Amanda Peet calls non-vaccinating parents "parasites"

Amanda Peet is an inane clueless twit who should really shut up about stuff she knows absolutely zero about. When she has a degree in something other than remembering her lines and looking coquettish, I may think about listening to what she has to say about anything. I actually read her article and of course her source of information are pediatricians who promote vaccines. DUH! If the all the information you ever learn about cars comes directly from Ford, guess what kind of car you are going to buy.

As for those who think that vaccines saved the world...you clearly have gotten all your info from "Ford" as well. We have flush toilets, Lysol, refrigeration, and soap these days which have drastically cut down on the filth and excrement your forefathers lived in. If you want to line your children up like cattle and have some clueless idiot who is reciting the American Academy of Pediatrics "party line" stick a needle full of who knows what into your otherwise healthy child and pray for a positive outcome, go ahead. Leave me and mine out of it. We don't treat diseases we don't have.

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"We have flush toilets, Lysol, refrigeration, and soap these days which have drastically cut down on the filth and excrement your forefathers lived in."

Yet, none of those explain the decline in cases of Measles and Rubella, or the near complete elimination of small pox in America by 1895. Both the transmission vectors of both these diseases are not effected by refrigeration, flushing toilets, or the use of anti-bacterial soaps.

As for Lysol, unless you spray it in front of you while talking, it'll have zero impact.

As for vaccine makers, shockingly, vaccines are a low-profit product. Drug companies do not get rich off of it, and suffer greatly under attack from ill-informed partisans of the anti-vaccine movement.

Perhaps you should you like the profit motivators of the critics of vaccines? Would anyone care if Jenny McCarthy was alive if she wasn't out harping on this issue?

Of course you can buy into the party line of the anti-establishment set if you like.

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They are parasites. They're children are ostensibly protected because the children around them vaccinated. Meanwhile, their own children can introduce potentially fatal diseases to children around them who weren't able to be vaccinated for VALID medical reasons.

Consider, before worldwide vaccinations, over 750,000 people DIED from measles. This was just in the year 2000 people. Just 6 years. Today, that figure is around 240,000 people. There are nearly 500 million people who have been vaccinated, if all you of you are right with your countless hours of research? Where are the hundreds of millions of people suffering from autism?

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What profit do the critics of vaccines seek?

How do you discount the fact that 50% of the parents of children with ADHD, Autism, etc. believe that their child was harmed or that their condition was caused by the vaccinations? Until you've walked a mile in their shoes, you should try to be alittle more compassionate.

To what do you attribute the epidemic of developmental disorders?

Do you really believe that all the vaccines are 100% safe 100% of the time for 100% of the children? Are you so naive as to believe the pharmaeutical companies have our best interests at heart?

My point was that many vectors have been drastically reduced, removed or eliminated, without vaccines, and thus render the vaccine moot. Why not go get a smallpox vaccine? Perhaps because the risk is not there? Think we may be able to apply the same logic to diptheria?

I am not anti-immunization. I am anti forced immunization. This is still America, isn't it? The sanctity of making our own health care decisions should be inalienable. A prent's right to guide the growth and health of thier child should be inalienable. Anyone who pretends to know what's best for everyone else is either a liar or deluded.

Jenny McCarthy is one of those parents who believe their child was injured by vaccinations. Whether you believe it or not does not matter. She is coming from a pure place and certainly would have preferred to remain clueless about these issues and happy with immunized children who have no disability, like most people . If Amanda Peet's child became disabled, she would sing another tune.

Have room in your heart and mind to embrace both sides of the argument, and try not to force your will on others. The golden rule should prevail.

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First, we no longer get vaccinated against small pox because it was eradicated by the vaccine, There are only two places on this planet that have the smallpox virus. There is a specimen held in a French lab and one specimen held in an American lab. There is no more natural smallpox that we know of on this planet.

However, the same is not true of any of the other vaccine preventable diseases. In fact, due to under vaccinating and the subsequent decrease in what we call "herd immunity" we are beginning to see measles, mumps, and haemophilus influenzae outbreaks.

The most important thing to consider when making any medical decision is to weight the risks and the benefits. There are two diseases commonly carried in the nasal passages of older children and adults which are invasive and can be life threatening in infants. Those two diseases are pertussis (whooping cough) and Haemophilus influenze type B (meningitis, epiglottitis, septic hip...). If you were picking and choosing during infancy, these are the most important 2 vaccines to get. If you plan to go to a foreign country with your infant, I would definitely get polio because it is still endemic in many parts of the world that do not immunize. By 6-9 months I would vaccinate against pneumococcus (pneumonia, meningitis, blood stream infection) because it also resides in the nasal passages of older children and adults and tends to be invasive with older infants and toddlers.

