Penn and Teller profanely destroy the anti-vaccination case in a 90 second video well worth watching.
Unfortunately, many of the so-called anti-vaxxers won’t watch it, or understand it, or believe it. No, they are willing to put their own kids – and everyone’s kids – at risk because of a completely wrong, now-retracted article in the Lancet purported to show a link between vaccinations and autism.
When, of course, there is NO SUCH LINK. As this group of parents with kids afflicted with autism eloquently shows…
And there’s any number of lunatics claiming vaccinations cause all type of horribles, e.g. whack-job, cartoon character Michelle Bachman’s assertion that the HPV vaccination can cause mental retardation…
From the other side of the political spectrum, there are anti-vaxxer liberals who don’t get refuse to understand/outright deny the science – nice to know we all have morons in our midst…
Fortunately, people in third world countries are a lot smarter than these cretins –
“We take vaccines so for granted in the United States,” Melinda Gates told HuffPost Live in January…
“They will walk 10 kilometers in the heat with their child and line up to get a vaccine because they have seen death. We’ve forgotten what measles deaths look like. We’ve forgotten … the scourges they used to be. But in Africa, the women know death in their children and they want their children to survive.”
The anti-vaxxers claim it is their right to jeopardize their kids – and yours. Fine. While one could make a compelling case that their stupidity is grounds for a charge of child abuse, there’s a much bigger public health issue here, one that is all too obvious now that these idiots have allowed their kids into public spaces where they’ve infected others.
That case is simply this – if you choose to do, or not do, something that creates a significant public health risk, then you get to pay for the consequences.
Monetarily, criminally, civilly.
DWI, knowingly infecting partners with STDs, failing to keep firearms locked up, texting and driving, all are akin to the anti-vaccine movement. And all come with legal consequences.
What does this mean for you?
Be careful, stupidity didn’t die out with the Middle Ages.