It’s been a while since I’ve considered Governor Christie as a potential for my vote in either the primaries or the general election next year, but this would have pushed me off the fence if I was still on it. Vaccine choice is where he decides that the government doesn’t know best?
If you don’t want to vaccinate your kids, that’s fine, but then you can keep them out of contact with other people’s kids; who might not have a choice. As an image macro I saw going around the book of Face the other day put it, “I can’t bring peanuts into school, but you can bring measles?”
Give the man credit for somehow sucking up to the ultra-conservative wing and the left-coast hippy wing at the same time.
Caveat: the wife and I have young kids and we spaced out vaccinations across multiple visits instead of the “one bad day” where you get 3-4 at the same time. That seemed reasonable for us. But never did we think that avoiding vaccines was smart. We’ve both seen what these diseases do to people elsewhere in the world and want no part of it.
I worked a field hospital in a SE Asian jungle in the 90s and remember a few kids between the ages of 4-5 who were dying from various things (mostly Malaria but also measles). We would medivac them out to Thailand but a few did not make it.
I’d like to see the left-coast wingnuts and the conspiracy theorists tell me it was better to hold a toddler and feel her burning so hot that they were cooking inside, than to require vaccinations.
The really shitty thing is in one case the girl had to fly alone because there was nobody able to take care of her siblings had her mother gone with her. She was 4 and I heard she died two days later, alone. She was so out of it by then I am not sure she even registered what was happening, so maybe she wasn’t scared. I don’t know. When kids are that sick, I suspect the DNA kicks in and cries for mommy no matter what.
I think this whole vaccination thing is a symptom of how good we’ve had it here in the US for so many years. If more people shared your experiences and had seen people that sick first-hand, I highly doubt they would stick to their current arguments.
I think there is less interest in arguments than there is a promotion of propaganda, and that goes for BOTH sides when it comes to vaccinations.
Maybe the government doesn’t know best here, either, Ian.
FWIW as a soon-to-be parent I do tend to lean toward Patrick’s analysis above regarding spacing out vaccines.
What does this have to do with gun rights? Yes, I can connect the dots as relates to government busybodies (which most “mandatory vacination” laws in recent years have become) and the odd batch of views that comprise Christie’s regard for the proper role of government. But………
Quiet gun-news day, maybe?
On the topic of spacing vaccines out, the request (accidentally) helped us find a pediatrician who cared about more than office visits and code charges. It’s a PIA for them to do 3 vaccines in three days over three weeks instead of the “CDC schedule” (whatever) all in one fell swoop. Insurance only covered one visit.
Once we found someone willing to spread them out a bit, we discovered someone who heard our concerns and was flexible working with us. It paid off later on with all kinds of issues. We’re at the point where we get house calls on really bad days.
And to thread-drift further from guns, the only doctors willing to work with us were all in the USA on immigration programs for high-skilled workers (South Asia mostly). The US docs all pretty much told us to stuff it. They got one way, or the highway.
Wow! I sure hope my experience will be the same with the pediatricians. From what the cynic in me understands, if they’re not trying to indoctrinate your kids on topics such as homosexuality or anti-gun propaganda you’ve probably found a winner of a pediatrician! One who happens to agree with you on vaccinations is a bonus. ;)
I consider myself a small-government/fiscal conservative (and not, say, a libertarian or a minarchist, nor yet a social/religious conservative). That means I do hold a place in my view of governmental theory for a minimal amount of coercion-by-state. That minimum, in this case, is met by not permitting unvaccinated-by-choice children to enter public schools; and using education campaigns/propoganda to marginalize the anti-vax movement.
It has to do with “gun rights” in that Governor Christie is both a contender for the GOP nomination and a proponent of ideas I find distasteful/dangerous, this being one of them. I’m not fond of his stance on gun laws, which while rrelatively loose by NJ standards, is still informed by his background as a prosecutor of “we’ll just use these to nail the bad guys we can’t get any other way.” And it’s an example of pandering to the lowest of low-information-voters, which disturbs me in a candidate for THE executive position.
Remember, I was a proponent of Governor Christie and defended him for a long time after he started to show some worrisome tendencies. I no longer feel he is a worth candidate, and this is one reason why. His timidity when given the chance to lay down a marker in favor of gun rights in the past few years is another.
Christie full statement indicated that he believed some vaccines should be mandatory, like measles, but others, like the flu or chickenpox, should be left up to the parents. The press is taking his statements out of context. I know…shocked am I!!!!!!!!!