The current vaccine schedule is based on science including studies on the impact to the immune system. So keep in mind that altering the schedule may make vaccinating less effective than it could be on schedule.

Now, what are the risks? Fever and fussiness. Pain at the injection site. Apart from that, it depends what you believe. The science and the epidemiology do not support a linkage between any of these vaccines and autism. There are certainly genetic markers for autism. There are children with autism who have never been vaccinated. There has not been thimerosol in vaccinations for over 4 years, but ther has been no drop in autism rates. In fact, autism continues to rise.

My real question is why? I think a number of things need to be looked at. What do we mean when we say autism? Autism spectrum disorders now encompasses a whole lot more than classic autism. There is classic autism; there is Asperger's; there is Rett's syndrome; and there is this humongous category called pervasive developmental delay. Asperger's is a relatively new subset and is certainly adding to the total with previously never diagnosed patients. However, PDD has stolen a whole lot of kids who ten years ago would have been labeled as mentally retarded. In fact, if you look at the numbers for MR in the last ten years, there decrease nearly equals the rise in numbers of PDD cases.
Have we suddenly cured mental retardation? Highly doubtful.

Has classic autism risen? Possibly a little bit. Has the number of children encompassed under autism spectrum disorders increased? Definitely. Has ADHD increased. Definitely. Has the number of children who died or who received permanent damage from vaccine preventable diseases decreased in the past ten years, twenty years, and thirty years? Most definitely. Will we see a decrease in herd immunity if people do not vaccinate their children? Yes. Are we likely to see outbreaks of diseases that result in the deaths or permanent brain damage of children if people continue to not vaccinate their children? Yes. That has already happened in communities with high nonvaccination rates.

I agree with trying to make informed decisions. I do not agree wtih name calling. Personally, I do not think either Amanda Peet or Jenny McCarthy is qualified to tell you what to do with your child. Nor do I think the media and the internet have your child's interests at heart. You do. And I bet your pediatrician does.

I also do not believe the vast majority of pediatricians are motivated to vaccinate your child because of a monetary gain. We do not make much margin on vaccinations. We actually make less when we give combination vaccines because it becomes one administration rather than three. We choose the combinations because it means less actual shots to your child.

What does motivate pediatricians? I personally can witness to the power of vaccines. As a medical student we admitted at least one child every night with Haemophilus influenzae type B (HIB)meningitis. The first vaccine came out when I was in my third year of medical school. About 18 months later as an intern, I never admitted anyone with any form of HIB disease. That had nothing to do with lysol. It had everything to do with vaccinating a critical mass of infants and toddlers and controlling overall exposure.

The pediatricians I know who have their own autistic child continue to vaccinate their children and their patients. Why? They fully know what vaccines can do to save lives and they have read every single scrap of science as it relates to vaccines and autism and have concluded their is no link. I recently visited the website for Autism Speaks. Nearly all of the recent grants they have given for research are targeting other possible causes of autism, not vaccines. Why? Because there is simply no data that supports either a link between thimerosol and autism or MMR and autism.
If we keep tilting at the same windmill we will never get to the bottom of this and find a cure.

I personally have autistic patients and I want to know why they are autistic. I do hope research continues to look for the likely multifactorial causes (genetics plus what?). And I hope all of you seriously consider what vaccines are intended for and why pediatricians believe in them so passionately. It isn't about money. It's about never wanting your child to be seriously ill when we could have prevented it. We know vaccines prevent deaths. We know vaccines prevent other sequelae of vaccine preventable diseases such as deafness, sterility, brain damage, lifelong muscle weakness or limp, liver failure, mental retardation, limb amputation, and cervical cancer. Consider the actual facts, not just the hysteria.

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I am on the fence with vaccines. I have selectively vaccinated my daughter up until now.

What I want to point out is that vaccination does not guarantee immunity. So, just because you vaccinate your child does not mean he/she cannot get that disease.

