Michele Bachmann And The HPV Vaccine
September 18th, 2011
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(Browsers that cannot view embedded content, click here for the original Youtube video.)
You may notice that there’s something a bit off here. Claims that vaccines are a dangerous conspiracy purported by horrible pharmaceutical companies are usually associated more with the Loony Left of the political spectrum, while Bachman is decidedly on the Loony Right side of the isle. It’s interesting to note that different ridiculous beliefs tend to come from different sides of the isle. Vaccine conspiracy theories tend to center on mistrust of corporations and capitalism in general and are often part and parcel of theories of how the military and big corporations are killing us with fluoride, chemtrails and depleted uranium, which means we all need to embrace the “natural way” and move back to mud huts where we can practice free love and drop acid.
You’ll notice, however, that Backmann is not opposed to vaccinations in general, but is singling out one vaccine which apparently has a nearly magical power to steal the innocence of sweet lovely little twelve year old and make them retarded. The reason that conservatives are so opposed to the HPV vaccine is that it’s seen as somehow encouraging sex or that requiring it is somehow offering a government endorsement of premarital sex. It’s an extremely warped view when one considers that they’re effectively saying that they are so opposed to what they consider to be offensive forms of sex that it’s worth avoiding a vaccine that could wipe out most cervical cancer.
Her sentiment seems to have been touched off in part by the state of Texas adding the HPV vaccine to the required immunizations for school admission for girls. This was done by another Republican presidential candidate, Rick Perry. Some have accused Perry of taking pharmaceutical money for this policy, it really does not change the fact that it’s a good idea to have girls vaccinated. If he did do so because he was paid off, then all he can be accused of is doing the right thing for the wrong reason.
About HPV:
HPV or the Human papillomavirus is a human-specific virus that can infect the mouth, respiratory system or skin. However, it is most problematic when it effects the genitals. Genital infection of HPV also tends to be quite contagious. Different strains of HPV tend to be more prone to infecting one area of the body than another, so while it is remotely possible that a strain of HPV associated with genital and oral infections could also result in an infection elsewhere, it’s unlikely that this would happen, except perhaps in an immune-compromised individual or in circumstances where there was an unusual level of exposure.
Most HPV infections are asymptomatic. The most common acute symptom of HPV infection is warts. HPV causes all varieties of warts, ranging from genital warts to plantar warts and common skin warts. There’s no cure for HPV, but the local infection is typically treated by removing the warts. Warts can be removed any number of means including cutting or freezing the warts off. Removing warts does not assure that they will not return, as the virus still exists in the region of the body. However, since the wart itself contains the highest concentration of the virus, removal of warts can help the body in clearing the infection. Ultimately, most HPV infections do clear the body due to the action of the immune system, but it can take months or more.
While warts are an unsightly, embarrassing and uncomfortable problem, the real danger from HPV is cancer. HPV is most strongly associated with cervical cancer. Indeed, more than 70% of cases of cervical cancer can be directly attributed on HPV. The strains of the virus that have the strongest association with cancer are not prone to causing warts. The greatest danger occurs in individuals who have the virus in their system for a long period of time. While most HPV infections clear the body in less than a year, 5-10% may last years. These long-lasting infections pose the greatest risk of cervical cancer. HPV is the reason it is recommended that women receive regular pap smears. Since the cancer-causing infection is usually asymptomatic, it is the only way of assuring early detection.
While HPV has the strongest association with cervical cancer, it is certainly not the only cancer that is caused by HPV. The same strains responsible for most cervical cancers are also responsible for at least 25% of anal cancers, a large percentage of oral cancers, cancers of the upper respiratory system, penil cancer and other types of cancer. More than 5% of new cancers detected are attributed to HPV, a whopping half a million cases per year, resulting in innumerable deaths. HPV may soon exceed tobacco usage as the single largest cause of oral cancers.
Overall, the risks of HPV are considerably greater for women than men, but it should not be considered an exclusively female problem. Men rarely get genital warts from the infection and male genital cancers from HPV are far more rare than in females, but they certainly can and do happen.
Transmission and Prevention:
HPV is extremely common. By some estimates, more than 75% of sexually active individuals will contract at least one strain of HPV at some point in their life. The prevalence of the virus varies by age, with sexually active women in their early 20’s having the highest rate of HPV infection – upwards of 40%, although most of these infections are considered “low risk” and will probably clear the body without ever causing any complications. Most infections are asymptomatic, so the majority of individuals are never aware of their exposure to HPV.
