Meryl Dorey is the gift that keeps on giving. Today she posted this remarkable comment, which deserves some remarks:
I am yet to see any evidence of confirmed death or disability caused by HPV vaccines. I would like Dorey to provide some: she has been asked over and over, but, cannot come up with anything apart from anti-vaccination propaganda.
The CDC has an excellent, concise page on the safety of the HPV vaccines here. It includes an explanation of the limitations of VAERS (the main source for anti-vaccination misinformation regarding the HPV vaccines) :
VAERS Limitations
VAERS data cannot be used to prove a causal association between the vaccine and the adverse event. The only association between the adverse event and vaccination is temporal, meaning that the adverse event occurred sometime after vaccination. Therefore, the adverse event may be coincidental or it may have been caused by vaccination, however we cannot make any conclusions that the events reported to VAERS were caused by the vaccine.
The page also has this extremely important paragraph on deaths falsely attributed to the vaccine:
Deaths
As of September 15, 2011, there have been a total 71 VAERS reports of death among those who have received Gardasil®. There were 57 reports among females, 3 were among males, and 11 were reports of unknown gender. Thirty four of the total death reports have been confirmed and 37 remain unconfirmed due to no identifiable patient information in the report such as a name and contact information to confirm the report. A death report is confirmed (verified) after a medical doctor reviews the report and any associated records. In the 34 reports confirmed, there was no unusual pattern or clustering to the deaths that would suggest that they were caused by the vaccine and some reports indicated a cause of death unrelated to vaccination.
There is just no evidence that what Dorey and other anti-vaccinationists claim is true.
As for the “vaccine steamroller” comment: well, there’s only one thing anyone can possibly do with such an absurdity:
Really…
Gather up the chidrens, but, remember to panic. You must panic.