The risk psychology of the anti-vaccine movement

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/no-vaccine-a-different-risk/

by cwan • 17 years ago

30 56 17 years ago

freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com

People who don't vaccinate their children do so as a luxury provided by the vast majority who do vaccinate.

hcayless• 17 years ago

Herd immunity helps, but the problem is that no vaccine is 100% effective and there are those who can't get vaccinated for health reasons (such as allergies, compromised immune systems, etc.). So, if you like, we're all relying on herd immunity to some extent, and people (hard not to type "morons") who don't vaccinate themselves or their kids are reducing the level of herd immunity. They're putting other people at risk--not just their own kids.

scott_s2• 17 years ago

And, sadly, from the article: "“I used to say that the tide would turn when children started to die. Well, children have started to die,” Offit says, frowning as he ticks off recent fatal cases of meningitis in unvaccinated children in Pennsylvania and Minnesota. “So now I’ve changed it to ‘when enough children start to die.’ Because obviously, we’re not there yet.”"

tomjen2• 17 years ago

Well, no they have to catch it from somebody that _do_ have it in the first place, so the real culprit is those who have the decease currently.

But yeah, statistically you are most likely to get to sick if you aren't vaccinated but at a certain point vaccination doesn't make sense at all.

83457• 17 years ago

So the non-vaccinated aren't the real culprits because they have to get it from someone who has the disease because they are not vaccinated?

Alex39174• 17 years ago

How are you supposed to make an educated decision about the safety of these vaccines, when there's a good chance that the CDC is lying to you about the data?

Just read RFK's article on the vaccine autism link:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/7395411/deadly_im...

I've seen a ton of evidence since this article saying that the vaccine-autism link is false. However I've seen zero evidence that the alleged CDC cover up of the safety information didn't actually occur. How are you supposed to make an educated decision about the safety of these products when the head of the CDC vaccine division goes on record saying they are hiding information about their safety.

gthank2• 17 years ago

You mean the article that the submitted article explicitly calls out as unbelievably shoddy, and for which Rolling Stone has issued multiple corrections?

DannoHung• 17 years ago

Well, honestly, even if you broke it down in terms of one disease versus another, I think vaccines still take the cake:

Don't vaccinate: Might get polio, whooping cough, meningitis, measles, mumps, rubella, tetanus or superflu. All of which are either deadly or crippling diseases, in some cases even when treated.

Vaccinate: Might become autistic. Which is a serious behavioral disorder.

kls• 17 years ago

Look at your source and see if they are credible.

first they say that vaccines contain mercury which they do not they contain thimerosal (sodium ethylmercurithiosalicylate) that is not mercury. Further in the body it is metabolized to ethylmercury which is still not mercury. It still has a whole ethy group. There are entire compounds that by slight deviation can mean the difference between fatal and essential.

While ethylmercury has some links to not being that great for you, the fact that the article is so grossly negligent to call a compound mercury (because everyone knows it is bad stuff) tends to hint that their is either a political agenda or that are looking to scare up a story.

Further, thimerosal was removed from all children vaccines in the 90's so even if there was a link, there is no valid reason today to not vaccinate you child.

Personally, (if it where mercury) I would much rather expose my child to even a small dose of mercury to prevent a return to the infant mortality rates of a century ago.

Can you imagine a time when it was unusual for a family to not loose a child. Ponder that for a moment, then weight it against the risks. Up until vaccination technology, a family would almost assuredly loose a child in their lifetime.

My grandmother lost her older sister at 10 years old to a vaccinatable disease. That was the reality back then The math says it all, something changed infant mortality rates and medical science has testable reproducible results that say they where responsible for that change, until the witch doctors can provide reproducible results, I am sticking with the guys that are using science.

_ck_• 17 years ago

Some key quotes in there to think about:

  RotaTeq costs a little under $4 a dose to make.
  Merck has sold a total of more than 24 million doses
  in the US, most for $69.59 a pop (a 17-fold markup)

  In 19th-century England, Jenner’s smallpox vaccine was
  known to be effective. But despite the Compulsory  
  Vaccination Act of 1853, many people still refused 
  to take it, and thousands died unnecessarily.

