokey shot or what could happen if he got polio. He picked the shot.

He cried when they gave it to him, but he told me later that it was better than getting polio. He repeated this information to his sister when it was her turn.

Measles nearly killed my older sister a couple of years before the vaccine became available. My mom only had to tell me once about going into her room that morning and not being able to wake her to stop me complaining about shots forever.

If anything I wrote about avoiding the shots because you don’t want to watch your child cry describes you, think about this: you’ll both cry a lot more if your child develops measles encephalitis and, a terrible morning comes when you find that can’t wake him up. How will you feel when you realize that this happened because you didn’t let the doctors give him a simple shot?

Vaccines are one of the greatest advances in the history of medicine. Don’t let the fools put us all at risk: vaccinate yourself and your kids.

Although the Institute of Medicine rejected the idea that MMR causes autism, there IS a clear connection between MMR and ASD: vaccination with MMR actually prevents some cases of autism.

Haha. I guess it’s time to put the Thimerosal back. FTW!

Valerie:

I figure “suffering” here refers to the little pokey from the needle. I’ve always wondered if some of the anti-vaxers are avoiding the shots in part because they don’t want to watch their kids cry.

Which baffles me when they provide this kind of “advice”:

We should be testing blood titers to see in an individual is immune to a disease instead of vaccinating all people over and over again.

Why would a blood draw and expensive lab tests be preferable to a booster shot?

It seems that measles was NO big deal end of the 60’s early 70’s before the vaccine was in use for very long…I notice how once a vaccine is in use for awhile all of a sudden the disease becomes more deadly.

http://www.blinkx.com/watch-video/the-brady-bunch-is-there-a-doctor-in-the-house/Vw7AJKy5XO3MhdzsNbPFqQ

in the modern world: acquired by a non virulent strain of the virus which acquaints the body with the antigens (just like the virulent strain) but without causing measles and its associated mortality and morbidity (unlike the virulent strain).
price tag: a little discomfort.

Hey newbie do you know that measles vaccines cause primary measles infection?

The vaccine causes mild or inapparent, noncommunicable infection.

h ttp://www.merckmanuals.com/professional/infectious_diseases/other_viruses/measles.html
h ttp://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/PDF/rr/rr4708.pdf

This infection is a MUST, not a side-effect nor complication dunce.

Narad, what “advice” am I giving?
—————————

Willing to accept the return of the measles

Accept implies that I have some control over everyone in the country. I don’t. Measles will or won’t return based on the combined actions of people acting freely.

Accept:
Consent to receive (a thing offered).
Agree to undertake (an offered position or responsibility)
—————————–
accrual of actual harm

Living under government control is an accrual of actual harm
——————————————–
how long you think such a scenario, having occurred, would take to reverse and what an acceptable ultimate tally would be in the name of personal comfort in parasitism.

Again with accept???

An equilibrium would set in. Again “acceptable” is only for utilitarian statists who think they have the right to control the lives of people they deem to be their property in order to create the world as they, and not individuals, would like it to be.

It is analogous to saying, “why do people have to go through the trouble of eating when the risk of dying from starvation is extremely rare, especially in healthy people?”

I think T-reg is implying that those malnourished children in Africa who were used to be healthy have since chosen to become picky eaters and now they are dying due to self-induced starvation.

Only in RI.

@thingy:

Hey uneducated and ignorant troll, my first and only response directly to you on this thread:

Yes it causes a primary infection. I’m a doctor (a newbie to this blog, definitely not a newbie to medicine or science or health care, you moron) and I jolly well know that. Did you miss the adjectives: “mild” and “inapparent” and “noncommunicable” in your own citation?
Did you miss the short summary of how the disease and its agent function vs the functioning of the organism in the vaccine?
Do you realize what an attenuated virus is? Can you tell me precisely what happens when the body encounters a pathogen? Could you tell me (without looking up a wiki) which part of the immune system deals with the measles virus? This knowledge is essential to understand how a vaccine works and why a mild infection with an attenuated virus is better than a severe infection with the wild pathogen.

Do you even realize what an infection is? Or a subclinical one, for that?
Any idea about risk vs benefit? Risk vs benefit is how REAL WORLD problems are negotiated. The unicorn that you seek is better suited to the children’s fantasies.

And, you moron, there’s a BIG difference between an INFECTION and a DISEASE.

The Institute of Medicine announced yesterday that Dr. Paul Offit was recently elected to membership.

“New members are elected by current active members through a highly selective process that recognizes individuals who have made major contributions to the advancement of the medical sciences, health care, and public health . . . . The newly elected members raise IOM’s total active membership to 1,688 and the number of foreign associates to 102. With an additional 80 members holding emeritus status, IOM’s total membership is 1,870.”

http://iom.edu/Global/News%20Announcements/2011-New-Members.aspx

That’s good news in Vaccine Injury Awareness Month. Dr. Offit directs the Vaccine Education and is chief of Infectious Diseases at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

Yes it causes a primary infection.

Thank you for being honest infection promoter. Are you proud?

However, you said the vaccine is acquired “without causing measles” yet you do recognize “there’s a BIG difference between an INFECTION and a DISEASE.”

Interesting.

For the benefit of lurkers:

INFECTION and DISEASE are not the same.

An infection is merely the entry of a micro-organism into the body.

This can lead to an infectious disease (destruction caused by the infection), if the host immunity is unable to contain it.

The disease may never occur if the host immunity tackles the invading organism long before it can cause the disease.

One example is tuberculosis: the infection is present in large populations in developing and third world nations. But the DISEASE only occurs if the host immunity is not able to contain it.
Similarly, the herpes zoster virus(causative agent of chicken pox) – the infection persists even after the disease subsides.

When I said that the measles vaccine is an attenuated form of the measles virus, it goes to follow that when it is injected, it is indeed causing an infection. But it is a mere SIMULATION for the immune system to learn to tackle the actual virus. The vaccine causes an infection NOT a disease. It in fact prevents the disease by allowing the immune system to be prepared against the actual virus (in the manner described previously).

Infection is NOT the same as disease.

RS:

It seems that measles was NO big deal end of the 60’s early 70’s before the vaccine was in use for very long..

Did you ever read The BFG, Matilda, James and the Giant Peach or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?

Could you kindly tell us how what happened to the author’s daughter, Olivia, was no big deal? Please, I’d be interested in knowing how you think what happened to her was so trivial.

For a more commercially accessible source of definition:

Wikipedia on Infection, “An infection is the colonization of a host organism by parasite species. Infecting parasites seek to use the host’s resources to reproduce, often resulting in disease”.

Disease is not the same as an infection.

