VACCINE SAFETY - VERY INFORMATIVE VIDEO -PLEASE FORWARD

[Guest guest]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6K6ayrThjM

[image: SafeMinds] *[image: video icon]*

*

Safe* *Minds Special Weekend Edition

*

*Please forward to all who may be interested.*

This video has been some months in the making and its release today is

highly appropriate given the new allegations regarding Dr. Wakefield,

which we believe to be calculated primarily to attempt to end the debate

over vaccines and autism, rather than having any merit. Please watch the

video and then read the commentary below:

[image: sebelius video -

full]<http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=ogytlsbab & et=1104211374694 & s=4031 & e=001e13cb\

WKxrX42teOtqapXt0jVpgA8_i9vq8OHNkzkfGBR-0vDv20XEe4o4kpIeOOdviGBCtrKjwMnUHWzsBjpi\

3NXVMOyVwAZTSw8tEgHs22QWbYaWp3Jjkj5GWtb_ut41IYOISyIMwjEBKuJdZgBJQ==>

Click above to watch or visit

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6K6ayrThjM<http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=ogytlsb\

ab & et=1104211374694 & s=4031 & e=001e13cbWKxrX42teOtqapXt0jVpgA8_i9vq8OHNkzkfGBR-0vD\

v20XEe4o4kpIeOOdviGBCtrKjwMnUHWzsBjpi3NXVMOyVwAZTSw8tEgHs22QWbYaWp3Jjkj5GWtb_ut4\

1IYOISyIMwjEBKuJdZgBJQ==>

*SafeMinds Commentary*

This past spring, Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius

was interviewed by Reader's Digest. In her interview, she stated that

people who question vaccine safety should not be given equal weight by the

press, compared to public health officials. Since the vaccine/autism

controversy is back in the news this week, we thought that it was important

to help the press understand that they need to do their homework on this

issue. The health of 4 million infants a year in the United States and

millions more worldwide is riding on the ability of our press to finally

delve into this issue and think critically about it. Vaccines are a

multi-billion dollar industry internationally and for many pharmaceutical

companies, it is the fastest -growing segment of their business. Even the

Centers for Disease Control (CDC) make money from licensing of vaccines.

There is also a swiftly revolving door between the CDC, the FDA and the

vaccine manufacturers in terms of recruiting. For example, former CDC

director, Gerberding, is now the head of Merck's vaccine division.

Truly unconflicted research in this area is rare and SafeMinds has

information obtained through FOIA requests indicating that the CDC has

massaged data to its own benefit in the past. We would truly like to see

all journalists investigate this debate and not just follow the party line.

SafeMinds has been mischaracterized as an anti-vaccine group. We are

actually a group of concerned citizens who know too much to stay quiet. The

truth is that we actually read the research (not just the abstracts and not

just the big journals) and look at the details. The associations between

autism and mercury and autism and vaccines are still open questions. The

majority of the studies that claim to " prove " that autism is not associated

with Thimerosal or MMR (the entire rest of the childhood schedule has never

even been looked at in this regard) have significant conflicts of interest,

havesignificant flaws in their methods and/or do not answer the whole

question. On the other side of this debate, and rarely mentioned by the

press, are the biological studies that continue to be published supporting

these associations.

Ultimately, public health needs to be about both protection from infectious

diseases and protection from chronic health conditions. In order to have

informed consent and the greatest possible safety for our children, we must

weigh both the risks and the benefits of any medical intervention, including

vaccines. At this point, we largely know the benefits of vaccines, but the

research on their potential risks is grossly inadequate. SafeMinds has been

asking for more than 5 years that the government perform a large study of

fully-vaccinated children compared to unvaccinated controls to assess their

total health and to compare autism rates in the two populations. The

standard response to our request has been silence or the argument that to

leave children unvaccinated is " unethical. " We feel it is more unethical to

inject 4 million infants a year in this country with a vaccine schedule that

has not been subjected to a placebo-controlled clinical trial. This

assumption of safety is analogous to arguing that because 10 individual

drugs are safe for children, it is therefore safe to give a child all 10 at

once. In addition, the safety and efficacy testing of a new vaccine is

often performed only in comparison to a previously approved vaccine, not to

a true placebo. Regarding long-term outcomes, the use of

hormone-replacement therapy comes to mind as an example of why it is

critical not to assume safety of any widespread treatment without actually

following patients over decades. There is currently no enforced requirement

that pediatricians report adverse vaccine reactions and manufacturers bear

no financial liability for the safety of vaccines.Vaccine injuries are

handled through the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) which is

grossly dysfunctional. Long-term safety studies of vaccines for outcomes

other than infectious disease have not been completed. Until these

situations are resolved, it is truly impossible for an accurate risk/benefit

analysis of vaccines to be made.

Please consider educating your readers, your viewers, your families, your

friends, your doctors and your legislators about what is going on and please

forward this e-mail widely.

Ultimately, we all want the healthiest children possible.

[image: Forward this

email]<http://ui.constantcontact.com/sa/fwtf.jsp?m=1101201531086 & a=1104211374694\

& ea=dmlcannon%40gmail.com>