Category: Vaccines

Information on vaccines

Interesting Information: ITP, or Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura

Interesting Information:  October 16, 2013

ITP

Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura

One year ago this month, our Kelly and his brother were taking a shower after a soccer game.

Nine year old Bowen wrapped Kelly, then 7 1/2, in a towel and brought him to his parents.

Kelly was covered with bruises–big dark bruises all over his trunk, front and back.

That moment will go down in family history as being one of the darkest.

The feared words lept into everyone’s mind:  leukemia, cancer…

But, fortunately, I guess, Kelly had contracted an immune system illness:  Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura, or ITP.  His body was turning on its own blood platelets and killing them.  Kelly was down to about 7,000 when he should have had somewhere around 200,000.  HIs doctor wondered how he was walking around, let alone playing a soccer game.

Here’s an explanation from the Children’s Hospitals and Clinics web site:

What is Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura?

Immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) is a platelet disorder in which the body produces antibodies that bind with platelets that are the small, sticky cells of the blood that help the blood clot. The platelet-antibody complex is then destroyed in the spleen or liver. This can occur as a short-term event or can be chronic. Patients who have low platelet counts are more likely to have bleeding with trauma or surgery. Some evidence suggests that ITP is related to an overactive immune system; however, the cause is not clearly understood. The condition happens more frequently following certain viral infections and certain immunizations. It also can be associated with autoimmune disorders such as lupus.

http://www.childrensmn.org/services/cancer-and-blood-disorders/blood-disorders/childrens-center-for-bleeding-and-clotting-disorders/idiopathic-thrombocytopenic-purpura-itp?gclid=CIirnN6RorQCFUid4AodhiwAxA

With both parents at his side and his siblings farmed out to nearby family, Kelly went straight into the hospital where doctors tried to trick his body into stopping its immune reaction.  The lobster pillowcase went with him.  (Kelly picked out these fabrics, and I made the pillowcase.)

Kels in hospital edited

Everyone held their breath to see if the treatments would work. to see if this would be an isolated incident or would become a chronic condition that would alter his life forever.

Parents worked to keep him amused, as with this loaded dinner tray–ordered to try to get him to eat as much nourishment as he could.  Kels loves mac and cheese and hamburgers.

Kels at dinner edited

HIs siblings visited and crawled into the bed with him.  And his first cousin Ailey visited as well:

kelly and Ailey after hospital, Oct 2012

Even Sea Breeze  visited:

Kels and Seabreeze edited

Thankfully, the treatments did work, and when his platelets had grown to numbers that were not so life-threatening, Kelly was allowed to visit even sicker children and, eventually, to go home himself.

The pillow went, too, but not before many, many people had remarked upon it.

Kelly going home edited

Kelly and his Mom Tami decided they would make more pillowcases and bring them back to the children’s wing of the hospital–and a local quilt store donated fabric.  Halloween fabric.  Here is Kelly giving a pillowcase to one of the nurses to give to a child.

Kelly and the pillowcases edited

The pillowcases make a nice story.

But, the real story here is the one that asks “why did this event happen to Kelly?”

Note that ITP is associated with having had a virus recently.  Or, a vaccine.  Or, certain drugs.  And the internet is full of people making associations with aspartame.

The fancy word for an association is a correlation.  It’s always important to remember that correlations are not causation–which has to be proven to be called a causation.  One thing that is really wrong with our culture today is that all sorts of correlations have been made to seem as if they are causations–like cholesterol and heart disease.  Or, saturated fat and heart disease.  Or salt and high blood pressure.

In the end, medicine and scientists do not know what is causing ITP.  And as near as I could discover, no one is asking about any correlations between toxic chemicals and ITP.

Who would do this work?  Who would pay for it?  Not industry.  Especially not the chemical or drug industries since either might be to blame.

Charleston folks do a lot of lawn spraying and mosquito/bug spraying.  Like too many folks today, they seem brain-dead about the effects of this kind of indiscriminate killing.  They ignore the fact that lawn chemicals have long lives and get on their children and are tracked indoors.  Skin is a very permeable organ.

Mosquitos are sprayed from planes that drop toxic chemicals on everyone and everything.  I’ve been told that after such spraying, local bee hives are surrounded by hundreds of dead bees and the beach is littered with dead butterflies.  Disrupting a food chain in this way causes a ripple effect that spreads and spreads.  Chemical fogging trucks patrol the streets at dusk.

Research shows that we are learning daily that very small amounts of toxic chemicals have long-lasting effects on humans.

It mystifies me why anyone would think that a chemical that kills an insect by harming their nervous system would NOT harm them.

Airplanes sprayed not long before Kelly got sick.  Now, there’s a correlation for you.