Sexual contact is the most common way in which HPV is spread and is the cause of nearly all genital tract infections with HPV. While it’s remotely possible that the infection could be spread by contact with some intermittent surface or object, such cases are rare to the point of being nearly unheard of. There are no documented cases of HPV being spread by a toilet seat, and evidence indicates the risk of this happening is approximate zero.
The risk of spreading HPV from one partner to another can be reduced by the use of a condom, but condom use is far from completely effective. Fluid transfer is not necessary to spread HPV, only skin contact is needed. Therefore, condoms offer, at best, very limited protection. Intercourse is not required either. Simply engaging in activities that involve touching of the genitals can spread the infection.
There are really only two methods of effectively reducing transmission of genital HPV. The most obvious would be complete abstinence from all sexual contact. Obviously, one who never comes in contact with the genital region of anyone else is not likely to acquire the infection. Needless to say, this is not something that is likely to have very broad appeal as a method of reducing transmission.
The second, generally more effective and realistic method is the use of the HPV vaccine, which is highly effective at preventing infection by the most high risk strains of the virus.
The vaccine:
There are currently two vaccines for HPV. Both vaccines are relatively new. Gardasil, developed by Merck was approved by the US government in 2006 and within the next year gained approval in the European Union, Australia and elsewhere. A similar vaccine, Cervarix, was developed by by GlaxoSmithKline. Cervarix was first approved in Australia in 2007 and later that year by the European Union. It won final approval in the US in 2009. The vaccines have now been approved in nearly all industrial countries.
While hundreds of strains of HPV are known to exist, the vaccine targets four strains that are known to cause the overwhelming majority of both cancers and genital warts. The vaccine has been shown to reduce the probability of cervical cancer by 70%, the risk of genital warts by over 90% and significantly reduce the risk of HP V-related cancers in other areas of the body. Of course, the vaccine does not only protect the individual who receives it, but also stops the infection from being transmitted to others.
To be most effective, the vaccine should be used prior to an individual becoming sexually active. When used as such, it avoids that individual ever acquiring the highest risk HPV strains. The effectiveness of the vaccine in individuals who have already been infected by one or more strains of HPV is not established. Most sexually active adults don’t know whether they’ve ever had an HPV infection and certainly would not know what strain. Therefore, it is considered optimal for the vaccine to be given at a relatively young age. It is not specifically approved for those older than their mid-20’s, although older individuals can be vaccinated, it’s not entirely clear what level of protection they will receive, if they already have been exposed to HPV.
The HPV vaccine has primarily been marketed for use in females, but it can be used in either gender and has increasingly been suggested for males. Use of the vaccine in both males and females can deny the HPV virus a host. Ultimately, wide deployment of the vaccine can wipe out the most dangerous strains of the virus and avoid at least 70% of cervical cancers. If everyone was vaccinated against HPV, hundreds of thousands of cancers would be avoided each year.
On a personal note:
I have had the HPV vaccine. This despite the fact that I’m a male and that I was technically above the cutoff age. I don’t know if I’ve ever had an HPV infection. There’s a very good chance that I have and a very good chance that I haven’t. If I have had an HPV infection, it was asymptomatic and there’s a very good chance that it was not one of the strains that is of concern and that the vaccine protects against.
Since I don’t know, I thought it was worth the cost of the vaccine to at least reduce the probability that I’d host the HPV virus. If I have not had any of the strains the vaccine protects against, I should be completely protected. If I have had one, I should be protected against at least the other three, but the effectiveness against the one I’ve already had is unknown. It may help or it may not. It’s also possible that I already have a naturally acquired immunity to that infection.
More importantly, I got the vaccine because I thought it was the responsible thing to do. I believe everyone should get it, even if there’s a good chance they’ve had exposure to one or more HPV strains before. The recommendation is more based on economics than safety, recommending the vaccine for those who most benefit. I want to protect humanity and when I say that the vaccine is safe I want to be able to back that up by saying that I was willing to put it into my own body. That was worth the couple hundred dollars I had to pay for it.
And no… it’s not because I’m some kind of playa’ or man-whore.
The Controversy:
There is really no debate over the safety or effectiveness of the HPV vaccine, but you might not know that based on what a lot of socially conservative and Christian groups have to say. In fact, they are not opposed to the vaccine because of any legitimate concerns over the possible side effects or medical validity of the vaccine, but simply because, in their minds, it somehow interferes with the message that all sex is wrong unless it is within the confines of a religiously-sanctioned marriage between and man and a woman.