Also, we have started vaccinating against diseases that are really not too difficult to treat, such as Measles, Chicken Pox and Rotavirus. The manufacturers of these vaccines would of course have us convinced that these are life threatening. I
had both Measles and Chicken Pox as a child and all both entailed were a week of missed school and some penicillin.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, that is the beauty of a free country, but when someone in the limelight whips out nasty namecalling, that is unnecessary. I can respect parent's decision to vaccinate, as long as they can respect other parent's decision not to vaccinate.

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I thought Amanda Peet's response to her earlier comments were very well worded and clear.

http://www.cookiemag.com/entertainment/2008/07/peet_apology

While I feel deeply for anyone who has an autistic parent, blaming vaccines is just incorrect, plain and simple. It's like looking for a sunrise, and running west. You could be deeply devoted to finding the answer, but by steadfastly going in the wrong direction, you may miss clues to the real answers.

As a parent of three small children, I, like every other parent, wants what's best for my children. But as a scientist (I am a molecular geneticist studying leukemia/lymphomas), I trust the scientific community's findings, that there is NO LINK between autism and immunization, rather than well intentioned but misguided people that believe otherwise.

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Amanda Peet just lost a long time fan. She should've educated herself a little bit before A. selling out to big pharma and B. giving an opinion on something she obviously doesn't know much about. I am currently in Austin, TX at Care Clinics detoxing my child who has suffered with mercury poisoning (autism) for the last decade from a bad lot of DPT vaccine that Lederle refused to take off the shelves of health clinics and out of pediatric offices due to the amount of money that would have been lost despite the fact that in 1996 it was highly recommended that they remove that particular lot of DPT vaccine and destroy it. My child received it in 1997. She can kiss my a$$ and forget about me ever spending another dime watching or buying another one of her movies. I'm certain that I'm speaking for millions of other "parasites". If it was just her opinion that children should be vaccinated, I would respect that. But, to reach out and punch the parents who do not support her views is despicable and I just hope she doesn't eat her words by witnessing the adverse reactions that can come along with vaccinating including autism. She disgusts me.

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Amanda Peet just lost a long time fan. She should've educated herself a little bit before A. selling out to big pharma and B. giving an opinion on something she obviously doesn't know much about. I am currently in Austin, TX at Care Clinics detoxing my child who has suffered with mercury poisoning (autism) for the last decade from a bad lot of DPT vaccine that Lederle refused to take off the shelves of health clinics and out of pediatric offices due to the amount of money that would have been lost despite the fact that in 1996 it was highly recommended that they remove that particular lot of DPT vaccine and destroy it. My child received it in 1997. She can kiss my a$$ and forget about me ever spending another dime watching or buying another one of her movies. I'm certain that I'm speaking for millions of other "parasites". If it was just her opinion that children should be vaccinated, I would respect that. But, to reach out and punch the parents who do not support her views is despicable and I just hope she doesn't eat her words by witnessing the adverse reactions that can come along with vaccinating including autism. She disgusts me.

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I have a daughter who has autism. I, with no doubt or hesitation, after all of my reading and research.............feel that the vaccinations all lumped together and given when she was too small, tipped the scales and flung her into autism. I want to vaccinate....................but I don't want all of the unnceccessary toxic crap that is in the vaccinations. I also want to be fully informed about what is in them and potential risks. Until we are at that point, I have chosen to space out my other kids vaccinations. My sixteen month old just had his first vaccination (dpat) and I will go very slow and be selective. That to me makes me a great mom......not a parasite. My daughters life was forever changed as well as my own and my enitre families. The drug companies should be ashamed and I believe due to parents like myself and celebrities like Jenny Mccarthy bringing attention to this issue........that the vaccine schedule will be modified at some point in the future. We need to respect our babies bodies and immune systems so that we can be healthy enough to fight off less serious diseases and get protection from vaccines for more serious ones.

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I thought Amanda's comment was a little harsh. Do we not have our own children to raise them the way we want and to protect them from what we feel will cause them harm? Whether you are a believer in vaccines or not, whether you choose to vaccinate or not is ultimately YOUR choice! No one should be criticized or called names because they do what they feel is best for their child. Shame on Amanda!

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My three boys had their vaccinations, but I chose to wait until they were a little older for their first shots. My middle son had to have a specialized shot after his first set, due to his reaction to one of the ingredients of the DPT shot. He was burning up with fever for eight hours straight and could not move. We were terrified. His doctor had to take out one of the ingredients of the booster shots, so he wouldn't get sick from it.
It is up to the parents whether or not they want shots for their kids-- not some celebrity who doesn't know when to keep her mouth shut.

