nickie on 16/2/2015 at 22:26
Quote Posted by heywood
. . . skepticism
Quote Posted by faetal
. . . vaccines
Yes, the fairly recent measles outbreak in Wales resulting in truckloads of people falling ill and 1 death, was said to be related to a lack of vaccination which would seem fairly obvious.
Even before the introduction of MMR and later, Andrew Wakefield's discredited research, there were mutterings about vaccinations causing problems and it's a hard thing to take your children for a vaccination when you're aware that there might be an adverse reaction. I remember virtually holding my breath for several days after my children had theirs.
Anecdotal evidence has more relevance for joe public, I think. Personal experience used to be pretty much just that. And I think that the ease with which it is now passed round the world contributes to scepticism as much as anything. It's gossip over the garden fence in huge numbers. If you don't really understand what's being said to you, you're more likely to listen to someone like you who you do understand. And the more it's read/said, the more it becomes fact.
A personal experience: 2 days after my doctor persuaded me to have a 'flu jab, I read on the BBC news website that the vaccine wasn't effective against the current strain of 'flu as the decision on what vaccine to make was taken based on what 'flu was going on in Australia 6 months earlier - or something like that (because of the time it takes to make the vaccine). But we didn't get that version, we got a different one. If I was a particular type of person, I would start ranting on FB or somewhere about the incompetence of doctors and how it was almost malpractice and vaccinations weren't worth it and, etc. etc. And there will be people who will take that and decide not to have a 'flu jab next year as it's obviously a waste of time and doctors probably get paid lots to get people to have them.
And then there's the solicitor who embezzled all our money so all solicitors are shysters.
And the bank who took away a measly £2000 overdraft, 1 hour after they said it was still in operation, but helped their wealthy customers evade and avoid paying millions in tax. Ergo, dirty rotten scoundrels, the lot of them.
In response to dema's link - my children both had spots on their teeth. Doing my duty as a good mother and encouraged by government advice, I gave them supplements. Only later did I find out from our dentist that the county I lived in added fluoride to the water and so they were getting too much.
It's so easy to discount anything informed sources tell you. And I wouldn't mind people shoving things down my throat if they weren't so flipping condescending when they did it.
Muzman on 16/2/2015 at 22:34
Quote Posted by heywood
Here is a (
https://www.wnyc.org/radio/#/ondemand/430212) commentary I heard on last week's (
http://www.onthemedia.org/) On the Media program which bothered me. It ends with a hubristic "telling it how it is" type rant that I find both disappointing and a little scary even though I agree with him on the larger issue of vaccine safety. Science is never, ever as black and white as he seems to think. It almost seems like he's calling the media to be responsible not for reporting but making sure the public reaches the right conclusion. That smacks of propaganda and could fan the conspiracy flames and risks a public backlash.
Considering being 'balanced' and 'simply following the story' over the last 15 years or so basically gave a platform to propaganda and fanned conspiracy flames and public backlash over nothing, the media taking a firmer line and not simply ceding the floor to anti-vaxxers these past couple of years has been quite refreshing. I seem to recall research that it did reinforce confidence in vaccination along the way.
The example of anti-vaccination is still a thing that dominates in certain geographic and socio-economic pockets. There's people there no authority can sway and its almost a waste of time to try (since authority trying to sway them produces that reinforcing effect). But the apparent crippling cycle of mistrust and disengagement on the internet isn't all that representative of wider society and debate can still take place I believe.
faetal on 16/2/2015 at 22:49
The media has so much to answer for. If you have the 99% and upwards of relevant professionals versus a few Concerned Parents and fringe (or in Wakefield's case, vested interest) professionals, the media gives them an equal platform, presenting a skewed picture for the public. Most of the vaccines cause autism idiocy came as a direct result of the media deciding that Wakefield's claims would sell papers, even after it was found that the research was falsified.
froghawk on 16/2/2015 at 22:58
This is awesome, so to prevent it from disappearing into the thread, I will post this awesome quote:
Quote:
The “science communication problem,” as it’s blandly called by the scientists who study it, has yielded abundant new research into how people decide what to believe — and why they so often don’t accept the expert consensus. It’s not that they can’t grasp it, according to Dan Kahan of Yale University. In one study he asked 1,540 Americans, a representative sample, to rate the threat of climate change on a scale of zero to 10. Then he correlated that with the subjects’ science literacy. He found that higher literacy was associated with stronger views — at both ends of the spectrum. Science literacy promoted polarization on climate, not consensus. According to Kahan, that’s because people tend to use scientific knowledge to reinforce their worldviews.
Americans fall into two basic camps, Kahan says. Those with a more “egalitarian” and “communitarian” mind-set are generally suspicious of industry and apt to think it’s up to something dangerous that calls for government regulation; they’re likely to see the risks of climate change. In contrast, people with a “hierarchical” and “individualistic” mind-set respect leaders of industry and don’t like government interfering in their affairs; they’re apt to reject warnings about climate change, because they know what accepting them could lead to — some kind of tax or regulation to limit emissions.