One could go so far as to say that, if everyone practiced sex as most fundamentalist Christians demand, it would mean that genital infections with HPV would not be a problem. If every person maintained absolute sexual abstinence, never engaging in sexual intercourse or any other sexual contact with anyone until the day they were married and thereafter had sex with only their partner, then HPV would have a very hard time spreading very far within the population. Therefore, in the minds of some, HPV is associated with sinning and the vaccine is only helping the dirty, sinful people who would do such a thing.
For most, it might not be so direct as saying those who have sex deserve to get cancer, but some of the arguments include the following:
- Giving a young girl the HPV vaccine effectively conveys the message that you expect she’ll have sex at some point in her life with someone other than her virginal husband and that it’s okay for her to do so.
- Protecting young girls from a sexually transmitted disease will make them go out and have sex.
- If the vaccine is paid for in any way by the government or insurance then we’re all subsidizing protection of the segment of the population that engages in sinful behavior.
- The vaccine would be unnecessary if everyone practiced the christian ideal of sex. We should focus efforts on just getting people to stop having sex.
If you do not believe me, here are some quotes on the subject:
Bridget Maher, Family Research Council:
Abstinence is the best way to prevent HPV… Giving the HPV vaccine to young women could be potentially harmful, because they may see it as a license to engage in premarital sex.
Tony Perkins, Family Research Council President:
Because HPV infection is caused by sexual activity, it is not transmitted by casual contact and therefore is not in the same class as other diseases like polio for which mandatory, school-based vaccination is a public-health imperative
David Bereit, American Life League
Gov. Perry has turned his back on the pro-life and pro-family people who elected him and is now playing into the agenda of Planned Parenthood, a group which regularly opposes parents’ rights and which praised his action as ‘a great day for women and for future generations of Texas women and families
…
Gardasil is a vaccination against a sexually transmitted virus, and parents should be the ones to decide whether their young daughters should receive these shots – not Planned Parenthood, and not the governor of any state. American Life League strongly opposes such a mandatory vaccine because it completely removes parents from these important medical decisions and makes children the innocent victims
…
Planned Parenthood’s own internal documents show that the organization makes most of its income from sexually active, young, single women . Not only does Planned Parenthood stand to profit by selling these expensive HPV vaccines, but it also will profit enormously from the aftermath of the sexual promiscuity that will surely follow when young girls are led to believe they can be sexually carefree without consequence once they receive these shots.
Steven W. Mosher, Population Research Institute
I (Steve) think that they see Gardasil as what one might call a “wedge” drug. For them, the success of this public vaccination campaign has less to do with stopping cervical cancer, than it does with opening the door to other vaccination campaigns for other sexually transmitted diseases, and perhaps even including pregnancy itself. For if they can overcome the objections of parents and religious organizations to vaccinating pre-pubescent—and not sexually active—girls against one form of STD, then it will make it easier for them to embark on similar programs in the future.
After all, the proponents of sexual liberation are determined not to let mere disease—or even death—stand in the way of their pleasures. They believe that there must be technological solutions to the diseases that have arisen from their relentless promotion of promiscuity. After all, the alternative is too horrible to contemplate: They might have to learn to control their appetites. And they might have to teach abstinence.
Human Life International (A Christian Pro-Life Group):
Excluding children from school for refusal to be vaccinated for a disease spread only by penetrating vaginal intercourse is a serious, precedent-setting action that trespasses on the right of parents to make medical decisions for their children as well as on the rights of the children to attend school. In addition, this vaccine prevents a disease which is exclusively sexually transmitted; mandating it as early as 9 years of age places the medical provider in an ethical dilemma.
The Pro-Family Law Center opposes this proposed legislation on the grounds that it infringes on parental rights, unequally protects female students over male students from HPV, and disturbs a natural incentive for teenage students to abstain from sexual intercourse to avoid the contraction of certain sexually transmitted infections.
