Measles and the Mumps and everything in between! ☤🏥🤕
This baby got measles because of anti-vaxers
By Elizabeth Cohen, CNN
Infectious disease experts say the cause is clear: anti-vaxers.
Haha.
The cause, obviously, is that she was exposed to the measles virus.
This is kind of like if someone gets shot, and you say "the cause is clear: 2nd amendment advocates".
The cause is someone fired a led bullet and it hit you.
You think legal gun ownership fosters an environment where shootings are more likely. Okay.
But even if that were true, you can't cause-and-effect one specific incident like that. What if it was a crazy guy on drugs and he bought the gun on the black market? Then it wouldn't have been caused by belief in the 2nd amendment.
What if baby Shira got measles from a homeless person who has no such "anti-vax" ideology?
It's a bullshit statement. "Here, think this", fake news, not journalism, social engineering type of thing.
Anti-vaxers who've chosen not to vaccinate will spread measles to babies under age 1 whose parents want to vaccinate them but can't because they're too young.
Actually, anyone could do this, regardless of what thoughts exist in their head and if they fit your loaded term 😆
(Which is what I'm getting at when I say we don't know who exactly spread measles to baby Shira.)
Some people who don't vaccinate probably aren't sure or are a little tentative, without strong feelings one way or another.
Some people probably forget, lol. Or just don't think that much about going to the doctor.
Personally, at least as it has to do with measles, the trade off seems awful to me. I'd take the 1-in-a-million shot that I need to nurse my child through what is essentially a bad flu, rather than definitely toy around with their immune response and communicate to them that it's a time of disease, at a tender and impressionable age.
Which doesn't mean I'm "anti-vax" or that I'm totally sure there's a problem with it or that vaccines are always bad in all circumstances or that I think I know what you should decide for your own kids.
There just are all sorts of reasons why someone, somewhere may end up not being vaccinated by everything you want them to be vaccinated by at all times. And I suspect that the path to health and wellness doesn't involve neurotically worrying about the medical decisions that everyone else makes.
I feel like the only way the vax-hysterical could truly sleep at night would be to segregate themselves, and whitelist people who agree to whatever set of immunizations they deem appropriate.
That's how you could actually have that kind of environment. Dynamic communities who voluntary agree to that standard. Otherwise people will always be slipping thru the cracks for one reason or another.
And the so called "anti-vaxers" tend to be into free association, so go ahead and work towards that if it matters so much to you.
One mistake and I worry it'll blow through your hallowed immune systems like a wild fire. But go ahead.
At least, I assume your norms will snowball.
When you have a society of only the people who currently push hard for vaccines, without any "anti-vaxers" or more agnostic or indifferent people in the way, it's easy for it to evolve to new territory, more vaccines and at earlier and earlier ages, and in general a drive to want to sterilize everything.
(And of course it's a culture where you never want to hesitate or turn the germaphobe mob against you.)
So you become weak and increasingly dependent on everything being sterilized without ever making a mistake.
The people today who kinda-sorta like vaccines but aren't totally crazy are unwittingly saved by the people who are more hesitant.
I'm agnostic in regards to what the medical efficacy of various vaccines is, and in regards to what choice you should make for yourself and your kids. But I know the world would get awful and unhealthy if there was too much of the vaccine-pushing, never-hesitate ideology.
In general, the people who worry too much about germs and sterilizing everything are the least healthy people you'll meet.
And it's a really fascinating form of projection. The vaccine-pushing ideology is what would actually fall like dominoes and end in ruin if there was too much of it, but that's what they worry about when someone is vaccine-hesitant.
"Our babies are no different than Israeli babies," said Dr. William Schaffner, an adviser on vaccines to the CDC. "And the measles virus in Israel is the same virus as here in the US."
Killer observation. 😆
Funny that CNN thinks it deserves space in the article.
This is a cute tactic that people do. (Subconsciously, probably.) When you don't have much of a point, you can rattle off irrelevant things that obviously are true and that no one disputes, to make it seem like you're on to something.