In the United States, climate change has become a litmus test that identifies you as belonging to one or the other of these two antagonistic tribes. When we argue about it, Kahan says, we’re actually arguing about who we are, what our crowd is. We’re thinking: People like us believe this. People like that do not believe this.
faetal on 17/2/2015 at 08:44
I'd be interested to know how they measured scientific literacy.
heywood on 17/2/2015 at 17:21
Muz et al,
I don't think the anti-vaccination movement got to where it is today because media coverage fanned the conspiracy flames. Quite the opposite actually. I think we got here because public health officials, the media, and the public weren't paying attention. If you look at overall vaccination rates by US state for example, they have been slowly but steadily climbing over the last 20 years with no decline associated with the Wakefield paper or the Jenny McCarthy interview. So no problem, right? Even if you look at non-medical exemption rates for school kids state by state, it doesn't look that bad. A few states over 5%, the worst 6%. It's only when you look at exemption rates by school district that you really see the problem. Oregon, which has the most liberal exemption policies, has exemption rates of 70% in some districts!!!
I had no idea that was happening, and neither did the national media, because exemption data wasn't readily available on the internet before the recent measles outbreaks, and district level data still isn't in some states. It was just sitting in the databases of local school districts and state health departments, and the people who were in a position to raise a red flag either didn't raise it or it wasn't picked up. In some states, I can accept that maybe they didn't notice any trend because they're used to dealing with pockets of religious exemptions for the Amish, Orthodox Jews, etc. But in Oregon, California?
So I think the anti-vaccination movement was able to gain significant ground in localized areas, and the policy makers and media at the national level didn't see it because they were looking at aggregated data, and most of the public just ignored the anti-vaxxers assuming they were just a small number of fringe nutcases.
I also think there is a political element, at least in the US where all national media is political. I think that if the anti-vaxxers were predominantly evangelicals or tea partiers or deep south rednecks, i.e. the usual anti-science suspects, the national media reporting would be far different and more political. But since the anti-vaxxers don't fall along party lines, the partisan media organizations haven't figured out which side to take yet. A typical anti-vaxxer in California or Oregon is politically on the left, anti-big pharma, and associated with trendy naturalist health practices that the left-leaning media seems fond of, such as GMO free, gluten free, organic, locally grown food, homeopathy, etc. And there is probably some influence from well connected anti-vax quacks like Mark Hyman, who is medical advisor to Bill and Hillary Clinton. So the left leaning media are treading softly. But there are a comparable number of anti-vaxxers on the right too, and the right isn't sure yet whether to oppose mandated vaccinations on libertarian grounds.
So anyway, we've let it get this far and some people's opinions have been formed and any contrary evidence you give to them is going to be dismissed as more propaganda from big pharma. The only thing that will get them to vaccinate their child is to keep them out of school or day care, and even then there are a small number of hardcore types who will still resist. They are a lost cause. The key to preventing the anti-vax movement from getting any bigger is to educate the skeptical people who haven't made up their mind yet. And I really mean educate, explainging the risk management case for vaccination. You can't just tell a skeptic that vaccines are proven safe, completely effective, and have no side effects, because it's way too easy to find counter-examples to throw back in your face.
Tony_Tarantula on 17/2/2015 at 19:19
Quote Posted by faetal
The media has so much to answer for. If you have the 99% and upwards of relevant professionals versus a few Concerned Parents and fringe (or in Wakefield's case, vested interest) professionals, the media gives them an equal platform, presenting a skewed picture for the public. Most of the vaccines cause autism idiocy came as a direct result of the media deciding that Wakefield's claims would sell papers, even after it was found that the research was falsified.
You're high if you think that the media, at least the dominant US outlets, give an "equal platform" to everyone. The only exception might be FOX which as a matter of policy runs their news reports the same way clickbait blogs do.
Any objective, empirical study shows that US media routinely runs stories designed to portray government interests in a positive light, while attempting to marginalize and ostracize those critical of established power centers.
Coincidentally I had a rather enlightening conversation with an anti-vaxxer at the gym who was my trainer's next appointment. What clicked in my head while talking to her is that most of the "anti vaxxers" aren't opposed to the concept of vaccination in the least. Their positions is based in a distrust of the pharmaceutical companies: they believe that the pharma companies are willing to put ingredients in the vaccines that they know are harmful in order to make a quick buck by taking advantage of consumer ignorance.
It's a dubious position (is a small dose of aluminum REALLY less harmful than mumps?) but it's also a lot less crazy than any online conversation with or media portrayal of anti-vaxxers that I've had.
faetal on 17/2/2015 at 20:03
Why would I be talking about the US media? I'm British and live in France.
