That depends what you mean by 'coerced'. I oppose fines or imprisonment for refusal to vaccinate; but I support prohibiting voluntarily unvaccinated persons from public places (which pretty much makes it mandatory if you are not living as a hermit), and I would support the same constraint on those who choose (with no medical justification) to be unvaccinated against influenza as on those unvaccinated against measles, polio, mumps, pertussis or rubella.Unless there are some in the current outbreak that I have not yet heard of, the last one was in 2005; there have been 15 deaths in the US since 1992. Prior to the availability of the measles vaccine, which was licensed in 1963, the number of yearly measles deaths in the US was around 450; in addition to these 450 annual deaths, in the US prior to 1963 around 48,000 measles patients per annum were hospitalised, and 4,000 developed encephalitis.
Anybody know if vaccination is mandated in Europe?
I don't think it is a legal requirement to immunise against any diseases anywhere in the EU at present, but I am not sure.
I should have asked before but I just forgot: Are such vaccinations mandatory in Australia? How is compliance monitored and enforced?
No, I don't think so. We have a small but very vocal anti-vax movement here; Nobody fines or imprisons them, although you would think they were being forced into gas chambers to hear the fuss they make about being advised to get their kids immunis
I was curious about how people felt about the flu vaccine for a few reasons:
1. It must be annual, not a few times and done.
2. It is far less effective than the other vaccines and the effectiveness varies from year to year
3. Many more people die from influenza than die from those childhood diseases we typically vaccinate against.
Points 2 and 3 are good reasons to get it done annually - and to get as wide an uptake of immunisation as possible in the population. The less effective immunisation is, the more important it is that lots of people have it, as the threshold for herd immunity rises.
Point 1 is interesting; I am not sure why a once per annum jab is much more of an issue than a once per lifetime jab, but the cost is an issue for some. My employer pays for all staff who want one to get an annual flu jab, and I usually take them up on this, but as I work from home, sometimes it is more convenient to pay for my own vaccination at the local doctor's office than it is to travel into town to get one from work. Having seen how dangerous influenza is, I am happy to get an annual jab, even though I am a big sook about needles. It is a tiny discomfort, and well worthwhile.
The issue is not really cost; it is effectiveness and how long the vaccine provides immunity.
The flu virus(es) differ from say, the measles virus significantly in a number of ways but most importantly, the flu virus(es) mutate regularly and quickly while the measles virus is virtually unchanged over hundreds of years.
This is why it is necessary to make new vaccines every year and to make the best possible guess about which strains of influenza will be most prevalent in the new flu season. The flu vaccine which might have been very effective last year will likely be very ineffective this year. There is also a certain amount of (educated) guess work involved: sometimes the vaccine makers get it wrong. This year's flu vaccine is only about 40% effective, for example. Even in the years when the vaccine makers are most accurate, there are multiple strains of influenza active within populations and the vaccine will not protect against all of them.
This also explains why 'herd immunity' doesn't really happen, at least not to the extent that we have it for measles: Older people such as myself have been exposed to many different strains of influenza, and if you are like me, have been vaccinated quite a number of times. We have lots of immunity, which is good because if you are a bit older than I am, you are also much more likely to become very ill if you get the wrong strain. It also explains why young adults have been stricken so hard in recent years: they haven't seen so many different types of flu and have less immunity. It is counter to the truism that influenza is most deadly to the very young and the very old. This is true but young, otherwise very healthy adults can also be particularly vulnerable, especially since many feel pretty invincible (see lack of use of condoms) and dont' get vaccinated.
Yes, that is all true; the 1918-19 'Spanish' influenza tended to affect people in their prime; elderly patients and infants had a much higher survival rate than young adults.
As I said, the less effective a vaccine is, the more important it is to have a very high rate of vaccination in the population. Everything you are saying here underscores that point.
Of course, there is a tendency for the uneducated to think that influenza is usually mild, as they conflate every single minor upper respiratory infection with influenza. I wish I had a buck for every person with a common cold who has told me that they have the flu.
Very few people actually have tests done to determine whether or not they have influenza or just a more minor respiratory infection. This includes well educated people with excellent access to health care.
That's true. A good rule of thumb is 'If you are well enough to complain, you haven't got flu'.
The fact is that the symptoms of influenza typically include deep muscle pain, and high fever; while most people who say "I have the flu' have little or no fever, and no deep muscle pain, but do have the rhinitis and secondary throat infections that are characteristic of the common cold. Anyone who says 'That's the third bout of flu I have had this year' can be safely ignored; Anyone who says 'I got the flu jab, but still got the flu' is more likely wrong than right - it isn't impossible, but it is not particularly common either. Even in a 'bad year', fluvax is over 40% effective, and bad years are not the norm - the guys who pick the strains to include in each year's vaccine are pretty good at their jobs, even though they are not perfect.
It's interesting that you would mandate confinement rather than fines for those who do not vaccinate. How would you handle those who travel from or immigrate from countries where vaccinations are not as available and not typically given in childhood?
Ideally I would want immigrants to be vaccinated on arrival, or for vaccinations to be a requirement of the application process (When I came to Australia as a permanent resident I was required to get screening for TB and HIV, at my own expense from an approved list of doctors licensed by the Australian Dept of Immigration; Adding vaccination or proof of childhood vaccination to the existing medical requirements wouldn't be a big change). Tourists are not an issue, as long as enough citizens and residents are vaccinated to provide herd immunity.
Actually, tourists are probably responsible for the recent measles outbreak in Disney.
