Sunday, April 13, 2014

Would you vaccinate your dog.? The Strange Paradoxes of the Anti-Vaccine Movement

As someone who was born and raised in a third world country, I always saw survival at every expense possible as well growing up in a family where my maternal grandfather was a physician, I always valued science above anything else in the help of the survival of humanity.

When I heard for the first time about the anti-vaccine movement, was in the mouth of Jenny McCarthy. I found it fascinating because I never seen even now, a person who has been known for her stupidities to have such a public weight. Maybe, maybe, that is one of the many problems with America, we are letting celebrities and luminaires to have more weight than the actual scientific community.

As I was in Colombia, I never heard anyone saying that vaccines are the problem; but, if he we are going to talk about a natural cleanse where the parents are going to be responsible of the genocide of an entire generation by letting their children die on diseases that are controllable and can be eradicated. It is true that everyone is entitled to believe into what they want, but there should be also some common sense because slowly we are turning into a parallel of the Late Middle Ages.

One paradox it seems it can not die it is the "autism is linked with mercury in the vaccines". If it was truth at least two generations of humanity would be autistic as the claims of the quackery says but there is one way to analyze the fails on their reasoning and that is with logical fallacies.
A man and a woman had a child, the child was born healthy but his parents after listening to Andrew Wakefield, a so-called doctor and a man of science, that vaccines turn children autistic. Sometime later, they heard on FOX News and CNN an actress talking about how vaccines turned her son autistic. So they decide to not vaccinate their child, even he wasn't in the risk of having problems with his immune system.
Sometime later, the couple adopted a dog; as they did with their child, they opted to not vaccinate the dog at all, because they were fearful the dog was going to die because of the vaccines; as the puppy grew older, the couple slowly decided to take the dog for his first walk.
As the couple, the child and the dog were walking on the park, a rabid raccoon appeared and attacked the dog; as the couple didn't vaccinated their pup against the rabies, the puppy grew up sick and at a certain point attacked the husband and the young child.
The woman tried to seek help four weeks later, but as they child wasn't vaccinated in a fear that he will turned autistic, the father of the child survived but the child died a couple of days later as he was interned in the hospital; only because his parents feared something that could saved his life; and the dog had to be put down to confirm the diagnosis.
Tragedies can be avoided, but there are always people who profit on the ignorance of people. Vaccines save life, and the stupidity of the anti-vaccine movement proliferated in the country with the biggest pharmaceutical monopoly in the world; if you go to third world countries, you are not going to hear the same idiotic and moronic speech that Jenny McCarthy keeps babbling about it, because people are aware of the dangers to die of diphtheria, "yellow fever" and a few other diseases that can be controlled and eradicated.

The focus of this Twenty First Century problem has its roots on the media, because mass communications are giving more weight to pseudo-science as an absolute truth. Just go the supermarket and you will see Mehmet Oz (Which he shouldn't be called a doctor, even if he is an Harvard graduate) on 10 different covers promoting weight loss and a few other strange things about metabolism.

If there is going to be a change, even a little one on the perceptions of the public health system as well the private one has to come from the media that is aimed at a middle class public, that is influenced by the pop culture. It sounds a little bit difficult but not impossible because we don't want some old diseases to rise again, even if they can be gone as easy when you vaccinate your dog.  


  1. Vets Weston
    That's strange!? What is the problem with the vaccine for dogs? It definitely saves life and by this we can avoid being sick due to illnesses cause by our dog like rabies and etc. I hope you all understand the importance of vaccine.

    1. Hi Mr. Gilbert;

      I been following some strange stories around Florida, and some modes around the American population. Of course I understand the importance of inoculation, (albeit I am not a physician but someone whose family was in the medical science). I am still thinking of writing another piece as I been listening to the strange speech of people that argue that vaccines cause autism.

      Regards Mr. Gilbert.

  2. When this popped up in my twitter feed the picture of the rabid dog, had a caption say "Religion Is Mental Rabies" that isn't on this article. Coming here and reading the article even though I'm a believer I have to agree with the post. I just wanted to clarify that the recent anti-vaccine movement isn't a religious movement per say. Most religious people with a few exceptions accept modern medicine and take advantage of recommended vaccinations.