Category: Health

Scare tactics and lies don't help; reasonable concern does

Posted on by Suki

A correspondent sent me a link to this video on YouTube. It’s a pretty good summary of what anti-vaccine activists are saying, so in case you’re wondering, you should go and watch it. But you might want to read on, first.

Child receiving polio vaccine, 1958

I have to admit that I could only watch about half of the video because it follows the template for all scare tactics these days: First of all, get people who seem to have great titles but no stated credentials in the subject matter; second, raise questions about something that is not even being done yet just to scare people; and third, cite  evidence (“two papers”) that showed adverse effects without any information about who put together that evidence and where it was published.

When I graduated with a master’s in creative writing, there wasn’t much work out there for me. So I ended up doing what most writers do…I got a job teaching Freshman English. My second job was at Cal State Hayward (now CSU East Bay), where one of the classes I taught required me to teach all the basics of argumentation. (Yeah, it’s true, my family did say, “Wow, you are SO qualified to teach people how to argue!”)

Ever since teaching that class, I have noticed fallacies (false arguments) everywhere. Fallacies are the sneaky ways people have had for arguing since the beginning of time. You might recognize some of them: “post hoc ergo propter hoc” (this thing happened after that thing, therefore that thing caused this thing); “ad hominem” (if the information comes from this person it must be wrong because of some attribute of this person), etc.

This video is rampant with errors in argumentation. It is a perfect example of what is being done to mislead people. Instead of considering the real problems and the real way to solve them, they just want to shock people so that they won’t use their logical brains to question whether the information they are being given is reasonable.

Here are just a few problems with the video: They didn’t ask anyone who actually works in the fields of epidemiology or vaccine research to respond to the statements being made. They didn’t back up any of the most extreme statements with large-scale, well-run studies (probably because there aren’t any that back up their statements). They pull out old scary stories that have, in fact, been studied on a large scale. The “vaccines cause autism” argument, for example. Scientists who understand epidemiology are just plain done with that theory. It doesn’t pan out. Rates of vaccination in this country are going down, yet autism continues to rise. Huge amounts of money have been poured into enormous studies, and they still can’t prove a correlation.

Then there’s the incredible body of facts they ignore. Just to test it, let’s just say that some of the problems they say are caused by vaccines are true. Let’s agree that some cases of autism, some chronic illesses, and some other problems they mention are directly caused by vaccine. Then look at this country without vaccines: is the result better or worse than with no vaccines?

It’s easy to go back to pre-WWII and look at statistics. Child mortality from whooping cough, measles, mumps. Lifelong injury or death from polio. The agonizing pain of the longterm effects of all those diseases. And on and on. So the question is, are things better now, or without vaccines?

Even if I accepted that all the things they say vaccines cause are true, I can’t agree with their assertion that things have gotten worse. Even if there are those many side-effects of vaccines, the end result is that we live healthier, longer lives now.

This is the analogy that has been in my head lately: I find out (as I would pretty often just by reading the paper) that a child was hit by a car walking to school. I don’t want my child to be killed. So of course the logical response to that is not to send my child to school, right?

That’s the logic that anti-vaccine people are using. They seem to think that it’s better to let children die than to immunize and do serious, rigorous studies of the effects. If the preservatives in vaccines are causing illness, then yes, they need to be changed. But all the noise they’re making hides the real questions that need to be sorted out. They’re scaring people instead of asking them to make reasonable demands that our government do serious work on making vaccines safer. And the noise these people are making drowns out the considerably quieter and more reasonable voices of those who have very real concerns about making vaccines safe.

I just wrote an article about what the Department of Health and Human Services is doing to look at this question in relation to the swine flu vaccine that is presently being distributed. This is the right approach. Scaring people, telling them lies, and trotting out conspiracy theories (a fellow video on that YouTube page had a great one!) won’t help anyone, and it won’t make us stronger or smarter.

Understanding how scientists make decisions about your child's health

Posted on by Suki

There’s been a theme running through conversations I’ve had lately. I and some of my more scientific friends have been noticing a general lack of understanding about how science works and what makes the scientific method worth considering.

First, a caveat. We all know that doctors have been wrong. So giving examples of when a medical approach turned out to be wrong doesn’t actually cancel out any of the information below. In fact, it confirms it. Science can handle mistakes — magic can’t.