A year has passed–a year in which Kelly, who was quite fragile for some time after his hospital stay, has grown stronger and more sure of himself.   The circles beneath his eyes are gone.

But there remains for me a nagging dread as to what caused Kelly’s very serious illness.

Nothing much has changed in his environment…

And, again, I ask myself, where is the tipping point where people say enough is enough and something has to change.  Clearly the tipping point is a long way away when one out of two people now gets cancer, and no one acts.

Interesting Information: Jessica Gianelloni Tackles Vaccine Myths: Herd Immunity and Measle Outbreaks

Interesting Information:  September 30, 2013

Jessica Gianelloni Tackles Vaccine Myths:  Herd Immunity and “The Worst Measles Year Ever”

 

Jessica Gianelloni is a young mother (five children, one of which is adopted from Uganda) who has DONE HER RESEARCH about her family’s vaccine decisions.  Fortunately, she blogs and has put her research online where everyone can read it:  http://gianelloni.wordpress.com.  I urge you to take a look if you are contemplating vaccines of any kind.  And I urge you to spend $20 and get a DVD of THE GREATER GOOD, a documentary that explores all sides of the vaccine question. 

A recent CNN story claimed that 2013 was shaping up to be “the worst measles year ever,” which sparked a new round of Jessica’s research.  Have you NOT noticed that we get a story like this almost every year from the media?  It’s either the flu or measles.  But there are no statistics.  No citations. 

Let me tell you that Jessica has read widely and documents what she shares.  She uses sources like the CDC database.  She wrote a two-part blog entry on this recent CNN story, beginning with the myth of “herd immunity” (a total industry scam backed up by a brain-dead press) and ending with the myth of any kind of measles epidemic occuring.

Here’s a quote on Jessica’s blog from Dr. Palevsky, a board certified pediatrician, on the myth of herd immunity:

You can’t vaccinate believing that your children are protected and then feel that your children are not protected because somehow, some non-vaccinated child is carrying some secret organism that no-one else is carrying. You can’t have it both ways. It just doesn’t make any sense.”

Jessica uses Dr. Palevsky to explain more of how vaccines work, using the Pertussis (whooping cough) vaccine:

Do children vaccinated with the pertussis vaccine somehow stop carrying pertussis bacteria in their airways simply because they’ve been vaccinated? NO

Do pertussis vaccines stop vaccinated children from transmitting the pertussis bacteria to other people? NO

Do pertussis bacteria disappear from society once vaccination rates are high? NO: Vaccination rates for pertussis have no impact on whether the pertussis bacteria are in the air or not, or whether or not we breathe them in. The presence of the pertussis bacteria, and the exposure to them, are in no way affected by vaccination status or vaccination rates.

Do unvaccinated children, because they are unvaccinated, carry the bacteria in their airways, which vaccinated children are somehow no longer believed to be carrying because they’ve been vaccinated? NO

Do unvaccinated children transmit the pertussis bacteria to other children by the mere fact that they are not vaccinated? NO: Air is air. Air is free to breathe. We breathe in whatever is in the air. And, vaccinated and unvaccinated children are equally exposed to breathing in pertussis bacteria.

Anyone who poses as science the idea that unvaccinated children pose a threat to the population because they are unvaccinated and are more likely to transmit a disease to the rest of the population, is misleading you, promulgating myth, and inaccurate.  Vaccination with the pertussis vaccine does not exonerate anyone from carrying the pertussis bacteria, or prevent them from being exposed to the bacteria.

The fact is that vaccination does NOT stop you from carrying bacteria or viruses in your nose, throat, intestines, airway, skin, or in your body. We have been made to believe that if you’re vaccinated, you won’t carry the viruses, and therefore, others will be protected because you’re vaccinated. This belief is NOT based on scientific fact.

You can’t vaccinate believing that your children are protected and then feel that your children are not protected because somehow, some non-vaccinated child is carrying some secret organism that one else is carrying. You can’t have it both ways. It just doesn’t make any sense.

So, Jessica asks the following—after noting that in her state there is over a 90% vaccination rate of children—as is true of many states.  And after noting that what gets ignored is that most adults HAVE NOT BEEN VACCINATED—so for the past 40 years or so, the herd has never been really “herd immune” at all.

So is the herd immune or not? How do we keep blaming the small percentage of unvaccinated children on “outbreaks” when the majority of children are vaccinated.  It’s a joke. I think we should blame the outbreaks on people who haven’t had a measles vaccine since they were children. Those no-good-non-immune-measles-spreading-x-generation-and-baby-boomers.

