VACCINATIONS: Informed Consent is Never Stupid

March 15, 2007

By: Bruce R Anderson Jr., attorney, Jacksonville Beach

Syndicated columnist John Stossel has entered the national debate about the importance of parental informed consent before children are given vaccines.

In his March 1 column titled "Scaring ourselves stupid and sick," he relied on a conversation with a single doctor as the basis for concluding "almost certainly" that the mercury in certain vaccines plays no role in causing autism.

Stossel ignored that doctor's earlier admissions that it's "reasonable" to be skeptical about anything you put into your body including vaccines, and "vaccines do have side effects."

The wisdom of parents weighing the risks and benefits of vaccination should not be tied to the ongoing scientific and legal debate over the relationship between vaccines and autism; it cannot be dismissed as "stupid."

As the parent of a vaccine-injured child, no serious discussion of vaccines can begin with the belief that they are risk free.

In 1986, Congress created the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act as a safety and compensation system to, among other things, compensate citizens injured or killed by vaccines and insulate pharmaceutical companies from liability (on the theory that vaccine-caused disease is unavoidable).

Through this act, our government recognizes that vaccines have known risks, including seizures, brain inflammation, encephalitis, collapse, shock, neurological injuries and death.

The parents' decision to vaccinate their children cannot be simplified by Stossel's flawed logic that vaccines "have done more good than harm."

Children can suffer when their parents fail to research and health care providers fail to provide full disclosure of the significant risks of permanent injury and death from vaccines.

Stossel implies that children who suffer illness or death from infectious diseases are more important than those who are injured or die from vaccination.

In a humane society, all human life is important.

No individual, organization, corporation or government office can rightfully claim the moral authority to mandate that some children are expendable to death or severe vaccine injuries in service to the rest of the population.

Informed parents have the right to determine whether it is in their child's best interest to delay vaccinations until their child is older and stronger, until safer vaccines are produced or not to vaccinate at all.

Children rely on their parents to make informed choices concerning cribs, car seats, food, toys, television shows and preschools. Why should vaccination decisions be any different?

Parents who question the safety of vaccines for their children should not be dismissed as "scared stupid."

Source: Florida Times-Union