Mass Vaccination: Mother Nature Fights Back

"Outbreaks of mumps in the Midwest -- where more than 1,000 cases were reported by April 2006 among largely vaccinated teens and young adults -- fueled concerns about the long-term effectiveness of the immunization that was supposed to forestall such a scenario. "The only people who don't have to worry about the mumps in the Midwest outbreak, which is occurring primarily among college students who have two doses of MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine, are older Americans who recovered from mumps as children," Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the country's largest and oldest vaccine safety and consumer watchdog organization, the National Vaccine Information Center, wrote in her newsletter. "Vaccines provide temporary, qualitatively inferior immunity compared to the qualitatively superior immunity achieved by recovering from the disease, which in most cases is permanent for once routine childhood diseases such as mumps.

".... the addition of a vaccine against pneumococcal disease -- including sepsis, or blood poisoning, meningitis, pneumonia and otitis media, or inflammation of the middle ear -- to the childhood immunization schedule, with four doses recommended in the first 18 months of life, has put a dent in the rate of sickness and of cases that fail to respond to treatment. At the same time, however, researchers have observed a dramatic shift in the microbial varieties that most often cause recurrent ear infections, the most common bacterial illness in young U.S. children. Since the Prevnar shot, formally known as conjugated heptavalent pneumococcal vaccine, or PCV7, was licensed in 2000, the bacteria it targets, Streptococcus pneumoniae, have taken a backseat to another type, Haemophilus influenzae. This flu bug now has become the predominant culprit in persistent ear infections as well, researchers reported in The Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal. Prior to the routine use of the vaccine and high-dose antibiotics, S. pneumoniae was implicated in nearly half of the cases, but now it is H. influenzae that brings on the malady 57 percent of the time, scientists said. " - Lydia Wasowitz, Earthtimes , Where Remedies Fall Short, July 23, 2007

Barbara Loe Fisher Commentary:

Time and again, when man attempts to alter the natural order, the change which occurs is damaging to the environment and the biological integrity of humans over the long term. Mandatory, mass vaccination policies have done far more than suppress or "eradicate" infectious diseases. Like the indiscriminate widespread use of multiple antibiotics, which has led to more virulent, antibiotic resistant bacteria, the indiscriminate widespread use of vaccines is placing pressure on viruses and bacteria to evolve and evade vaccines.

CDC officials direct pediatricians to give all infants 4 doses of pneumococcal vaccine in the first two years of life. Wyeth is the sole source of that vaccine (Prevnar) and heavily promoted it as an ear infection vaccine prior to its licensure in 2000, even though clinical studies demonstrated only a 6 percent efficacy for preventing ear infections. The vaccine contains seven of the most antibiotic resistant pneumococcal strains (there are more than 80 strains of the organism) and now, predictably, other strains of bacteria are replacing those contained in Prevnar vaccine and causing disease.

Some are also predicting this "replacement" effect will occur with the newly licensed HPV vaccine (Merck's GARDASIL), which the CDC has recommended be used by all 11 year old girls. GARDASIL contains two of the 15 strains of human papillamovirus that are associated with cervical cancer. However, FDA officials warned prior to the vaccine's licensure and CDC officials published an article in JAMA after licensure that widepsread use of GARDASIL could cause the two high risk HPV strains in the vaccine to be eventually replaced by other high risk strains.

When government officials and drug company lobbyists persuade politicians to pass laws mandating use of new vaccines, they often do not stop to consider the potential negative effects. The "cure" may be worse than the disease when public health officials and vaccine makers urge the public to use more and more vaccines and politicians are quick to legislate vaccine use without all of the scientific information required to make an intelligent decision on behalf of the people.

The study of wellness and finding more natural ways to help the body enhance immune function to both resist and recover from infectious disease so good health can be maintained over the long term might be a better way to go in the future, rather than placing narrow-minded emphasis on suppression and "eradication" of infectious disease with the mass use of multiple vaccines. If there is one thing that Mother Nature has demonstrated over the last century, it is that she is not amused when doctors and drug companies think they know how to do it better.