Every now and then something pops into my inbox which is such an affront to ethics, reason, and public health that I’m not sure how to address it. The best thing to do, I figure, is to highlight it. This is one of those times.
Stephanie Messenger is an anti-vaccination zealot from Queensland. She is currently giving seminars under the banner of “informed choice” information (red flag right there).
Messenger has written a book. A book for children:
Melanie’s Marvellous Measles
a children’s story
written byStephanie Messenger
This book takes children aged 4 – 10 years on a journey of discovering about the ineffectiveness of vaccinations, while teaching them to embrace childhood disease, heal if they get a disease, and build their immune systems naturally.
This thing doesn’t so much need debunking as outing. Measles can be deadly. Recent outbreaks in Australia, the US, and New Zealand are all traced back to unvaccinated individuals. The overwhelming majority of those infected are unvaccinated or undervaccinated individuals. In Europe there have been several deaths this year alone.
Stephanie Messenger is a friend and colleague of Meryl Dorey and her Australian Vaccination Network. Dorey and Messenger have co-written a book together:
For a concise run down on Messenger and her anti-vaccination colleagues, see the excellent Antivaxxers site here and here.
Anti-vaccination advocates are a threat to the health of our children. Speak up about the risks they pose due to their dishonesty, ineptitude, and their incessant refusal to acknowledge facts. Counter them whenever and wherever you see them. They are a public health menace.
Update January 6 2012
Meryl Dorey is selling this book in her online shop.
I am speechless with disgust.
Yep.
Son of a bitch… I NEED TO PUBLISH!
Share away Reuben.
I meant as in publish “The Poxes”…
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Edward Jenner. Spinning. Grave.
Who will save us from anti-vaccine nutters and the homeopaths who will inevitably get in on the Health Bill for a tidy profit.
This is beyond horrible. We are backsliding from a society on track to eliminate childhood disease entirely. and for what? to indulge a segment of society enchanted by their own ignorance. Do these people stage methodical, scientifically valid studies to prove their point? NO. Why not? Here is why: they are full of crap. I cannot believe we are even talking about this in the 21st century. Ideology is apparently a disease every bit as deadly as the worst plague imaginable.
I would say we need a vaccine for Ideology, but they wouldn’t let us give it to them.
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Waiting for part II: Awesome Aids
I must admit, I’m tempted to read this one just so that I can write a parody in which the protagonist dies an agonizing death: the title “Melanie’s Measels Mortality” readily suggests itself.
All joking aside, this is really sick. To me, this is comparable to a children’s book that advocated sticking fingers into electrical sockets or playing with matches.
I read Messenger’s personal site, and apparently she had an infant who died under circumstances which she connected to vaccination. So I feel sorry for her (and for the baby!), and I can understand that the trauma has left her somewhat broken.
Yes, let’s build our immune systems naturally, just like back in the days when 2 kids in 5 never made it to adulthood because of infectious diseases.
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Has she any idea what it’s like to contract these diseases as an adult? Herd immunity won’t protect her children all their lives.
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All this sounds fine, but Stephanie really needs to perform a practical demonstration that will drive home her message loud and clear. How about inoculating herself with half a dozen pathogens and “building her immune system naturally”. If nothing else she would definitely be in line for a Darwin Award.
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One of the tragedies of the skeptical movement is that we often have to witness the very worst of our society. Stephanie Messenger is one of those ‘worst of society’. It make me want to puke.
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Oh dear god. 🙁
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Stephanie Messengers baby died of a congenital disease called Alexander disease.Check the photos. Which she will quickly remove.and google this disease. By blaming vaccinatoin for his death ,she is doing humanity a great disservice.
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