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Vaccination Rates Drop in Wealthier Kids: The Autism Rumors Take a Toll

Vaccination Rates Drop in Wealthier Kids: The Autism Rumors Take a Toll

If there's one great truth of political debate, it's this: when noise trumps knowledge, someone's going to get hurt. That's been proven anew with Wednesday's report that vaccination rates for children with health insurance have been falling — due mostly to fears about the widely disproven link between vaccines and autism. If there was a glimmer of good — and surprising — news in the report it's that vaccination rates for kids on Medicaid are on the rise.

I've read the more education one has, the more likely to embrace alternative medicine, too. I'd like to see this broken down by which academic majors these “educated” people studied. Yes, I do believe we'd find a difference between science majors and the humanities graduates. But, that's only my theory.

I am a humanities graduate (English, journalism), but I found some very vocal academics upset that anyone questions climate science often had crystals and dreamcatchers over their desks. Apparently, one gets to select which sciences are trustworthy and which are not. I'd rather assume most scientists are honest seekers of knowledge. The earth is warming and vaccines are generally as safe as possible. I wonder what happens when parents start to sue doctors who did exactly what the parents wanted and skipped vaccines?

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Comments

  1. Adelaide DupontNovember 4, 2010 at 8:08 PM

    Hello C.S.!

    I think most people are honest seekers after knowledge, love, truth and the rest of the many things we value.

    It's interesting to see that (many of) the people who have more education embrace alternative medicine.

    ReplyDelete
  2. PoetCSWNovember 4, 2010 at 9:24 PM

    You are less cynical than I am, but I do believe scientists and many other people, regardless of careers or backgrounds, do seek knowledge and truth. Just not a majority of people.

    Many people seek nothing more than affirmation of their existing biases and cultural expectations. In some academic circles the claim is that all knowledge is socially constructed, there is no "truth," and connections are transient. When you teach such things to college students for decades, relativism is bound to affect judgment. A generation told there is no right or wrong, only cultural norms, is more likely to lose its moral and ethical grounding.

    This is probably why I like dealing with the hard sciences. The answers are out there, even if we don't always know them.

    ReplyDelete
  3. melboAugust 10, 2011 at 6:37 AM

    I like the way you think, CS. Great blog by the way.

    ReplyDelete

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