Jessica uses Dr. O’Shea to explain how NATURAL herd immunity actually works:

Dr. O’Shea, in his book: “Vaccination is Not Immunization”  explains:  “Do not make the error of many pediatricians or journalists who talk about herd immunity as though it refers to the immunity that proceeds from a large group of people being vaccinated. The calculated deception behind this common misnomer is that if you don’t know what herd immunity is, you’ll buy their illusion: that the unvaccinated child can take advantage of the herd who have been vaccinated. This is well though-out propaganda. True herd immunity is a term which indicates that a disease has burned itself out within a population, as with plague, smallpox, typhus-every infectious disease in history. The herd has become immune. Natural selection. It has to do with nature, not with manmade vaccines. Don’t be fooled again”

And, here again is Dr. Palevsky:

 “This whole concept of herd immunity is very interesting, because we were taught that herd immunity occurs because a certain percentage of a population gets an active illness. Therefore by a certain percentage of getting the active illness, they impart a protection onto the remaining part of the population that has not gotten the illness yet. And so the herd that is getting the illness is shedding the illness and protecting those who have not gotten it.

In vaccine science, we are extrapolating or concluding that if we vaccinate a certain percentage of people, we are imparting protection on those who have not been vaccinated. And that has NOT been shown to be true, because the true herd immunity in theory is based on an ACTIVE DISEASE, and we know that despite what we’re taught, vaccination does not mimic the natural disease.

So we cannot use the same model of herd immunity in a natural disease in the vaccination policy. But unfortunately, we do use it even though it doesn’t have scientific backing.

Jessica surfaces the other really BIG FACT that we should all know:  vaccines are only effective for from two to 10 years!!!  Vaccines DO NOT give one lifetime “protection”—and that word I am putting deliberately into quotes because so many children are being harmed by vaccines. 

Further, the greater predictor and correlation of death due to a child getting measles or one of the other childhood diseases is malnutrition and poverty—not being unvaccinated.  And, most “outbreaks” are occurring among children who have been vaccinated. 

So now let’s go back to the September 2013 CNN story.  Jessica looks at some history:

The article published last year (2012) from USA Today read “CDC: 2011 was worst measles year in U.S. in 15 years” But now today, CNN runs an article titled “U.S. measles cases in 2013 may be most in 17 years”. Well if 2011 was the worst in 15 years, how is 2013 going to be the worst in 17 years? We haven’t surpassed the amount of cases in 2011 yet. And we are nowhere close to surpassing the amount of cases from 1996. And guess what? Yep, the 2011 worst year was caused by the unvaccinated kids too. Haha!  And the 2008 outbreak.  And every outbreak, right?  Nope. Outbreaks have occurred in populations where 99% was vaccinated.

And then she looks at some facts:

I went through the last few years of measles “outbreaks”, and there hasn’t been a measles death since 2003, despite years and years of “outbreaks” being caused by the unvaccinated. Which by the way, do you notice that we are always having the “worst outbreak in years”, every year? In 2008, we had an outbreak in San Diego…this is how they worded it….”In the end, 839 people were exposed to measles. Eleven were infected.” 11. But in 2008, if you remember the headlines, it was the worst measles outbreak. Ever.

Jessica notes how the media is NOT doing its homework, but just accepting uncritically what it is being told.  By whom?  Mainstream medicine?  The vaccine/drug companies?  Well-meaning doctors who also have not looked at this issue critically or examined the science—of which there isn’t any that looks at what vaccines do to individual and their cells.  (All the science claimed by vaccine promotors are large epidemiological studies looking at large groups of people—studies which could also be correlated to things like DDT use, malnutrition, poverty, and the like—but aren’t.)

The CNN article gives no sources or references. People demand that my blog give sources and references, but we don’t demand the same from media reporting. People just read an article like the CNN one, and they are sold on the underlying message: BLAME THE UNVACCINATED.

Meanwhile, there are states out there—and school systems—who are demanding that ALL kids be vaccinated—regardless of their tolerance for vaccines.  And children are being hurt and families are being torn apart as they try to struggle with the fallout from a child who has been hurt.  Vaccine harm is vastly underreported as the whole system is voluntary entirely.    

Parents who object are being dragged into courts in those states.  That’s why those who smell a skunk are demanding that (1) they be shown the science and (2) they be given a choice.  And that lands us up at the documentary THE GREATER GOOD, which I will write about in a separate blog. 

Meanwhile, Jessica recommends parents trying to figure out what’s what with vaccines take a look at her current favorite books:

There are great books out there. I’ve probably read them all. Here are my current 3 favorites.

“Vaccine Epidemic: How Corporate Greed, Biased Science, and Coercive Government Threaten Our Human Rights, Our Health, & Our Children” Featuring more than twenty-five experts from the fields of ethics, law, science, medicine, business, and history, Vaccine Epidemic urgently calls for reform. It is the essential handbook for the vaccination choice movement and required reading for all people contemplating vaccination for themselves and their children.