Jacob Puliyel, St Stephens Hospital in Delhi:
The underlying assumption here is that adolescent girls in India may all become promiscuous
Leslie Unruh, the National Abstinence Clearinghouse
I personally object to vaccinating children against a disease that is 100 percent preventable with proper sexual behavior
Gene Rudd, Christian Medical and Dental Associations:
I’ve talked to some who have said, This is going to sabotage our abstinence message
Conclusion (yes it should be mandated):
Requiring vaccination as a condition of entry into school is nothing new. It’s a well established health policy that has resulted in numerous diseases being wiped out. Since the vaccine is an unavoidable requirement, health insurers have to cover it. For those who do not have insurance, required vaccines are usually available through state programs. Wide distribution of such vaccines can reduce the individual cost. Of course, the vaccines will eventually reduce healthcare costs dramatically due to less need for cancer treatment, although in this case, the majority of those savings will take some time to be realized – although reduction in genital wart treatment will occur much sooner.
The fact of the matter is that the vast majority of girls will eventually have sexual contact with more than one person. Most will not wait until they are married to do so and even for the few who do, they usually will not be marrying a man who has likewise been completely sexually sequestered. Providing the maximum protection requires that they receive the vaccine early in life, before they have had any chance to be exposed to the virus. For those who might not be exposed, such as those who plan on going into the convent and becoming nuns, getting the vaccine still does them no harm.
The idea that parents should decide whether their girl “needs it” is ridiculous. It’s totally unreasonable to expect that a girl is going to go to her parents and reveal that she is thinking she might engage in some sexual activity and therefore, it’s about time she gets that vaccine. It’s also completely absurd to expect that parents are somehow completely aware of their kid’s sexual experimentation. It’s one thing to be open with your children, but lets be reasonable here! If nothing else, the mandate allows for girls to receive the vaccine without having to go through the uncomfortable process of requesting it. It gives them an “out” to simply say “I need it for school” and not “I might someday have sex.” (Even though they generally will.)
It won’t turn innocent little girls into whores or even encourage sex. It’s not as though risks like sexually transmitted diseases have ever been that much of a deterrent anyway, and eliminating one of the less high risk ones is not going to make anyone suddenly feel liberated to go screw the entire town. The whole ideas is as absurd as thinking that getting a tetanus shot encourages anyone to go play with dirty, rusty nails.
There is one thing, however, that is missing from most of the requirements: it only applies to half of the population. We already know that the HPV vaccine protects boys from genital warts and a variety of cancers. Overall, the chances that HPV will cause harm to a male are far less than those for females, but that’s not the entire issue. If the vaccine were given to both boys and girls, it would deny the virus hosts and eventually the most harmful strains would be driven to extinction.
This entry was posted on Sunday, September 18th, 2011 at 8:04 pm and is filed under Bad Science, Conspiracy Theories, Culture, Education, Politics, Quackery, media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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September 20th, 2011 at 1:33 am
It’s probably because it’s only recently that large numbers of people have refused to get their kids vaccinated. Back when vaccination rates were high enough for herd immunity there was no reason for the insurance companies to particularly care if a few people didn’t bother with the vaccine.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 4:33 am
Anon said:
Sure, but not by forcing their problems on other people!
Anon said:
That is an unreasonable strawman.
Anon said:
When you introduce force, you remove will from the equation. An uninformed voter will only add the rule of the mob to the polls, and that is not desirable in any way.
Anon said:
Well in the Danish system jury duty can be compulsive but have not been for a hundred years. I am volunteering, and I know many other good people who volunteer. There are not even any public campaigns calling for volunteers.
Compensation should be enough for enough people to volunteer.
Anon said:
And that is the very scary position I am very much concerned about.
Anon said:
That is really your problem, and the answer depends on your risk aversion. You can stay away from people you do not know the vaccination status of. You can ask them. People with allergies do it like that, they usually don’t call for total bans on they favorite allergens, and neither should you.
Anon said:
That is usually called parenting. Is is a bad decision? That is our point of view.
DV82XL said:
So? Get vaccinated yourself and you are protected!
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September 20th, 2011 at 6:20 am
Leclerc said:
What kind of libertarian la-la land do you live in anyway?
Leclerc said:
That’s practically everyone in the population.
I mean if I took that position to its logical extreme I wouldn’t be able to go to any public place nor would I be able to use public transport to get there (nor could I walk there).
Leclerc said:
Do you really think it is somehow reasonable to expect a person to ask the ~200 passengers or so in a crush-loaded train if they’ve all been vaccinated?
Leclerc said:
Usually what they do is require that food items containing potential allergens have that marked on the package so that they can check for whatever it is they are allergic to (though I think there is a good argument for banning perfumes which contain allergens as it’s very hard to avoid exposure).
