Red Flags - Safety

The Hepatitis B Vaccine: What Went Wrong?

Wed, 21 Jun 2006 19:48:21 -0400

The United States embarked on a “universal” program for hepatitis B vaccination in 1991. As of this month, there have been 47,198 reports to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System describing complications following the administration of the hepatitis B vaccine alone or with other vaccines. Of these, 23,406 reports — including 795 deaths — have been about children 14 years of age and younger.

Influenza Vaccination During Pregnancy: A Very Bad Idea

Fri, 02 Jun 2006 19:30:09 -0400

“Influenza vaccination during all trimesters of pregnancy is now universally recommended in the United States. We critically reviewed the influenza vaccination policy of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practice (ACIP) and the citations that were used to support their recommendations.” Thus began the abstract to a paper by David Ayoub, MD, and me, which was just published in the summer issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.

Are Vaccines Involved In Gulf War Syndrome, Autism And Other Chronic Diseases?

Fri, 07 Apr 2006 22:27:17 -0400

As with many complex issues, unless a question is probed deeply and exhaustively, the most interesting and cogent points may be missed. So it is with a 2005 study on Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) and autism, “Chronic Mycoplasmal Infections in Gulf War Veterans’ Children and Autism Patients”...

Is Mandatory Vaccination Destroying An Important Bond?

Wed, 05 Apr 2006 18:02:03 -0400

An article by human rights journalist Anai Rhoads Ford entitled “Why signing a waiver to avoid vaccines can be considered abuse” was recently circulated to parents’ groups in the United States. Originally written in the fall of 2005, it says, “Recently, The Washington Post printed an article about vaccine waivers that could jeopardize your parental rights. In the article was the following comment: ‘The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that doctors ask parents who refuse to vaccinate their children to sign a waiver indicating they are aware of the risks of refusal.’”

The Polio Vaccine: A Critical Assessment Of Its Arcane History, Efficacy, And Long-Term Health-Related Consequences

Fri, 10 Mar 2006 13:56:59 -0500

The polio vaccine: a critical assessment of its arcane history, efficacy, and long-term health-related consequences

Vaccine Tales

Wed, 01 Mar 2006 17:54:28 -0500

In an August 2005 Red Flags’ column, I commented on a mumps outbreak in the United Kingdom and how the Department of Health and the press suggested, as usual, that somehow it was caused by researcher Andrew Wakefield’s 1998 Lancet publication, in which he suggested that more investigation was indicated into the role of the MMR vaccine, if any, in regressive autism.

Peer Review: A Slippery Slope

Wed, 08 Feb 2006 04:00:00 -0500

“When looking for health information on the Internet, don’t believe everything you see. Articles published in peer-reviewed medical journals are checked for accuracy, but anyone can put information on the Internet, so there’s no guarantee that the information you find is accurate or up-to-date.”

This statement made last month (1) by someone at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) is obviously not always true. The accuracy of peer-reviewed studies about arthritis drugs, specifically, has been in question lately in the news and in the courts.

Kicking It Up A Notch, CDC Style

Wed, 18 Jan 2006 04:00:00 -0500

In the United States, we have Emeril Lagasse and then we have the CDC.

Lagasse grew up in Fall River, Massachusetts and was apparently talented enough to become a career musician. Instead, he became America’s most famous TV chef. After graduating from the College of Culinary Arts at Johnson & Wales University in Providence, he trained in Lyon and Paris. When he returned to the U.S., he worked in well-known restaurants in Boston, New York, Philadelphia and New Orleans, where he later opened his first restaurant; he now owns several.

Those Lucky Dogs

Fri, 30 Dec 2005 04:00:00 -0500

We have five pet “great-grandchildren:” Cracker, a golden retriever; Lola, a bichon frise, whose buddy is a cat named Tessa; Charlie, a cavalier King Charles spaniel; and Yen, a 10-year-old, grey-and-white, all-American cat. Charlie required a pre-adoption interview, 200 miles away from home and cost as much as my first three cars combined. Yen came free from the neighbors who moved to a no-pet condominium.

Vaccines — Like Apple Pies On A Conveyor Belt

Wed, 21 Dec 2005 04:00:00 -0500

One of my favorite “Candid Camera” segments was on a new employee in a pie company whose job it was to pick up each pie arriving on a conveyor belt, slip it into a box, turn around and put the box on a second conveyor belt. He did fine for a short while; then the show’s producers cranked up the first conveyor belt and the pies arrived so fast that they were falling on the floor or flying across the room. I feel the same way as that worker. I am simply unable to keep up with all the vaccines that are being released at record speed. No one really can.

Combination And Multiple Vaccinations: A Mixed Reaction

Wed, 09 Nov 2005 04:00:00 -0500

3 and [1 +1] ≠ 5

U.S. pediatricians may or may not have noticed the eye-catching headline in the October issue of Pediatric News: “Immunogenic Surprises Limit Combo Vaccines.”

The article by Nancy Walsh started, “Efforts to develop combination vaccines that would streamline immunization schedules have hit some surprising snags including unpredictable immunogenicity, Jim P. Buttery, MD, said at the international congress of the world Society for Pediatric Infectious Diseases.”

The Flu Shot — Or Not

Mon, 31 Oct 2005 04:00:00 -0500

The good people of Houston, Texas had more bad news last Friday.

This time it was not a hurricane coming their way.

According to Armando Villafranca of the Houston Chronicle (1), more than 1,000 Exxon Mobil employees and 80 contractors may have received a “fake” flu shot at a health fair that was held at a company complex on Oct. 19 and 20. The “vaccines” were administered by a “state-licensed independent physician’s office” with whom the company had contracted — not by the company’s medical team, as in previous years. The spokesperson for Exxon Mobile said that all 3,800 employees at that particular complex and all contractors were notified and that the company recommended that employees who actually received the “flu shot” be tested for blood-borne infections.

Stop Deliberate Poisoning - Provide Safe Vaccines

Wed, 05 Oct 2005 20:26:24 -0400

Dear Red Flags Readers,

We received the following pamphlet from India this morning and would like to share it with you.

It is safe to say that many of us know very little about autism in India and about the vaccination practices in that country. The attached pamphlet demonstrates how well-informed Indian parents are about autism research and how concerned they are about pediatric vaccination practices.

Could Thimerosal Be Worse Than We Thought?

Wed, 05 Oct 2005 04:00:00 -0400

In “Trust me: I have the statistics to prove it,“ (1) I described the findings published on July 29, 2005 in the Mortality and Morbidity Weekly Report of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) under the title “National, State, and Urban Area Vaccination Coverage Among Children Aged 19-35 Months — United States, 2004.” (2)

It was evident that the CDC took great pride in the achievements of its National Immunization Program (NIP) and particularly in the results of a 2004 vaccination survey, which showed that the 80.9 percent vaccination coverage for the 4:3:1:3:3 series of children aged 19-35 months had exceeded the Healthy People 2010 goal.

Influenza Vaccination Of Infants: A Useless Risk

Fri, 30 Sep 2005 04:00:00 -0400

In the spring of 2004, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended that all children 6- to 23-months of age be vaccinated against influenza because they were at “substantially increased risk for influenza-related hospitalizations.” (1)

A review in The Lancet suggests that influenza vaccination of infants is useless.