Childhood Vaccinations: Walking Down Memory Lane In Asheboro

For some reason, this has been the season of walking down memory lane.

One of those memories has to do with the environment I landed in way back in 1995 . . .  in a familiar-yet-somehow-strangely-out-of-touch land where local newspaper columnists could openly trash childhood immunizations.  Just out of residency, such heresy blew my young professional mind.

For years, Pediatricians had to tap-dance through a minefield of bad science and the fear it engendered (lapped up by talk-show-hosts, d-list celebrities and a vapid MSM) in order to get well-meaning parents to vaccinate their children.

I blogged about my frustration back in 2007 (in one of my original treatises on the scumbag journalistic tactics the Courier Tribune has employed over the years to bury my story and aid/abet the obstruction of justice):

In December 1995, right after I came "home" to practice, the Ramseur Bulletin published an "editorial" by a local columnist (Sharon Womick). The thing read (to me) like the rant of a soccer-Mom-on-acid . . . in what can only be described as a hatchet-piece on childhood immunizations. Now, I am one of those less-than-robotic "fringe" Pediatricians who doesn't always swallow every policy statement of the American Academy of Pediatrics hook line and sinker. I have always questioned the wisdom and reasoning behind giving some vaccines en mass . . . Varicella (i.e. Chicken Pox), Rotovirus and HPV in particular. Now they want to add Hepatits A to the mix. At some point it just gets ridiculous . . . and well-child checks become dreaded torture sessions. Years ago, I was telling Mamas that the Chicken Pox vaccine would likely just postpone the inevitable nastiness (with the potential for worse nastiness as an adult) and would probably require boosters . . . long before recent research bore that out. And I've been reasonably tolerant of parents who don't want to protect their children from things like polio and tetanus. I try to work with them when the law allows.

But Womack's "Op-Ed" was a bit too over-the-top for even me to stomach . . . sarcastic (an art form I actually appreciate when done properly), paranoid, inflammatory . . . with a good portion of its facts cherry-picked or just flat out wrong. The Randolph County Health Department (back when I was their darling) actually contacted me about penning a rebuttal. I left the dirty work to them, but I did write a letter to the paper's Editor (on RMA letterhead) expressing my dismay with Womick's rant.

I don't think it ever got printed. That's okay. I never picked up the Ramseur Bulletin again.

Fast forward to 2010 . . . after years of Ray Criscoe, Chip Womick and their "ace" reporter-pals at the Courier sneering and spitting at my story-of-woe . . . as they lined up for the fancy ordurbs at the hospital's Dine-Arounds.

This was a newspaper that was not interested in the truth.  It's still not interested in the truth.

A few weeks ago, I found this Penn & Teller "Bullshit" gem on the folly of holding/not giving childhood immunizations (warning: the video is filled with copious use of "the F word" and all its variations) over at Respectful Insolence.

Sayeth Orac (and I agree):  I have to say, I've rarely seen a more visually effective way of portraying the benefits of vaccination than was shown in the opening scene of the episode. It was particularly effective how it pointed out that, even if vaccines did cause autism in 1 in a 110 children, the risk-benefit ratio would still favor vaccination.

I forgot all about the insolent post/video until I saw this story on CNN today.

The scientific and legal "debates" are over.

VACCINATE YOUR CHILDREN!!!

This post is dedicated to Chip and Sharon Womick.