“You may choose to look the other way, but you can never say again that you did not know.”
— William Wilberforce
In an opinion piece in the Houston Chronicle titled “Why I’m standing up to the anti-vaccine nonsense,” pediatrician and vaccine developer Peter Hotez, MD, PhD sought to explain his reasoning for declaring himself the primary antagonist of parents defending the moral and legal right to make informed, voluntary medical care decisions, including vaccine decisions, for […]
June 2017 saw the biggest public demonstrations against forced vaccination held in Europe since the Victorian era,1 as tens of thousands of Italians of all ages marched for vaccine freedom of choice in Rome, Florence, Milan, Bologna, Turin, Cagliani and other cities.2 They marched in opposition to a May 19 decree endorsed by the government’s […]
A few weeks ago, I shared part of an online conversation I had about vaccines. Initially, I was hesitant to reply but after rereading a callous response made by a woman I’d never met, I needed say something. Demanding that everyone should be vaccinated no matter what, I thought I might offer this person a bit caution in making…
The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists’ Committee on Ethics released a new “Committee Opinion” this month that outlines what doctors should do when a woman refuses the treatment recommended to her by an obstetrician. A desire to protect the health and safety of the unborn baby may be at odds with the ethical obligation to safeguard a woman’s…
The common conception of vaccines is that they have saved millions of lives by eradicating deadly diseases and that they are mostly if not totally safe. The public debate hinges on and legislative decisions are made based on these assumptions. Neither of them holds up to the barest scrutiny. A cursory look at government data shows that the death rate from infectious diseases, both…
Those tiny miracles. God’s most precious gift to us. We hold them in wonder just moments after they are born. We love them in a way we never loved anyone, and they love us in a way that no one else ever will. Then, one day, we wake up. And they are as big as […]
Parents know best when it comes to THEIR child. Like most parents, when I had to learn to parent my son on the fly. It’s what we do. I didn’t really know what I thought about vaccinations when, at 2 months, my son had his first set of them. After all, I was vaccinated and didn’t seem to come out any worse for wear. I had also been on a bit of a “health kick” in my later 20s…
The public conversation about whether we should have the freedom to choose how we want to maintain our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health has become one of the most important public conversations of our time. It is a conversation that challenges us to examine complex public policy, scientific, ethical, legal, philosophical, economic, political and…
Published in 1932, arguably at the advent of the technological age, Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World seems at least as relevant in the 21st century as it was at the time. Long a staple of high school and college literature classes, the story is set in the year 2540 AD—or rather, 632 AF (“After Ford,” a nod to the introduction of the Model T car and the technology…