“Vaccine Illusion” Newly release by a Harvard PhD immunologist. I love her forward: “I never imagined myself in this position, least so in the very beginning of my Ph.D. research training in immunology. In fact, at that time, I was very enthusiastic about the concept of vaccination, just like any typical immunologist. However, after years of doing research in immunology, observing scientific activities of my superiors, and analyzing vaccine issues, I realized that vaccination is one of the most deceptive inventions the science could ever convince the world to accept”

“Thinking Mom’s Revolution: Autism Beyond The Spectrum” Inspiring True Stories from parents fighting to rescue their children.

Mainely Tipping Points 48: Is Dr. Russell Blaylock a Quack?

Mainely Tipping Points 48:  July 2, 2013 

 

Is Dr. Russell Blaylock a Quack?

 

 

Wikipedia says Dr. Blaylock is a quack because he does not follow “science based medicine.”

On the basis of a Wiki page, which is anonymously written, a Facebook page on my news feed discussing Dr. Blaylock was removed by a FB friend yesterday without allowing the benign discussion taking place to go forward to its conclusion—which amounts to silencing and censorship, which means a refusal to dig deeper into the issue at hand to see what science actually says, which means a policing of the status quo, which means fear is present.

Science based medicine…

Well, that’s something I’ve been researching and writing about for the past five years or so.  And, living, since my husband fell into the hands of “science-based” medicine practices during a time when the oversight boards for prostate cancer were saying that doing nothing was the best course to take since the treatments did not affect the outcome.  I will go to my grave believing that the treatments did affect the outcome in that they hastened John’s death.  How could they not since they assaulted his body in countless ways.  It never had a chance.

I am sympathetic with our local doctors, most of whom are caring people who wanted to make a difference for John.  The problem is that their tool box did not contain what John needed, so they just recommended the tools they had, regardless of the shift in the science.  These doctors built their careers on these tools—such a shift threatened their ability to support themselves.  That’s a grave place to be in.   

What do we know about Dr. Russell Blaylock?

His own web site details his medical credentials (http://www.russellblaylockmd.com/). I do not doubt them since they would have long since been debunked if he were not telling the truth.  You can go there for the whole list of his medical credentials.

The pertinent information is that Dr. Blaylock is a board certified neurosurgeon who practiced for 25 years before he retired.  He worked with the eminent neurosurgeon Dr. Ludwig Kempe.  Together they developed the transcallosal removal of intraventricular tumors, which he claims is still used today, and the ventriculolymphatic shunt in treatment of hydrocephalus.  Their personal relationship continues to this day.

A turning point for Dr. Blaylock came when he started using “high-intensity nutritional supplementation in craniocerebral trauma patients” which “met with great success.”  Eventually, Blaylock retired in order to spend more time studying and researching nutrition and healing with nutrition. 

In that regard Blaylock is part of the current and growing movement which seeks to understand the connections between foods and human health.  Some stars in this arena are Dr. Mary Enig (fats), Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride (GAPS), Dr. Joseph Mercola (amazing general blog), Dr. Kaayla T. Daniels (soy), Dr. William Davis (WHEAT BELLY), Dr. Chris Masterjohn (vitamins A, D, and K), Michael Pollen, Sally Fallon Morell, all the scientists now working on the integrity of the gut and gut health and its connections to behavior, and so forth.  Blaylock’s work in this arena led to The Weston A. Price Foundation giving him their Integrity in Science Award in 2004.

Blaylock is a member of the International and American Associations of Clinical Nutritionists, the American College of Nutrition, the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation, and many other health-related organizations.  (Pottenger did the famous cat studies involving the generational effects of malnutrition.)     

Dr. Blaylock is on the editorial staffs of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons and of the Journal of the American Nutraceutical Association.  He is on the board of Fluoride.  He is, or was if he’s retired from there, a visiting professor in the department of biological sciences at Belhaven College in Jackson, Mississippi—a conservative Christian college for those of you who think you are dealing with a liberal.

His web site lists his publications and his three books—the first being EXCITOTOXINS:  THE TASTE THAT KILLS.  (Aspartame is an excitotoxin.)  It makes sense to me that Blaylock’s interest in the impact of excitotoxins on the brain lines up with the fact that he was a practicing neurosurgeon.

Is this a “star” resume?

I do not know, medically speaking.  It is the resume of a working neurosurgeon of twenty-five years who got interested in the relationship of healing and food nutrition and acted on it.  It is the resume of someone who went on to study nutrition, to put himself in the nutritional arena with his associations, and to write about nutrition.

