A Critical Look at Vaccination

The overwhelming view presented to the public by mainstream science and medicine as well as the media is that immunisation is a safe, scientific procedure which protects and safeguards health. Historically, the story of vaccination and immunisation is one of sweeping claims coupled with apparent successes, tragic failures, and, in some (albeit rare) instances, actual distortion of objective evidence. The motives involved touch on the best and worst of human nature, as well as on professional short-sightedness and unwillingness to question currently held "truths". This is a trait in medicine as in all orthodox professions, but it prevents truths from penetrating to mainstream practice for many years longer than is really necessary.

Current methods of immunisation include the use of live vaccines (this involves inactivated forms of the micro-organisms responsible for the particular disease). The diseases which are "protected against" by the use of live vaccines include measles, rubella, tuberculosis, polio and yellow fever. The main killed vaccines used relate to diseases such as cholera, influenza, typhoid and paratyphoid, whooping cough, anthrax and rabies.

The dependency on immunisation to give protection against disease misses the key factor in the equation — the individual’s immune system. Much of the thinking behind the concept of vaccination stems from a philosophical belief of the causation of disease, which perverts our understanding of the innate, self-regulating mechanisms of the body. The ability of the body to protect itself against infection is, of course, closely linked to underlying levels of well-being and immune efficiency. This means that arguments for reliance on a healthy and efficient immune system to offer protection, which makes perfect sense when discussing a child in good health, with optimal nutrition, becomes far less meaningful in relation to a malnourished child.

Is immunisation safe?