I’m torn on this one. On the one hand, requiring vaccines to attend public school (as Oregon and many other states do) is a severe weakness in the “mandatory
leftist indoctrinationpublic education is a right” crowd. If the “right” comes with too many disqualifying strings attached, it’s no right. The schadenfreude of these conflicting “rights” is delicious, especially since the primary pushers of both ideologies are wealthy-ish leftists.On the other hand, I can see the personal responsibility angle of vaccinating your kids in order to keep everyone else healthy and crippling-disease-free. While “the system” can handle a small number – ~3%, by some estimates – to skate by on the collective immunity of everyone else, it’s not fair to burden everyone else to support one person’s life choices.
And so, the Catch-22: personal liberty (complete with consequences), which must be balanced against the well-being of the community, who bears the brunt of those consequences, thereby justifying the reasonable restriction of personal liberty. (And unlike guns, this actually is a “public health” issue.)
That said, although I understand his point, I still don’t like Chris Christie as a presidential candidate. He’s too wishy-washy on too many things, and being “conservative” by NJ standards still leaves an awful lot of wiggle room for leftist tendencies.
Answer me this, IF the vaccines work as we are told, then how does an un-immunized kid pose a risk to an immunized one?
Because no vaccine is 100% effective (for measles, it is 95% effective). A small percentage of those vaccinated will not develop immunity, and some will develop a weak immunity. Additionally, even if a child does develop full immunity, if they are exposed when their immune system is otherwise weakened (say, they’re already coming down with or are recovering from the flu, strep throat, etc.), they are vulnerable.
That small percentage who do not respond fully or at all to the vaccine, those whose immune systems are weakened by other illnesses, and those who cannot be vaccinated for other medical reasons, depend on the immunity of those who have been successfully vaccinated to protect them.
Several of the children affected in the most recent outbreak were younger than the recommended age for inoculation, or were otherwise medically unable to have it or were immunocompromised.
Five infants in Chicago daycare just tested positive for measles. They are below the age for the vaccine. Their parents had no choice – now the kids have a disease which can prove fatal or seriously debilitating because some jackhole decided to take medical advice from a lefty – or let in a foreign person without the MMR vaccine.
Either way, this is the answer to your question: how are the voluntary avoiders a threat. Because not everyone can make the choices you do.
The babies got it somewhere. If every person in the USA (or a grand majority of them) were immunized, these things would be less likely. And when I say, “every person in the USA” I include all persons – visitors, tourists, immigrants (every legality)…you name it.
Archer,
I totally agree with you RE: Christie as presidential material. Don’t want my defense of his vaccine statements to be misconstrued as supporting him in any way. He would be a disaster as a presidential candidate.
I’d go along with the vaccination program if someone could explain to me why it’s a good idea to give a 6-month old infant type a and b hep vaccinations(among other ones).
An as far as this “measles-at-Disneyland” thing, I suspect that’s the result of some paid-by-the-kid-to-house-the-little- illegal-disease-vectors-group decided that a nice day at Disney land (courtesy of the taxpayers of course) would be such a treat.
And on that note, what should one expect to see when the .gov spews 100K+ sick and UNVACCINATED kids around the country?
a) Both are spread via close contact with others.
b) Many, especially young children, often don’t show symptoms during the initial infection. That kid in daycare who just stuck his hand in his diaper then rubbed it on your kid’s face? He could have hepatitis and you’d never know it.
c) Once infected, lifelong complications can result, even if they don’t show up immediately.
d) The vaccines are most effective when given at a young age.
Exchange of bodily fluids isn’t just a euphemism for THAT when toddlers are involved. They bite, they scratch, they produce an amazing amount of snot, they’re just learning how to properly wash their hands and to keep them out of places they shouldn’t have them.
Apparently, Governor Christie is not just a supporter of vaccine-timing choice; he publicly chose to side with the vaccines-cause-autism camp in 2009.
Second para in a fundraising letter, he stands with parents duped by a scientific fraud.
http://www.lifehealthchoices.com/images/christie.pdf
At this point I should be fair and point out that the current president expressed similar views in 2008, I guess?
Honestly, we did the research and don’t have any answers. But for our kids we spread out the dosing, just in case. We worked with a competant doctor to evaluate the absolutely required and then did the rest over weeks and months.
Our kids entered school (both early pre-pre-K at 3) with everything required, though. We just took a little more time getting there.
Caveats: we now live in a rural area (we raise hogs for fun and profit, and have our own shooting range). Were we still living in LA we would have probably revised the schedule a bit. As it stands, our kids are nearly 3/4 mile by crow from the nearest elementary-age kids. I am not sure…we never see any unless they are in town or at a school.
Point is: it was easier for us because the kids had limited contact with the outside world at a real young age. Today though, they are all over the place and see more of this state than most urban kids. That’s why we don’t play around and have all their shots up to date.