So, where does he begin to fall afoul of the Wiki author of his page?  The following list lies at the juncture of where many folks are asking “where’s the science?”—vaccines, aspartame, mercury in dental amalgams, fluoride, and aluminum cookware.

Which takes us back to “science-based” medicine…

Vaccines:  Would it surprise you to know that there have been NO LONG TERM gold-standard studies on the efficacy of vaccines?  That renders all we “know” about vaccines in the correlation camp.  There is not solid cause and effect scientific data in this country.  None.  Period.   

Would it surprise you to know that many scientists are now thinking that smallpox was tamed by sanitation and that polio may have been caused by DDT?

Would it surprise you to know that there is a government organization that pays off parents of children who have been harmed by vaccines?  Or that you can’t sue a vaccine maker if you or your child is harmed?

Recently, two young women died after a Gardasil vaccine.  Researchers examined their brain tissues and discovered that the vaccine had breached the blood-brain barrier, which in turn triggered the fatal autoimmune response that killed the girls—which vaccines are not supposed to do (Pharmaceut Reg Affairs 2012, S12:001).  What if other vaccines are making this leap? Could that account for the undeniable vaccine damage in children?  Leslie Mannookian’s documentary THE GREATER GOOD addresses the lack of science in the vaccine debates.  It is being shown all over the country in many venues, including to medical personnel.  I, for one, am going to see this film, which I think is available online, as soon as possible.

Fluoride:  I wrote three essays on this blog (Tipping Points Essays 34-36) that attempted to summarize the book THE CASE AGAINST FLUORIDE—written by three senior, well-established scientists with impeccable biographies in chemistry, toxicology, medical biophysics, and biological sciences.  There never was any science supporting putting fluoride in the water.  The most recent mandated government-sponsored assessment raised dozens of red flags about fluoride.  It was the first panel that contained nonbiased scientists.  The dose isn’t controllable, and even the American Dental Association warns not to feed infants formula made with fluoridated tap water.  Studies from all over the world show that fluoride is dangerous:  it harms bones and affects IQ in developing infants.  Countries that do not fluoridate do not have worse cavity rates than the U.S. does.  The stronger correlation with healthy teeth is good diet.

Mercury amalgams:  The mercury in your fillings off-gasses for the rest of your life and can make you sick.  Mercury is very, very toxic.  Europe is banning mercury fillings.  In our country dentists are quietly switching to non-mercury fillings.  I and many of my family members have had old mercury fillings removed.  (Be careful doing that and find a dentist who knows the danger of what s/he is doing.)

Aspartame:  Aspartame has, famously, never undergone third-party independent and objective assessment.  Industry supplies the “proof” of safety and the government (with staff assessment by actual scientists saying no about aspartame) allowed its use.  That’s a nasty, nasty story—and I covered it in Tipping Points Essay No. 19 on this blog.  The approval was a political decision, not a scientific one.  If you go to www.snopes to check on claims that aspartame is dangerous, you will see that the story is “false” and you will see a letter written by a government staffer claiming it was tested.  Don’t you believe that because the studies were all industry produced.  That’s the kind of corrupt system our government is running now, and we have got to get the foxes out of the regulatory henhouses and put in some laws with teeth if we want our government to actually protect us. 

Aluminum cookware:  Aluminum is a toxic metal.  If you cook with it or use a lot of aluminum foil, it will reside in your body.  Our bodies have enough environmental burdens without having to cope with aluminum toxicity.  I don’t use it any more—either cookware or foil.  Parchment paper works just as well in most cases. 

So, you decide about Dr. Blaylock. 

He’s not a saint.  He’s got quirks—like most of us he is a complex figure, not a cartoon all bad/all good character.

He’s asking “where’s the science” behind a number of mainstream medical practices and recommendations that he (and I, after researching them) believe are quite dangerous.  He’s looking for ways to effect healing by giving the body the healthy nutrient dense food it requires.

The response from the mainstream—as it almost always is—is to demonize him as a quack.  Devra Davis, a premier scientist, described this industry-driven process brilliantly in THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE WAR ON CANCER.  And make no mistake about it, too much of science and medicine today is industry driven, with little relationship to actual science and a huge relationship to profit making. 

With demonization, Blaylock joins any number of folks who have said “where’s the science” and been attacked and smeared in an attempt to erase what he’s asking as it falls into the realm of “an inconvenient truth.”  Dr. Mary Enig, for instance, tried to tell us about the danger of trans fats and about the healthy nature of high-quality saturated fats.  She lost all her research money and was demonized and not published for years.  But, she was right all along.  

Follow the money.  Vaccines, aspartame, and fluoride are big, big money.  Under our economic system, it is entirely logical that industry would fight to continue making that money and that it enslaves us all to its purpose, doctors included.    

