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18
4
State mandate Free to choose
Debate Score:22
Arguments:20
Total Votes:24
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 State mandate (14)
 
 Free to choose (4)

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nobodyknows(745) pic



Vaccines

Really? We have to debate vaccines? What is this world coming to? It appears some college educated moms with 4 year degrees in English think they understand medicine better than CDC officials with 11 year degrees in medicine and are writing in their blogs that vaccines are bad and that they are not vaccinating their kids. This puts everyone else in their community at risk because we need herd immunity to prevent spread and to protect vulnerable people, people for whom the vaccine either can't be administered or is unnaffective. This debate isn't whether or not vaccines are effective or safe, I am asking wether or not a society is justified in forcing crazy people into vaccinating their children. Not only for the public safety reasons but also for the well being of the child in question. You are not allowed to shoot your children, leave them out in the cold, give them ebola, or feed them gasoline. Why should parents be able to risk their own child safety just because they don't understand science well enough to realize they should trust the CDC and medical research community more than some vlogger on YouTube with a degree in stupid. 

State mandate

Side Score: 18
VS.

Free to choose

Side Score: 4

The idea that vaccines are bad is all just scaremongering.

Side: State mandate
1 point

The bottom line is creating a "herd" immunity so that the majority of people have been immunised so we control outbreaks of disease infection.

Infections have been successfully controlled and immunisations have been successfully modified over many years since the original ones so now problems are rare - but not impossible.

Yes it would be awful for the child and parents if an immunisation was harmful - but it is successful for the majority of people and though a few do have a real and idiosyncratic reaction that is not sufficient reason not to protect millions.

Do we want ebola to run rampant. Do we want measles, tuberculosis, polio and smallpox to ravage our society again without protection killing and harming huge populations all around the planet the like of which has happened in previous generations and why we now have immunisation programs. Wherever diseases still break out there has been a poor response to immunisation.

So lets get together and support immunisation programmes otherwise the price is way far too high to pay.

Side: State mandate

Well said. I didn't think about who would pay for vaccines if they were state mandated. As there are huge social benefits for vaccination it seems entirely appropriate that the government pay for it. Would you agree that it is also appropriate for the government to compensate those who are adversely affected by a vaccine (I believe we already do in the US)?

Side: State mandate
1 point

In Australia the children's immunisation program is free, paid by the government and supplied through authorised medical services.

I understand that at the moment rare cases of vaccine injury have had to find fault and sue and whilst I understand that a no-fault compensation scheme has been implemented in New Zealand I believe it has yet to do so in here Australia.

Side: State mandate
Jace(5222) Clarified
1 point

Do we want ebola to run rampant. Do we want measles, tuberculosis, polio and smallpox to ravage our society again without protection killing and harming huge populations all around the planet the like of which has happened in previous generations and why we now have immunisation programs.

Arguably, yes. While immunizations has limited widespread and lethal outbreaks, it has also created more dangerous strains that we are utterly incapable of treating or protecting against. Viruses are also an integral part of a delicately evolved ecological balance, and in a human-centric view their most vital function may actually be their capacity for decimate large portions of the human population. I realize that sounds cold, but there are very real problems - social, political, economic, environmental, etc. - that we are only just beginning to encounter that stem directly from the longer lifespans for which immunization is a considerable component.

Perhaps the higher price actually comes with immunization, not its absence.

Side: State mandate
1 point

I agree with the first part. We certainty don't want all those viruses running rampant. The economic harm let alone the death of children gives us a moral imperative to mandate vaccines.

The second part I disagree with. Here's why, vaccine reduce infant and childhood morality. High child and infant mortality leads to more children being born. Low morality rates means lower birth rates. Thus longer life is helping keep the human population under control.

Supporting Evidence: Largest gains in human longevity is due to vaccines. (bigthink.com)
Side: State mandate

We need mandates the benefits out weight the costs. Only medical exemptions.

"CDC estimates that flu has resulted in 9 million – 41 million illnesses, 140,000 – 710,000 hospitalizations and 12,000 – 52,000 deaths annually between 2010 and 2020."

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html

Side: State mandate
0 points

If even one child was injected with a vaccine and that night suffered a seizure and that left him brain damaged then we should all question whether vaccines are safe or not. However this is not the case. Thousands of parents are reporting them same thing.

Side: Free to choose
Cartman(18192) Disputed
2 points

No, you have it massively backwards. If even one child contracts a horrible disease that could have been prevented by using vaccines we should question the anti vaccine movement. However, this is not the case. Thousands upon thousands of children are dying of previously wiped out diseases.

Side: State mandate
Atrag(5666) Disputed
0 points

If everyone else is vaccinated and your child isn't then it is extremely difficult for your child to catch the illness. It is a selfish choice by parents not to vaccinate but is understandable. Particularly so as no professional admits the risks of vaccination.

Side: Free to choose
nobodyknows(745) Disputed
2 points

Those cases are so rare that it isn't possible to scientifically link brain damage with vaccines. The benefits far outweigh the risks.

Side: State mandate

The benefits far outweigh the risks. Great post succinct and accurate.

Side: State mandate
Jace(5222) Clarified
2 points

Parental claims hardly satisfy a more rigorous interrogation of causality. Feel free to provide any such substantive evidence if you have it, though for the sake of getting to the heart of the issue let us assume the claim valid: a few thousand children have an adverse reaction to a given vaccination.

A few thousand adverse reactions in the context of literally millions if not billions of persons involved in a given (inter)national vaccination program renders that health risk relatively negligible. The real question is whether that relatively small though severe health risk constitutes a legitimate basis from which to invalidate a government mandate on vaccination.

Many if not most illness combated with vaccination will have a higher mortality/disabling rate than will occur due to the vaccination itself. From a utilitarian perspective at least, vaccination clearly has an imperative over non-vaccination. To pursue a vaccination program without a mandate may render the vaccine ineffective, while potentially also contributing to the emergence of more dangerous strains.

The question, then, becomes whether or not the government ought to have the authority to shift the risk of an illness to a potentially different demographic in order to reduce the overall risk. Does the extent to which we care about the mandate risk being government induced outweigh the the extent to which we care about the original risk of the unregulated illness? (One might also question the validity of vaccination itself, of course.)

Side: State mandate
flewk(1193) Disputed
2 points

Are you talking about febrile seizures caused by the rare fever caused by vaccines?

Because diseases like mumps, chickenpox, rubella, measles, influenza, etc. can all cause febrile seizures in infants. Turns out there are vaccines for those.

Side: State mandate