  All you have to do to get the measles is to inhabit 
  the airspace of a contagious person within two hours 
  of them being there.

There are going to be parts of this country in several years that are going to be darn dangerous to travel to as herd-immunity will be gone for several major diseases. I personally think the anti-vaccine people are way overboard.

rimantas• 17 years ago

Does that take into account R&D?

gthank2• 17 years ago

Doubtful, since the number would change with every single dose produced if it did.

dschobel4• 17 years ago

It's really frustrating that we can't get honest numbers on how much it takes to bring a drug to market.

In the anti-pharma camp you see people quote the manufacturing price, and then you get the pharma companies quoting their entire operating budgets.

protomyth2• 17 years ago

The other problem with all this foolishness is that the resistance provided by these groups changes the research direction of the big drug companies. It is unwise to walk into a never-ending set of lawsuits. So, they make stuff that is less essential, but still makes them money (e.g. 'enhancers').

Even if you spent all the money and the FDA approves the drug for a specific use, the company will still get sued and it could be devastating. Look at the actual stats for asbestos and how many companies are out of business and how many NEW ones are being sued.

Hysteria and foolish courts are going to wrack up a heck of a death toll.

blueben3• 17 years ago

This is exactly why Congress has given the flu vaccine manufacturers a pass on lawsuits. Without such immunity, who would take on the risk of manufacturing a low profit item like swine flu vaccine?

But to the conspiracy theorists, this is just "proof" that the vaccines are dangerous and that "big pharma" and the government are conspiring together.

blakeGideon• 17 years ago

I hadn't had a flu shot in years. But with the added risk swine flu has brought, I plan on getting on this season.

ars4• 17 years ago

What added risk?

The swine flu is not worse than regular flu, it's simply that more people than usual will get it. That's troubling to governments, but should not matter to you.

sketerpot5• 17 years ago

The added risk of getting the flu. It well and truly sucks to get the flu, even if it's not much worse than usual.

blueben3• 17 years ago

Not worse now. But the probability of the virus mutating goes up with the size of the population it has to play around in. We all have a vested interest in making sure that doesn't happen.

fnid• 17 years ago

I've only had the flu one time in my entire life and it was the same as the only year I got vaccinated. I haven't had a flu vaccine since and I haven't gotten the flu since.

Edit: Not saying I don't believe in vaccines in general. But I'm not sure I believe in the flu vaccine. I can't explain my flu infection, nor can others who experienced the same circumstance: getting the flu the only year they were vaccinated.

I have been vaccinated against other diseases since then though.

eru2• 17 years ago

I tried to re-upmod your post back to 1 point.

You state an observation. And while that anecdote flys in the face of what many here (including myself) believe about vaccination, there's nothing wrong with your comment.

For what its worth, I had have lots of flus, but was never vaccinated against influenza (as far as I can remember).

sketerpot5• 17 years ago

The observation isn't inconsistent with the facts about vaccination. Flu vaccines can't protect against every strain you might encounter, and it's a simple matter of probability that there are going to be a lot of people who get vaccinated for the first time, get a flu that year, and stop getting vaccinated from then on.

This is why anecdotal evidence on this issue is worthless. Worse than worthless, actually, since it distracts from the proper statistical approach to thinking about vaccines.

nollidge7• 17 years ago

Correlation is not causation. Correlation is not causation. Correlation is not causation.

Edit: "I can't explain my flu infection"

I can. You got the flu strain which wasn't covered by the shot.

gcheong2• 17 years ago

The flu vaccine is very hit or miss as there are multiple strains each year and vaccines are only developed for the strains most likely to be the most active each year so there are many possible explanations for your case, but one thing is certain - the vaccine did not cause you to get the flu as a dead/weakened virus cannot cause the illness. Also, you may have had the flu before but not recognized it so I'm not sure you could say you've never had it before except that one time unless you've done extensive blood testing. But let's say you really never did have the flu except that one time, well, if millions of people are tossing coins you would expect that there will be cases where for some people it always comes up heads with one tail.

dschobel4• 17 years ago

and the very first post in response to the NYT blog:

I will never get another vaccine, just another way for the goverment to poison us off. Vaccines are the biggest scam ever created.

sigh.

pcestrada• 17 years ago

It's a self-correcting problem. Those who don't vaccinate will eventually dwindle in numbers and their offspring won't reach reproductive maturity.

mynameishere• 17 years ago

Which is to say, those who don't get the vaccine will die in proportion to their natural weakness to a particular disease. The survivors will have the strongest resistance out of the entire population.

anigbrowl• 17 years ago

I wish. Aside from the ethical problem that adults are compromising the survivability of their children, who are not in a position to make the decision for themselves, this view depends on the idea that illogical thinking and paranoia are heritable traits.