Leclerc said:
You seem to be having a lot of trouble fully understanding the fact that being vaccinated may not actually protect someone.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 6:53 am
Anon said:
Well, it is not your Democratic Republic of Totalitarian!
Anon said:
Then don’t! Taking you position to the logical extreme with and forcing someones preverences on thers with force has already been tried several places with no happy outcomes.
Anon said:
Then don’t take the train. You are the one going of the reservation being paranoid and wanting to force your will on everybody else, so you don’t have to face the consequences of you own choices.
If you are afraid of the public, then don’t go there. Don’t try forcing the public to do your bidding.
Anon said:
That is no argument to use force on everybody else. Why are you bolstering the anti-vaxer arguments?
You cannot get a risk free society. You take your own precautions and evaluate the risks you are willing to take and stay out of everybodu else’s business. You can try and pursuade them, which is easy for most people, but don’t use force on people.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 7:10 am
Leclerc said:
So this is the crux of your argument. Frankly I am not impressed. People living in groups have always had rules that must be enforced. Ideally these should be kept to a minimum, as should the methods to force compliance, but in the end the group must prevail.
Thus your argument must be based on reasons why in this instance free choice must be maintained, and a general appeal to individual freedoms is just not sufficient. The benefits of mass vaccination are clear, and the risks are relatively small, and on this you seem to agree. Unless you can table something beyond an appeal to general Libertarian philosophy, your argument falls flat.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 7:52 am
Leclerc said:
While taking your position to its logical extreme would require us to legalise drunk driving.
Leclerc said:
It isn’t about me not wanting to face the consequences of my choices but of their bad choices.
Leclerc said:
Never mind that most of the public is probably on my side on this issue.
Leclerc said:
You’re the one who is siding with them.
Leclerc said:
Doesn’t mean we have to tolerant people putting everyone else at increased risk for no good reason.
Leclerc said:
The problem here is that there is a small group of idiots who just can’t be persuaded to not harm the rest of society.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 9:44 am
DV82XL said:
My position is no different. There are other non-violent methods to employ that will not endanger the group. The number of people who does not respond to incentives like pursuasion, peer pressure, insurance premiums and other social and economic pressures that does not employ force is very small and thus the risk is very very small. The danger to society of using force for this and that are eminent – libertarian or not.
Unless you can table something beyond an appeal to general strong man tactics your argument falls flat. Using force is an extreme option no matter how many other times it has already been used, so as the proponent of using force, the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate that society will end if force is not used.
Such a demonstration has already fallen flat on its nose through the last 56 comments. Cervical cancer deaths from HPV is only 6 out of 100.000 women a year about half of the low number of traffic deaths in the US. Should no one be HPV vaccinated society will not fall.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 9:54 am
Anon said:
You are right, but I am not asking you to take it to the extreme, though this could be an interesting topic somewhere else. I am only asking that you don’t force risks on somebody else. Preventing drunks from driving does not expose them to other risks.
Anon said:
Like we have already discussed, you can do that without forcing anyone.
Anon said:
So your point is that because I do not literally want to kick anti-vaxer ass, then I am siding with them? Don’t be foolish.
Anon said:
Not using force is in it self a good reason, and you are still able to manage the risks even if you don’t like to. Your likings is not reason enough to use force.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 9:55 am
“le” is still me!
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September 20th, 2011 at 10:40 am
Anon said:
Yeah, I think that’s pretty much it. One could argue that they really started addressing this a bit later than they should have, because really, this became an issue as early as the mid to late 1990’s, but the reason it was not traditionally considered is that there was no reason to do so.
Like I said, this should really prove the effectiveness and relative risk of vaccines, because insurance companies make their money by managing risk. That’s what they’re all about and they are constantly calculating the relative risk and return for things to keep the proportion of times they’ll need to pay out low. They have very smart people who are employed to spend their days crunching the numbers on this and coming up with the probabilities.
The fact that insurance companies generally want you to have your vaccines comes down to their projections. They take the cost of the vaccine (relatively low in most cases) and then multiply that by the number of clients they insure and compare that to the number who would be expected to otherwise get sick multiplied by the average cost of care.
Insurance companies cover vaccines if they are required to, if it’s part of the plan agreed to or if it is calculated to be to their benefit.
