Dear Editor, I’ve read with interest the various comments re: An Open Letter to the Lakewood Community and the post of Dr Robert’s. As a relative new-comer to Lakewood I generally choose to remain low key when such issue arise. However, since one of my daughters and grandchildren are effected by the response to the measles outbreak, I felt it was time for me to chime in.
My comments are both an attempt to raise some serious questions vis a vie the safety of herd vaccination as well as sharing personal experience that spanned two decades, two continents and three Torah communities.
My thoughts are found in the attached document for your consideration.
I wish to remain anonymous for my children’s sake (I could care less what people may say about me).
Sincerely,
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Last year a nurse in Ohio gained media attention for her controversial demeanor. Evidently, this nurse had been administering flu vaccinations, and expressed that she was “exhausted” from causing “1autism a minute.”
Concern arose from a mother of the disability community, who stated she felt this nurse should have had more professionalism in her post, especially in regards to autism. When this post went viral, a blog of this incident brought out points from both sides of the vaccination argument: those in favor of vaccines argued over the consideration towards others in the community as well as influenza-related deaths. Those against vaccines argued the validity of disease eradication and noted reported links to autism.
However, an interesting viewpoint surfaced, and it was something that you wouldn’t typically hear at work – nurses across the internet vocalized their stance against vaccines.
In the comments, many nurses proudly stated their profession and their opinion, letting the internet know that they have been educated in their field and may even administer flu vaccines during their workday, but do not practice vaccination in their own personal lives.
Other nurses who felt similarly jumped into the related thread with a “me too!” and others told stories of making their social media presence untraceable to their real identity due to threats of being reported to the Board of Nursing because of their vaccination beliefs.
Naturally, this fostered a two-sided reaction from both nurses and non-nurses alike. Some stated they felt validated that other medical professionals held similar anti-vaccination beliefs; others argued that nurses with said views needed better education on the effectiveness of vaccines.
Whether you are for vaccines or against them, the upshot in this episode is the undeniable fact that working in healthcare does not make you an automatic advocate of vaccinations. Are you surprised? Do you wonder what drove that nurse from Ohio to express such an extreme comment after giving hundreds of juvenile immunizations? I have one theory – maybe she sees 5-year old Johnny getting his DPT booster and notices he seems listless and unresponsive to normal stimuli. She’s shocked because half a year ago he was a perfectly normal child. Perhaps this nurse has seen the same pattern happen with Jill, Jack, Joan and Jimmy.
If that what’s going on behind closed doors in pediatric offices across America and some of the largest injury settlements in history are coming from the pharmaceutical companies who produce vaccinations*, why is there such an uproar here in Lakewood where informed parents who love their children (and their Jewish neighbors’ children as well), are being pilloried and persecuted for conscientiously choosing not to vaccinate?! It’s becoming a virtual witch-hunt. I overheard someone I’m very close to tell her daughter; “Don’t mention to your friend that you’re not immunized, they may suspend you from school.” Where’s the ahavas yisrael and kavod habrios?
A number of years ago, my late-wife (who just happened to work in the healthcare profession) and I had to make a very difficult decision. Our second and third child had serious side-effects (high fever and lingering body welts) upon being vaccinated. There were many sleepless nights and painful cries we had to endure.
Not being alarmists and using reason, we discussed this with members of the medical world and they advised us to refrain from vaccinating, either because of a hypersensitivity (allergy) to components in the vaccinations or other factors that, believe it or not, had to do with contaminated serums. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/10472327/)
Regardless, we decided to refrain from vaccinating any of our subsequent children – nine in all. Many of you will say we were taking risks with our children. Or perhaps it’s anecdotal and doesn’t represent what the majority should be doing. Be as it may, we found a supportive pediatrician in the city my children grew up in. She showed tremendous sensitivity and sagacity by prescribing various known substances to bolster my children’s immune system. They flourished, BH.
Not only that, the state we lived in had a libertarian approach to school admission and by documenting our experience with vaccinations coupled with granting parents the decision to vaccinate or not – we sent of children guilt-free off to school. The administration of the Yeshivas my children attended recognized the reality of that State’s law and never made an issue of it – at all!
Therefore, I’m surprised and frankly shocked to have relocated to this glorious Makom Torah and witness such fear-mongering and katnus hadaas over this issue, when even Gedolei Torah here and elsewhere have voiced support for parents who for various reasons have chosen not to vaccinate.
Please educate yourselves so no more harm is done and the tenor of mass hysteria abates.
Your neighbor’s livelihood or reputation depends on that. Save your zealotry for another issue.
An advocate for shalom and sensibility,
*According to the CDC, from 2006 to 2016 over 3.1 billion doses of covered vaccines were distributed in the U.S. For petitions filed in this time period, 5,544 petitions were adjudicated by the Court, and of those 3,758 were compensated. This means for every one million doses of vaccine that were distributed, one individual was compensated. https://www.hrsa.gov/vaccine-compensation/data/index.html
https://hrsa.gov/vaccinecompensation/data/monthlywebsitestats_09_05_17.pdf
Once again another anonymous antivaxxer sharing their personal opinions with zero facts
Maybe they’re anonymous because of dissing commentary on the web, and the fact that they could lose their job.