How can something "click in your head" about "most anti-vaxxers" if you are talking to one person? If this problem was caused by big pharma using additives in vaccines, then the wave of disease resurgence would derive from that. Instead, the vast majority of resurgence in diseases prevented by vaccines have been since the Wakefield paper created a global wave of people deciding that their kids presenting with autism after their vaccines, were because of the vaccines. It's called nucleation and the epidemiology is stronger than "I had a chat with someone at my gym". If you can point to a better nucleation point, then do, but given that vaccines have always contained additives (you need preservatives and adjuvants) and that they have only become safer over time, that doesn't explain the increasing prevalence of people shunning vaccines. Whereas the post Wakefield "what aren't they telling us about vaccines?!" paranoia does. The fact that Wakefield is now earning his bread and butter in the US as an antivaxxer hero kind of attests to that.
Tony_Tarantula on 17/2/2015 at 22:05
Quote Posted by faetal
Why would I be talking about the US media? I'm British and live in France.
How can something "click in your head" about "most anti-vaxxers" if you are talking to one person? If this problem was caused by big pharma using additives in vaccines, then the wave of disease resurgence would derive from that.
What on earth are you talking about? I'm not sure what problem you are referring to. The only thing I mentioned was that people don't trust that the manufacturing processes are safe and your comments don't have much to do with that.
How on earth would a toixic additive cause disease resurgence? The resurgence would result either from people avoiding the vaccines or a vaccine in question not being effective....not from other additives in the vaccine?
Quote:
vaccines have always contained additives (you need preservatives and adjuvants) and that they have only become safer over time, that doesn't explain the increasing prevalence of people shunning vaccines.
I'm being polite as I can here, but you need to understand that reality is NOT equivalent to perception....and the current perception is that pharma companies and regulatory agencies (particularly the FDA) are completely untrustworthy. If you ask me they've got nobody to blame but themselves for that.
Muzman on 18/2/2015 at 05:50
Quote Posted by Tony_Tarantula
In the US it is very common to vaccinate babies immediately after birth. As explained to me by a family member with over 40 years medical experience, it is useless to do so because at that point the baby is still relying on the antibodies it receives from the mother and does not produce its own. The only thing you achieve is to expose the baby to a level of toxology that he/she is not equipped to handle at that point.
There's only one newborn vaccination on the US schedule and that's the Hep B. The US is one of the only places that does this and that's because Hep B is endemic in the USA, so there's often no antibodies a parent can confer onto a child in the first place. It does actually work because infants are making their own antibodies all the time, it just takes five weeks to give themselves a fuller set. Plus a few other reasons, like which disease and which antibodies etc. Some vaccines require more effort. That kind of thing. Hep B is one of the easier ones, apparently. The immunity lasts for ages. There's reasons the schedule is the way it is usually. If people were truly worried about 'overstimulating' a baby's immune system they'd have much bigger worries like exposing it to touch, food, air etc.
That's where the whole mistrust thing gets silly, speaking generally now (and I'm sure most has been said already). Be critical, even suspicious, sure. But to simply shift belief based on shared mistrust is as dumb as unquestioning trust. It's not just the devil that's in the details. Shit is complex all over yo. That's why memories of thalidomide and that flu shot that gave everyone some terrible disease are only marginally interesting. Things aren't the same as they were five years ago, let alone forty.
And then you hit the problem of it being impossible to keep up with all that and still function without being a professional in the field. What you're left with is a surprisingly high level of trust in expertise being necessary for this society of ours to even run. Which is where the true dilettantes run into problems. But it might not be a big deal because I suspect few of them actually have the courage of their convictions. It's more like cynicism as a psychological salve to their wounded intellectual vanity at how dependent they are on everyone around them, including the 'experts'.
Even though that does sound a little mean now I've written it.
Still, anti vaxxers have grown to a critical mass such that we are talking about them a lot and outbreaks are happening. Which kind of goes against my point, I guess. Maybe it is a problem.
Heywood-
Yeah I broadly agree with that. It was a grassroots movement spread through motherhood & health blogs and later facebook. Many of which had been hijacked by conspiracy nuts. And I think there was no countering voice, outside of a couple of experts and the skeptic movement. There is now, with daytime chat show hosts routinely talking about it. But I think that's the thing. Any given harshly dismissive take is only one voice. Its capacity to offend and dig in heels is only relative to its place in the overall. It's better that it's there. The debate was ruled for so long by the emotional position of outraged mothers protecting their children, which was considered untouchable. It gets really interesting when the opposite position is also outraged mothers protecting their children.
You could say that the official version didn't have an argument, like with climate change. Taking the PR for granted left room for nuts to run rampant. I'm not sure that's true. Depends where I guess. I don't think government literature on the subject of vaccination changed much. It was always there too if people wanted to find it. They just found the alternative more interesting for whatever reason. Conspiracies are sexy.
So I think you don't really get this fight without dragging it into the mainstream and having various personalities take it up, in any form. You can find old clips of anti vaxxers vs government people from ten years ago or so. The scientists try to be so measured and reasonable; not wishing to offend or alienate with their authority. Putting over the facts and trying to win with mildness and respect while weathering all sorts of implications they're liars or corrupt etc, being shouted over.
It seems its really when you get some passion into the argument that you see the difference. Passion from people who aren't themselves experts but do actually trust them. People just taking a dismissive position, who had nothing to say before, is all part of that I think. Anything but silence.