For more authentic sources, please check any book on microbiology, pathology, surgery or medicine. No difference there either.
It is infection by the measles virus and measles the disease – 2 separate entities. The former may or may not result in the latter thought the latter can never occur without the former.

Just as there is infection by the herpes zoster virus (which may or may not cause disease) which is different from the chicken pox (a disease which may result from that infection) which is different from shingles (another disease which may result from that infection).

Oh well, since I am sometimes called a raconteur**…

I obviously did not die of the measles: my mother made an appointment for me to get the new measles vaccine but I couldn’t go because I got the measles first. Then begins a period of time for which I have very little memory- what do I recall is mostly a blur. I *know* that I didn’t go to school for a while, had to stay in a darkened room, and wasn’t allowed to read, write, or draw ( which is what I really liked ). I don’t really remember how I *felt* at all. Or what measles looked like. Or exactly how old I was.

Recently I asked a few of my much older cousins if they could remember anything about this. They sure did : they told me that I was really sick, adults were very worried about me ( especially my vision, cough, and the fact that I didn’t eat much),and that I missed about a month of school. It’s odd because I remember so many details about other events even earlier in my life..

I seem to have reasonably good vision with a few abnormalities – which may or may not be related ( extreme sun sensitivity, floaters since a young age) but I’ve never “looked into this ” nor have I discussed it with a doctor. Sunglasses have proved very useful as well as being a fashion statement. I started out with ’60’s style and have kept up.

Those who oppose vaccination often tell us that childhood illnesses are not much of a concern. I would disagree: losing a month is not minor. If I had children I wouldn’t want them to experience what I fail to recall experiencing. Same goes for other people’s children.

** but not in Jack White’s band.

@Th1Th2Bot:

It’s all yours…

@Sid

Still no answer to my questions, eh? In case you forgot, here it is again:

What percentage of measles cases in MN this year resulted in hospitalization?
What percentage of MMR vaccines administered in MN this year resulted in hospitalization?

Also, any comment on the fact that in the 2005-2009 period we had 1 measles death, 1 mumps death and 1 rubella death, as well as 1 case of congenital rubella syndrome, while we have had zero deaths or CRS from MMR?

And yes, the percentage is important, as it says something about risk.

Sid doesn’t really have valid arguments against vaccines. Instead, he merely has a petulant stubbornness against any sort of authority. It’s like he’s rebelling simply because his parents never let him have any fun as a kid.

Science Mom

I’m sorry you can so easily dismiss the pain of others

Not that anyone needed any additional proof that Th1Th2 is a liar, here is the difference between disease and infection from the source she cited as her definition of infection:

Many terms have been used to describe the stages of progression of the infectious process. This inconsistent vocabulary can lead to considerable confusion. For many infectious agents, the terms infection and disease have been used interchangeably. This equivalence may be appropriate when all infected hosts progress to disease in a brief time, but for many agents this is not the case. For most epidemiologic studies it is important to distinguish invasion and replication of the infectious agent without signs, symptoms, or laboratory evidence of tissue damage from replication of the infectious agent with signs, symptoms, or laboratory evidence of tissue damage. We therefore use the term infection exclusively to refer to the state of tissue invasion without disease and use the term disease to refer to the state of clinical signs, symptoms, and abnormal laboratory findings, even though “infection” is usually also present in the disease state.

Sid needs to compare the needle-sticks of vaccination to scary, unethical things like waterboarding. Poisoning the well is the only way he can sway people, since he has no science or evidence to back up anything he claims.

Mr. Schecter, why do you want children to suffer high fevers and the chance to become permanently injured?

No

Guys, how can you ask for science, evidence or reason from somebody that either never opened a Biology textbook (resulting in a complete lack of any idea about what a disease is, what is immune system, how his/her body works) or just plays dumb to dumbly try to make a point (that he/she knows that is absurd).

Sometimes, when I read comments on this blog (and I imagine that most of the people here are North Americans) I really wonder how poor the educational system is there. And it scares me because people that live where I live tend to copy everything American (specially the bad things) as if it was the Law.

Oh… and about Thingy. That is not a person, obviously, but a bot (software, programmed Thingy). Look at the response pattern. A cleverly developed one, but just a bot. And it is absurd to try to argue with a bot. Really now.

Measles is only a plane ride away.

No. You’re just being silly Chris. The shortest distance between measles and a naive and uninfected child is the measles vaccine.

Thou dost protest way too much about this issue, Orac. It’s definitely to the level now of obsession. So don’t vaccine injuries occur? Should people not be made aware of instances to minimize damage, say not vaccinating the sick, as Callie Arcale has discussed? What if you have a known allergy to a vaccine ingredient? You people must be very worried because the tide of injured children grows too much to control and convince…

@Chris Please do not jump to conclusions. I read Orac’s posts, as well as your comments (and the others’), because I see sense in them and I get good information about a field I am not specialised in. I am not talking about you people. I am talking about the others that obviously went through the educational system without learning anything, the ones with enough skills acquired to use a computer but with an obvious lack of any scientific background. Seriously, sometimes I can not believe my eyes.

because I see sense in them and I get good information about a field I am not specialised in.

It thought it would be better for you to shut the hell up. Please be aware of your limitation.

@The Christian Cynic Don’t bother. As I said before, just a bot with pre-prepared answers reacting to key-words. And if I am wrong and Thingy is a real person, it is even worse and we have even more reasons to ignore any of its interventions.

a- nonymous:

You people must be very worried because the tide of injured children grows too much to control and convince…

Oh, really? Perhaps you can back up that assertion with some real evidence. You know, like you have been asked about more than once. Or are you going to run away again?

@ BadDragon:

While I’m sure that intelligence varies along the same lines in different countries, it seems that the idiots are extremely vocal in English-speaking countries: perhaps internet connectivity is cheap; perhaps it derives from their laws and ideals about free speech. The US, UK, and Australia have spawned quite a crew of loony pseudo-scientists with their hoards of groupies: anti-vax, HIV/AIDS denialism, nutrition *uber alles*, “natural foods for natural dudes”, ad nauseum. Such a lovely multifarious language put to such extravagantly ill use!

Many seem to mix up the right to express their opinion with the “right” to create their own facts ( paraphrase of Senator Moynahan). Of course the issue of government-sponsored education since 1980s is relevant but I’d rather not go in to that.

@Chris Chris, fist of all, I apologize for the misunderstanding. The way I expressed what was in my mind was not the most fortunate one. It was not my intention to imply anything like what you suggest.

Please see what I replied to Dangerous Bacon at #150.

About education, I think it has a lot to do with it. People like Wakefield are, as you said, educated. But they are also frauds. As are some of their followers, both educated and frauds. But they would have absolutely no success without the huge numbers of uneducated people that believe what they are saying. They have to be uneducated simply because what the anti-vax big heads are saying is wrong. Most of the time it is wrong even from the perspective of a high-school pupil. Otherwise it makes no sense.

