This is an expansion on a post that first appeared yesterday on my Facebook page (Thankfully, this is a far more tightly edited version). Vaccination was never an issue I ever saw myself being a champion of, possibly because the logic and science behind it made it…well, kind of obvious. Now I have to try to understand how members of my own family- kind, intelligent, and caring people- could be irretrievably committed to a belief that could actually harm children. The more I learn, the more I’m stunned by the people who believe vaccines to be dangerous and refuse to consider anything that doesn’t mesh with that conviction. I’m gobsmacked, really.
I’ve come into some conflict with members of my family over the past few days regarding the anti-vaccine movement. Their response has been, to paraphrase, “I and I alone have the right to decide what’s best for my child.” To that, the only available answer is, “Yes…and no.”
You absolutely have the right- and obligation- to protect your children, but there’s also a corresponding responsibility to protect society. These two responsibilities are not mutually exclusive, but vaccine deniers treat them as if they’re polar opposites. No one should be allowed to elevate the denial of scientific truth over the protection of society from exposure to preventable, potentially deadly childhood diseases. If anything, the Disneyland outbreak serves as forewarning of what can happen to herd immunity when the vaccination rate drops below 94%.
I’m not going to debate relative responsibility or irresponsibility, because I have no desire to engage in a potentially acrimonious debate. I would only ask one question: Assuming you’re not Thom Tillis, do you expect servers in restaurants to wash their hands after using the toilet? You don’t want disease to be spread when there’s a simple, easily accessible means to prevent it. The same principle applies to vaccination. Society has every right to expect that children be vaccinated. No one has the right to risk the public health in denial of what’s long since been scientifically proven. Vaccines work; why would measles have been declared virtually eradicated in 2000? It wasn’t because kids were eating their fruits and vegetables.
Are vaccines 100%, perfectly safe? Of course not; what in this life is? That still doesn’t provide justification for refusing to meet your social obligation to vaccinate your child.
Being a parent doesn’t mean you’re the only one with an interest in the health and well-being of your child. Society also has an interest, especially when the decisions a parent makes have the potential to adversely impact public health. This is a case in which no, you aren’t the only one who gets to decide what’s best for your child.
I get that people resent being told by government what they must do…but sometimes the role of government is to save society from itself. As Barney Frank once said, government is simply what we choose to do together. In this case, that means protecting children from the irresponsibility and magical thinking of their parents.
I have no desire to anger or alienate those members of my family who are strongly anti-vaccine. Sometimes, though, it becomes necessary to stand up and point out when those you love believe things that are dangerously and demonstrably wrong. I believe this is one of those times.
Part of the problem is that vaccine deniers demand with lightning quickness that their rights be respected…but they’re far slower when it comes to acknowledging and embracing their responsibilities. What deniers seem unable to admit is that there’s a collective responsibility to ensure all reasonable steps are taken to protect the public health. It’s one of many responsibilities- paying taxes, following speed limits, not drinking and driving, etc.- that taken together make our world a safer, more easily negotiable place. You don’t get rights without responsibilities, and in this case vaccine deniers are laser-focused on their rights even as they blow off their responsibility to help ensure that public health isn’t endangered. The hypocrisy and willful denial of scientific reality can be stunning in its breadth.
If you go to a restaurant, you’re well within your rights to expect your server to wash their hands after using the toilet. Disease prevention is the reason most states mandate the posting of signs in restrooms to reinforce the requirement that employees wash their hands before returning to work. You have a RIGHT to expect that, and your RESPONSIBILITY to vaccinate your child comes from the same place. You don’t get to demand one while simultaneously ignoring the other.
One family member blocked me on Facebook, which is her right. Truthfully, though, if you can’t handle having your beliefs questioned and/or you interpret those questions as disrespect/persecution, that says far more about you than it ever could about me. Another has said she’d home-school her children if vaccines become a universal requirement…and I’d say that she’s welcome to it. Home schooling is always an available option, particularly if she refuses to meet her obligations to parents of other children hers would come into contact with. If I was a parent, I’d object strongly to her child being in the same school as mine, because I understand the risks involved.
There’s no “right” which could be interpreted as allowing you to endanger public health.
I saddens me that there are members of my family upset with me for stating my case, but I find it difficult to stand mutely by while someone denies scientific reality and/or cherry-picks the science they choose to believe. Especially when that sort of intellectual dishonesty may well endanger the health and safety of children besides their own.
Parents don’t enjoy an absolute right to make decisions when it comes to the welfare of their children. Society absolutely has a vested interest in the safety and well-being of children- why else are child abuse laws on the books? If parental rights were absolute, they could without question choose whether to feed, clothe, and/or educate their child. Society sets a baseline for the care and treatment of children to ensure their well-being; where we’ve fallen down is in allowing the proliferation of religious exemptions from vaccination requirements.
Religious belief isn’t- and shouldn’t be- an excuse for endangering the health and safety of a child, nor for potentially imperiling the public health. That’s not a religious issue, that’s an issue of personal and social responsibility. Parents are charged with protecting their children, and thus with helping protect public health. Refusing to meet this responsibility is something that could be construed as grounds for questioning parental fitness.
Good people can and often will disagree, and that can be a good thing. I don’t have all the answers, and sometimes someone will have a take on something I hadn’t considered or shares something I didn’t know. That said, there are times when the truth is out there and all around us, and denying it serves no useful purpose. Before vaccines, children frequently died horrible deaths that, at least from 2000 until now, had largely been eradicated. Now we’re faced with the reality that a growing number of well-educated people who really should know better are saying that they understand the science, they simply choose not to believe it [insert sound of Neil DeGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye suffering a facepalm moment here].
Science is not something one chooses to believe in. The nature of science is that it exists in the realm of the knowable, the demonstrable, and the provable. It IS or IS NOT; there is no “believe” (apologies to Yoda). In the case of vaccines, their widespread deployment had, until now, almost completely removed the risk of diseases like measles, mumps, and diptheria. With decreasing immunization rates, we will continue to see more outbreaks like the Disneyland measles epidemic. The truly tragic thing about that is that there’s no reason for it. The easy availability and accessibility of vaccines means that the risk of contracting a childhood disease should be negligible. Refusing to avail oneself of that availability means potentially increasing the risk not only to your own child, but those your child comes into contact with.
I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised at the growing number of vaccine deniers. Fourteen years on, there are still those convinced 9/11 was an inside job, and there’s absolutely no dissuading them. The same can be said for vaccine deniers.
WE DESERVE BETTER. Lord knows our children certainly do.
