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Herb Rothschild Jr.: Spreading the risk of vaccination ... Ticket Availability ... Guest Opinion: Allegations unfair to Dr. Tomashefsky ... Herb Rothschild Jr.: Spreading the risk of vaccination ... Ticket Availability ... RELOCATIONS Herb Rothschild Jr.: Spreading the risk of vaccination Comment DailyTidings.com Writer Posted Apr. 18, 2015 at 12:01 AM Posted Apr. 18, 2015 at 12:01 AM » Social News My starting point last week was the difference between English law, with its focus on the individual, and Roman law, with its emphasis on community cohesion and cooperation among individuals. I then showed how this difference plays out in the “right to work” versus “union shop” debate. I promised that today I would show how it plays out in an issue more salient in Ashland these days, the compulsory vaccination of children. I begin by assuming that you don’t believe the most alarming but thoroughly discredited claims about early childhood vaccinations, such as they increase the risk of autism. If you are wedded to these beliefs and you usually like my columns, I suggest you stop reading this one and restart next week, because I’m not interested in arguing with you. Rather, my intention is to keep us thinking about what we prioritize as we live with others. If there were no risks associated with immunization programs, and thus no calculation of their costs-to-benefits ratio, this inquiry wouldn’t be worth conducting. Our choice would be obvious. But there are risks associated with vaccinations, just as there are risks with every drug. So what’s a parent to do? Unlike the decision to use other prescribed drugs, weighing the costs and benefits of vaccinations requires us, if we are morally responsible people, to acknowledge our situation as members of a community. Few other people will be affected by our choice to use or not use a blood thinner. Millions potentially will be affected by our choice of using or refusing the vaccine to prevent poliomyelitis. And there is a corollary consideration. Even if we don’t vaccinate our children, they will be protected from the risks of our choice as long as the large majority of other parents vaccinate theirs. This reality is analogous to the one I discussed last week — as long as most employees are in a union strong enough to negotiate good wages and benefits for the workforce, an employee who chooses not to join the union nevertheless enjoys the fruits of the contract. It’s only when enough people act on their perceived individual self-interest (e.g. not paying dues to the union, not running the risks of vaccination) that the collective weakens and the costs of the individual choices manifest themselves. You may think we can cut through this complexity by asserting that the consequences of individual choice are also individual, not collective. That is, if measles strikes, those who have been vaccinated run no risk; only those who haven’t will be vulnerable. Oddly, that’s not the way immunity works. In “On Immunity: An Inoculation,” Eula Biss points to the failure of the Hepatitis B immunization program when it targeted only babies of high-risk populations like drug addicts or prostitutes. Only when it was recommended for all newborns did the rates of infection drop, and it’s now nearly eliminated in children. Key to collective immunity, it seems, is that almost all human (and often animal) reservoirs of contagious pathogens be eliminated. Biss quotes her pediatrician father saying that immunity “is a common trust as much as it is a private account.” I won’t presume to tell parents what choice to make for their children (which itself raises a moral issue). I’ll only note, first, that it would be a needless tragedy if diseases like whooping cough and polio returned, and second, that relying on others to take risks we consider unwarranted for ourselves violates my sense of justice. Herb Rothschild Jr. is chairman of the board of Peace House.   DailyTidings.com Writer Posted Apr. 18, 2015 at 12:01 AM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. calendar Connect with DailyTidings.com Facebook Twitter RSS Back to top Reader Services Reader Services home Subscriptions Subscriber controls Contact us Submissions Photos Events Letters to the editor Corrections Alerts Email alerts RSS feeds Text Alerts Advertise Media Kit Home Products and services Ad rates Advertising contacts Mail Tribune Daily Tidings The Nickel Shop Our Valley Blogs Stay Informed Email newsletter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Your privacy is important, read our privacy policy. © Copyright 2015 Local Media Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 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