• Dr Archie Kalokerinos: "There has only been one controlled trial of smallpox vaccine and that was in the Philippines at the turn of the century when they were under Australian control. The figures were clearly startling. There were twice as many deaths amongst the vaccinated as amongst the unvaccinated. The only people who got smallpox twice were the vaccinated ones.
• Between 1973 and 1984 one quarter of all reported cases of paralytic polio occurred soon after vaccination, with 94% of these after the first dose of oral vaccine. 36% occurred in people who were in contact with vaccinated children, with 82% of these after the contact person had received the first dose of oral vaccine.
• In 1982 and 1983 all cases of paralytic poliomyelitis in the USA were vaccine associated. Only one case caused by wild virus has been reported. (Centres for Disease Control, Atlanta, Georgia)
• An outbreak of paralytic polio occurred in Germany in the early 1980’s following a vaccination campaign. The investigation into this concluded that diphtheria-whooping cough-tetanus injections should not be given at the same time as the live polio vaccine because of the risk of triggering "provocation polio". (A practice which is still in use today!)
• Dr Robert Mendelsohn states after extensive research that "the use of either, live or killed virus, in vaccines will increase, not diminish, the possibility that your child will contract the disease. In short it appears that the most effective way to protect your child from polio is to make sure that he doesn’t get the vaccine."
• Reports in the US suggest that one out of every 100,000 children receiving mumps vaccination will develop meningitis as a direct result. A study in Yugoslavia puts the figure at an astonishing one in 1000. British experience has been equally dramatic — with a suggestion of between one child in 4,000 to 11,000 likely to develop meningitis following a form of mumps vaccination.
• Drs Kalokerinos and Mendelsohn say that the measles vaccine itself carries a high risk of producing encephalitis, as well as other serious conditions such as subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, which is almost always fatal, involving as it does a hardening of the brain substance. There is also evidence that measles vaccination may produce such severe reactions as ataxia (lack of co-ordination of movement), mental retardation, meningitis, convulsions, one-sided paralysis and blindness.
• From "Science" magazine in America (26-3-1977): "The HEW reported in 1970 that as much as 26% of children receiving rubella vaccination, in national testing programs, developed arthralgia or arthritis. Many had to seek medical attention and some were hospitalised to test for rheumatic fever and rheumatoid arthritis. In New Jersey this same testing program showed that 17% of all children vaccinated developed arthralgia and arthritis. — The report points out that during the previous year there had been, in the entire USA, 87 cases of congenital birth defects, resulting from rubella infection in the expectant mother, but that the figures quoted above indicated that in the state of New Jersey alone 340,000 children were placed at risk of serious ill-health by virtue of immunisation against the disease which had resulted in but 12 cases of birth defect in that state in the previous year."
• Glen Dettman PhD is quoted in the book "Dangers of Immunisation" as describing a figure of 30% of adults in Canada, given rubella vaccine, suffering from arthritic attacks within four weeks. Some of these were crippling in intensity. Dr Dettman states that live rubella viruses have been found in one third of children and adults suffering from rheumatoid arthritis.
• It is often possible to isolate the virus from affected joints in children, vaccinated against rubella, many months after vaccination. Similarly, it is often possible to isolate rubella viruses from the peripheral blood of women with prolonged arthritis, which followed vaccination. These viruses were found up to eight years after the vaccination procedure, although there had been a normal immune response. This, it is suggested, could account for the chronic joint problems of many people.
• The greatest threat of rubella is to the unborn child and one would anticipate that obstetricians would be sure to have had immunisation to prevent them infecting their female patients. The American Medical Association Journal reported that more than 90% of the obstetricians and gynaecologists had refused vaccination.
• Professor Stewart writes in the British Medical Journal in 1983: "Pertussis (whooping cough) vaccine has a consistent record in the published work, and in the unpublished reports since 1933, of neurotoxic and other sequelae unmatched by other vaccines long before there was any adverse publicity about it in the media." Professor Stewart concludes that the risks of vaccination to first-born babies in the average household are as great as those of catching whooping cough itself.
• It was noted by Dr William Torch, of the University of Nevada School of Medicine, that the DPT (diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus vaccine) might be responsible for many cot deaths. He noted in one survey that two thirds of 103 children who died of cot death had been immunised with DPT vaccine within the previous three weeks.
• Professor Stewart’s views on the dangers of pertussis vaccination in 1980 were as follows: "If reference be made to events in the USA and UK at the time of the earlier trials of pertussis vaccine when given alone, it becomes clear that the inclusion of pertussis vaccine makes the triple vaccine (DPT) much more likely to be followed by adverse reactions involving heart and nervous system. Such reactions include shock, collapse, convulsions and screaming fits, all of which had been recorded in some children who received pertussis vaccine alone in the earlier trials."
• A study undertaken in 1979 at the University of California Los Angeles under the sponsorship of the Food and Drug Administration, and subsequently confirmed by other studies, suggests that in the USA approximately 1,000 infants die annually as a direct result of DPT vaccination, and these are classified as cot deaths. These represent about 10 to 15 per cent of the total number of cot deaths occurring annually in the USA (between 8,000 and 10.000 depending on which statistics are used).
• The question is raised by Dr Robert Simpson of Rutgers University, New Jersey, and others as to whether the introduction of viruses of influenza, mumps, polio and so on to the body in vaccination programmes may not be "seeding" humans with virus RNA. This would allow the development of proviruses which could lie dormant anywhere in the body. The activation of these at a later stage might, it is thought, be responsible for such diseases as multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, cancer and others.
• The health histories of over 3,500 people who had received measles vaccination in 1964 were evaluated and compared with the histories of over 11,000 people who had not been vaccinated against measles and around 2,500 of the partners of the vaccinated individuals (a total of over 17,000 people altogether). The results showed that measles vaccination leads to a 300% increased risk of developing Crohn’s disease and a 250% greater chance of ulcerative colitis.

In normal circumstances infection and contact with micro-organisms takes place via a series of interconnected events, which results in the activation of cell changes that prepares the B-lymphocytes to recognise and deactivate (or attempt to do so) any invader which reappears. This is what takes place when, in childhood, the normal diseases of this stage of life are overcome, one by one. By adult life immunity to these diseases will have been achieved, and it is estimated that only a small portion of the immune system’s capacity will have been committed and used in this defence mode, whereby B-lymphocytes can only recognise and challenge those pathogenic invaders previously responded to. The rest of the immune function remains free to deal with new challenges.

When, however, the immune system is artificially challenged via immunisation methods, in which toxic material is injected into the bloodstream (not the way things happen in normal infection), a far larger commitment is called forth. It is estimated that as much as 70% of all immune capacity may be thus committed (as opposed to only between three and seven per cent — committed as a result of normal acquired previous infections). The consequences of this excess commitment of immune functions are unknown. But the chances are that impairment of the immune system results, leaving the individual more susceptible to infection of other sorts, more prone to allergic response, and with greater chance of disturbed immune function diseases.

