I live in a county that has pertussis and measles outbreaks on the regular, one of the worst in the country. And we’re in a deep blue state.
We’re the perfect intersection of three groups, conservative anti-vaxxers, hippie progressive anti-vaxxers, and former Soviet bloc immigrants who don’t trust the government (can you really blame them given their experiences).
I do think that this should probably be in the politics forum but at least here it is a multi dimensional group of people. Our progressive private schools and evangelical private schools often have kindergarten vaccination rates in 60% while the public and catholic schools are all closer to the average.
I have a friend (yes, we all have That Friend) who claims she’s not anti-vax, she’s just “doing my own research”.
The last science class she took was junior year bio in HS. The last math class she took was trig. She could not tell you if her life depended on it how a plane flies, how an automobile moves or brakes, why the light goes off when you close the door to the fridge, why a person’s blood pressure can vary and yet health care workers know when someone has “high blood pressure”. Her level of mathematical, medical and scientific knowledge is abysmal.
And yet- she regularly posts her “research findings” on various medical topics- usually vaccine and infectious disease (if you eat a healthy diet, you’ll never get sick!) but sometimes including the fascinating things she’s learned about supplements and herbs and the evils of sugar. I have not seen her face-to-face since early covid when a mutual friend died and she was filled with self-righteous blather about “our bodies are designed to fight off viruses if you give them the right fuel”.
What is scary is that she’s not smart enough to come up with half the stuff she posts and writes and emails around. She’s got a team behind her-- folks who earn their living selling supplements and convincing scientifically ignorant people that turmeric prevents multiple sclerosis and that high concentrations of fish oil is an effective treatment for Parkinson’s.
Just avoid her (and her children) IRL since the likelihood that they are vectors for measles or polio is pretty high…
I recently learned that the pediatric practice I went to when my kids were small is no longer accepting new patients if the parents will not agree to the medically accepted guidelines on vaccination.
For years their stance was “we don’t want to turn away families who need more education to make a sound medical decision for their kids”. Which turned into “We can’t demonize people for exerting their parental right to make decisions for minor children”.
And now that the dust has settled-- and a hard core group of people have decided that Big Pharma is the enemy, the CDC should be disbanded, measles is “just an uncomfortable day or two out of school”-- they’ve done a 180. Who wants to sit in a doctor’s waiting room with a kid who has pink eye knowing that the child next to you might be spewing an easily preventable disease with every cough?
Our frustration is trying to concisely explain that “weakened immune system” isn’t something that extra zinc can fix. When someone takes (for example) anti rejection meds, or is undergoing chemo, or has some other medical condition , you can’t just add some elderberry syrup.
Everyone around my son gets every vaccination we can to protect him. His new medicine, developed w grant money and 20 yrs of research, has made him somewhat safer. But we still avoid crowds in the winter for 10 days prior to seeing him. He still takes extra precautions on a plane or bus. When it is Christmas gathering time, our extended family w children let us know if any are sick, or newly vaccinated for chicken pox. Viruses loose in a body that has abnormal immune function can cause death, organ failure, disfigurement, etc.
I don’t think people are cruel as much as ignorant, literally. But I can’t spend my life tilting at this windmill.
I admire you for taking the high road on other people’s ignorance.
I also have family members with compromised immune systems, and other people’s habits/lack of respect drives me nuts. The same people who remind family members that “Helga is still grieving for Muffin (a cat) who she had to put down 4 months ago so let’s respect her boundaries” don’t seem to remember that their flu (hacking cough) or covid (all the symptoms but “it’s ok since I went to work yesterday and nobody noticed”) could actually be dangerous to someone else.
I worked for 30 years at a state long term care facility for individuals with developmental disabilities. When I first started working a large number of our older patients were there because they had measles when they were little and ended up with brain damage. Before the vaccine was developed. We also had at least 30 patients whose mom’s had the German measles while pregnant. My saddest case was in the 90’s. A sweet young boy had gotten the measles when he was 12 months old (at the time the vaccine was recommended at 15 months). He recovered but a couple years later got SSPE (subacute sclerosing panencephalitis) a progressive neurological disorder caused by the reactivation of the measles virus. He went from a happy healthy boy who could ride a bike etc… to a vegetative state. It was absolutely heartbreaking. So in my experience measles is anything but benign.
I had a horrible case of the real measles in 1955 or 1956…whenever that big epidemic was. I couldn’t even be in a room with the lights on. I still remember it.
I also had rubella, but never the mumps…so I also had the MMR vaccine.
My kids were both fully vaccinated. My son was in the first batch where college kids were asked to get a MMR booster as part of their college physical. So we did that too.
My poor mom – we all had chicken pox, but in a neverending overlap, culminating with my oldest sibling being hospitalized for a week.
One of my brothers came down with the mumps when we were on a long trip to see our grandparents. I think it was the only time we turned around and went home.
When D came down with chickenpox as a toddler, several people told me she was lucky to get it then ( and her case was mild). So many stories of people getting chickenpox as teens/ young adults and being terribly sick for weeks.
Definitely was the case for us. My little sister brought the chickenpox to me… she had a few zits on her butt, but I had to take some sleeping pills just to be able to have a few hours of sleep.
My oldest sib? Had them down the inside of their throat and could not swallow. I think that every time somebody say they’ll just let their kid catch it, how bad could it be.