In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the discredited notion that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu ... and polio.
Health officials in New York have discovered a case of polio in an adult — the first case in the country since 2013.
The good news is most people have nothing to worry about. "Unless you're unvaccinated," according to retired family physician and polio survivor Marny Eulberg.
The New York State Department of Health said the unvaccinated individual from Rockland County likely contracted the virus from someone outside of the country who had taken an oral polio vaccine, which hasn't been authorized for use in the U.S. since 2000.
The new YouGov poll shows that fewer than half of Republicans — 46 percent — now say parents should be required to vaccinate their children against infectious diseases.
That’s both far shy of where Democrats are at — 85 percent — and also far shy of where Republicans used to be. Used to be, as in last year.
YouGov has polled this question repeatedly over the years, and up until recently Republicans were in a pretty similar place to Democrats. Back in 2015, both 81 percent of Democrats and 67 percent of Republicans believed such vaccines should be mandated for children.
And that split held pretty constant, through 2020 — until the coronavirus vaccines.
State politicians advanced an effort Tuesday to place anti-vaccination language onto a general election ballot, which would leave the fate of vaccine mandates in Ohio in voters’ hands.
If passed, Ohio would become the only state in the nation with an explicit ban of vaccine mandates in its constitution. It would mark a major step backward for public health, dampen an already sluggish COVID-19 vaccination effort in Ohio, and nix a practice of mandating vaccination that traces back through early American history.
The Ohio Ballot Board — a bipartisan panel controlled by Republicans — allowed organizers of the “Medical Right to Refuse” amendment to begin gathering the 443,000 voters’ signatures required to place the referendum on a ballot. Organizers said they’re hoping to put the issue to voters in May 2023.
- The proposal covers all vaccines, not just COVID-19. It contains two basic elements:“An individual’s right to refuse any medical procedure, treatment, injection, vaccine, prophylactic, pharmaceutical, or medical device shall be absolute.”
- “No law, rule, regulation, person, employer, entity, or healthcare provider shall require, mandate or coerce any person to receive or use a medical procedure, treatment, injection, vaccine, prophylactic, pharmaceutical, or medical device nor shall the aforementioned discriminate against the individual who exercises this right.”