Modern vaccines have been suggested as a major factor in the growing tendency towards allergy, involving both mind and body. Among other diseases which have been directly related to this sort of immune system assault are Cot Death and Multiple Sclerosis. In normal infections (i.e. not vaccination) the immune system responds to antigens of various sorts in an ordered and efficient manner. In artificial stimulation by vaccination the response is abnormal and unnatural.

Is vaccination effective?

• By the middle of the 20^th century there was evidence that smallpox was already in slow and progressive decline and that smallpox vaccination was causing more deaths than the disease itself. Its incidence dropped in all parts of Europe, whether or not vaccination was being or had been employed.
• Tuberculosis reached its peak over two generations. In New York the death rate was certainly very high indeed in 1812, but had declined to 37 per 1,000 by 1892, when Koch cultured and stained the first bacillus. The rate was down to 18 per 1,000 when the first sanatorium opened in 1912. After World War II, before antibiotics came into general use, it had slipped to 5 per 1,000.
• Cholera, dysentery and typhoid similarly peaked and dwindled outside medical control. By the time their aetiology was understood, or their therapy had become specific, they had lost much of their relevance.
• The combined death rate for scarlet fever, diphtheria, whooping cough and measles from 1860 to 1965 for children up to 15 years of age shows that nearly 90% of the total decline in the death rate over this period had occurred before the introduction of antibiotics and widespread immunisation against diphtheria.

The explanation for this decline could relate to altered virulence in the micro-organisms themselves as well as improved sanitation, better housing and, of course, greater resistance to disease, due to improved nutrition.

• Dr Bernard Greenberg, head of the Department of Biostatistics at the University of North Carolina School of Public Health, has gone on record to say that cases of polio increased by 50% between 1957 and 1958 and by 80% between 1958 and 1959 after the introduction of mass immunisation. In five New England states cases of polio roughly doubled after polio vaccine was introduced. Nevertheless in the midst of the polio panic of the 1950’s, with pressure to find a magic bullet, health authorities, to give the opposite Impression, manipulated statistics. Cases of polio were renamed as "aseptic meningitis" or coxsackie virus infection. Doctors often simply do not believe that what they are seeing is a disease, which has been protected against, and therefore it must be something else.

• In 1958 there were about 800,000 cases of measles in the USA, but by 1962, the year before a vaccine appeared, the number of cases had dropped by 300,000. During the next four years, while children were being vaccinated with an ineffective and now abandoned "killed" virus, the number of cases dropped another 300,000. In the UK, despite almost complete immunisation of infants the rate is rising again.
• The death rate from measles had declined equally dramatically, independently of vaccination. In 1900 there were 13.3 measles deaths per 100,000 population. By 1955, before the first measles vaccination, the death rate had declined by 97.7%, to only 0.03 deaths per 100,000 of the population. In 1978 a survey of 30 states showed that more than half of the children who contracted measles had been adequately vaccinated.
• A measles epidemic, during which 130 children were hospitalised and six died, occurred in St Louis City and County, during 1970 and 1971-74. 430 cases occurred, during a forty week period. In one school, out of 90 children known to have been vaccinated, 19 developed measles, a failure rate of 20%. Clinical data sheets were returned from another 125 children in another school; 28% of these had been vaccinated.
• During the winter of 1967-68 an epidemic of measles occurred in Chicago, from which two lessons were learned. One, there was a high percentage of cases among vaccinated pre-school children. Two, the failure of the intensive school immunisation program to terminate the measles epidemic.
• Dr Beverley Allan, of the University Department, Austin Hospital, Melbourne, Australia conducted trials on army recruits, who were immunised with an attenuated virus and sent to a training camp known for regular epidemics of rubella. Four months later an epidemic occurred which affected 80% of the men who had been "protected".
• Annual deaths, per million children, from whooping cough over the period from 1900 to the mid-1970’s dropped consistently from a high point of just under 900 deaths per million children in 1905. By the time immunisation was introduced on a mass scale, in the mid-1950’s, mortality had dropped by 80% or more and this decline has continued, albeit at a slower rate, ever since.
• A report in The Lancet (5-10-85) described a group of children infected with whooping cough (confirmed by identification of the micro-organism) the majority of who had been immunised.
• According to Professor Gordon Stewart, formerly head of a department of community medicine at Glasgow University, "vaccination has been at best only partially effective in controlling whooping cough, and has never been proved to be adequate in protecting infants below one year of age who are, in the United Kingdom, the only group of children whose health is seriously menaced by whooping cough".
• Professor Stewart states that in the 1974/5, and 1978/9 outbreaks in the UK, and in the 1974 outbreaks in the USA and Canada, the proportion of children developing whooping cough who had been fully vaccinated was between 30 and 50%.
• Flu-vaccine to protect against a coming influenza epidemic does not even contain the current influenza virus responsible for the outbreak, and can therefore not provide any protection against the new strain of influenza.