BadDragon, you don’t get it: they are not under educated.

They have an agenda, or they want something, they just do not want to face reality, or they need something to blame for what happened to their children (because it is apparently not genetics)… or as you noticed with Thingy, there is some mental illness involved. There is also some Dunning Kruger effect.

Also, you will find that many are highly skilled in their field of study like business, engineering, chemistry, law, etc. But they then assume that they can be just as skilled outside their field. Prime examples of this are Andy Cutler (PhD in chemical engineering), Mark Blaxill and JB Handley (business), Mary Holland and Cliff Miller (law), Andrew Wakefield (gastroenterologist) and Russell Blaylock (neurosurgeon).

And it is not limited to vaccine issues, there are others like Neal Adam claiming this is a hollow planet. And getting a Nobel Prize does not make someone immune: Beware the Nobel Laureate Argument from Authority.

@107: “Don’t get a measles shot (even in the pre-vaccine era) = 99.9999999% chance of living”

Idiot. A 0.0000001% chance of death is one in 1,000,000,000 (one billion). Given that 450 Americans died of measles every year in the pre-vaccine era, when the population was considerably smaller than it is today, the chance of death from measles was clearly much, much greater than one in a billion. Unless you think there were over 450 billion Americans in the 1960s. Which you might.

It thought it would be better for you to shut the hell up. Please be aware of your limitation.

Posted by: Th1Th2

My mind boggles.

Orac @170 —

“Right now it’s starting to look really tempting to give my regular readers a respite from your idiocy for a while.”

Pretty please?

I’d like to think that a breakthrough of this kind would be such a wonderful thing that even the anti-vac folks would be struggling to find a negative spin.

That a vaccine can be injected directly into the blood stream?

Dangerous Bacon

Australia has a notorious antivax movement (the Australian Vaccination Network).

Meryl Dorie, the head of the Australian Vaccination Network is an American. – Just saying

I think that often all that education does is enhance the Dunning Kruger effect in that the more education someone had, the better they are able to rationalize and defend their pseudo scientific beliefs and the more likely they are to think they can have greater knowledge than the recognized experts in the field.

Thuggy, you are a ghoulish monster, an idiot of the highest caliber, and to top it off, you’re in the rare position of being on thin ice with Orac.

Far be it from me to talk down to anypony, but I would highly suggest you shut your festering gob.

Orac a quote for you

“You gotta get up close like this… badaBING! you blow their brains all over your nice Ivy League suit. C’mere… you’re taking this very personal.”

😉

Thanks. Great post I hope to see more, keep at it.

because otherwise there is absolutely no reason why they would follow this line

History is replete with well-educated individuals who have been fooled or fooled themselves. When there is some sort of emotional investment involved or where they have melded their beliefs with their own identities, there is quite a bit of reason to adhere more strongly to their beliefs in the face of contradictory evidence. I just wrote a bit about this over at Harpocrates Speaks, and Steve Novella touched on the subject at NeuroLogica.

Not all well-educated cranks are necessarily con men, at least not consciously.

That is very true, Todd. Just because someone is intelligent and well-educated doesn’t mean that they must be deliberately lying if they espouse antivax views.

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself – and you are the easiest person to fool” — Richard Feynman

Even very smart, well-educated people who you’d think would know better fall into this trap. This is not because they’re stupid; it’s because they’re human, and it’s part of how humans think and learn. Science is a herculean effort to overcome our natural biases and shortcuts. Everyone is biased; not all of us have the humility to realize it, and fewer still have the ability to do good science despite it. Training and education helps, but are no guarantee.

@Tony Bateson:

To reject this hypothesis all that has to be done is to show that autism has the same prevalence in unvaccinated individuals as in those who are vaccinated. This is the point where seemingly all scientists run a mile!

You are a liar, Tony. What of the multiple studies done that showed no difference between the autism rates of the vaccinated and unvaccinated? Seemingly all scientists run a mile? Only in your warped worldview.

Remember, according to Tony the prevalence of autism in the unvaccinated is precisely zero because he’s never met one! All of the people who have presented evidence to the contrary (or are unvaccinated autistic themselves) are ignored and/or accused of lying.

Geez, all the trolls are out to play today! Even Tony (I can’t find any unvaccinated autistic children even though many people have pointed to Kim Stagliano’s daughter) Bateson (I don’t believe they are really unvaccinated unless you send me full medical records because I’m an ass that way) has come out.

I really need to install greasemonkey and killfile on the iPad if possible. I can’t stand to read the Thingbot and happily avoid it elsewhere…

Just to counter some misinformation, the malaria vaccine currently in the news is injected intramuscularly not, “directly into the blood stream” as Th1Th2 claimed above.

Haha. I wasn’t referring to that particular vaccine instead I was questioning if a malaria vaccine can be given intravenously hence being more effective compared to other routes of administration?

Researchers found that the vaccine produced a partial protective response in the 80 volunteers who were immunized subcutaneously, or under the skin, by traditional needle and syringe in the trial at the Center for Vaccine Development in Baltimore. However, this response was significantly less than the 80 percent to 90 percent protective immunity the research team is intent on achieving. Researchers suspected that administering the vaccine more directly into the bloodstream, accelerating its path to the liver, might produce an even stronger response. Further study conducted by collaborating authors from the Vaccine Research Center at the NIH found that administering the vaccine intravenously produced a very high level of immune response in animal subjects.

h
ttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/09/110909111451.htm

Sanaria is planning a small trial of intravenously-injected virus for later this year. The company hopes its virus will protect more than 80% of the people who receive it for at least six months, and ideally more than two years.

h ttp://blogs.nature.com/news/2011/09/live_malaria_vaccine_trialed_i.html

So just sit back and relax.

Don’t forget, to Thingy that is the same thing.

That was a joke, wasn’t it?

Malaria vaccine efficacy IM = 53% IV= at least 80%

I can’t tell you the sheer trauma I’ve had each time I’ve been given a vaccine. Why, the next day, sometimes my arm is ‘sore’ and my ‘range of motion’ is uncomfortably limited. Did you know that for a lot of vaccines they actually stab you? That’s right! They take metal and shove it into your body – anyone who says this doesn’t cause damage is lying to you!

When you compare that against, say, cervical cancer prevention, it’s a no brainer. Clearly, cancer is a superior alternative to being stabbed by those evil butches. Well, they are polite in that they wash their hands first, but still!

Lynxreign:

She has no idea how vaccines work, what the germ theory of disease is or why the voices in her head won’t stop yelling.

Or that if one vaccine is intravenous (and that is because the parasite hangs out in blood cells, not muscle cells), that it makes all vaccines intravenous.

