Parents do all sorts of things with their children that have far greater risks of injury and death than vaccinations.

Like NOT vaccinating, for one.

Do they think polio, whooping cough, measles, etc. went away on their own for a few decades?

To me this is the equivalent of never letting your kids learn to drive or get licensed. It makes their world smaller, much smaller. Does something for the parents sense of wellbeing, but harms the children. Cause they'll never go to college - private or public. Do you really want to go ahead decide that Johnny or Jane don't really need all that extra learning and stuff? Or don't need to go to the doctor cause they won't see you anyway since you declined their medical advice and are a risk to their other patients? Helicopters don't hover that as much as these parents do.

I don't know, Amy. Why are you still driving a car? You have a greater chance of dying in a car crash than you did of contracting and dying from Ebola, but that didn't stop you from insisting that all those who came in contact with the disease, symptomatic or not, be quarantined.

Patrick 12:13 PM,

Your point relies on a curious idea, that the future will be the same as the past regardless of current actions. Like this:

() The infection incidence for ebola is now 2.
() The death rate from auto accidents is now (approx) 45,000 /year.
() Therefore, a reasonable person would not take any actions against ebola ahead of reducing the death rate from cars.

But, under not entirely understood conditions, the current ebola outbreak has been uncontained. So, what would the future statistics be without some action?

> Therefore, a reasonable person would
> not take any actions against ebola
> ahead of reducing the death rate
> from cars.

Says who? What does "ahead of" mean in terms of being "reasonable"? Is there a takedown list of hazards, to be addressed in sequence, if one is to be "reasonable"?

A reasonable person might not allow their own fears to morph into demands that distant medical professionals submit to months of needless incarceration for an oceans-away outbreak of a well-documented disease which killed no Americans on American soil. What conditions do you regard as "not entirely understood," but that you personally have no degrees in epidemiology of infectious disease?

Dozens of Americans in cars will kill others tomorrow. Wednesday. That will happen. So don't worry about it... Not as you might (presumably) worry that an educated nurse (who's seen the impact of the contagion from the most intimate perspective) might judge the risk with calculations which you and I, in line for extra fries at the Burger Doodle, might not.




Also, remember that Rolling Stone fucked up this topic as well.

Crid,

You ask a lot of sarcastic questions but provide no answers. Really, what is your point?

My point with Patrick is that I find a fault in his reasoning. Your reply seems to be about the absolute effectiveness of ebola quaranties.

So, OK, show that no quarantines were or are needed.

> You ask a lot of sarcastic
> questions

Not one… I want sincere answers for each of them. (You said "Therefore" as if executing a logical construction not in sight, or relying on a shared authority unknown to me. So "Says who?") You may have great answers for all of them, but I can't anticipate those answers.

> Your reply seems to be
> about...

The "absolute effectiveness of ebola quaranties" is of zero interest. Pointless incarceration of distant, experienced and compassionate health care works concerns me a great deal.

> So, OK, show that no
> quarantines were or
> are needed.

Sheezus... DONE. Or have you missed the news for the last two months? There's been no need to isolate any publicly-selected health-care-givers on American soil due to this oceans-away outbreak.

Perhaps more importantly, there's been no need to respond to the crisis beyond the protocols composed for this bug nearly four decades ago. There's no new threat, there's zero reason to think there ever was.

Here's the deal. The customs, courtesies and body language of everyone on the planet are composed atop a network of fight-&-flight responses installed in our character during the 550+ million years before there was any understanding of microbial hazards… These responses were the best natural selection could do to protect us when we were sea slugs and field mice.

Last summer, a lot of Americans with the scientific literacy to know better rose to their feet to scream Cooties!

This was not appropriate behavior. It would be like flying to Chicago and deciding —just as your flight crested the Continental Divide— to stand up in the cabin and scream Gravity!… Merely because the Rocky Mountains look like a scratchy place to land.

Pilots are taught to trust their instrumentation and ignore their feelings about which way is north, how high they are, even (literally) which way is up.

Contemporary men & women should know to trust the literature of infectious disease... Even (or perhaps especially) when they haven't made the time to do the research themselves.

Modernity, especially in matters of health care, is like the old Mafiosi. You're in, Buddy. You have been made, in the mobster sense of the word. Don't start squealin' just 'cause company's expected.

That's a hoot.

Sorry, Andrew, but since I noted that you produce more content per syllable than Crid (for all his grace), this was inevitable...

Here's a thought: try calm logic for a change, Crid. The number of windmills for you to challenge will drop immediately.

Go beat some children with a stick, Radwaste.

Still no response from AG...

"You ask a lot of sarcastic questions but provide no answers."

His usual stand by. Expect a lot of that.

"Here's a thought: try calm logic for a change, Crid."

HA! Baptize a cat. You'll get better results.

My thoughts are this....with the world as overpopulated as it is, let the yuppies have their children go without vaccines. Segregate them, and let them watch their children die a horrible, painful death. We get fewer people to contend with, and they learn a lesson. If they survive.

Also, take the warning labels off condoms, bleach and Tylenol. It will have the same effect, the problem will sort itself out.

> with the world as overpopulated
> as it is...

Those concerned by "population" never offer the most readily available alleviation.

Why izzat?

"Those concerned by "population" never offer the most readily available alleviation.Why izzat?"

Cause you'd be one of the first to go. Be thankful we don't.

The most readily available alleviation has been tried in China. Look how well that turned out.

C'mon, ya little kidder-- No one in your culture is prepared for any kind of ugliness beyond your borders.

"C'mon, ya little kidder-- No one in your culture is prepared for any kind of ugliness beyond your borders."

Sure we are! We deal with people like you all the time! A large part of my job is customer service, cross border. Ya think you're unique?

Also, way to prove how logical you are, and stay on point.

But then, cowards usually run when presented with things they don't understand anyway.

Yeah... What had sounded like a mortal challenge ('Pistols at dawn!') has withered into the threat of aloof waitstaff ('You already have an ice cube in that drink!')

(Dear me.)

Because, Europe, right?

Crid;

First of all, I hope you get the therapy you need to deal with whatever heart break us awful Canucks have dealt you. You're clearly suffering either from ED caused by some horrible trauma an anonymous Canadian babe caused you, or one massive inferiority complex caused by her hung like a horse Canuck lover.

Either way, continuing to insist on attacking Canadians when the issue clearly has as much to do with Canada as the price of sugar in Taipei only results in you looking like a bigoted idiot.

Either get help, or get off the crack.

Secondly, I think wtf might be a better screen name for you. What the hell is that garbled mess of a comment supposed to mean? And what for the love of all that's Holy does any of that garbage you call an article have to do with anything I said in general, and vaccines in particular? Logic love, please get some.

Thirdly, could you PLEASE join us in 2014, and use a link that is at least less than ten years old?

I confuse you with another of Amy's readers who's from another lesser, developmentally-frozen country and who desperately wants to be American and who also has a threeple name like yours... UTI, or something like that. So I can't tell you apart.

Sorry.








Kidding!

I mean, I truly can't, but what difference does it make? What's to be sorry for?

Everyone riding on America's coattails looks the same, even when you're actually separate people.

In other words, I was right and you're a bigoted weenie.

If you go to Vancouver, you could take advantage of the methadone clinics there.