The Australian antivax movement takes its toll

The Australian antivax movement takes its toll
by Phil Plait, Apr 29 2009

In America, people who claim vaccines cause autism are a major health threat. Some of these folks are just parents, people concerned about their kids, people desperately looking for a cause for a devastating illness. Others are vocal advocates of nonsense, saying things that are proven beyond reasonable doubt to be untrue.

The end result? Kids, including infants, are getting sick, and some of them are dying. Never, ever forget that, no matter how loudly these people yell, and no matter what garbage they spout (including, inevitably, in the comments that will follow this very post). Babies are dying.

In Australia, this movement is taking root as well. Calling the alarm to this, a TV program in Oz called "Sunday Night" aired an excellent exposé of what happens when parents don’t vaccinate their kids: they risk their children’s lives, and those of others. In the case shown on the TV show, a four-week-old baby, Dana McCaffery, died of whooping cough. This innocent infant wasn’t eligible for vaccination yet, but the lack of herd immunity — that region has lower-than-average vaccination rates — sealed her fate. The fact that other parents didn’t vaccinate their kids gave that little girl a death sentence.

Here’s the segment from that program. Warning (and I’m serious): if you are a parent, or any kind of feeling human being, this segment is seriously disturbing. I could barely watch it.

More:
http://skepticblog.org/2009/04/29/the-aust... /