Personal Rant about Alternatives, Prescriptions, HPV Vaccine and Conspiracy Theorists
Posted on Tuesday, November 13th, 2007 at 12:43 PMI bring up the “alternative/natural” substances vs. “prescription” because there are a lot of conspiracy theorists that read my blog on a daily basis – so that was more for their benefit than strictly just for you.
How long should we have to wait before we figure out that vaccines save lives? Ten years, twenty years, thirty years of waiting before we can find out that it’s really ok to take the HPV vaccine and that as with all vaccines, there may be some side effects? We already know this, right? How long do you think it took for scientists to put together the HPV vaccine? Do you think that they just sat around in the board room, through it together without conducting years of testing before offering it up to the public?
So we miss out on the vaccine that has the potential to prevent two types of HPV that can cause cervical cancer. Why? Because of conspiracy theorists against any and all research that has been conducted within the pharmaceutical industry to try and save lives? Are you against the drug companies so much so that you would forgo vaccinating your children just to prove a point after all the years of research that has already been done on this? Does that not count at all or do we have to start over because it’s finally made it to the market?
Everything out there to treat any type of illness whether it be alternative or clinically proven has the potential to have side effects. When you go to pick up your medication at the pharmacy there is always a list of possible side effects that come with medications. The same thing goes for vaccines. When you vaccinate your children they send you home with a sheet of paper that tells you what to watch out for and what to do if your child develops any of the symptoms associated with that vaccine. Why would the HPV vaccine be any different?
I know that it’s different for some… because there are MANY that truly believe that vaccinating our daughters with the HPV vaccine essentially says to them that they can go out and have sex and won’t have to worry about two types of cancer or contracting any type of genital wart. Why is it that it’s ok to vaccinate but when you are vaccinating for the purpose of preventing a sexually transmitted disease people have a problem with that? The strange part is that this sexually transmitted disease happens to cause various strains of cervical cancer which happens to be one of the leading causes of death in women. I guess the three letters STD sorta trumps that then so that makes it bad. WHATEVER!!
So basically what you are saying is that it doesn’t matter how many years have gone into researching and developing this vaccine. It will never be good enough unless we wait another life time and millions of deaths later in order to know what we already know about the vaccine. Oh THAT makes perfect sense to me now… what I want to know is what your definition of a lifetime is? How long should we wait before we protect our kids from the four types of HPV that cause cervical cancer and genital warts?
Many people don’t realize this but many “perscription” drugs actually come from natural substances!
I think if folks would just do their homework on everything they are thinking about trying whether it’s OTC or prescription, they would realize that it’s really going to be ok.
The HPV vaccine is available and know one in the public health system is stopping you from vaccinating your daughters. Currently Cervical cancer is responsible for 1% of the cancers that effect women. The issue of whether this vaccine promotes promiscuity in young women is far less a problem than mandating a vaccine that has not been thoroughly tested. Merck did not do any drug trials in combination with their other vaccines. For example, they did not test the vaccine being administered with the Hep B vaccine. So we have no idea if there will be an adverse reaction when Gardasil is injected in combination with other vaccines. Second problem is there are no long-term observational studies on possible latent effects that may occur as women mature. I think the public has the right know that 17 girls died in the Gardasil drug trials. Whats worse is that Merck will not disclose the causes of those deaths. As of February 21, 2007- Out of the 385 individual GARDASIL adverse event reports made to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, VAERS, two-thirds required additional medical care and about one-third of all reports were for children 16-years-old and under, with nearly 25 percent of those children having received simultaneously one or more of the 18 vaccines that Merck did not study in combination with GARDASIL. If Merck and public health officials are so concerned with protecting our daughters, why don’t they make this vaccine available for free? In stead, families will be paying in excess of $600 for the three injections. What do we do with families that are un-insured and don’t have the money to vaccinate their children against this so-called deadly disease? Merck will need that money in the long run to settle all of the vaccine related injuries that occur as a result of insufficient research on safety and reactivity with other vaccines.
My two daughters will not receive this vaccine.
You raise some interesting points Alex. Points that need further investigating. There are two sides to every issue and while your daughters might not receive this vaccine, mine will be getting it when the time is right for us to do so.