WASHINGTON (AP) — Amid the measles outbreak stemming from California, the White House is telling parents that science indicates they should vaccinate their children.
President Barack Obama’s spokesman, Josh Earnest, said Friday that decisions about vaccinations should be left to parents, but the science on vaccinations “is really clear.” Some parents continue to believe debunked research linking vaccines to autism and refuse vaccinate their children.
“I’m not going stand up here and dispense medical advice,” Earnest said when asked whether the president supports parents who choose not to vaccinate. “But I am going to suggest that the president’s view is that people should evaluate this for themselves, with a bias toward good science and toward the advice of our public health professionals, who are trained to offer us exactly this kind of advice.”
About 100 cases of the measles have been reported in the U.S. since last month in the second-biggest outbreak in at least 15 years. Most have been traced directly or indirectly to Disneyland in Southern California.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says measles-mumps-rubella vaccine is 97 percent effective at preventing measles. The American Academy of Pediatrics says doctors should bring up the importance of vaccinations during visits but should respect a parent’s wishes unless there’s a significant risk to the child.
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I’m not sure why anyone would trust any goddamned thing Nedra Fucking Pickler has to say about anything, ever.
Go read her wkiipedia page, she’s a frickin’ hack.
Is TPM attempting to help rehabilitate her after her horrorshow of a career of Republican dick licking during George the lesser’s administration?
Maybe the measles argument needs to be remade. The don’t vaccinate thing is basically happening because people have forgotten (never knew) what measles was like or why the entire vaccine regimen is what it is.
Parents should vaccinate their kids, full stop. Idiots with foolish ideas should never be listened to, end there too.
Putting aside for the moment the irresponsibility of the parents who refuse to vaccinate their children…doesn’t this whole problem eventually correct itself? That is, under the cold calculus of disease transmission, the children who don’t get vaccinated are the ones most likely to suffer and die from measles. I’m not sure there’s a more convincing argument to a parent for getting a child vaccinated then seeing that not doing so results in their child’s suffering and death from the very disease that the vaccine protects against. If that doesn’t do it, what would?