..Yes, obviously viruses and biology and whatnot work the same in the US as they do Israel. 🙄
When you trim the fat from articles like this and try to zero in on what meaningful points or info was given, often they're startlingly empty. (Like this article.)
"Let's talk for a moment about freedom of choice for those who believe that vaccinations are Satan and the source of all evil," Sukenik wrote in Hebrew.
Thinking that they're bad or that the trade-off isn't worth it or feeling less anxious to give it to children than what you may consider to be optimal (or all the things people actually think) doesn't mean they think it's "the source of all evil".
She suggested that anti-vaxers either "stay in enclosed areas or hold a big banner noting that you are anti-vaccine."
"Are you ashamed that you don't vaccinate? No, you're not ashamed. So you should wear a sign and let me choose whether my kids will play with your kids," Sukenik told CNN in an interview.
Ya, that's psychotic.
There are plenty of things I'm not ashamed of. I enjoy a good veggie burger, for example. But it doesn't mean I want to walk around with a sign about it.
You can feel free to wear a sign. You can encourage your hysterical, paranoid cohorts to also wear a sign to whitelist yourselves to each other.
The largest and longest of the ongoing measles outbreaks in the United States started last year when an unvaccinated ultra-Orthodox Jewish child in New York visited Israel and became infected.
This reads like a fairy-tale to me.
Can you really trace this stuff to the exact people involved and how it happened and state it as fact like that?
Maybe you can. I don't know. I just don't give CNN much benefit of the doubt lol and wouldn't be surprised if it was total fairy-tale.
Plus what does "ultra-Orthodox" have to do with anything? (If it was a Muslim going back to Pakistan I tend to feel like they don't go out of their way to work this into the article, let alone mention the degree of orthodoxy.)
I would think 3rd world migrants and caravans of Hondurans and mass illegal border crossing (where of course there's no mechanism to test for viruses) are all likely contributors to measles re-emerging in the US.
But no, look over here, it was that Jewish kid in New York 😆😆
It rarely happens, but about seven to 10 years after someone has measles, they can develop subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, a disabling and deadly brain disorder, according to the CDC.
Among people who contracted measles during a resurgence in the United States in 1989 to 1991, 4 to 11 out of every 100,000 were estimated to be at risk for developing the disease.
So not to minimize the chance of getting an awful disorder, but note that even if this "estimation" is correct, what it boils down to is < 0.1% chance of being at risk for it...
🤔
At risk. In someone's estimation. I wonder how many actually got it.
(Or why CNN didn't just give us that info instead, which is a data point that actually means something. Or why they're turning back the clock to 1989 rather than give us something current.)
Hint: Measles isn't actually going to kill you.
Besides, you could tell me that by virtue of being alive we all constantly face a 0.1% chance of becoming at risk for basically everything, and that would sound pretty uneventful and how probability works.
"For years I'm not going to be able to rest from this fear," Sukenik said.
Then you're insane and should read less CNN articles.
"If they want to pick a fight with me, I am not afraid," she said.
Not afraid of words on the internet. Good. Have a ribbon: 🎀🎀
But she literally is the one picking the fight. (She's making Facebook posts about it and suggesting that they're at fault for what happened to her daughter.)
Of course you can understand why she'd pick the fight. Even disagreeing with her, I certainly understand and in a way totally support a concerned mother speaking her mind.
But it's psychotic to pretend they're picking a fight with you.
CNN
In CNN's defense, they probably aren't even trying to be journalists or accurate or anything. Attracting eyeballs to advertisements is the point.
That's what it is, a vehicle to bring the most eyes to the most advertisements.
And ultimately it's not reasonable of us to expect them to behave like journalists when the incentives are otherwise. It's kind of like you can't expect Razor Ramon to go out there and have a real match with Shawn Michaels. Why would they when something else works better?
It all makes more sense and feels more sane and less ridiculous to me when I stop and appreciate that.