So here’s the scientific method in a nutshell: Scientists noticed that if they could get a large sample of a phenomenon (let’s use human disease in this case), they could make general predictions for everyone based on that sample. So for example, all the knowledge we have about the basic vitamins in our diet came from observations like the ones we (hopefully) learned about in elementary school: Chinese sailors getting rickets, children getting vitamin D deficiency in wintertime. [Read more about the scientific method here.]

The scientific method says this: You make a hypothesis (a guess) based on your observations. You test that hypothesis in a double-blind test, where the people involved don’t know whether they’re getting the real treatment or a placebo (for example, a sugar pill instead of a medication). Then you look at the results. Did the people in the control group react in the same way as the people being given the real medicine? If so, the “real” medicine is a failure. If not, it’s a success. A good scientist is perfectly happy to prove that her guess was wrong.

So here’s a real-life example: American communities used to be devastated by polio. Children and adults died or were maimed for life. Then Jonas Salk developed a vaccine for polio. It was tested on a group of people, who were then compared to a group that didn’t get it. Amazingly different results: the vaccine worked. Soon practically everyone in this country was being vaccinated against polio, and now we live in a time when no one who now has small children remembers the devastating effects of polio on their community.

Until 1999, the polio vaccine was “live” and thus caused some polio symptoms in a small amount of children (many fewer than were affected before the vaccine). Since then, all polio vaccines are dead and there have been NO cases of vaccine-induced polio in children in the United States. (Polio, however, does still exist in the world, and the amount of unvaccinated children in our community makes it possible that it will return here.)

So how does this relate to the great interest people have had lately in alternative medicine? The thing you need to remember is that science does not negate community wisdom, but it can test community wisdom, which is very important.

So a good example is St. John’s Wort, an old remedy for depression. It has been tested and retested. The studies don’t all agree. So should we ignore them and assume they’re wrong? No — this is just a good example of the scientific method in action. Some studies have shown moderate benefits from St. John’s Wort, many have shown no benefit, and just a handful make it seem as effective as modern anti-depressants. So it’s clear that scientists need to keep working on this to be more definitive. But on a personal level, it means that you might want to try St. John’s Wort and see if it works for you. And if it doesn’t, there are other medications available.

Community wisdom was not able to test this age-old remedy. Science is in the process of doing so.

We have a number of medical doctors in our community who also work with “alternative” medicine — a better term is integrative medicine because it can be a good partner to Western medical techniques. I wrote an article about Lucy Hu of 7 Branches. She is a Western medical-trained doctor who works as an acupuncturist. Rachel Abrams is an MD who started a clinic that incorporates various types of medicine. These people understand that an integrated approach is better for everyone.

Finally, I wanted to address the question of group vs. individual decisions. The scientific method is what’s used by our public health officials to make decisions like the recent one to try to get all children vaccinated against this year’s H1N1. (Read H1N1 information here.) Their decisions are based on which alternative makes the most sense over a large population. Sometimes those decisions seem wrong on a personal level, but that doesn’t change the fact that the decision was made with the larger population in mind.

All the recent studies done lately to analyze whether early childhood vaccinations caused autism are pretty clearly negative. Over large groups of kids, there is no evidence that vaccines caused problems. But that does not actually refer to any one situation. It is completely consistent with that result that one child’s autism could, in fact, have been triggered by vaccines. What the research says is for the larger group: It’s still safer for your child’s longterm health to get vaccinations. Saying that no child should get vaccinations because one child was hurt by them is like saying that no child should walk to school because one child was hit by a car while walking to school. It makes no sense, and if you made all your decisions that way, you might end up living in a padded cell.

I read a really great piece in the New Yorker about fear of vaccines and its roots in a swine flu scare in the 70’s. Definitely worth reading (if it’s still available when you read this). The writer says that some parents have been having “swine flu parties” like some do for chicken pox (another disease that can be debilitating or fatal).

The facts are out there if you want to know them. If you don’t, then you’re making your choice and you will live with the consequences, as we always say to our kids! And it’s very possible that there won’t be any consequences. The scientific method tells us that.

No matter what you choose on an emotional and personal level, the scientific method will be there to test whether it’s a logical decision for large numbers of people.

Gifted misunderstandings

Posted on by Suki

A friend forwarded me a link to this article. I think she thought that I wasn’t busy enough this weekend, and that instead of cleaning the toilets and vacuuming (which is what I’m supposed to be doing right now), I should write a passioned response to yet another blogger who doesn’t get it!

She was right. I would much rather write about education than clean toilets…

The article is about how “gifted” children really aren’t any different than other children and shouldn’t be given special educational opportunities. The writer compares giftedness with getting teeth early, and says that just as it’s ridiculous to give special dental care to a child who got his teeth early, it’s ridiculous to give special educational attention to kids who read early.