If you want to realize how downright cold the math can be, you can look at where insurance companies don’t cover a vaccine. When the chicken pox vaccine came out, it was expensive (most medicines are very expensive the first year). Many insurers did not cover it. Basically, someone had crunched the numbers. They could pay $400 per injection for kids to get it. If they did not pay, they figured X number would go unvaccinated and Y number would get it anyway and pay out of pocket. Of the number X, they determined that a certain percentage would eventually get the infection (lets say 75%) They then calculated that of those 75%, a certain percentage (lets say 33%) would need some kind of care from a doctor and figured that the average cost might be something like $200. They also would figure that a small percentage would need more than a doctor visit – let say .05% and that the cost of those would average $5000.
They may even go so far as to consider the number expected to die, the proportion of those who had a death benefit on their policy and the amount paid to each for the death.
In the end, at least until the price of the vaccine came down, it was more favorable to not cover it. (oh, and they may also consider that too, the projection for the reduced price. The number of additional illnesses if they put off coverage for a few years versus the savings when the price comes down)
Yes, that’s how insurance works. They don’t really care about you personally, but they care a lot about the collective risk. Anything your insurance company recommends to you is always going to have a lower risk than the alternative. They will cover anything that represents a net risk reduction unless the reduction is less than the cost of covering it.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 11:20 am
Leclerc said:
We’ve been trying the other methods (persuasion mainly, but also some peer pressure and starting on increased insurance premiums, though given that the problem is mostly coming from the upper classes that isn’t likely to help much) but even then we still haven’t got enough people (but do have a solid majority).
Leclerc said:
Well then ig you think it is appropriate to use force to stop a crime (such as say, a robbery) then it us up to you to prove that society will end if it isn’t done.
Leclerc said:
Typical anti-vaccination crap asking how we managed to survive without vaccines.
Besides, half the number of traffic deaths is still quite high enough to justify spending significant resources reducing.
le said:
It prevents them from going where they want to go (and also requires them to rely on others for transportation).
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 1:09 pm
Anon said:
Not counting af few hot-spots of anti-vaxers, I am not convinced that we have a problem right now. there are challenges and issues to take care of, but we are not in trouble right now.
Anon said:
Of course. Do you think that is difficult prove?
Remember I am talking about a specific vaccine and not individual vaccinations just like we are not talking about specific instances of crime.
Anon said:
What kind of counter-argument is this? You are proposing to use force against parents for doing what they think is right to combat a tiny risk to a small number of people that does not respond to the vaccine, and can be handled without violence, and you respond like this. Come on.
Anon said:
But it is an acceptable risk, otherwise nobody would be driving. You are saying that half of an acceptable risk is unacceptable, and violence should be used to prevent it. That is not right.
And it is worse than that because when you vaccinate yourself and your kids, the risk to you is almost zero, you still want to use violence to eliminate the last hint of risk. That is not reasonable.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 3:00 pm
I don’t really understand why Leclerc is so much set against State power. Without it, the law of the strongest would prevail – and that isn’t a very nice situation, just read Leviathan by Hobbes. At least in the somewhat civilized west citizens can influence State power (democracy; human and other rights;…). Considering a mandate that the children in public schools be vaccined as illegitimate state violence does not strike me as very honest in a democratic country: if the democratically prevailing group decides (1) to organise public schools (without forbidding private schools) and (2) to impose vaccination as precondition for entrance, there isn’t that much difference between them and private groups with private schools. If the public schools had a monopoly, I would somewhat understand his position, but even then it’s the monopoly and not the mandated vaccination that is illegitimate.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 3:36 pm
Vjatcheslav said:
I am against agressive violence no matter who does it. I am surprised that you are not!
BTW you only need society to achieve justice. A state is not needed to do that. That said I am not an anarchist but I am extremely vary of state power as justice is rarely a concern for the rulers of states. Using violence when no violence is needed is the antithesis of justice, and that is exactly the situation with HPV mandates.
It seems your view of a legitimate democracy includes two wolves and a sheep voting on the dinner menu. That is not legitimate in mine.
People are still forced to pay for the public shools even if you exclude them from using them with mandates. Private school requirements is completely different, and requirements are part of the competition between the private schools.
Your arrogance in telling people how to live their lives and your disregard for using violence against your opponents scares me.
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 4:41 pm
After all this discussion I’ve not yet understood if Leclerc thinks that in the USA government people (ie cops) are actively chasing unvaccinated people to force them to get a shot or otherwise directly shooting them with syringes filled with vaccines…
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 5:03 pm
Massimo C said:
What would you think a mandate is?
