Government or Measles

I am glad to see a number of commenters at LewRockwell.com discussing the significant survival rate in modern industrial countries of those who contract measles.See: Lew Rockwell and Ryan McMaken.

I had the measles when I was a child and I seem to recall that pretty much all the kids in the neighborhood did. On the first sign of spots, Dr. Tony was called and he visited the house, doctors made house calls in those days. He confirmed it was measles, and it did not send my parents into panic. Back then, all parents seemed to know that  kids were going to get the measles eventually. It was kind of a rite of passage.

The BIG thing I remember about it is that I got to stay home from school for a few days.

According to  Atkinson, William (2011). Epidemiology and Prevention of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases (12 ed.). Public Health Foundation. pp. 301–323,  the risk of death among those infected is 0.2%.  And this is a pro-vaccine, Center for Disease Control publication. There are many others that claim the death rate in a modern industrial country is much, much lower.

Measles is not ebola. That said, I am not going to pretend that I have any knowledge at all about the tradeoffs between the risk of dying from measles versus the risk that a measles vaccine will cause autism.

I suspect, like most things, a few scientists may understand the true risk trade offs, but then the understanding curve drops very quickly, with most loudmouths who think they understand the tradeoff not having a clue as to the science required to truly understand the topic.

But what I can’t understand is why many of these loudmouths are on the side of coerced vaccinations. If they think that a vaccination is required to protect themselves and their kids, then they should just go ahead and get it. I am all for allowing them to get vaccination shots in their arms, their butts and their eye sockets, if they want. That should give them the protection they desire and, then, they should  leave everyone else alone.

Quite frankly, the thing that is in epidemic proportions these days is not measles but government coercion. Government coercion always and everywhere, every time we come up against it, snuffs out a little bit of our freedoms and lives. And given the number of new laws and regulations that are put on the books on a daily basis, we are nudging up against this coercion more and more often. We are, in an important sense, in a prison without walls.  That in the long run is the real killer of our life and energy—and coerced vaccinations would just add to that government kill.

Reprinted with permission from Target Liberty.