I heartily agree with that. But the problem is, reading early is not equivalent to what “gifted” really means. And the problem starts with that word, which I like to refer to as “the G-word.”

Parents of “gifted” children talk often about how that word doesn’t work. It implies that other children are “not gifted,” which is misleading. Public schools have also missed the boat on what “gifted” means, and they are more and more often missing the boat for all other kids, too.

A better term for the kids referred to as gifted is “neuro-nontypical.” They learn differently than other kids. They are often awful students. They have a higher drop-out rate than neuro-typical students. They do not cease being neuro-nontypical in fifth grade — if they do, then the assessment of the child was not done correctly.

What characterizes a neuro-nontypical kid is not reading early or doing math early: it’s how they think and learn. Even the ones who do well in school are often miserable, because our standard way of teaching goes about it all wrong for neuro-nontypical kids. Lots of neuro-nontypical kids seem delayed like Einstein did. Those kids seldom get picked up by public school gifted programs.

I completely agree that each child should have her own “IEP.” Unfortunately, that’s just not possible over a huge population. Some small private schools and special public school programs can do that. All homeschoolers (many of whom are homeschooling because their kids are neuro-nontypical) do it by default.

If you want to learn more about what “gifted” is and why these kids need a different educational approach, I suggest Serving the Emotional Needs of the Gifted as a great resource. Being a neuro-nontypical kid is hard! And if you have a neuro-nontypical kid and need help educating her, The Gifted Homeschoolers Forum is a great place to start.

Also, remember that saying that we should deny an appropriate education for one group because you don’t think another group is getting one is much like one oppressed minority group saying help shouldn’t be given to another minority group.

All kids do need and deserve an appropriate, loving education in which their weaknesses are addressed and their strengths are supported. Parents who are obsessed with their kids’ early reading or math skills are definitely doing a disservice to their child. But parents who try to change the school system so that it better serves their children are doing what ALL parents should do.

It’s the parents who don’t watch out for their kids’ needs who allow our public schools to slide further into mediocrity.

Scientists need help! Moms to the rescue!

Posted on by Suki

I read recently that scientists are hard at work in laboratories trying to make the H1N1 (swine) flu virus become more virulent. They are trying to figure out whether it could become more virulent on its own by trying to force it to do so in the lab. Some of these scientists may be moms, but they seem to have forgotten the lessons they’ve learned outside of the lab.

Any mom on the front lines of child rearing could have told them they were going about it all the wrong way! You can’t force a small being to do anything you want it to do. Instead, moms suggest that scientists follow some simple techniques culled from parenting manuals past and present:

Method #1: The Two Choices

Everyone knows that little beings want to have choices, and viruses are no different. Tell the viruses what their choices are: mutate in the way I want which would be really cool and I’ll iron a Superman S onto your t-shirt, or you can choose to spend the rest of your life inside a pig’s gall bladder. Which do you prefer?

Method #2: Distraction

Hey, H1N1! Look at that cool bacteria over there! Isn’t its mutation cool?

Method #3: Consequences

Look here, H1N1, do what I tell you or there are going to be consequences. I’m going to make sure if you don’t mutate right now, you’re going to spend the rest of your life** in a pig’s gall bladder.

Method #4: Counting*

*Can be used in combination with other methods

OK, H1N1, I’m going to count to three, and if you haven’t mutated…

Method #5: Corporal Punishment

Yeah, I know we got rid of this in schools. But nobody said it’s wrong to do in a lab! The only problem will be finding a ruler small enough… and finding the virus’s tushie.

Method #6: Positive Discipline

Oh, H1N1, you know how I love you, and how it would be so great if we could be positive and happy so let’s cuddle for a bit before you do exactly what I told you to do.

Method #7: The Scream*

*Usually follows method #6

MUTATE NOW YOU PUDGY LITTLE INFLUENZA A VIRUS SUBTYPE H1N1 OR I’LL, WELL, I WON’T TELL YOU WHAT I’LL DO!!!

Method #8: Attachment Parenting

Remember that the virus is also a being with needs of its own. Get down to its level and be with it so that you can understand why it doesn’t want to do what you know it’s going to have to do even if you have to resort to Method #5.

Method #9: Trust the Virus

Though it can take longer than you’d like, trust little H1N1 to do what it naturally will and be secure in your knowledge that you didn’t force anything. Everything H1N1 did was its own free choice, which is beautiful, even if it mutates into the meanest killer virus in history.