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It is too bad that Amanda Peet said this. I think everybody is entitled to their opinion. I personally am against vaccination. I represent a growing number of people because more and more people are becoming informed and not just listening to what their doctors say. For anybody who wants to really balance the debate and read why you should not vaccinate your child or yourself read Dr. Tenpenny's book Saying No to Vaccines. There is a lot of good information in there and all of her facts are backed up by reputable references. I saw Amanda Peet on a morning news show this morning and she said that vaccinations are not a medical debate. This is simply not true; it is not just "nervous little mothers" that are concerned about the safety of vaccines. There is also a growing number of scientists and doctors who are concerned and speaking out. Vaccine efficiency is based on epidemiology studies which are studies based on the pattern of epidemics. All of the vaccines were introduced at the end of the high disease incidences. This is their evidence that vaccines work?! It is far more likely that sanitation, less people being malnourished and the introduction of clean water systems that led to the decline of these diseases. If vaccinations are the only thing that can be responsible for the falling incidence of these diseases then how can we explain how diseases that were not routinely vaccinated against declined too such as yellow fever and TB? Furthermore the people who decide how many, how often etc your child and you receive vaccines are a board of 15 people who make up the ACIP. Every last one of these physicians are either working directly or making dividends to the tune of millions via stock from vaccination manufacturers. Are these really the people you want to trust with your child's best interest? There is major corruption in the CDC as well so if that is where you are getting your indisputable facts from then I'm sorry for you; you more than anybody need to get informed. Children and adults do in fact get permanently damaged and die from vaccines. The FDA admits that only about 10% of adverse reactions to vaccines are reported. This 10% is then grossly understated. If you read the facts on both sides which I have and you still believe that vaccinations are safe and effective then I have a lot of respect for that but to the people that don't even know what most of the diseases that we are vaccinating against are (which would really shock you since most have very little chance of harming a normal person permanently), get informed. Vaccinations may become the biggest debate of our time and right now we dirty parasites are outnumbered however; the number of us hippies is growing rapidly. Think of it this way, why would we choose to do something that makes us outcasts and makes people call us parasites and not want their children to play with ours if there were not a really good reason? Just something to think about. Mrs. Peet and I agree on one thing…. we should not be getting advice on huge life affecting things like this from celebrities!

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I was born a few years before the HIB vaccination, and at

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I just love how the pro-vax community, love to run there pie holes. That is the one beauty of this country freedom speech. The other is that we have the right to make an informed choice on our children’s safety.
It’s so refreshing to here their true compassion for those families that have lost a child to vaccinations! Oh sorry but but, but, but whatever. You feel nothing for these families, and if you want to believe it or not there are very dangerous side affects. You can down play them all you want. Someone please crunch the numbers for them on vaccine injured children yearly, or children harmed by outbreaks yearly. What is the greater number? Oh but that doesn’t count because, because, because whatever!
In closing I do care about your children! I wouldn’t harm them by not vaccinating, but you have to respect my rights as well I have respected yours. My child was just one of those oops to you people that you want to sweep under the rug, but the fact is she would still be here if I would have not vaccinated! I would also suggest if you don’t like my freedoms to choose to vax or not vax. Move my rights are protected, no matter how much you fear mongers lie that will never change.

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I contracted a (now) vaccine-preventable disease and lost my hearing from it when I was 7 years old. It was meningoccocal meningitis and I'm lucky to be alive. At that time, there was no vaccine for this type of meningitis at all, and even now the vaccine is only available to children 11 and older.

My parents were told I had an 85% chance of dying. The total hearing loss was just secondary to that as they watched every blood vessel in my body hemorrhage because the bacteria had invaded my bloodstream - you could see the bleeding through my skin. I held on by a string for days. When they determined I would survive, my parents were told I'd never hear again.

Did I mention I only showed my first symptom of illness 12 hours before I was rushed to the hospital? I went to bed with a headache and woke up very ill and completely deaf - that's when I went to the ER.

My point is that while I completely understand the hesitancy some parents have about possible links of vaccines to autism, they are being very nonchalant about those diseases these vaccines prevent! My parents would have KILLED to have had a vaccine to keep me from suffering that way and having permanent - yes, it is, I'm now 36 years old - hearing loss, balance problems and concentration issues. The parents are removed from the complications and fatalities involved with vaccine-preventable disease. And that's dangerous.

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