One of her infamous statements: Intravenous pertussis vaccine and you wouldn’t dare.

@Prometheus

[Note: even Ms. Stagliano appears to have ignored this “inconvenient truth”, so Mr. Bateson is not alone in his denial.]

I seem to recall that she rationalizes it as being due to vaccines that she received somehow transferring their evil autism-causing properties to her daughter while she was pregnant.

Luna_the_Cat:

Sorry to butt in, but I think BadDragon has a point. Many of the standard anti-vaxx followers (note, I’m not talking about most of the “luminaries” that the anti-vaxxers hold up as authorities, I’m talking about the passionate lay audience who support them) are not well educated.

I was first offended by way he phrased the notion about the education in North America.

But I will say it is not quite that simple. I’ve seen too many of the anti-vax followers post up their credentials like badges of honor, and they include nurses, engineers, lawyers and the like. And some that used to be reasonable that have fallen into some kind of denialist loop.

I recently read the book Among the Truthers by Jonathan Kay. It was a disappointing read, but he did try to figure out why these people who should know better were spouting nonsense. This review gives some of his ideas on why they are what they are. It should give you an idea of where I am coming from… oh, and read Todd W.’s article.

Oh, I’m not bothered by thingy.

Not bothered? Great. Then answer #140, if you don’t mind.

Th1Th2, you completely ignored #139, which quoted the source you used. Do you feel that was honest?

Prometheus #204:

Thank you for the clarification. My education isn’t as good as most of the other posters here, but I was curious about that as well.

This would be an excellent moment to thank everyone else on this blog (ORAC especially) for all the information. I started lurking here roughly a year ago to get some info on vaccine safety after putting up with family members telling me that vaccines cause autism, are full of mercury, will turn you into a mutant, etc…

The discussions, as well as the numerous links to other resources have provided me with an education on the subject that I could not have gotten otherwise.

Thank you all of you. Seriously.

Gray Falcon (#205),

“Th1Th2” has, in the past, asserted that injecting “killed” virus, killed bacteria and even recombinant viral proteins constitutes an “infection”, despite the fact that none of these immunogenic agents is capable of replication.

Do you really think it will be concerned about the difference between a clinically inapparent “infection” and a clinically relevant “disease”?

These are distinctions “Th1Th2” has already demonstrated – repeatedly – are too fine for it to distinguish. I also don’t think that there is any further need to show that “Th1Th1” is eccentric, inconsistent and irrational (not to mention insulting and juvenile) – those facts are beyond dispute.

If you wish to “…gild refined gold, to paint the lily, to throw a perfume on the violet…”, please feel free to demonstrate – once again – the errors and inconsistencies of “Th1Th2”. To my eye, it has already become synonymous with blind, irrational objection to reality.

Prometheus

T-reg

Oh good. I’m glad she didn’t annoy you into leaving, you have some nice posts here today. I can understand why the constant stream of smug ignorance from thingy would drive some people away and I’m glad you’ll continue to post facts in response instead.

I was hoping in #205 to get Th1Th2 to notice how dishonest she was being, but now that she just attributed her own argument to Chris, I think that’s a lost cause.

Quick primer for lurkers on the herpes zoster virus (aka, varicella).

The virus is a bundle of genetic material. It is not a disease. However, it does cause disease. Chicken pox is one disease caused by the virus. Shingles is a different disease caused by the same virus. If you have never had chicken pox, you can be infected by the virus and get chicken pox, but not shingles. You can only have the disease shingles if you have previously had chicken pox, even though the same virus is involved.

Thingy @212

I know it’s useless to argue with a non-medical person

Since you’re a “non-medical person” are you telling us it is useless to argue with you?

Gray Falcon,

A malaria vaccine with 55% efficacy may not sound too good, but given that there are an (estimated) one million deaths each year from malaria (and 300-500 million cases each year), the public health benefits from such a vaccine are potentially immense.

That said, if I were to go out in malaria-endemic region after getting this malaria vaccine, I’d still take prophylaxix and use mosquito repellant and netting (the vaccine won’t prevent itchy bumps from mosquito bites, either). It may seem a bit of overkill, but malaria (especially falciparum) is a bad actor – I’ve seen people sick with malaria and I’d rather not get it.

As I see it, the vaccine “backs up” the phycial barriers (netting, clothing) and repellants, and the prophylaxis protects me if the parasite load I get is too great for the vaccine to block.

From a pure public health viewpoint, dropping the malaria incidence by 55% is a huge win, not only because of the dramatic reduction in human suffering (you listening, Mr. Shecter?) but also because fewer people infected with malaria means – eventually – fewer mosquitos carrying malaria.

Up to today, the “standard” approach to eradicating malaria (as it was done in the Southern US) was to eradicate the mosquitos long enough to get rid of the human reservoir. An alternate approach is to remove the human reservoir – which has worked in a few isolated cases (primarily islands), but has never, to my knowledge, been used as with the intention of eradicating malaria.

With the vaccine, we have an opportunity to start reducing malaria transmission to uninfected people by reducing the reservoir of infected people that the mosquitos feed upon. Modeling I’ve done suggests that a 50% reduction in malaria-infected humans (which can be done with a vaccine or by rigorous treatment of malaria) will eventually lead to malaria dying out over several generations (human generations, not mosquito generations, sad to say). A malaria vaccine could do this at significantly less cost and with a much more meager medical infrastructure (see: sub-Saharan Africa) than medical treatment of malaria would require.

Prometheus

Sorry, #220 was addressed to Th1Th2 in #218. I’m not entirely sure what she was hoping to accomplish, save for a distraction.

Prometheus:

From a pure public health viewpoint, dropping the malaria incidence by 55% is a huge win, not only because of the dramatic reduction in human suffering (you listening, Mr. Shecter?) but also because fewer people infected with malaria means – eventually – fewer mosquitos carrying malaria.

Ah, so it isn’t just a small layer of protection, as I initially thought. Thanks.

@Todd W.

That’s better than my analogy. I work in engineering, so I understand the importance of backup controls. Malaria’s a big killer, so this is a major medical advance.

You can only have the disease shingles if you have previously had chicken pox, even though the same virus is involved.

With one exception. If your chickenpox vaccination doesn’t “take” and you only get partial and fading immunity, it is possible to later get a wild-type HZV infection without getting chickenpox. This infection can then result in shingles later on. (This seems to be the real source of “vaccine-induced” shingles – the vaccine itself isn’t the source of shingles)

This is similar to what happens in atypical measles. The vaccine only caused partial and fading immunity, so that when a later wild-type measles infection occurs, the course of the disease is altered. This is why we stopped using inactivated measles vaccines.