I hope that this quick primer is helpful to our brave scientists, who are sacrificing their time and creative energy trying to unlock the psychological mysteries of little beings who, they believe, are unfathomably complicated. Those of us working with rather larger little beings know that, in fact, those scientists may be more educated, but we are the ones they should turn to when they’re dealing with the mysteries of the stubborn minds of small beings. Perhaps next we can turn to cancer as our subject, though we may be out of time because the two-year-old has just constructed the Empire State Building in our living room with all of our fancy shoes from those long-ago years of freedom and simplicity.

**Note: Viruses aren’t actually alive, per se, but with cantankerous small beings it’s not advised to split hairs or to say anything to which they can answer, “No, I’m not!”

Swine flu facts

Posted on by Suki

Is your school going completely nuts about the H1N1 (swine) flu yet? No? Just wait…

OK, it’s true that my son’s school has not yet broke out in swine-flu hives, but my daughter’s homeschool program does seem to have the rumblings of a controversy, so I thought I’d write about it and hopefully point a few people in the direction of trustworthy information before the rumor mill gets crazy.

Here’s the scoop: we thought we had a family with H1N1. That family went into isolation, and kids who had been with the family the day before the virus broke out skipped a gathering just to be sure, and all seemed to be taken care of with great seriousness and proper precautions, but then…

Fact #1: You can’t actually find out within any reasonable time if you have H1N1. The notoriously faulty test the family had been given at Dominican said positive. The very reliable test done at Stanford, which takes up to a week for results, said negative. Not just for H1N1, mind you, but for flu at all. An entire family went into seclusion over the common cold.

That should be well enough. The family is back. But then we hear by e-mail that another homeschool program is spreading a rumor that swine flu is running rampant through our community. Or something like that. Don’t quote me: I heard it second-hand. But it’s like that game of “telephone”…

Fact #2: The people to believe are the medical professionals. Your friend may be well-meaning in telling you something, but don’t freak out over it, OK? For really good information about the flu in Santa Cruz, visit the SC Health Agency or talk to your doctor (MD).

A lot of people are getting really freaked out about swine flu because it’s more dangerous than standard flu for children. The dangerous part is true — it’s the “freaked out” part that’s not good. Instead of getting freaked out, parents need to educate themselves.

Fact #3: Our yearly flu is dangerous, too. You might not have noticed this, but read my article at Examiner.com for details. There are links there to very reliable flu information.

Fact #4: Flu vaccinations are safe and effective. They are given to bazzilions of people worldwide every year. Whether or not you choose to get them is up to you, of course, but you might want to consider getting them for your children this year, especially if they have health problems.

Fact #5: It is true that this flu is new and thus the vaccine is “untested.” But it won’t hurt your child. It’s the same old type of vaccine people have been getting for the usual flu. The difference is that we don’t have antibodies to this new H1N1 variety, so we might need more than one dose to give us immunity. That’s the part that’s “untested” about it.

So you’d think we’d all breathe a sigh of relief now that we know that the family in our program didn’t have H1N1, but of course, people are still freaked out. New things are scary. But there are some very easy things you can do to take care of your family.

Fact #6: Flu is spread through bodily fluids touching your mouth or nose. Make sure that kids are educated to sneeze and cough into their sleeves and wash regularly. If you keep your hands clean at all times, and your kids’ hands, you can reduce your risk substantially. Case in point: one of the kids in the family with the common cold goes rather overboard with hand-washing. She didn’t get sick. She was living with four other sick people, and she’s fine.

Fact #7: People can spread the flu virus before they become symptomatic, so fact #6 is the most important thing to remember in protecting your family.

Fact #8: This, I think, is the most important thing to remember for the benefit of your school culture: giving someone a virus is the one bad thing you can do to someone and not feel bad about. Viruses want to be passed around, that’s what they live for. If your child is not showing symptoms (fever, aches, cough, sore throat, chills), send him to school. If he comes down with the flu the next day, don’t beat yourself up about it.

Fact #9: So-called “stomach flu” (which is not a flu virus at all) is usually viral as well, and highly contagious. If you’ve got it, stay home.

Fact #10: Only go to the doctor if there’s a problem! Medical offices are going to be swamped with sick, scared families, so if it’s just a little fever and sniffles, stay home, eat some chicken soup, and rent a good video.

Keep healthy, keep safe, and above all, stay calm. Let’s all have a happy, healthy, sneezy season.

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