THANK YOU!
does anyone have anything new to say? we know that anti vaxxers believe that it causes autism and we know that most medically backed research disagrees. No one is listening to what the other side is saying anyway. If you are a frum person, and you truly want to do what is the right thing, ask your own shaila from your own personal family rav (or find one right now!) and move on!!
They disagree, or don’t WANT to agree, because it’s not profitable?!
Everyone is always talking about ‘vaccinations not causing autism’ but there are a whole bunch of other reactions to vaccinations that these nurses are bringing up that aren’t about autism, and yet for some reason the only retort you can think of is “it doesn’t cause autism’. And maybe it doesn’t. But my issue is that we don’t know how vaccinations affect the gut. There are neurons in the gut. This means that what you ingest affects the brain. People have developed mental disabilities because of chemicals or too many antibiotics crammed into the gut. Since the rise of pesticides there have been a rise of autism. Granted, it could be due to other things, but isn’t it worth looking into instead of writing off as stupid? How about we research things instead of covering up and dissing each other? What’s the harm in that? Not to mention that pharmaceutical companies are drug pushers. They don’t look for the natural way of solving things first, they give you drugs. Got ADHD? Take Ritalin. Got acne? Take Accutane. Got hives? Take this steroid. They don’t mention that there is a neurological therapy that can help you train your brain to hyper-focus without taking drugs. They don’t tell you that there is a way you can manage your diet to help you skin (like not eating crap), and they don’t tell you that there is an oat paste at Walmart that relieves hives ten times better than any steroid because they want you to take these drugs. Never mind that Accutane can trash your liver or that you can overload your system with drugs.
So maybe we could do some research in places that aren’t biased (yes, websites by pharmacies are biased. Science is not neutral) or listen to experienced people who have seen the results (nurses) and actually learn whether or not these things are harmful rather than crap on people for being concerned about what is being introduced into their children’s systems. Which they should be.
Give me a break!!!! Seriosuly!!! Magority vaccinate. If these vaccines caused autism there would be alot more kids today with autism. Lakewoodscoop, by you publishing all these ridiculous annumouns letters u are causing doubt and fair in ppls minds who do vaccinate and who do follow daas torah and MAGORITY Of medical professionals.
btw it’s MAJORITY
either way you may be surprised to learn that NJ has the highest autism rate in the USA.
Not only that, but Ocean County has the highest rate in NJ…
Just how many kids with autism do you need…
Proof?
“The highest prevalence estimate of 2.9 percent came from a community in New Jersey.”
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2018/p0426-autism-prevalence.html
Well I guess you just debunked your own theory than. NJ has over 3x the autism rate of Alabama. Yet, Alabama has a higher percentage of vaccinated people than NJ, by almost 7%. If vaccinations caused autism, than Alabama should have a higher rate of autism than NJ, not 1/3 of the rate.
RN, I agree with what you have to say, but I must say I don’t believe you are an RN. Anyone who spells so badly could not have received much of an education. Unless you became an RN in a foreign country, I don’t believe you.
There are more kids with autism. Autism has been increasing greatly over the years. Also, mind that what the majority does has never indicated that something is safe. A majority of people who have bad acne take accutane, and it can potentially trash their liver and cause night-blindness and other symptoms. Maybe we can stop bashing on people for being concerned about what goes into their kids bodies and who are searching for natural ways to strengthen the immune system. And maybe we can look into points being made rather than just pushing aside every claim people make, example, the nurses.
Why give a forum to madness? All it will cause is either more bashing or …possibly cause a wavering parent not to vaccinate! There are many at risk in our community, none more than those that believe in these conspiracy theories. Why haven’t Rabonim who have supported the anti vaxxers in the past spoken up to say that in times of an outbreak, all need to be vaccinated? What will it take for them to stop their selfish,stupid behavior?
But this letter looks like it is about Flu not Measles.
Thank you Lakewoodscoop for bringing balance to this debate. Vaccine injury is real and we ask for the community to respect our choices, especially those of us who have witnessed vaccine injury first hand. It is a devastating blow to the family to have a once perfectly healthy child become a sickly and damaged following vaccinations.
Also important to highlight the fact that the first person to bring and spread measles in Lakewood was a vaccinated adult. Why is all blame pointed towards a small subset of the population? Please stop perpetuating baseless hatred toward your fellow Jew.
To all antivaxxers: Please do not come into contact with me as I am immune deficent ue to a gentic disease.
For that reason I don’t frequent public palces but some times i must.