The malaria vaccine is kind of like the ultimate in herd immunity, right? Where the herd protects the mosquitoes, which in return protects the herd?

From what Prometheus describes, what I see is that if you have half the number of people infected with malaria, then only half the mosquitoes that bite those humans would pick up the virus to transmit on to someone else. So when that group goes on, the likelyhood that someone will be bit by an infected mosquito gets cut in half, and since half the people are protected, the number of malaria cases is now 1/4 of the initial. But now only 1/4 of the mosquitoes pick it back up, and so only 1/8 of the people are bit by an infected varmint, etc

Just to reinforce what Todd W said (waves, Hi, Todd!) and to break my rule and answer Thingy only for the benefit of others who really want to know:

No, Thingy. Shingles is NOT a “primary infection” of HSV. By definition, shingles is a reactivation of the HS virus, which has lain dormant since the person has chicken pox. You can’t get shingles unless you have has chicken pox. NOT the vaccine. The chicken pox vaccine has not been shown to cause shingles in the person who received the vaccine.

Personally, I’d rather my kids had the vaccine over the disease, I could have avoided hours of crying, a child in so much distress she needed narcotics for pain, and 4 weeks of sick children. My kids could have avoided some of the scars they now carry. If you asked them, they would have gone for the vaccine, too.

@ Tdoc:

According to the loons, vaccination had nothing to do with stopping those diseases. It was all improved sanitation. (All those open sewers in the 1950s, I guess.)

Alternatively Big Pharma just needs to remove all the poisons they stick in vaccines for the sole purpose of making people sick, and then they’d be fine.

Or we should be using homeopathy instead.

Or all the kids in iron lungs were deliberately harmed by Big Pharma to deceive people into thinking there was such a thing as polio, so that they could sell vaccines.

Probably other even loonier delusions too, which I simply haven’t run across.

Of course, the fact that they don’t WANT to cause that doesn’t mean that it’s not what will happen if they get their way.

With one exception. If your chickenpox vaccination doesn’t “take” and you only get partial and fading immunity, it is possible to later get a wild-type HZV infection without getting chickenpox. This infection can then result in shingles later on. (This seems to be the real source of “vaccine-induced” shingles – the vaccine itself isn’t the source of shingles)

Haha. So you’re actually saying shingles can be a primary infection with HZV, yes or no?

So you’re actually saying shingles can be a primary infection with HZV, yes or no?

What part of “later on” do you not understand? No, I’m not saying that at all, which anyone who understands modern American English should have understood.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Disease is not the same thing as infection.

Is my point clear?

You can’t get shingles unless you have has chicken pox. NOT the vaccine.

NOT the vaccine? [Citation needed]

The chicken pox vaccine has not been shown to cause shingles in the person who received the vaccine.

[Citation needed]

Th1Th2, what do you think “straw man” means?

That “MAY” is based on many factors, not the least of which is the strain of the virus – virulent vs attenuated. Hence just because a vaccine infects you doesn’t mean that it causes the disease (infection and disease being separate entities). This infection without the disease is precisely how the vaccine provides immunity.

The measles vaccine, to be effective, MUST not only infect but MUST replicate inside the host. Do you dispute this?

Comparing this (vaccination) with naturally acquiring the immunity (getting infected with the virulent strain of the virus and thus risking getting the disease and even dying due to the disease) – vaccination wins hands down,

You’re an infection promoter. It’s your job. But are you claiming that measles vaccines are more immunogenic thus more protective than natural infection? Wherever did you learn that?

This is similar to what happens in atypical measles. The vaccine only caused partial and fading immunity, so that when a later wild-type measles infection occurs, the course of the disease is altered. This is why we stopped using inactivated measles vaccines.

That is demonstrably false. The pathogenesis of shingles and atypical measles is NOT similar. Atypical measles is caused by re-infection by exposure to exogenous measles virus whereas shingles is reactivation of a latent virus, and not the result of subsequent re-infection or exposure.

Your confusion [between the terms ‘infection’ and ‘disease’] stems from the fact that the layman uses these two words interchangeably.

Actually, Thingy’s confusion between these two stems from her being crazier than a sh*thouse rat. She actually believes that if you get injected with a DNA vaccine, one that generates antigens but has never even been in contact with the pathogen whose antigens it is emulating, you’re actually getting the disease. Yes, she’s that crazy.

Frankly, count me among those who don’t think we’d be missing anything if Thingy was banned. I believe strongly in the good that can come from correcting “Goofuses”, but Thingy is almost valueless even for this purpose. Contrast this with, say, Sid Offit. Sid is reprehensible and racist, but he at least will try to put forth arguments for what he believes. Thingy just attempts to bludgeon and browbeat everybody, and now she’s attempting to silence others who don’t agree with her.

“Are you inventing words?”

This merry-go-round needs music.

Lynxreign @195: “secret knowledge” that only she has access to and she’s not telling where it comes from.

Voices in the head, probably. It would explain the claims of extensive medical experience (if only on the receiving end), and being off the prescribed meds would explain everything else.

This merry-go-round needs music.

That one’s easy (I’m too lazy to find a higher quality version).

ARRRRRG the troll comments are doing my head in! How do they keep it up?? I have more sensible conversations with my toddler…

You know, how *la* Ding** intrudes into a discussion, heaping inconsequentialities upon irrelevancies, is somewhat analogous to what pseudo-scientists like anti-vaxxers and HIV/AIDS denialists do to a conversation about consensus in science: ” But.. but.. there’s mercury in vaccines!”,” No one has ever isolated HIV!”, or start throwing in the kitchen sink. Any port in a storm.

After a lengthy explanation that precisely details the error, we’ll hear, “But the mercury”,” They never isolated HIV”, or about bits of DNA or suchlike. So *la Ding* is an exaggerated personification of pseudo-scientifc argument: going nowhere at breakneck speed.

** I know, I know, I mixed 2 languages but what the hey, it *is* English.

Notice how Thingy never answers the questions I had posed to it months ago…when it claimed to be working in a hospital:

Where did you to university?

What university degree do you have?

What professional licensing do you have?

Where are you employed in any health care field?

I’ve been out of town for the past two days. Do I get to vote twice to vote Thingy off the island?

We regret to report that the rap fragment we were able to salvage after the bot ran into hardware problems doesn’t look like it’s going to make it out of moderation.

@Helantius (48) Nitpick: “citric acid [aka vitamin C]”
Actually, these are two different molecules: vitamin C’s correct name is ascorbic acid.
Citric acid is that the lemon uses as a buffer to kept itself acidic (and kept the vitamin C active).

Oh crap. I knew I was making a mistake when I wrote that. I even went so far as to search for the two terms together and didn’t pay attention to the results. Thanks for the corrections.