Quote Comment
September 20th, 2011 at 7:20 pm
This has stopped being a debate on the vaccine issue and has shifted into one over collective vs. personal rights. In my experience this balance is not even a matter of opinion, but one of preference. As such it cannot be resolved any more than a debate over coffee vs chocolate – personal tastes will prevail.
To those like Leclerc I can only point out that there has never been a functioning example of Rational Anarchy, (which seems to be the system you are espousing) anywhere or at any time in history. If one accepts that a society needs rules, perforce one must accept that there must be some mechanism of enforcement, be it incarceration, fines or ostracization. Without enforcement rules have no effect, as voluntary compliance has also been shown to be ineffectual more often than not.
Therefore I submit that the issue of enforcement, the degree of such, and the penalties involved must be decided on a case-be-case bases, not by broad ideological theory. Thus to assert that the state has no right to force anyone to receive a vaccination must be argued on the benefits vs. the cost of vaccination and not on the issue of freedom from government control.
I have yet to see Leclerc post anything substantive against vaccination per se except that they may on rare occasions cause side effects. I have also not seen any considered argument by him why the minor risks of that happening are worse than the possibly that some pathogen gets out of control.
So let’s forget the political aspects for now and refocus on the scientific debate, because the former cannot proceed rationally until the latter is settled.
Quote Comment
September 21st, 2011 at 3:23 am
DV82XL said:
The debate over colelctive and original right started in the blog post we are commenting. A debate of pro vs con vaccines is a dead issue, and I got first hand experience of the debate tactics here when I wrote something that could be considered con when taking statements out of context and torturing the words used.
The rest of your comment is just one looong strawman.
DV82XL said:
I have stated the exact opposite. Oposing an expansion of government force is not espousing anarchy, and saying otherwise is just stupid.
DV82XL said:
Now that you have started a debate on anarchy, I will just say that that anarchy also have rules and mechanisms of enforcement.
DV82XL said:
That is not obviously wrong. When you debate using government force on anyone you are by definition debating the issue of freedom from government control – you obviously reject freedom and individual rights and turn to a morally dubious utilitarian position.
DV82XL said:
Of course not, and that lack is no argument to use violence agaist your opponents.
DV82XL said:
I have not seen any argument, considered or not, that pathogens are getting out of control. And aboslutely no arguments that pathogen control cannot be obtained without violence.
DV82XL said:
Your comment is one long ideological tirade even if you do not know it. There is no scientific debate because we seem to be in complete agreement on the scientific facts.
A scientific debate can never conclude on using violence on your opponents or not. Science can bring facts to the table for that discussion but nothing more.
In your comment you urge one thing and do the opposite. Not good.
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September 21st, 2011 at 3:33 am
Leclerc said:
Yes, by becoming something other than an anarchy (usually a dictatorship of some kind).
Leclerc said:
If we’re seeing pathogens we haven’t been seeing for decades than I’d say we have lost control of them.
That happens to be exactly what has happened when people stop vaccinating before complete global disease eradication has been completed.
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September 21st, 2011 at 3:45 am
Anon said:
That is not true. You should read up on anarchy. There are many free books on that. Do you really want to debate anarchy? I can argue the position even if I do not support it.
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September 21st, 2011 at 6:27 am
Leclerc said:
All I see here now is a troll determined to highjack this thread to his own ends and avoid any attempt to bring it back to the topic at hand. In other words he has decided that this forum is to be a soapbox for his political ideology regardless.
I do not feed trolls and suggest others do not ether.
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September 21st, 2011 at 7:33 am
http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/2011/is-the-hpv-vaccine-safe-v-2-0/
Not going to join any of the chatter on whether or not vaccination should be mandatory, convincing people over the internet is like trying to nail jelly to the ceiling.
But I offer the above link as some information, just to put the risks and dangers of the Gardasil vaccine into context.
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September 21st, 2011 at 3:42 pm
Note: ‘planters’ should be ‘plantar’ which means pertaining to the sole of the foot.
I agree with DV82XL @ 71.
Troll should not be fed. It should be culled, or given separate thread.
Otherwise, use a kill-file.
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September 22nd, 2011 at 10:26 am
Leclerc’s opinion – that vaccines are great and everyone *should* have them but that it is their choice to do so and that you cannot force them on those who don’t want them is by no means fringe or even unjustifiable. I have to admit that I do sympathize with this stance to some degree. I tend to be a libertarian by philosophy and government regulations are not something I’m fond of. I admit the whole thing gives me mixed feelings.