Thanks
Dear immune deficient individual. You are more at risk from individuals recently vaccinated with a live virus vaccine than from an unvaccinated individual. Live virus vaccines can shed the virus for up to six weeks. This is self evident if you attend a hospital ward for cancer patients and those with compromised immune systems. They request individuals recently vaccinated with a live virus to not enter the ward. Most vaccines also do not prevent transmission. They only mitigate the effect of the infection. To believe that vaccinated individuals are safer for you will put you at greater risk.
Nurse isn’t the doctor. And his job is just to take care of the patient not to make medical decisions. They have absolutely no training in making medical decisions
Wow, you have no concept of modern healthcare. It hasn’t been that way since the 1960’s. The nurse’s number one job is to be a patient advocate. Nurses assess, diagnose, create plans of care, and carry out those plans. Nurses have nursing degrees and hours and hours of clinical training to make them competent and legal to make medical decisions. Ask any physician how many times a nurse has caught a medical error. Additionally, advance practice nurses are autonomous in 24 states and the entire VA system across the USA.
Science isn’t neutral. Yes, a doctor is supposed to have the patient’s best interest at heart, BUT that’s not how medical care functions. It’s a business. Pharmaceutical companies aren’t advocates for the human condition, they’re drug pushers. It’s what they lean on and it’s how they get funding. And most doctors follow the Pharmacies recommendations/requirements because they get paid for it. Some doctors are paid 400 dollars for every vaccination they give. Some doctors are bribed and some are silenced. This is why doctors rarely ever recommend solutions that don’t involve drugs, for example, depression = anti-depressants instead of a counselor, ADHD = drugs instead of Neuro Feed Back Therapy, Hives = steroids rather than a drug-free oat paste (can be found in target). This is why some parents who have ADHD kids or children diagnosed with some sort of disorder (bipolar, depression, etc) end up with highly drugged up and messed up kids because they follow everything the doctor says and give them a plethora of medications. There have been kids as young as 3-years-old on 30 prescribed medications who have ended up dead or developing ticks and motor function disabilities as teenagers and adults. Doctors are not God, the media isn’t God, and are perfectly capable of having negative biases. You can accuse anti-vax people of believing whatever they hear, but they are doing research. You can call them ignorant, but they’re looking at sources from the crevices of the anti-vax censored media to find out whether it’s true rather than just defending vaccinations blindly. And it is blind if you are only willing to look at from one perspective.
Stop just stop! Why do you keep on giving a platform for people to spread dangerous and irresponsible lies? I know the LakewoodScoop is trying to be open minded but it is crossing into the absurd
As a medical professional, your letter pains me! Do you know the difference between a nurse and s/o who practices medicine (ie, NP,Doc,PA, etc.)? A nurse is Not allowed to practice medicine! Her opinions are just like laymans’. The medical community overwhelming support vaccination!
Also, just because you won in court, doesn’t actually mean there was an injury. Go learn American law. The law of guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt, only applies in criminal cases, not in tort law!
Great letter.
great letter indeed! but lets move on, we all know there are 2 sides of the story
I really like this letter my kids are vaccinated but I understand those that don’t vaccinate and would never bash them for their choice we need to be more accepting of ppl who do things differently and calm down about this also if u have the vaccine ur immune so u have nothing to worry about and just keep in mind that even if the schools crack down on the anti vaxxers there’s still the bus driver the maintenance man the ppl who make or deliver the lunch the staff etc etc just daven that’s all u could do
We shouldn’t be accepting of dangerous stupidity
Another anonymous letter making an assumption based on anonymous internet posts and claiming Rabbonim back the anti-vaxers.
NAME THEM!!
Another anonymous coward with zero facts Dr Roberts warned us about
Wow what a huge chesed for our community! Thank you thank you!!!
I beleive that I have the right to allow my children to run around town with a loaded machine gun. If everyone wears a bullet proof vest then there should be no worry because they are protected. So why can’t I and only I choose to do so and demand that everyone protect themselves from me. I may shoot and I may not but as long as you wear YOUR bullet proof vest then you shouldn’t worry about me. I hope all you silly people get the hint.
Thank you for your wonderful letter.
Though I vaccinate my children, I generally wait until they are of school age. The poor Jews of Lakewood are going hysterical over a small group of antivaxxers who don’t want to risk their children’s health for the minute chance of affecting someone else’s child.
I personally believe the risks of not vaccinating are greater than the small chance of catching a disease.
Live & let Live
Please everyone relax. We don’t have to be so bashful. Just be accepting and do what is best for your family.
Rabbonim who antivax will never go public, because it will create nuclear war of machlokes .
Whoever is hounding the so called ‘anti-vaxxers’ needs to thank Hashem every day for sparing them from the negative side-effects that ‘anti-vaxxer’ parents have to live with 24/7.
Anyone I know that does not vaccinate their child/children is because their family experienced negative side effects (and continuation of negative side effects after getting booster shots).
It’s not enough that parents of hurt children have to deal with all of their child’s physical/neurological issues with many specialists/therapists – they also need to get kicked out of school.
Thank you dear neighbors for your compassion and understanding.
Maybe little Johnny is sad because he was molested. You’re theory makes no sense