To be sure, growing up in an ignorant family may well offset the benefits of education, but many otherwise intelligent people can fall into error. Consider deniers of evolution or moon landings, who often know enough science to put up superficially persuasive arguments for their conspiracy theories (a favorite being 'van Allen belt radiation would have killed the astronauts') but seem unable to deal with questions of probability.

These beliefs are more common in the US than in Europe; I wonder if this is due to some basic weakness in the design of US school curriculum. Maybe if basic programming were included as part of the math curriculum people would b better equipped to deal with these issues.

dschobel4• 17 years ago

That's a rather severe position when you consider that the children are the ones who will pay the price for the parent's ignorance.

I don't think most people would be comfortable with letting the children of ignorant or misinformed parents simply perish though.

omouse• 17 years ago

I hope they have stopped paying taxes since they hate the government so much so that the IRS can pick them up :D

sketerpot5• 17 years ago

I'm not sure why the government would want to kill its own taxpayers. What could they possibly gain from it? This guy isn't even a good conspiracy nut.

iterationx• 17 years ago

Government's have never killed their own taxpayers. That's ridiculous.

xexers2• 17 years ago

While I do think it's important to get the tried, tested, and true vaccines, I am not sure about some of the newer ones. There have been many stories in the past of people getting worse off from brand new vaccines. For new vaccines I use at my own discretion.

ars4• 17 years ago

I have the same policy - I will not use a vaccine until it's been in (at least moderate) use for at least 10-15 years.

A good policy is never use a vaccine that is still under patent (although that's 21 years, which is probably too much).

nollidge7• 17 years ago

Lots of people are dying of vaccine-preventable disease. They are quite obviously not dying, or even getting sick, from vaccines, except in extremely rare cases.

So, that's a terrible policy.

Edit: removed inflammatory language. Sorry.

nollidge7• 17 years ago

Perhaps instead of reading stories, you should look for evidence. Then you would see that such stories are incredibly rare among the population at large.

xexers2• 17 years ago

Just so we stay on point here, I am only talking about NEW vaccines here. I support ones that have been established.

Well, evidence to one particular story comes to mind:

"Still, as observed by a participant in the immunization program, the vaccine killed more Americans than the disease did."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swine_flu#1976_U.S._outbreak

johnohara• 17 years ago

As a teacher, I've been fortunate over the years not to get most of the stuff students 'graciously' share. I don't know why, lucky I guess.

I've taken every precaution in the computer lab to slow the spread -- sanitizers, keyboard/screen cleanings, constant reminders how to cough, etc. Some years, we've gone through 2 large pump bottles of sanitizer.

One year I decided to get a flu shot just 'to be sure." Within 45 days I came down with one of the worst bouts of flu I had ever experienced and got into serious dehydration problems (almost hospitalized) before turning the corner. The strain I had actually induced 'projectile vomit.' I remember thinking "wow, I didn't know my body could do that." It was horrible, scary, and impressive all at the same time.

I'm keeping a very close eye on this H1N1 business and like the other posters here, will read all I can to know more. But there's no way I'm marching down to get a flu shot just because the CDC says so. I've done that already. I'm not a conspiracy guy, nor am I herd-stupid. I'm just cautious by direct experience.

sketerpot5• 17 years ago

You got a flu shot, got another strain of flu a whole 45 days later, and you think that there's a connection? I'm sorry, but this isn't evidence; it's the exact same cognitive failure mode that convinced people that dances and sacrifices could control the weather. You were in a high-risk environment, with lots of flu strains circulating around, and you probably just got unlucky that year.

The risk psychology of the anti-vaccine movement

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