It’s an age old debate of course.
There is a point where a society must impose its rules on what is otherwise private property or private matters in order to reasonably protect others. In many places you can’t have pools of standing water outdoors on your property unless you add chemicals to them that will kill mosquito larva. You are required to drain any kind of stagnant pond and you can be fined for anything from old tires to unmaintained bird baths that would provide a breeding ground for mosquitoes. It does not matter if you don’t care if mosquitoes bite you. You still can’t let them breed on your property and must take measures to avoid that happening.
Of course, our bodies are more fundamental than land ownership and controlling what goes into it is more fundamental than the right to keep old tires. Then again, human to human pathogenic infections could be considered a greater risk than mosquitoes, even in areas with malaria.
I don’t know where you draw the line. However, I certainly think that denying a child full vaccination is at the very least bad parenting and very well may represent neglect, which is a valid concern of a society.
One problem with mandating vaccines as a way of combating illness and raising levels of vaccination is that it’s just never going to be totally effective. Some people will resit. You can’t put everyone who does not vaccinate their child away, because the jails are not big enough. People will go to great lengths like forging records or homeschooling. It’s pretty damn difficult to stop people from injecting substances into their body when they want to (we try very hard to do that), but making them inject substances they do not want is going to be even more difficult and probably less successful.
Vaccine mandates may help if they prevent people from just forgetting about the issue, which I could easily see many doing. Those who don’t care enough to vaccinate their child may do so if they are asked to when their child goes to school. Insurers may be compelled to pay if it is required for schooling. However, those who really oppose it are another story.
The fact that we even need to consider that situation, to me, represents a failing of our educational system and of our public health officials to adequately address the public and inform them. Every ignorant parent who refuses vaccination is an example of someone who got the message from the anti-vaxers and swallowed it whole before we could refute it.
In my opinion, unless you can get people to accept the benefits of vaccines, you just can’t win. There will probably always be a lunatic fringe, but the problem is that it’s not the fringe anymore.
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September 22nd, 2011 at 3:33 pm
drbuzz0 said:
In any society that places importance on individual freedom there is always going to be tension between the rights of the individual and the rights of the group. Every time this comes up there will be debate, and so there should be. Ultimately however the the decision needs to be made by considering the facts of the situation and those must take presidence over the ideology. This is not what is happening in this case.
The facts supporting the benefits of mass vaccination far outweigh those of the dangers. Furthermore the generally stated reasons the anti-vaccination movement claim that are dangers have been show to be false. Thus the weight of the evidence supports the subordination of individual rights in this case.
Debate anytime restricting individual rights and freedoms are at stake is very important, and the decision to do so must never be taken lightly, but once the facts are in, and a decision is made in consideration of those facts, the debate is over unless new information is brought forth, which is not the case here.
I agree that education is the key, as it is in just about every case we discuss in these pages, but in the end commonsense must prevail. Hopefully that will come from third-parties like insurance companies, employers, schools and the like. While there may be those that will try to get around these by subterfuge, the numbers will be small.
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September 22nd, 2011 at 6:17 pm
drbuzz0 said:
I completely agree on almost everything you write, but the question is if we are at this point for the HPV vaccine and I am not even close to being convinced on that. Most commenters here jump straight to using force without exploring other options and arguing that it they are not enough.
drbuzz0 said:
I am not convinced you are right about that. The problem if you are right is that if it has gone mainstream, we as vaccine proponents can no longer claim to be representatives of Society.
DV82XL said:
I am not sure what you think ideology is other than the filter/wouldview humans use to make sense of facts in a socail context. Everybody have an ideology, and I am sorry that you do not recognize your own ideology in this debate.
DV82XL said:
That is only true if you use a strict utilitarian ideology, and even then the proposition falls short because possibly better alternatives have not been evaluated or tried. For the HPV vaccine it is even debatable how much effort should reasonably be put into a vaccination campaign as the benefits on a macro scale is modest compared to other initiatives like other child vaccination programs.
BTW calling somone a troll for not agreeing with you is not cool.
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October 24th, 2011 at 5:54 am
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October 24th, 2011 at 6:38 pm
George Orwell said:
You meant to say something?
Oh I’ll just see what the telescreen showed.
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