For lurkers: scientists like me like to be told we were wrong about something so that we can figure out the truth. Pretty minor in this case, but the idea is the same generally. Contrast with people who aren’t interested in the truth, who tend to use insults, write nonsense, and usually don’t answer direct evidence-based challenges to their nonsense.

I think those words are way overdone and redundant. Kevin is just trying to impress.

If you think “Do you dispute that?” is way overused, you might want to reconsider saying it over and over.

Of course, it has everything to do with the discussion since the only lucky candidates for shingles are those persons who have had primary VZV infection either by natural infection or vaccination. Your straw man is this, you are confused whether to call chicken pox as primary infection or a disease.

*Sigh
@lurkers:
Natural history of HZV infection:
*HZV infects a person not immune to it.
*HZV enters epithelial cells of the host (where it is active) and causes chicken pox.
*At this stage, where the immune system doesn’t yet have specific defenses against the virus, it may spread to other systems to complicate chicken pox with CNS, lung, heart etc involvement.
*HZV also enters peripheral sensory ganglia (type of neurons) – but is dormant here.
*Immune system eventually produces antibodies against the virus – virus is caught and cleared from the system if it exits the cell (antibodies don’t enter cells) – thus can’t hop to other cells.
*However, it is safe from the immune system inside the neurons where it lies inactive.
*Chicken pox eventually subsides (infected epithelial cells are shed off or, like other cells with the ACTIVE virus, are destroyed by cytotoxic t-cells).
*Following the development of specific immunity against HZV: When the immunity goes down due to any reason, the virus lying dormant in the sensory ganglion is activated – comes out of the ganglion and enters the epithelial cells in the area supplied by that ganglion and causes Shingles.

Scenario in a previously immune person:
*HZV infects the immunized individual i.e. enters the body.
*Antibodies bind to it and render it unable to enter other cells, including neurons.
*No chincken pox or shingles – no disease.

So, we learn that HZV causes chicken pox as the primary DISEASE and shingles as the secodary DISEASE when it infects a non-immune individual. However, this still doesn’t change the fact that HZV INFECTION MAY NOT CAUSE DISEASE as seen in the second scenario.
So, whether shingles is the primary or secondary disease, it has no bearing on the fact that “infection and disease are 2 separate (although not mutually exclusive) entities” and infection doesn’t necessarily translate into disease.

@Thingy:

Your straw man is this, you are confused whether to call chicken pox as primary infection or a disease

*You don’t really understand what is a strawman fallacy.
*You are clearly the one confused regarding the terminology used in medical science.

Of course, it has everything to do with the discussion since the only lucky candidates for shingles are those persons who have had primary VZV infection either by natural infection or vaccination. Your straw man is this, you are confused whether to call chicken pox as primary infection or a disease.

*Sigh
@lurkers:
Natural history of HZV infection:
*HZV infects a person not immune to it.
*HZV enters epithelial cells of the host (where it is active) and causes chicken pox.
*At this stage, where the immune system doesn’t yet have specific defenses against the virus, it may spread to other systems to complicate chicken pox with CNS, lung, heart etc involvement.
*HZV also enters peripheral sensory ganglia (type of neurons) – but is dormant here.
*Immune system eventually produces antibodies against the virus – virus is caught and cleared from the system if it exits the cell (antibodies don’t enter cells) – thus can’t hop to other cells.
*However, it is safe from the immune system inside the neurons where it lies inactive.
*Chicken pox eventually subsides (infected epithelial cells are shed off or, like other cells with the ACTIVE virus, are destroyed by cytotoxic t-cells).
*Following the development of specific immunity against HZV: When the immunity goes down due to any reason, the virus lying dormant in the sensory ganglion is activated – comes out of the ganglion and enters the epithelial cells in the area supplied by that ganglion and causes Shingles.

Scenario in a previously immune person:
*HZV infects the immunized individual i.e. enters the body.
*Antibodies bind to it and render it unable to enter other cells, including neurons.
*No chincken pox or shingles – no disease.

So, we learn that HZV causes chicken pox as the primary DISEASE and shingles as the secodary DISEASE when it infects a non-immune individual. However, this still doesn’t change the fact that HZV INFECTION MAY NOT CAUSE DISEASE as seen in the second scenario.
So, whether shingles is the primary or secondary disease, it has no bearing on the fact that “infection and disease are 2 separate (although not mutually exclusive) entities” and infection doesn’t necessarily translate into disease.

@Thingy:

Your straw man is this, you are confused whether to call chicken pox as primary infection or a disease

*You don’t really understand what is a strawman fallacy.
*You are clearly the one confused regarding the terminology used in medical science.

But are you claiming that measles vaccines are more immunogenic thus more protective than natural infection?

@thingy:
You have amply demonstrated that you are a moron who fails to understand the context of the statement. This new example to demonstrate that property of yours was really not necessary. We understood it the first time.

@lurkers:
I’m merely stating that acquiring immunity by vaccine induced infection is far SAFER than acquiring the immunity by natural infection (the former doesn’t cause the disease while the latter causes the disease and even death in some cases).
Immunogenicity has nothing to do with it.
Difference in immunogenitcity of the antigens doesn’t change the fact that an infection doesn’t always cause disease. It doesn’t change the fact that the vaccine infection is far safer than the natural (virulent strain) infection.
Immunogenicity just determines the chance of developing immunity with a single exposure, and how long that immunity lasts. If the immnunogenicity is lower, increasing the frequency of exposure ensures development of effective immunity (simple property of probability) – booster shots.
Again, practically no bearing on the safety of vaccines and no bearing on the fact that vaccine induced infection doesn’t cause the disease.

The thingy method at argument:
*Make a statement which makes an assertion based on the wrong premise that ‘A is the same as B’.
*When you are shown that A and B are indeed different and hence the assertion based on it is wrong, try to confabulate by saying “oh so you are saying that ‘B and C are the same’?” (where the relationship between B and C has nothing to do with the relationship between A and B). This shall ensure that the focus is shifted from your actual fallacy.
*Use technical Terms and phrases (which you do not understand) to sound sagacious (don’t worry about inappropriate usage – after all, no one will notice).

Julian Frost and Delurked,

1.

Yes, we do dispute this. The virus does not need to replicate to provoke an immune response.

2.

Absolutely ! Citations please to prove your statement otherwise, as a longtime lurker and fence sitter on your trip to the bottom of the lake to ‘sleep with the fishes’ in Orac’s sandbox, I will join the chorus in saying “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”
Put up or shut up Thing

Principles of Vaccination
 

To produce an immune response, live attenuated vaccines must replicate (grow) in the vaccinated person. A relatively small dose of virus or bacteria is administered, which replicates in the body and creates enough of the organism to stimulate an immune response. Anything that either damages the live organisms in the vial (e.g., heat, light) or interferes with replication of the organism in the body (circulating antibody) can cause the vaccine to be ineffective.