No. Tourists brought the illness - as they do all the time - but it couldn't have become an outbreak if there hadn't been a pool of unprotected people to infect. The anti-vaxers are responsible for the routine arrival of infected tourists becoming an outbreak. We expect it to rain; If our furniture gets wet, it is the hole in the roof that is to blame, not the rainfall.
Also please note Loren's post earlier about the ease with which health documents are invented or forged.
Which is another reason not to worry about tourists - they are too hard to control, and it is needless as long as the vast majority of the population are vaccinated.
Then there is medical science: If you are immunized today against (fill in the blank) it will take some weeks before you develop sufficient antibodies that will confer immunity.
Yes. Another reason why it is vital that the vast majority of the population are vaccinated, to protect those who are not yet vaccinated, or who have not yet developed immunity as a result.
I would also like to add that it is sometimes the case that it turns out that the recommended vaccination regime does not confer the lifelong immunity it was once thought to confer. Which is why my kids and their agemates were getting re-vaccinated in middle school and probably part of the reason sometimes there are outbreaks of childhood diseases in college campus settings. In order for your body to maintain immunity, it actually needs to be 'challenged' or to 'see' or be exposed to the virus, enough to remind those B cells to make more of themselves and keep you immune.
Indeed; but vaccination is by far the safest way to expose the immune system - and so that is a good reason for requiring booster shots when needed. In the case of influenza, this is annual; for tetanus, about once a decade. Different pathogens change at different rates, and immunisation programs need to reflect the pattern of vaccine effectiveness over time.
How do you think those who have serious reactions to vaccines (there are actually deaths due to reactions to vaccines and serious illness/injury disability, although they are rare) should be compensated?
Well, they could be compensated pretty handsomely out of the money saved by not hospitalising thousands of people per annum with preventable diseases; but then, compensation probably isn't called for. People who suffer chest injuries from wearing seatbelts as mandated by law don't get compensated either.
If you look at Rhea's tables she so kindly linked, you will see that far more people are actually harmed by vaccines than by the actual disease. This, of course, is because almost no one contracts these diseases anymore (which is why it makes news when there is an outbreak) and deaths are quite rare.
Indeed, and that makes comparisons between current disease risk and vaccination risk pointless and meaningless. If you want to judge whether a vaccination is needful, you compare the risks of the vaccine with the risks of the disease in completely unvaccinated populations - a good option is to compare against the population before the vaccine was developed - hence my figures for measles deaths and hospitalisations prior to 1963 in the US. These are the appropriate disease risk figures to balance against the risk of vaccination; and the conclusion is a no-brainer.
Also, there simply is no amount of money that will compensate you if your child is killed or profoundly disabled because of a vaccine. Or any other cause, of course.
Indeed. So if they have a one in ten million chance of dying from being vaccinated; and a one in 100,000 chance of dying from the disease if nobody is vaccinated, they should be vaccinated. This leads to fewer dead children, which I am sure we all agree is a good thing.
Of course, if everyone else gets their kids vaccinated, one can cut the risk to one's own child even further, by free-riding on the herd immunity. But this is morally vile, as it results in lots and lots of dead children if everyone does it - essentially this is placing everyone else's children at risk for purely selfish reasons. Anyone who explicitly chooses not to vaccinate their children for this reason alone, deserves to be disembowelled by wild dogs. Taking the benefit of other people's social responsibility, without contributing oneself, is truly disgusting behaviour.
I'm a big proponent of vaccines. As I've mentioned, I remember well those childhood diseases. But I'm also a big proponent of individual freedom and control over one's own body. I find harsh penalties problematic.
Me too. That's why I don't support fines or imprisonment. People are completely free to not vaccinate; but they are not free to put others at risk by mixing with the general public while unvaccinated.
I see forced isolation as being far harsher than fines and really akin to imprisonment. How would you enforce it? Ankle bracelets? Like they do for prisoners under house arrest? Colonies, like they used to have for lepers?
No, just the simple things that are being done now - refuse to allow unvaccinated children to attend school; or to go to Disneyland; or to the Superbowl; or anywhere else where crowds gather.
If people want to refuse the responsibilities that come from living in a society, they have no right to be allowed to reap the benefits that membership of the society provides.
Why not apply the same harsh sanctions against others who endanger the public? There are far more deaths in the U.S. (and actually I am assuming Australia and most of the west) due to smoking and automobile accidents. And due to DUIs and other alcohol related accidents and violence. I'm talking about children, not just adults. And in the U.S., gun violence claims the lives of far more children than does measles, mumps, rubella, chickenpox and influenza combined.
DUI is outlawed. So are assaults; so is dangerous driving; and so, in the civilised world, is unregulated carrying of guns.
Should we outright ban alcohol and tobacco? Gun sales/ownership? If no, why not? We'd save a lot more lives, especially a lot more children's lives than if we confined those who don't vaccinate to isolated colonies.
Prohibition of recreational substances of addiction causes more problems than it solves, and is not comparable to requiring vaccination. Gun sales and ownership need to be far more strictly regulated than is currently the case in the USA, but contrary to what the NRA might have you believe, guns are not banned in the rest of the world; just regulated.
People need to be vaccinated, for the same reason that they need not to drive drunk - or perhaps a better analogy is driving without training. You can't lawfully drive on public roads without a license; and you shouldn't be allowed to attend public schools, or public events, without vaccinations (absent a genuine medical issue preventing you from being vaccinated). In either case, if you are caught doing the wrong thing, it is reasonable to throw the book at you for recklessly endangering others.
