What the Papers Don't Say About Vaccines 737
jamie tips an article in The Guardian's "Bad Science" column which highlights recent media coverage of the MMR vaccine. A story circulated in the past week about the death of a young child, which the parents blamed on the vaccine. When the coroner later found that it had nothing to do with the child's death, there was a followup in only one of the six papers who had covered the story.
"Does it stop there? No. Amateur physicians have long enjoyed speculating that MMR and other vaccinations are somehow 'harmful to the immune system' and responsible for the rise in conditions such as asthma and hay fever. Doubtless they must have been waiting some time for evidence to appear. ... Measles cases are rising. Middle class parents are not to blame, even if they do lack rhetorical panache when you try to have a discussion with them about it. They have been systematically and vigorously misled by the media, the people with access to all the information, who still choose, collectively, between themselves, so robustly that it might almost be a conspiracy, to give you only half the facts."
Took me 5 minutes... (Score:5, Funny)
...to read the last sentence.
They have been systematically and vigorously misled by the media, the people with access to all the information, who still choose, collectively, between themselves, so robustly that it might almost be a conspiracy, to give you only half the facts.
Six commas...
Re:MMR? (Score:1, Funny)
yes
A beef, with commas, you have? (Score:5, Funny)
You must be new here, for if you were not, you would know that us, the readers of slashdot, enjoy reading summaries which, when read slowly and carefully, provide some great meaning that, fortunately, could not have been presented to us without all the deliberately, refreshingly placed commas, all of which brighten our sad, lonely days in these dank, windowless basements which, for many of us, have been our homes for decades and, comma-willing, will continue to be for many more decades to come, for we would be distraught should our parents, who gave birth to us, of course, were to boot us out into the "real world", the simple notion of which frightens us beyond belief, really.
Sincerely, yours,
Reader, who is anonymous, for various reasons, none of which concern you, the reader of this comment.
I'm glad my parents didn't know about this . . . (Score:3, Funny)
Dosing him with multiple ones really knocks 'em down for a week or more until they return to normal.
. . . or they would have vaccinated me more often.
. . . Or maybe they did, and I still haven't returned to normal.
Yes, that's it.
Re:Helminthic Therapy to the Rescue (Score:5, Funny)
Today, I bow to dedicate my entire week's worth of beer fund to creating scorp1us foundation for cure to this despicable disease.
Join me, fellow slashdoters, to bring some gleam of hope and cure for this poor little sap.
Re:Doctors != Scientists (Score:1, Funny)
Yes, good point.
Doctors are just the mechanics - the actual insights come from scientists-who-studied-medicine. If only there were a convenient short word for these folks.
Re:Good Article, shame there arent more like this (Score:3, Funny)
Perhaps the rational stories just need *better headlines:
Exclusive Report: Sensationalist headlines could kill your child!
*For certain definitions of "better"
Re:Negative headlines sell better (Score:3, Funny)
Maybe he meant Celsius instead of Fahrenheit.
Laugh, dammit.
Re:Parents ARE to blame (Score:3, Funny)
This also might lead you to understand why docs get upset with the Jenny McCarthy types.
This is why I love America. What's a better source of medical information than a doctor? The lady who blows Jim Carrey, thats who.
SMOKIN!
Comment removed (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Lack of Interest in Science (Score:2, Funny)
washing your hands afer having a pee - urine is antiseptic so what does it gain?
Hands that don't smell like urine? :P