Demonization is how a system of cultural power maintains the status quo.  But that status quo is not ultimately healthy for you. Today, one in two people will get cancer.  That’s 50 percent.  That’s a plague.  So, think twice, investigate, learn how to find and read reputable sources, and choose not to participate in practices that will make you sick. 

Ultimately, this issue isn’t about Blaylock personally.  It’s about “where’s the science?”  It’s about your health.   

Interesting Information: More FDA Shady Dealing With A New Vaccine For Babies

Interesting Information:  July 24, 2012

More FDA Shady Dealing With A New Vaccine For Babies

Here’s a quote from Dr. Joseph Mercola’s article–the link is below–on the FDA’s approval of a new combo vaccine for meningitis for babies.  Meningitis is a rare disease.

Ironically, on June 14, the FDA awarded GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) a license to sell MenHibrix, a new vaccine that combines two meningitis vaccines into one shot.  The FDA had rejected the license in 2010 and 2011 because, reportedly, the British drug company giant was having trouble proving the vaccine actually worked.

This time, FDA staff did not bother to ask for an opinion from the agency’s own vaccine advisory committee before giving GSL the green light to market MenHibrix in the U.S. for babies as young as 6 weeks old.  In a letter, FDA official Marion Gruber, PhD, told the company that:  “We did not refer your application to the additional VRBPAC [review] because our review of information submitted in you BLA, including the clinical study design and trial results, did not raise particular concerns or controversial issues which would have benefited from an advisory committee discussion.

Really?  Sounds like some FDA officials didn’t want Advisory Committee members to ask the drug company lots of questions about this new vaccine, just like the CDC and AAP (American Academy of Pediatrics) officials don’t want parents to ask lots of questions about ANY vaccine.

Mercola goes on to note that MenHibrix has “not yet been studied in combination with every one of the other vaccines already given to babies simultaneously.”  And, “even premature babies weighing less than four and a half pounds are subjected to the mindless one-size-fits all `no exceptions’ vaccine schedule.  Where is the solid scientific evidence that it is safe or effective to give eight or nine vaccines to an eight or nine pound newborn?”

Mercola also notes that there is no evidence proving that vaccinated children are any healthier than nonvaccinated children as no studies have been done.

The CDC will vote in October on whether or not to make this new vaccine optional or whether to add it to the already bloated vaccine schedule–in the process giving “another big pharmaceutical corporation a guaranteed, liability free market [underline mine] by adding four doses of an expensive new vaccine to the child vaccine schedule so parents can be forced to buy it and give it to their newborns–no questions asked and no choices allowed….”

A June  2012 study published in Pediatrics concluded that “about 10 percent of parents living in Portland, Oregon are making independent decisions about how many vaccines their babies should get and when they should get them.  Those parents are rejecting the CDC’s aggressive vaccination schedule promoted by the AAP that directs pediatricians to give 2- to 6-month-old babies between seven to nine vaccines on the same day, without exception.”

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/07/24/new-vaccines-for-babies.aspx?e_cid=20120724_DNL_artNew_2

Interesting Information: “Vaccinations, The Ongoing Debate”

Interesting Information:  July 23, 2012

“Vaccinations, The Ongoing Debate”

Well, here’s a must read for everyone from young parents to grandparents.  Vaccinations are a very charged subject in our society and parents who are looking more deeply and asking questions are being called crazy or ill-informed or irresponsible.

Are they?

Leslie Manookian published this piece in The Weston A. Price Foundation’s journal, Wise Traditions, summer 2012 issue.  Manookian has made a film, THE GREATER GOOD, in which she has attempted to determine where the facts and hard science are with relation to vaccinations.  She notes that the “vaccine debate is a scientific debate,” or should be so, and is not “one between emotional parents and their doctors.”

The tagline from the film is the following:  “If you think you know everything about vaccines…think again.”

The School of Public Health at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, awarded the film its Koroni Award “for a documentary feature addressing an issue of importance to public health.”  The film was featured at the Amsterdam Film Festival, where it was awarded the Cinematic Vision Award.  The film was aired nationally on Current TV and has been shown at film festivals all over the world–where it has been “applauded by lay, medical, and film audiences alike….”

You can read Manookian’s article at http://www.westonaprice.org/childrens-health/vaccinations.

Here are some highlights:

Children today receive 26 doses of 9 vaccines by their first birthday.  In 1983, they received 11 doses of 4 vaccines.

By age 18, children today receive 70 doses of 16 vaccines.  In 1983, they received 23 doses of 8 vaccines.

