One thing I would recommend
not doing, is try and figure out the demographics of these people. The internet is awash with finger pointing and mud slinging.
But that hasn't stop people from trying. The following is an article which looks fairly legitimate, and appears to be the source of some of the "It's the left wing hippies fault!", based on the demographics of a discussion group of 11 people. Though, I disagree with the generalization. The following is from a slightly larger sample, of 83 people:
Measles Outbreak in a Highly Vaccinated Population, San Diego, 2008: Role of the Intentionally Undervaccinated
9 authors
March 2010
Online Parent Network Survey
Compared with the overall county population, survey respondents more often were non-Hispanic white (91% vs 50%), were college-educated (91% vs 34%), and had household incomes higher than $100 000 (51% vs 19%). Two-thirds indicated that they would accept certain vaccinations, but three-quarters would not accept measles vaccination. Perceived adverse vaccine reactions, especially autism, were often cited by those who declined some or all vaccines (Table 2).
Table 2 is probably the most interesting thing I've seen so far, with some real eye openers. Raw numbers from a survey returned by 83 people, 81 of which were mothers/stepmothers.
Practiced no religious faith: 52.6%
Concerning health condition
Autism: 79.8%
ADD/ADHD: 73.4%
Asthma: 73.4%
Allergies: 73.4%
Inflammatory bowel disease: 67.1%
Source of information
Doctor: 67.5%
Internet sites: 38.6%
Alternative provider: 32.5%
CDC: 30.1%
Books: 24.1%
Now it's possible that 67.5% of these people all went to the same witch doctor, but my hypothesis is that social media is the bigger culprit. People tend to have social media friends who share their views. I base this on (a) My sister's FB friends all seem to belong to the same coven, and (b) I unfollowed my sister the other day, because I found their crowd feeding hysteria somewhat disturbing.
The "no religious faith" percentage kind of confirms my belief that there's really little difference between people of faith, and those of notafaith.
As the concluding statement from Borg's post from Friday stated:
IMHO, there will never be enough derogatory nouns to describe these people.
ps. I really like the WHO Measles FAQ. They are very to the point:
Measles
Measles is a highly contagious, serious disease caused by a virus. In 1980, before widespread vaccination, measles caused an estimated 2.6 million deaths each year.
The disease remains one of the leading causes of death among young children globally, despite the availability of a safe and effective vaccine. Approximately 145 700 people died from measles in 2013 – mostly children under the age of 5.
And their
info-graphic page is very interesting. You can follow the planetary immunization rates for 1 year olds from 1980 through 2013. I could spend days trying to interpret all the data.
For instance, tracking the USA, the last time we had a 98% immunization rate was way back in 1988. Since then, it declined, and has been hovering around 90%. But there have been no big outbreaks
until last year. Which would indicate that a homogeneous 90% immunization rate is adequate. And, as you can imagine, I conclude that this is a "let's point our fingers at the pockets of misguided ignorance, and shame them into not killing other people's children", moment.
hmmm... Perhaps, like my former employer, which also houses a hospital, which last year, during the flu season, told all employees that "opted out" of the flu vaccine, that they would have to wear surgical gloves and a surgical mask, when entering patient areas. The anti-vaxxers were quick to comply.
Perhaps if whatever government agency is in charge of who can travel overseas, were to tell people; "I see your child isn't immunized against measles, and the country you're traveling to has an outbreak, so, I'm afraid you can't go. Sorry!", we'd see some changes. I mean really, if the thought of having to put on rubber gloves can motivate people...
the social security system.
