Minnesota Measles Outbreak

I wasn't going to post about this specifically, but I think it bears repeating...
There was an article posted yesterday by Sarah Dillingham that depicted in detail the situation going on in the Somali immigrant group in Minnesota--the ones who have recently been affected by a Measles outbreak. The article was so well-researched and well-written that I wanted to reiterate it here on my blog.

If your only source on this subject is mainstream media, give this a look to have a well-rounded perspective on the situation. I'm going to quote some things from her post, but I highly recommend going to her site to read this in full--she has links to back up her research there:
http://sarahdillingham.com/wordpress/measles-and-autism-in-minnesota-false-prophets-and-real-problems/

Excerpts from the article: "Measles and Autism in Minnesota: False Prophets and Real Problems" by Sarah Dillingham,

As of this writing, 51 children and 3 adults in Minnesota have come down with measles in the past month, of which 3 had been vaccinated. So far, the scale of this outbreak falls within familiar patterns of recent years, including the much-hyped 2015 Disneyland outbreak – the U.S. has averaged about 125 cases per year over the past two decades. However this cluster is unique in that it began in the tightknit Somali-American community of Cedar-Riverside in Minneapolis.  Forty-seven of the 54 reported cases – 87% – are Somali-American.

Somali-Minnesotans share another distinction: the unusually high autism prevalence in their community. One in 32 children (3% of the population) is 1.5 times the statewide prevalence of 1 in 48, and more than double the national rate of 1 in 68.  Even more troubling, autistic Somali-Americans have 3 to 5 times greater risk for intellectual disabilities than their Minnesotan peers in other groups.  Public health officials have downplayed the significance of these findings, pointing to the statistically comparable rate of 1 in 36 among white Minnesotans. However, a similar 2010 Swedish study reinforced the distinction, reflecting autism prevalence 3 to 4 times higher among Somalis in Stockholm than that of other ethnic groups.

[...] As Somali-American parents have observed staggering rates of regressions and neurological impairments among their kids, vaccination uptake in their community has declined in recent years. Community leaders reached out to advocacy organizations for support in exercising their parental right to choose individualized vaccination plans appropriate for their children’s medical histories. This action has sparked unprecedented backlash from public health officials and media outlets.

[...C]overage of the 2017 outbreak in Hennepin county has acquired new elements of condescension and paternalism: Lena Sun of the Washington Post declares “Anti-vaccine activists sparked the state’s worst measles outbreak in decades,” opening with the foreboding specter of a young mother “getting advice from friends,” who have apparently been fomenting “a discredited theory…fanned by meetings organized by anti-vaccine groups.” Sun proceeds to invoke the pharmaceutical industry’s most convenient and reviled villain, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, and misquotes him out of context. Other outlets followed suit, some with comedic hyperbole.

In fact, the work detailed in the 1998 Lancet paper co-authored by Wakefield and 12 others was fully exonerated during co-author Dr. John Walker-Smith’s trial in 2012, in a scathing decision which declared “the finding of serious professional misconduct and the sanction of erasure are both quashed.” The results of that paper have been replicated numerous times, and the causal association between thimerosal and aluminum adjuvants and the brain injuries which cause symptoms of autism are well established. Large court settlements have been awarded to victims of vaccine-induced brain injuries resulting in autism.

The frenzy reached a crescendo this past Monday when the Boston Herald called for the revival of public execution by hanging. It’s one thing, the Herald admonished, when elites in Hollywood don their “fashionable” anti-vaxism atop designer gowns at the Oscars – but “it’s another thing when anti-vaccine activists start preying on vulnerable people, particularly within immigrant communities.” Presumably “immigrant communities” are less capable than other parents of making sound evidence-based decisions, so the vile anti-vaccine interlopers must be dispatched via the hanging rope.

The Somali-American community of Cedar-Riverside sought out Dr. Wakefield to address the consistent pattern of their children’s regressions following the MMR vaccine, after their concerns had been categorically denied and ignored by public health institutions and care providers. The parents pursued comprehensive information to properly weigh the risks and benefits of wild measles infection against risks and benefits of strict compliance with the CDC vaccination schedule.

First-generation Muslim-Americans of color expose themselves to compounded bigotry and mistrust when they insist upon appropriately individualized care for their special-needs children, as evidenced by distorted representations in the press. So why would they take this risk? Perhaps they perceive a more ominous threat than pervasive prejudice or outright bullying. [...] Somali-Minnesotan parents are no less likely than any other parents to base their medical decisions on the entire body of available scientific evidence, which reveals that concerns over vaccine safety are warranted, if not acknowledged by public health officials.