As usual, everyday is a learning process for science-free, ignorance-based RI.

Good night.

As far as Jay Gordon is concerned April would be a better month since it is already “Safe Digging Month”.

Thingy: Why do you continue to bring up live attenuated viral vaccines and confusing infection with disease…it has already been explained to you upteen times…most recently by T-Reg.

Your reference to the CDC Pink Book and twisted the words to fit your own delusions about vaccines and the diseases they prevent are evidence of your lack of education, your lack of professional licensing and your lack of employment in any health care field.

Information is gathered from the patient about pre-existing conditions that might constitute a medical contraindication against receiving a live attenuated vaccine, such as SCID (Severe Combined Immune Deficiency)and history of a anaphylaxis to any of the components of the MMR vaccine…all of which have been discussed in prior RI blogs…which Thingy has argued about in hundreds of aimless delusional derailing posts. That is the reason why only licensed medical professionals are permitted to administer vaccines.

The problems with Thingy’s arguments against vaccine have also been discussed:

It is delusional

It has no education at all in the sciences

It has no professional licensing

It has no gainful employment, no less employment in the health care field.

I again vote for actual banning or extensive long moderation of its comments to prevent it from derailing each and every blog.

Here is another statement from the CDC for laypersons who have questions about the MMR Vaccines:

What kind of vaccine is given to prevent measles?

The MMR vaccine prevents measles and 2 other viral diseases—mumps and rubella. These 3 vaccines are safe given together. MMR is an attenuated (weakened) live virus vaccine. This means that after injection, the viruses grows and causes a harmless infection in the vaccinated person with very few, if any, symptoms. The person’s immune system fights the infection caused by these weakened viruses and immunity develops which lasts throughout that person’s life. (CDC Measles-Q & A about Disease & Vaccine)

Reading comprehension 101, Thing. Viruses DO NOT need to multiply to have an immune response. Vaccines from live attenuated viruses require the virus to multiply to work. Both are not mutually exclusive nor collectively exhaustive concepts. You’re embarrassing yourself.

Sorry, Reuben, but you failed reading comprehension yourself (as did Julian Frost and Delurked). Thingy’s statement was restricted to measles, which does require replication. You fell for her latest ploy, which is to pretend that someone said the opposite of what they actually said.

To recap, the part that was wrong was not the statement, but the question that implied the quote said the opposite of what was actually said.

Kevin,

Thingy’s statement was restricted to measles, which does require replication.

No it wasn’t. ALL live vaccines MUST infect and replicate inside the host. Don’t be a fool.

Prometheus,

Additionally, there was an inactivated measles vaccine (I got it as a child) which – by definition – didn’t require replication to work. By way of illustration, “Th1Th2” claims that administering this sort of vaccine also constitutes an “infection”.

Well, it’s definitely an infection. Infection precedes replication however the latter is absent in inactivated vaccines. Following the link I posted above, it further states:

Inactivated vaccines are not alive and cannot replicate. The entire dose of  antigen is administered in the injection. These vaccines cannot cause disease from infection, even in an immunodeficient person.

@W. Kevin Vicklund (is there a Roman numeral after your name by any chance? Because it should.)

That’s what I get for coming into an idiotic conversation late into it.

ALL live vaccines MUST infect and replicate inside the host.

Nonetheless, your statement as written was restricted to measles vaccine.

I have to say, T-reg, I do enjoy your posts. Very educational and easy to read, as well as based in scientific fact.

I heartily concur. the Thing’s responses get weaker every time T-reg smacks it down.

And I would agree that a time-out for the Thing (whether outright ban or moderation purgatory) is a good idea. It’s rapidly losing its entertainment value and is now reduced to using endless variations on the Pee Wee Herman gambit (“I know you are, but what am I?”) to draw attention to its nonsensical arguments.

I’m merely stating that acquiring immunity by vaccine induced infection is far SAFER than acquiring the immunity by natural infection (the former doesn’t cause the disease while the latter causes the disease and even death in some cases).

But the fact still remains that you are an infection promoter and that you’re not really preventing nor controlling infectious diseases. You have admitted that measles vaccines cause measles infection. How is this different for the measles disease that you’re trying to define (actually you have not define what a disease is)?

Immunogenicity has nothing to do with it.
Difference in immunogenitcity of the antigens doesn’t change the fact that an infection doesn’t always cause disease.

Again that is demonstrably false. Immunogenicity is sacred to vaccine makers. It could mean vaccine failure or disaster (e.g. High-titer measles vaccine). And you’re implying that such highly immunogenic vaccine “doesn’t always cause the disease”. Well, you’re right. It didn’t at least for the said vaccine. Only an increased incidence of mortality. Thank you come again.

“Th1Th2” (#290):

“It’s not the measles vaccine would stimulate an inadequate or ineffective immune response but instead the vaccine virus (being unrestricted) would cause considerable tissue damage if given to the immunocompromised (e.g., CD46-deficient) not to mention persistent and chronic infection.”

Not that anybody is looking to “Th1Th2” as a source of information, but “CD46-deficient” is not the same as a CD46 mutation. In addition, the only disorder associated with absent or truncated CD46 is atypical haemolytic-uremic syndrome (not immunodeficiency).

CD46 is a cell-surface protein that is a complement cleavage co-factor. It is also used as a binding site for measles virus and HHV-6, so mutation of certain domains can make people non-permissive (as opposed to “immune”) for measles and, presumably, HHV-6.

I’m not sure where “Th1Th2” is getting his/her/its “facts”, but they aren’t consistent with what we know in this Universe.

Prometheus

CD46 is a cell-surface protein that is a complement cleavage co-factor. It is also used as a binding site for measles virus and HHV-6, so mutation of certain domains can make people non-permissive (as opposed to “immune”) for measles and, presumably, HHV-6.

And what is the implication of this mutation to the immunocomprised if given the measles vaccine?

And your answer was, “inadequate immune response”? Meaning less effective vaccine and more importantly the host will just be fine, no?

But what about Thang-Thang? Sure, he was mildly funny with that keeping naive children away from dirt and grass and crap.

[Citation needed]

“Th1Th2” (#295):

“And what is the implication of this mutation [CD46] to the immunocomprised [sic] if given the measles vaccine?”

[1] Immunocompromised people are not generally given live virus vaccines, although there are exceptions based on their particular type of immune dysfunction (there are many different types and degrees).

[2] If an immunocompromised patient with a CD46 mutation (as mentioned above, the two are not related – no CD46 mutation has been found that leads to immunodeficiency) that made them non-permissive (meaning that the virus cannot replicate in their cells) received the attenuated measles vaccine, there would be no replication of the virus and no detectable immune response. However, they would already be protected from (most strains of) the wild-type measles virus by their CD46 mutation.