Big Pharma has an estimated 200 vaccines in development for use across the population.  The CDC recommends an annual flu shot from cradle to grave.  There are many adult booster shots for childhood diseases and new vaccines like the shingles vaccine, which I recall reading only covered about 30 percent? of the potential to get shingles.  Flu shots still contain mercury.  “Many diseases vaccinated against today were considered fairly benign in past decades (flu, chicken pox, mumps, rubella) or quite rare (hepatitis A and B, meningitis).”

No one knows if vaccines are safe because no “large, long-term clinical study comparing the medium or long-term health outcomes of vaccinated and unvaccinated groups of people” has ever been done.

Children are given as many as TEN vaccines in one visit, but there are no safety studies evaluating the safety of simultaneous shots.

No study has been done to evaluate the “different ingredients of human infant vaccines taken individually or in combination.”  This list of ingredients can include, “but is not limited to” the following:  “mercury, aluminum, formaldehyde [a known carcinogen], cells from aborted fetuses, cells from monkey kidneys, chicken embryos, viruses, antibiotics, yeast, polysorbate 80 and detergents.

Most vaccine trial only last a few weeks, so long-term effects are not known.  Worse, Big Pharma is allowed “to use another vaccine or a liquid containing an adjuvant such as aluminum as the placebo”–so the “vaccine producer can say that the vaccines cause no more adverse reactions than a placebo.”

Mercury is still used in the manufacturing process and trace amounts remain.  Aluminum–a “demonstrated neurotoxin”–is used as an adjuvant (a substance added to vaccines to stimulate an immune response–without which the vaccine is useless).  Medical science’s “understanding about their mechanisms of action is still remarkably poor….[but] Experimental research…clearly shows that aluminum adjuvants have a potential to induce serious immunological disorders in humans.”

Much evidence exists now that vaccines are harming children, and Manookian discusses some of those peer-reviewed studies.  She includes the notion that ‘there is in fact peer-reviewed scientific evidence connecting both [mercury and vaccines] to autism.”  She notes that “research has also shown impaired immune function and autoimmune disease in humans following the administration of these same compounds [alluminum].”  Neurological damage, “including motor function deficits, cognitive impairment, and behavioral changes in mice given the aluminum in vaccines.”

What is most disturbing are the behavioral changes in vaccinated children. “Normal” reactions are considered to be “swelling, soreness, tenderness and a lump at the injection site, fever, fussiness, tiredness, and vomiting.”  But “no studies exist to determine what happens to the body’s systems and tissues when a vaccine is given.”  Manookian writes:   “In the making of the film and while conducting screenings, we have come across many parents who said their child had these `normal’ reactions after a round of vaccines but never was quite the same again and went on to develop a learning disability, allergies, ADHD, or another type of chronic disease.”

The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986, signed by Ronald Reagan, “acknowledged tha vaccines can cause injury or death.”  “To date, the program has paid out more than two billion dollars and has about three billion dollars in reserves” as a tax is paid on each vaccine given.

It’s important to realize that “doctors are taught that vaccines are safe and effective; they are not taught how vaccines are studied, the components of vaccines, or the gaps in research.  Doctors are taught that decades of clinical use of vaccines have demonstrated their safety and that vaccine side effects are rare, but there are no large, long-term clinical trials comparing the health and well being of those vaccinated to those unvaccinated to back up these assumptions” (underlining is mine).   IN OTHER WORDS THIS “KNOWING” IS A BELIEF SYSTEM, CREATED BY BIG PHARMA, THAT IS SOLD TO DOCTORS AND PARENTS USING FEAR ABOUT CHILD SAFETY.  THERE IS NOT DATA BEHIND IT.  Plus, Big Pharma has ZERO LIABILITY for vaccines that cause harm.  You cannot sue them for damages.

What about the notion that vaccines have reduced infectious disease?  Bernard Guyer et al published in Pediatrics (December 2000) a history showing that “`nearly 90 percent of the decline in infectious disease mortality among U. S. children occurred before 1940, when few antibiotics or vaccines were available.”  Guyer et al’s consensus was that public health measures (water treatment, food safety. organized solid waste disposal, and public education about hygienic practices) were what made the difference.  “Moreover,” writes Manookian,” disease outbreaks regularly occur in fully vaccinated populations so vaccinations may not be as effective a preventative as generally believed.”

You should look deeper before making any decisions about vaccinations for yourself or your children.   You might be putting them at more danger than any disease they might catch would.

You should know that in California right now your child who is twelve or over can be vaccinated for a sexually transmitted disease by a school nurse without your consent or knowledge–since parents will have “no access to the child’s medical records that pertain to these shots”!!!!  How can that be in a country that touts freedom as its organizing principle???  This is a perfect example of the power of industry to work its will on a population.

One excellent book is Neil Z. Miller’s VACCINES, ARE THEY REALLY SAFE AND EFFECTIVE.”   This book was my first introduction to the idea that vaccines might be really dangerous.

