More on Vaccines

There is an interesting posting today on Broadsheet in Salon which notes that the pro-vaccine lobby has recruited their own celebrity, Amanda Peet, to refute the allegations made by Jenny McCarthy on Oprah last September that vaccines can indeed be linked to autism. In the letters section following the posting the two sides clashed in a pretty ugly display of collective ignorance, although the pro-vaccine side was far more aggressive and seemingly certain in their beliefs. The readership of Salonresides squarely in the left-of center side of the big tent we call American politics so I was a little surprised that the letters ran 2-1 in favor of vaccinations. Personally, I found it interesting how people who wouldn’t trust the government with their privacy somehow think that when it comes to health issues the government is beyond reproach. Here is Robert Kennedy’s story from Rolling Stone from 2005 where he discusses why the general public has carefully and deliberately been led to believe that there is no link between the mercury preservative themerosol and autism. As usual it involves corrupt politicians and the quest for drug company profit. American collective intelligence has become so dulled by incessant propaganda that all the government has to do to create a general belief that something is true (i.e. there is no link between mercury and autism) is repeat it incessantly and get the mass media to repeat it incessantly, and then paint anyone who disagrees with the official party line as a nutcase. They have done this successfully to opponents of the Iraq war and wireless surveillance and, apparently, with people who think that the health of their families is more important than shielding drug companies from liability for creating a generation of neurologically damaged children.