What I can add to this is that both my kids, yes both, have been fully vaccinated, and have taken antibiotics when needed, which is rare. They are in their late teens now. They are not autistic. They didn't sprout a 3rd arm or go into a magic coma or start drooling on their selves while staring off into space. They hardly ever get sick, other then during cold season, and even then its mild for them. Science and the advancement of medicine in the modern medical world. Its f*cking awesome. Respect it, use it, and it will take care of you and yours.
Germs and pathogens are advancing every year. Its hard enough for even the medical field to stay equipped to fight an ever changing, ever evolving enemy, like the flu for instance, so they need our support, not our doubts and nay saying. Our immune systems are amazing, usually, but even they can only go so far. Mother nature is turning against us slowly as time goes on, has been for thousands of years, presenting mankind with joys like Yellow Fever.
And for that matter there are other factors at play. Other humans, some meaning well, others with nefarious intent, have been and continue to play god with said pathogens and genetically modified primordial germ cells in labs all around the world, waiting to deliver the next big cure to help mankind, or the next big bio weapon to hurt and hinder it.
If something happens, like the next black plague similar to whats been hitting Madagascar, big or small, I'm going to be counting on the good guys in the labs working for the CDC and WHO who risk their lives every day to study and test this shit for the benefit of mankind to deliver a vaccine or antibiotic treatment. Its what they f*cking do, and to be frank, they have had more success then failure over the years. The negatives have not outweighed the positives. More lives have been saved then lost.
Because of these scientist, doctors and nurses in the medical field for the past couple hundred years have been risking and dedicating their lives to said deeds, we can now cure and treat shit that was killing thousands a day for extended periods hundreds of years back, when we were still in the dark, tossing the dead out into streets and boarding up windows. We can keep shit at bay that was killing hundreds of thousands if not millions. We can keep the current deaths in the tens of thousands instead of the millions. We can fight back.
I think some people in here need some f*cking education.
http://www.historyofvaccines.org/content/timelines/allGo on that link, scroll along, klik on shit and read and get a glimpse of how shit was before we had legitimate treatments for all this shit that has tried to kick humanities ass, and read about the people who finally came up with ways to combat it. As you read on, pay attention to the f*cking death tolls caused by shit we at one time had no treatment for as you go, and imagine if all of this shit was hitting us year after year now, with no viable treatment or prevention on hand. Before diseases etc had to wait weeks to travel from one country to the next, over the ocean, across vast unpopulated lands.
Imagine this shit having free reign now due to a sudden outbreak. Pretend we never created a vaccine before for it, or did but tossed it due to whatever crazy reason some group of fools came up with on a whim. Just imagine we always got lucky prior with small outbreaks, small death counts in remote isolated parts of the world. With the way a potential carrier could be in another country in less then 24 hours now, and every person they were in contact with also in their own countries in yet another 24 hours, going out, shopping, eating out, breathing, spreading shit... Just imagine how fast and destructive something like Yellow Fever or Small Pox could be if it had 100 percent free reign over every country due to lack of knowledge, treatment, prevention, or plain ignorance.
Imagine some psycho doomsday cult, or modern day enemy fascist regime like the Nazi's finding ways to breed batches of Yellow Fever carrying mosquitoes ready to be unleashed upon a modern day southern part of North America during a humid summer, or finding new ways to cultivate Smallpox or the black plague into an effective weapon against the United States during a time of war, instigating a major outbreak in multiple large industrialized zones that were dedicated/tasked to creating and manufacturing weaponry/machinery for our military in a war that we were barely winning, thus crippling/killing/destroying our own work forces, along with their families, and ensuring our total defeat.
Imagine this happened all because a treatment or vaccine was never found or created, or was but was tossed away because of a few a$$hole wackamoles in the early 1900s ranted and got their way because they believed vaccines would suddenly make their kids retarded or whatever. So they demanded an end to science and a total reliance on god/faith, spiritual healing, luck, a rabbits foot, 7 herbs and spices, and in a worse case scenario, maybe leeches and blood letting, along with an annual town witch burning to keep things straight and the plague at bay. The Nazis and the Japanese were already toying with ideas such as this as is during WWII, biological warfare, so seriously, think this over.
We are already dealing with shit like Ebola as is trying to keep it at bay, but imagine if something more easily widespread like the above hit. You really wanna tell me you'd rather not be able to vaccinate or treat your kids, let alone yourself, against that kinda shit? You really wanna turn back the clock and start rolling the dice on shit like that?
Look, nothing is perfect. There is a risk to everything. A small percentage of the population may indeed not be responsive in a positive way to some vaccines. But that DOES NOT mean the majority will not be. The key thing here is to save and treat the majority. Saving lives, as many as possible. In a perfect world everyone could be saved, but the world isn't perfect.
Lets say hypothetically, that there are a few well known and widely used vaccines that happen to prevent HIV or Ebola did in fact cause autism in something like 4 percent of those vaccinated, or ADD in something like 5-15 percent of the North American population. Regardless, there was still like a 85 percent total success rate with no negative symptoms what so ever. To work the vaccines have to be administered when they are children.
Would you really want to just completely do away with a vaccine like that, one that could completely prevent the spread of HIV, just because that minor percentage had negative side effects? Would you really choose to prevent your kids from being vaccinated with the such on the 3 percent chance they may become autistic, or the 10-15 percent chance they may develop some form of ADD? ADD, something that is entirely treatable that can be coped with during their life, in favor of them being at risk of contracting HIV in their teen to adult years?
We all know what, well hopefully all of us here know what HIV can become, and what it does to the human body when it does. Something like ADD may complicate someones life, but HIV will f*cking destroy it when it turns into full blown AIDS. With the right meds you may be able to slow it down, but eventually your time will run out, and there is also the social stigma that having HIV carries.
That stigma is a lot worse then having ADD. So what would you choose? Permanently prevent HIV, or maybe prevent ADD, and maybe in a tiny possibility prevent autism, in favor or risking contracting HIV as an adult due to some drunken one night stand? The fact is ADD and autism can develop even without vaccines. Your kids may develop that shit just from being a toddler sucking on some dumb toy that may have had lead paint. All sorts of shit can cause behavioral disorders. Some of it can be prevented, some cant.
But HIV, well, we all know how you can catch it, and it isn't from licking f*cking lead paint as a toddler. So, what would you choose? Ponder on this, seriously, because one day this may actually be a reality. There may one day be a vaccine for HIV, and it may have minor side effects for a small percentage of the population. And you or your kids may have to make that choice....
End of rant.