Here’s an article by Dr. Mercola that came in the past few days about how the Merck mumps vaccine is not effective, how they knew it, and how the whole story, which appeared in the WALL STREET JOURNAL, has now been covered up.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/07/23/merck-vaccine-fraud-story-buried.aspx?e_cid=20120723_DNL_artNew_1

Here’s The People’s Chemist, Shane Ellison, on why the whole “herd” protection assumptions are nonsense.  Ellison can be flamboyant, but he’s a pretty solid scientist:      http://thepeopleschemist.com/blog/

I can tell you that if I had young children today I would not vaccinate them.  I’d take our chances, knowing I might lose them.  But, losing a child can happen just as easily with vaccines and with all of the other really dangerous things children do every day.  In the end, you can only protect children so much and overprotection is just as harmful to their development.

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Interesting Information: The CDC Announces Horrifying New Autism Rates

Interesting Information:  April 24, 2012

The CDC Announces Horrifying New Autism Rates

The CDC has announced the following information:

1 in 88 children are now diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD);

1 in 54 boys; and

1 in 252 girls– which means BOYS ARE FIVE TIMES MORE LIKELY TO HAVE AN ASD.

This number represents a 78 PERCENT INCREASE in the past five years and a 23 percent increase in the LAST TWO YEARS.

Utah had the highest prevalence of autism:  1 in 47,  8-year olds.

New Jersey had 1 in 49.

Dr. Mercola, in “The Silent Time Bomb Now Affecting 1 in 54 Boys in the US,” asks “What’s really going on here?”  (See http://articles.mercola.com for more information.)

And, Mercola adds the following:

“Personally, I don’t see how anyone can look at a 78 percent increase of any health problem in a mere five years without snapping to attention.  Prior to the CDC’s announcement, the Canary Party, a citizens’ action group on autism, rightfully predicted that the CDC would down play the seriousness of these latest statistics.

On its new autism webpage, the CDC state they suspect some of the increase `is due to greater awareness and better identification’ among some of the children.

But even taking that possibility into consideration, the statistics are truly shocking.  How can one in 88American children have some form of autistic disorder?  In a normal, healthy environment, that just shouldn’t happen.  And the fact that it IS happening demands our immediate attention.  Something is going very wrong, very fast…”

That SOMETHING WRONG is toxic overload, according to Dr. Mercola.  I agree.

Here’s some contributing areas  Mercola identifies:

Environmental areas, of course.  But, which ones?

Likely, there are multiple factors.  Among them are the overuse and inappropriate use of vaccines–which may function as “the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

And, our overuse of toxic chemicals–which are being put into our food, our air, our water, our clothing, our furniture, and on and on and on.   Key among these are mercury, toxic adjuvants in vaccines, phthalates, BPA, and so forth.

Electromagnetic fields need much more investigation.  Women who sleep in strong electromagnetic fields during pregnancy might give birth to babies that exhibit neurological abnormalities.  Computers, smart meters, cell phones, those baby-monitoring systems, microwaves, all throw electromagnetic waves.  I would not put those baby-monitoring systems into a baby’s room knowing what I now know, and I remind young parents that babies have survived just fine for all the thousands of years before the last 10, when these systems became “must haves” for child safety.

Vitamin D deficiency in pregnant women might be a factor.

And, Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride is arguing that children born to parents with abnormal gut flora develop devestating gut and brain toxicity that leads to autism–all of which can be cured with diet.  If you are working with an autistic child, please, please read McBride’s book, GUT AND PSYCHOLOGY SYNDROME.  I wrote about the GAPS diet in my Mainely Tipping Points Essays on this blog, essay No. 31, “I Feel It In My Gut.”

WHAT TO DO?

Read Mercola’s article for more guidance, but, basically, do everything you can to lower toxic overload.  Buy organic foods; get rid of personal body care products and household cleaning products loaded with chemicals; and read up on vaccine dangers and only get the ones, if any, that seem the most necessary to you.

Clean up your diet.  Get rid of the junk food.  If it comes in a box, don’t eat it.  If it comes in a can, make sure it’s BPA free.  Limit carbohydrates, especially grains and legumes.  And, if you eat them, make sure you prepare them properly–more on this subject in upcoming Mainely Tipping Points essays.

SUPPORT THE IMMEDIATE INSTALLATION OF THE PRECAUTIONARY PRINCIPAL.  All untested chemicals in circulation must now be tested–and tested by scientists who do not have financial interests in the outcome.  Nothing can be allowed into circulation that causes human harm.

We have to develop the POLITICAL WILL to make these changes–and that starts with understanding that we cannot continue down this road without dire, dire consequences.

One in 54 boys.  That’s at least one boy you know, for sure.