Apparently, Rob Schneider thinks ALL CAPS is a substitute for having a clue: A lower-cased, fact-based rebuttal

Anyone unsure of where Rob Schneider fell on the vaccine conspiracy scale can rest assured: he’s way down there on the sanitation-and-hygiene-wiped-out-infectious-disease-claiming, homeopath-quoting, Louise-Kuo-Habakus-praising end of things. To wit, check out this comment, which he left earlier this morning on my recent Txchnologist piece, “Vaccine denilaism isn’t funny, so why does HuffPost give Rob Schneider a forum?”

This is Rob Schneider.

To quote Bernadine Healy, MD., former director, National Institutes of Health (NIH), “There are unanswered questions about vaccine safety… No one should be threatened by the pursuit of this knowledge.” The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act (“1986 Act”) describes vaccines as “unavoidably unsafe.” FACT, In the last 2 decades more than 2 Billion Dollars has been paid to families of children injured or killed by vaccine injuries, paid by tax payers, (The 1986 Act indemnified Vaccine manufacturer’s against lawsuits).

The bitter truth is 3 out of 4 vaccine victims are turned away without any compensation through THE SPECIAL COURT. The heavy burden is placed on the families to PROVE vaccine injury, not the Vaccine Manufacturer having to prove it’s product’s safety and efficacy.

This is almost the exact opposite of what actually happens in the Vaccine Court, where there is a much lower bar to prove causality than there would be in a regular court of law. The entire Vaccine Court is set up to give the overwhelming benefit of the doubt to parents. I have a whole chapter that deals with this subject in The Panic Virus.

We must challenge the assumption that vaccination mandates are strictly necessary for the public good. These mandates have not been studied empirically.

This is false. Vaccines are probably the most studied public health intervention in history. That’s why we know, beyond any doubt, that there is no causal connection between vaccines and autism. Check out the Institute of Medicine’s August 2011 report, “Adverse Effects of Vaccines: Evidence and Causality” for a discussion of some of these hundreds of studies. (You could also flip through the 100 pages of bibliography and source notes I included in my book.)

INFECTIOUS DISEASE MORTALITY HAD A PRECIPITOUS AND SUSTAINED DECLINE DURING THE ENTIRE TWENTIETH CENTURY! BEFORE THE ADVENT OF FEDERAL VACCINATION POLICY.

These two things — the beneficial effect of public sanitation on public health and the ability of vaccines to protect against infectious diseases — are not mutually exclusive. Tougher drunk driving laws and safer cars are both factors in lowering fatal car accidents…or, to put it in terms Schneider might be able to better understand: An unusually hot summer and a big blockbuster hit could both effect movie ticket sales. So while it’s undeniably true that many public health efforts played a role in, for instance, the decline in measles, it was vaccines that all but wiped out the disease in the US. But don’t take my word for it — here are the facts! In between 1917 and 1919, the civilian population in the US had more than a million measles infections and more than 21,000 measles deaths. In the 1950s, the number of infections had been cut basically in half and the number of annual deaths was around 500. Then, in 1963, the measles vaccine was introduced:Figure and data in previous graph from: Hinman, et al., “Impact of Measles in the United States,” Review of Infectious Diseases, Vol. 5, No. 3. (May-June 1983), pp. 439-444.)

Health officials attributed these gains to the significant investments the country made in modern sanitation and hygiene infrastructure.

Really? What “health officials” are you talking about? Because I don’t know any public health official who has said that vaccines have not been a major factor in the decline in infectious disease in the twentieth century.

Furthermore, the government must prove that those who are vaccinated will be harmed by those who are NOT vaccinated.

Is Julieanna Metcalf, a fully vaccinated girl who was placed in a medically induced coma after being infected with Hib, proof enough for you? How about the San Diego infant who was too young to have been fully vaccinated who caught measles after one of Bob Sears’s unvaccinated patients was infected while on vacation in Switzerland? Or maybe you’d like to talk to some of the parents whose infants have died of pertussis?

The Government surrenders it’s moral authority when it requires children to receive vaccines it knows will cause death or permanent injury to some.

Ten infants died of pertussis in California, your home state, in 2010. There have been Hib deaths in the US and measles deaths in the UK over the past several years. This is reality, not the paranoid ravings of conspiracy theorists; the government would surrender its moral authority if it ignored these facts.

There needs to be an open public debate.

There has been an open public debate — for years and years and years. The sad fact that places like The Huffington Post give you attention is evidence that there continues to be a public debate long after the answers have come in. Just because you or Jenny McCarthy or Generation Rescue or any of the other vaccine denialist groups out there haven’t gotten the answer you want doesn’t mean there hasn’t been a debate.

Vaccines can be a useful tool against disease.

We agree!

But there needs to be procedures put into place to test those who may be VULNERABLE to the very real side effects of this invasive medical procedure and the increasing toxic load placed on these small people.

What increasing toxic load are you talking about? Due to our improved understanding of immunology, vaccines have many times fewer immunogenic proteins today than at any time in the past. When you were growing up, you received more than 3,000 immunogenic proteins; children today receive less than 150. (On the off chance that math is not your strong suit, 150 is five percent of 3,000 — which means it’s much, much smaller.)

Unfortunately, mandated vaccination represents a limitation on basic human rights.
Thank you,
Rob Schneider, Father.

Hey, guess what — I’m a father too! So is Levi Johnston and Barack Obama and Jack White and Stephen Colbert. The fact that we’ve all successfully procreated doesn’t give us any special knowledge into vaccines, infectious disease, or public health.

Please read “The Vaccine Guide” by Randall Neustaedter OMD

I love Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark! Oh, wait — that stands for “Oriental medical doctor,” doesn’t it? I have a better idea: If you want to read about vaccines, how about reading a book by an actual immunologist like Paul Offit?

and “Vaccine Epidemic” by Louise Kuo Habakus, MA and Mary Holland, JD (research scholar, NYU School of Law)

I’ve spent many hours with Louise, and have read “Vaccine Epidemic,” a book which includes a contribution from, and several celebrations of, Andrew Wakefield. If you believe that the CDC is made up of Nazi stormtroopers who spend their every waking moment dreaming about ways to maim and kill innocent children, this is definitely the book for you!

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