The rest of the question from “Th1Th2” was a non sequitur.

Prometheus

Always happy to oblige.

It is peculiar that it’s been responding in this fashion to invocations of what is perhaps its most well known and widely mocked comment.

[1] Immunocompromised people are not generally given live virus vaccines, although there are exceptions based on their particular type of immune dysfunction (there are many different types and degrees).

Like?

there would be no replication of the virus and no detectable immune response.

Again you’ve failed to point out the implication of a nonreplicating virus inside the host cell more so in the absence of detectable immune response from the host. Is this something good?

Worse, is that you had the audacity to falsely conclude that in such events the host would still be “protected” from subsequent infection. What a horrible idea. (Hint: vaccine failure)

#280 Prometheus

if the attenuated measles strain was unable to replicate (as is seen in some people with mutations of the CD46 cell surface protein), it can still stimulate an immune response, although that response will be inadequate (in most cases) because the amount of virus in the MMR is so low.

#290 Th1Th2

It’s not the measles vaccine would stimulate an inadequate or ineffective immune response but instead the vaccine virus (being unrestricted) would cause considerable tissue damage if given to the immunocompromised (e.g., CD46-deficient) not to mention persistent and chronic infection.

#293 Prometheus

I’m not sure where “Th1Th2” is getting his/her/its “facts”, but they aren’t consistent with what we know in this Universe.

Prometheus
All that Th1Th2 did @290 was to take your comment, twist it around some, substitute “deficient” in place of mutation and then mix in some garbage.

Like this..

It’s not the measles vaccine….but instead the vaccine virus (being unrestricted)…

Th1Th2 is just desperately trying to convince others that it knows what it is talking about.

Excellent post Prometheus.

Nope, it was yours:

Th1Th2, do you think Jansici’s method of rinderpest eradication should be used in measles and poliomyelitis eradication efforts?

Yes.

Lancisi’s method included slaughtering those animals not immune.

So, answer the question:

Have you stopped slaughtering naive children in areas where polio is endemic?

If the measles virus (wild-type or vaccine strain) is unable to bind with CD46 – because it is absent or mutated – the virus cannot enter the cell. CD46 is necessary for the fusion of the viral membrane with the cell membrane, so a non-permissive mutation would prevent the virus from entering the cell. [Note: some studies show that CDw150/SLAF1 is an alternate binding protein]

Again you’re deliberately dodging the question: What would happen to the unbound virus? Since the virus cannot replicate inside of the host cell because of mutation, where does it go then?

Secondly, the measles virus has a (-) sense ssRNA genome, so a measles virus that did enter the cell but was unable to replicate (for whatever reason) would be rapidly degraded by cellular RNAses.

How is that possible when you claimed there is no immune response?

Tell me you’re bluffing.

Here’s the citation: http://www.bluesci.org/?p=1960

His solution was to control its spread by slaughtering ill and suspect animals, burying carcases in lime, controlling the movement of cattle and inspecting meat.

His solution was to control its spread by slaughtering ill and suspect animals, burying carcases in lime, controlling the movement of cattle and inspecting meat.

That doesn’t sound like “genocidal” to me which Kevin was trying to portray, does it?

“Suspect”, in this instance, would mean anyone exposed to the disease that wasn’t immune. In the case of measles, that would be an entire town.

And how about those non-immune who were not exposed to the disease? I bet Kevin would kill them too including you if you were one of them.

No, that wasn’t part of Lancisi’s solution. Which, I might add, you advocated without bothering to read. Did it ever occur to you to actually learn something about what you’re talking about?

I’m confused. Who are you arguing with? For Kevin, Lancisi’s method was a “genocidal technique” which I disagree. Now stop wasting my time.

“Are you truly incapable of understanding basic concepts of human honesty?”

Is that a rhetorical question?

Th1Th2, I’m arguing with you, you vile thug. Are you suggesting killing entire villages and towns because they were exposed to measles isn’t genocidal?

So you actually believed Lancisi’s method was genocidal? That all naive children are suspects therefore should be slaughtered?

What would happen to the unbound virus? Since the virus cannot replicate inside of the host cell because of mutation, where does it go then?

Nothing happens. Or rather, the virus faces one of the following fates: it eventually dies and is scavenged, it is eventually killed by the innate immune system, or it is eventually excreted. It fails to cause any damage in any of the cases (you are aware that a virus can only cause damage if it gets inside a cell, right?).

Secondly, the measles virus has a (-) sense ssRNA genome, so a measles virus that did enter the cell but was unable to replicate (for whatever reason) would be rapidly degraded by cellular RNAses.

How is that possible when you claimed there is no immune response?

Cellular RNAses are not part of the immune system. They recycle RNA in the cell without regard to whether it is “self” or “other”.

@ Gray Falcon: It is such an odious troll which has taken over this blog repeatedly…and it always resorts to vile inhumane comments about disabled kids.

At the risk of stuffing the ballot box to black-ball this delusional disease-promoting nasty troll, I again state I am in favor of banning this POS evil Thingy. Let it get its “jollies” some other way, not by its crass, vulgar postings.

@ Th1Th2bot Service Center:

In admiring tribute to the bot, I’ve been singing, “We got the bot!”** recently.

** my apologies to George Clinton & Co.

Nothing happens.

That’s it? Nothing happens? Wow. Of course you know that that is one big pile of crap. Are you saying that people with CD46 mutation are not susceptible to measles?

Or rather, the virus faces one of the following fates: it eventually dies and is scavenged, it is eventually killed by the innate immune system, or it is eventually excreted.

That’s a contradiction to your previous statement. Again how are these possible when there is “no detectable immune response” like you said?

Cellular RNAses are not part of the immune system. They recycle RNA in the cell without regard to whether it is “self” or “other”.

Let me ask you why do you keep recycling crap?

I am highly supportive of people becoming more aware of vaccine injuries. Namely, that they are very rare and don’t include autism.

But trying to hijack Breast Cancer Awareness for pseudoscience? Low…

OK. #334 is for Kevin not Prometheus. I don’t think it matters nonetheless.

It really is quite simple. See if you can follow along: The risk of injury, illness or death from vaccines is so very small that there have only ever been a handful of actual verified cases. (VAERS reports alone are not verified cases as they are based on self-reporting, and include reports from a cartoon mouse) On the other hand, the amount of diseases and deaths prevented by vaccines is so large a number as to include billions. This, dear friends, is called a risk to benefit ratio, and is the prime metric by which all medical interventions are evaluated.

@jon

And why the hell are you necroing a thread, idiot?