[...] And what of the measles crisis in Minnesota? The current cluster of 54 cases has thus far sparked a 0.001% statewide incidence rate this year, with a more impressive 0.004% rate of incidence in Hennepin County. However the hospitalization rate among this handful of patients is high, fluctuating between 25-33%. The CDC estimates that during the modern pre-vaccine era, the hospitalization rate of measles patients was around 1-2%, with 85% of cases being so mild as to go unreported. The average annual risk of death from measles complications between 1950 and 1963 was 0.0003%, or about 0.26 per 100,000. (The average annual risk of death by lightning during that period was 0.0001%, or 0.10 per 100,000.) There have been pockets of measles cases every year in the United States since the vaccine was licensed in 1963, including 6 reported deaths in the U.S. over the past decade, and one 2015 case in which an immunocompromised patient’s pneumonia was posthumously reclassified as a measles complication resulting from presumed exposure months prior to her death.

[...] Certainly the fact that a death was unlikely to occur makes it no less tragic when it happens, whether by lightning strike, complications from an otherwise mild infectious illness, or adverse reaction to a drug or vaccine. There have been no measles deaths in Minnesota over the past several decades; however a one-year-old infant died the night after he received the MMR vaccine in 2011. VAERS is a passive reporting system which FDA Commissioner David Kessler estimated captures about 1-10% of adverse reactions and deaths. [...I]f Kessler’s estimates are correct, the MMR-related reports in VAERS represent a real number of MMR-related deaths which could easily exceed pre-vaccine-era measles mortality.

Vaccine safety advocates seek to document and compare the real risks of infectious diseases with the real risks incurred by their means of prevention. Pointing out abysmal institutional failures to do so with scientific integrity does not imply indifference to children’s deaths. On the contrary,

 it demonstrates great care and investment in every child’s life and the quality of their future. Safety advocates will persist in their efforts to raise awareness of vaccine risks, effective approaches to disease management and prevention, and the exercise of medical informed consent. We are not going away.

I'm so appreciative of the work Sarah did on this article--I think it is always important to have a well-rounded perspective before placing any judgement on a topic. When I first read the Washington Post's depiction of the measles outbreak, I was outraged by the blatant disregard they had for the Autism prevalence among the Somali immigrants, and the way they projected that the Somali immigrant parents were, basically, incapable of making an informed decision on whether to vaccinate their children and adhere to the strict CDC schedule.
With all the science and court cases supporting the need for safer vaccines and safer vaccine schedules, it's no wonder the vaccine companies are grasping for ways to keep their products relevant and in circulation via mandatory vaccine legislation.

In my opinion, if the products were worthwhile and safe, they would not need to be mandated. They would speak for themselves. And they most certainly would not be considered by the supreme court to be "unavoidably unsafe."

If you asked an immunologist, "How much do we really know about immunology?" They would tell you that the information we have is just the tip of the iceberg! We know that antibodies are made AFTER an infection--vaccines are given specifically to produce antibodies in the immune system. We know that people who suffer from agamma-globulinemia (individuals with a deficit in antibody production), recover from wild measles just as easily as those without the disorder (Humphries, 363). We also know that when people with cellular immunity impairment (such as those with leukemia) contract measles, it can be devastating. With this information, we can speculate that cellular immunity plays a critical part in the prevention and resolution of disease--and furthermore, vaccination does nothing to support this aspect of immunity, and consequently, it actually hinders it. 

Something to consider from the book Dissolving Illusions, pages 365-366: 

"The pro-vaccine argue that the reason to vaccinate all healthy people is to protect those at highest risk. Huge amounts of money are spent figuring out why so many vaccinated remain susceptible to infections and why the same people who are susceptible to disease complications don't respond to the vaccine.
The appearance of one case of measles in the highest vaccinated populations always promotes widespread fearmongering by public health officials because they know the fragility of vaccine immunity. [...]  If they understood the innate immune system, the real history of measles, and the use of vitamins C and A, their official response would not always be to promote fear.

Why does it make sense to subject all healthy people who are not usually susceptible to disease complications, to the known and unknown risks of MMR vaccines, when the result could be leading the world to a situation worse than the pre-vaccine days?"

As the records show, Measles was already on a steady decline before the vaccine was introduced in 1963. In addition, immediately following the release of the vaccine, the criteria for measles diagnosing was narrowed--so cases that previously would have been diagnosed as "measles" were suddenly reclassified. Conveniently for the vaccine manufacturers, this made it appear, at least on paper, that the incidence of measles had further decreased--when in actuality, the definition had been made more exclusive (368-379).

All this to say that in order to make an informed decision, we must look at all the material. We must look at the context, and we must look beyond what we're being told. 

The burden of proof should fall to the industry (vaccine manufacturers) according to the precautionary principle, but it does not. As we have seen, it falls on the public, and as such, we now have a responsibility to speak up and stay informed. 

Image source, thedailyquotes.com

Sources:

1. "Measles and Autism in Minnesota: False Prophets and Real Problems" by Sarah Dillingham,  http://sarahdillingham.com/wordpress/measles-and-autism-in-minnesota-false-prophets-and-real-problems/

2. Humphries, Dr. Suzanne and Roman Bystrianyk, Dissolving Illusions,  http://www.dissolvingillusions.com/