5 Vaccination Myths

Exercising Your Right Whether or Not to Vaccinate

Perhaps many reading this article are like me. We’ve grown up during the era of vaccinations and have never experienced any long-term negative complications from a vaccination. But now we’re hearing of a growing movement that is raising serious concerns about the health of vaccinating—especially vaccinating small children.

Why the sudden alarm about vaccinations? Aren’t vaccinations responsible for warding off massive outbreaks of diseases like polio, whooping cough, mumps, measles and rubella?

The big question I’d like to focus on is whether individuals should have the right to choose whether or not to vaccinate themselves and their children. Do we have a moral obligation to vaccinate and be vaccinated? Does the government have the right to tell us who, how often, and against what diseases we must be vaccinated?

Let’s look at some of the major issues and then you decide.

Myth #1: Vaccinations Have Staved Off Massive Epidemics

Actually, although that is the widespread belief, it wasn’t the vaccines that brought about the dramatic reduction in these diseases, but improved hygiene, nutrition and sanitation. Polio, whooping cough, measles, mumps and rubella, for instance, were all in radical decline before the vaccinations were developed and administered.[1]

Many who adamantly support extensive immunization fear that non-vaccinated children will infect their children. This makes no sense logically or medically, since the purpose of a vaccine is to protect the individual and the spread of such communicable diseases.

In this regard, some refer to “herd immunity,” arguing that diseases simply can’t spread in a community where a high enough percentage of the population is vaccinated against them. But this is an old, unproven hypothesis that defies logic.[2]

Myth #2: Vaccinations Immunize a Person Against Disease

Everybody knows that by injecting weak or dead viruses, the body develops antibodies. But does this combat and protect you from the real virus? Actually, we now know that this only holds true temporarily—and, not always.

Furthermore, the World Health Organization (WHO) has admitted that “Children under two years of age do not consistently develop immunity following vaccination.” In fact, vaccinating can actually compromise their immune system.[3]

In a recent 2012 whooping cough outbreak in California, doctors discovered that the majority of children who contracted whopping cough had been vaccinated against it!

• In fact, 81% of the children with whooping cough had received the full series of “immunizations” against the disease.
• Another 11% had received only part of the whooping cough regimen.
• Only 8% had not received any whopping cough vaccinations.[4]

Here is a perfect example of how the “herd immunity” hypothesis failed. The team of doctors who studied this whooping cough outbreak theorizes that the effectiveness of the vaccine wears off after several years. The truly disturbing part of this is that the drug maker Glaxo Smith Kline had never performed long-term studies to determine the on-going effectiveness of the vaccine.[5]

A similar 2014 outbreak of the mumps in Ohio revealed the same outcome. Individual infected with mumps included a large population of those vaccinated. Among 28 cases of the mumps, all had been “immunized” against the mumps except for one person.[6] Understanding this, the late Dr. Robert Mendlesohn, MD, in his book, How to Raise a Healthy Child in Spite of Your Doctor, asserted, “vaccinated individuals are 14 times more likely to contract mumps than unvaccinated.”[7]

If you think you are safe with the flu shot, think again. Four Canadian studies released in 2009 demonstrated that a seasonal flu shot increases the probability that one will contract H1N1 flu by 250%![8]

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the effectiveness of the influenza vaccine for the 2014-15 flu season is 19%.[9] In spite of this pathetic performance, the CDC still insists, “Getting a flu vaccine each year is the best way to prevent the flu.”[10] The flu vaccine really does increase your risk for serious pandemic flu illness!

While the flu virus is primarily spread through coughing, sneezing, or touching items contaminated by an infected person, “it is also possible for vaccine strain influenza to be transmitted by persons who have recently received live attenuated influenza virus nasal vaccines.”[11] This holds true for seven days or more following administration of the vaccine.

In other words, it is possible to contract a disease from a person who has been infected with it through immunization. In fact, government pamphlets warn, “Children who have been vaccinated should avoid close contact with people with severely weakened immune systems for around two weeks after being vaccinated.” Vaccine experts also warn that children “May have to stay away from elderly relatives for a few days after vaccination.”[12] The takeaway: the unvaccinated can become infected from the vaccinated.

Another problem is that viruses are constantly mutating. Antibodies developed against one virus will not be effective at warding off its mutant cousins.^[13] One wonders whether vaccinating actually assists in the mutation and development of superbugs. Bacterium and viruses may be turning into strains that can no longer be controlled.

So we find that immunizing can actually lead to greater chances of contracting the disease for which one is being inoculated.

Myth #3: Vaccinations Are Safe

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