My position on vaccines

Introduction

This is a topic I have been reluctant to write about because it is a quagmire of emotion and confusion, especially nowadays and sure to gather heat as this year rolls along. The topic has been so polarised into opposing camps such that there is no longer any middle ground, which is where I want to be.

"If you not totally for, or totally against vaccinations, then you are my enemy".

No matter what I say, or how careful the wording, I'm going to upset one camp or the other. My article "Why we need the vaccines", caused some consternation and the need for me to say where I stand on vaccines, so here we go!

The first thing to emphasise is I don't mind vaccines, but this is with several provisos, which I explain in this article. The most important proviso and one that concerns me greatly (they all do!) is the way they promote vaccines as the saviour from all that ails while ignoring the need for urgent action to address the reasons New Zealanders are becoming less healthy and, therefore, so vulnerable to disease.

Best used sparingly

Like antibiotics, vaccines are a wonderful health technology, but best applied sparingly and for only the most compelling of purposes. The widespread use and overuse of antibiotics in humans and for animal husbandry is causing widespread antibiotic resistance, requiring more powerful and larger doses (intravenously, for example), thus increasing the risk of serious complications. We now face the end of antibiotics as a therapy, and that will be a disaster. Any new antibiotics must be more potent than the last and in large doses, increasing the risk and severity of side effects. Routine surgery, even the most simple, may soon become life-threatening as antibiotic-resistant superbugs proliferate. The problem with vaccines is similar, but with differing consequences (weakened and confused immune systems) which I will explain in a moment.

Invest first in what really produces good health

Medical procedures, including antibiotics and vaccines can not be replacements for public health measures such as providing clean water and sanitation, reducing poverty, providing warm and dry housing, reducing stress, improving nutrition and removing toxins from our environment. Antibiotics and vaccines have had dramatic effects, improving health and longevity, but measures such as sewage reticulation, reticulating clean water, and even the invention of the refrigerator have been more beneficial for health and longevity. We must not forget this.

Do you really think they want you to be healthy?

With the increasing privatisation, politicisation, industrialisation and domination of food and healthcare by massive transnational corporations, plus the dis-powering of the general medical practitioner, the application of medical procedures are now predominantly for the generation of profit. With the collusion between politicians and industrialist, positive health outcomes are a secondary or nil consideration.

Vaccination is a trillion-dollar industry. Like all industries operating under the capitalist model, it requires ongoing and unlimited growth. For this to happen, industry must find a new disease for which they develop a new vaccine and roll it out.

Every human being has an immune system. This is our most powerful and most comprehensive defense against all disease - every disease. The role of our immune system protecting us is being ignored and for good reasons. People who are strong and healthy, regardless of age, need little in the way of highly profitable patent medicines. A sick person, from the cradle to the grave, is the best customer. A healthy person is bad for business. Lifespan is irrelevant, so long as they are around long enough to have their pockets and those of their family emptied of their last cents.

The response to this COVID-19 pandemic includes ignoring any health measures other than locking down, isolating, whipping up fear and offering patented vaccines as our only escape from the prisons that now confine humanity. The measures of lockdown, isolation, confinement and fear are damaging to our immune health, making us more vulnerable to all disease, including COVID-19. These measures are good for business, for some, when you think about it. Your local greengrocer, butcher, cafe and restaurant are struggling to survive or out of business while the huge mail-order multinationals, supermarket chains and the fast-food conglomerates are thriving. Big Pharma and Big Medicine are making trillions out of this pandemic and everything else, big and small, that threatens our health.

Too much of a good thing is unhealthy

When I was a child, the number of vaccinations we received were a handful, no more - yes, I can count the number on one hand. Today, a child may receive 50-80 different vaccine doses during their first ten years. Despite the lack of vaccines when I was a child, we were historically the most healthy generation of humans. We had fresh full cream milk in schools and health camps for any sickly children, funded by the sale of stamps. The post-war design for schools was called the "sunshine school" with large classroom windows opening wide onto courtyards and all facing North towards the sun! We had a massive investment in quality state houses. All of us had the cleanest water delivered to us in tap water, and I remember the original sewage line being dug leading to our house, replacing the cesspit. Vaccines played a role in eliminating diseases such as tuberculosis, polio and smallpox, but they were not the key players in producing the healthy generation of post-war children that became known as the "Baby-Boomers".