In light of new evidence claiming fraudulent data regarding vaccines and the occurrence of autism in children, there are people demanding "more rigorous controls ... over what is published as peer reviewed science and what is not". Should it be the scientific community, the press or the general public responsible for determining reliability of data? What controls could there be put on the scientific community if any? Could an entire nation become scientifically literate, let alone just having the ability to think critically about what it hears in the news (or on facebook or on twitter or any other form of published work)?
Read the following article, before commenting
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ac/7546906_autism_vaccine_link_study_proven_as_a_fraud
4 comments:
I remember when this "finding" was announced in 1998, and I also remeber thinking it was ridiculous. I had been vaccinated with this vaccine as well as all my relatives and friends and I knew of no one that had any symptoms of autism. It seemed to me that the general public got all "crazy" without looking at facts and evidence. I believe that a scientist can "manipulate" data in all sorts of ways, it is our job as society to listen and interpret and to think before coming to "rash" decisions that will hugely affect yourself or others. Not immunizing your children may ultimately lead to the recurrence of diseases that were previously though of as eliminated.
I believe that all children should be vaccinated. Not being vaccinated can make infants prone to so many more diseases, especially ones that have being nearly wiped out, but not totally. I have been vaccinated for all the necessary one's since I was a child, and have had no side effects. When any sort of scientific study is released, the public believes it right away and go into panic mode. People should always dig deeper or wait, because most newer studies are always being published years later that refute the previous study. Jenny McCarthy, who's son has autism, is telling everyone that vaccinations give children autism. Now that this study has been proven wrong, she will have to find a new blame for the reason her son has autism. Vaccinations are here to help the world, and only very rarely can things go wrong. The chance of getting a disease is far greater then having a bad side effect from vaccinations.
I agree with Neil. I have also recieved all vaccines since I was an infant and have never had any symptoms of autism or any other diseases. From reading the article, it is amazing to hear the amount of people that believed Dr. Wakefield and his theory of autism being tied to the MMR vaccine after only testing this on 12 subjects. I believe the scientific community would be a more reliable source for confirmation of such theories, rather than that of the public or media. I am not sure I believe an entire nation could become scientifically literate by means of news and other sources because how would anyone be able to determine the honesty of the published work? Without actual scientific knowledge, the average person wouldn't be able to determine actual fact from a fabricated theory. I know myself, if I wasn't more concious of reliability and personal knowledge I would probably believe a story such as the one from Dr. Wakefield.
I disagree with Katie and Neil on the issue that all kids should be vaccinated. I have never had a 'mandatory vaccination' and have turned out just fine. This may not be the case for all people, but these are my beliefs. While reading the article though, I was taken aback by how much of an impact Dr. Wakefield's research had. 12 test subjects is not a lot to go by. This goes to show how gullible people ca be. One scientist may say one thing, and it might be totally wrong. We, as a nation, need to think with out own heads and form our own opinions before we just to conclusions.
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