I see that Robert de Niro is making a right tit (see above) of himself again over vaccinations. In a recent publicity move he has teamed up with well known vaccine sceptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to offer a silly prize of $100,000 dollars to anyone that can "prove" vaccines containing Thiomersal (which was a compound used as a preservative up until 1999 and hasn't been used in almost two decades in children's vaccines) are safe. It's worth noting that there is no scientific evidence that this compound ever caused anything let alone autism. People like de-Niro and Kennedy harp on about Mercury in vaccines being a potential cause of autism, Mercury is one molecule in the compound that is Thiomersal along with Sodium, Carbon, Oxygen, Sulphur and Hydrogen; if I injected pure Sodium into a Human Being (especially a child) they would probably die; but as a compound bound to another deadly chemical Chlorine, in say, common table salt; it's perfectly safe. A point of detail that these faux crusaders seem not to want to grasp.
Even if Thiomersal were still used (and it isn't) each dose of vaccine would deliver roughly 1 micro-gram (1 millionth of a gram) or less of Mercury; this is an amount equivalent to the average amount of Mercury found in a portion of barbecue sauce containing HFCS (high fructose corn syrup) and certainly exceeded in most fish species these days. Eating a Swordfish or Tuna steak could easily deliver a dose of pure Mercury (i.e. not bound into any compound) of around 0.5 micro-grams per gram of fish which means a 250 gram steak would contain 14 times as much Mercury as a vaccination.
None of this is even relevant if you simply look at the numbers; 85 percent of children in the world have been immunised against Measles so according to these people most of Humanity is in peril? The only study ever to make a link between vaccination and autism was written by a fraudster and convicted criminal; a corrupt doctor who used fear to extort unnecessary fees from gullible parents. The hypothesis is dead in the water, has been for years.
Talking of death, it could be your own child (like in the case of a young boy in Spain) that dies, it could be your baby cousin who's too young for a vaccine, it could be your Father battling cancer and going through chemotherapy with a suppressed immune system, more likely it will just be strangers. Widespread vaccination generates herd immunity; people who are vaccinated keep the ones who can't safe, between 2000 and 2015 roughly 20 million children were saved by the Measles vaccine alone. It's a simple equation, if we don't vaccinate kids, people are going to die, choosing not to vaccinate is choosing death.
2 comments:
That's a left one isn't it?
More seriously - we have wiped out, or nearly done so, many diseases worldwide. We don't have to worry that our children may die of smallpox or measles. Anti-vax is the vanity of well-off people whose neighbours have provided their children with herd immunity.
AE, I know, I couldn't find a right handed version and lacked the Photoshop skills to fix it (I'm more a left brain kinda person) - Totally agree on the contagious disease front; I saw a nice tweet that said - "$100k" isn't much when split between the 7 billion people who DON'T have Polio.
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