The central most important aspect in improving control of infectious diseases is the host and his/her immune function. To strengthen the individual’s immune system by natural ways should be our primary concern.

Some of the problems with statistics

• Prior to 1954 a diagnosis of polio was made on two clinical assessments of paralysis at least 24 hours apart (no laboratory confirmation was required). After 1954, residual paralysis was determined 10 to 20 days after the onset of illness and again 50 to 70 days after onset. What was diagnosed as polio before 1954, would not necessarily be polio after 1954.
• In July 1955, in Los Angeles County, there were 273 cases of polio and 50 cases of aseptic meningitis. A year later there were just five cases of polio and 256 cases of aseptic meningitis (the symptoms of which are hard to tell apart).
• Recently in China a condition called "Chinese Paralytic syndrome" has evolved. Researchers there believe that this disease, which affects mainly children and young adults, is a form of poliomyelitis. They believe that the widespread use of oral polio vaccine has resulted in a mutation of the virus and the development of a new paralytic condition. This, of course, is not classified as polio, so will not influence the WHO statistics for the elimination of the disease.
• In some countries (such as parts of England) AIDS is defined as existing if someone has tested positive for HIV using the ELISA system and has a specific number of what are known as AIDS-related diseases, conditions or symptoms. There are now almost 30 to choose from. In other countries (most parts of the USA) an AIDS diagnosis requires a positive HIV test on both ELISA and Western Blot test methods, and for the person to have an appropriate number of associated diseases or symptoms. In many parts of Africa, however, because of the lack of testing facilities and the expense of applying these, an AIDS diagnosis can be, and usually is, made based solely on the patient’s presenting symptoms plus a degree of weight loss over a short period of time.
• In underdeveloped countries where sanitation is poor, polio viruses are widespread. Almost 100% of children develop antibodies due to infection in infancy. Paralytic cases are few; the great majority of cases are minor illnesses and epidemics are unknown. With a higher standard of living, epidemics occur every few years, and paralytic polio becomes more the norm.
• Identification of the infective agent is not always carried out, especially during epidemics when medical facilities are stretched. Typical, during a "flu" epidemic, the influenza virus, responsible for flu, is not targeted in the medical procedures. Many viral infections are responsible for identical flu-type symptoms but all cases automatically become "flu" statistics.

Other information

The blood itself, if healthy, can deactivate and control bacterial and viral invasion via its very chemistry. This is largely dependent upon adequate nutrition. Vitamin C in the blood is capable of deactivating virus particles. It is important to realise that vitamin C levels required to achieve this degree of protection are far above that required to produce minimal anti-scurvy effect. Vitamin C requirements fluctuate widely at times of stress, infection, pregnancy, alcohol and tobacco use, air and water pollution levels, refined food products, etc. Insofar as the immunological defences are concerned there is also a need for optimum nutrition. This is the last line of defence after the skin, the mucous secretions and the chemical factors of the blood have failed to check an invader. Alertness of this immune response is said to depend upon adequate levels of Vitamin B6. Both this vitamin B6 and vitamin C require that all the many other nutrients are adequately present, in order to operate at high levels of efficiency.

Dr Archie Kalokerinos has done far and away the most important practical work in this area and Glen Dettman, PhD, in their work with aboriginal children in Australia, described in the book "Every Second Child". Aboriginal infant death rates had shown a dramatic increase in the early 1970’s, having doubled in 1970 and gone even higher in 1971. In some areas of the Northern Territory the infant death rate was reaching 50 out of every 100 babies. Dr Kalokerinos proved that the cause of death was what is called immunological shock, or paralysis resulting from nutritional-immunological interactions; in this particular event it was Vitamin C deficiency. He says: "I have no doubt that some so-called "cot deaths" are in fact acute vitamin C deficiencies, and that these occur even if the diet is adequate….. and their response to vaccines against infections is not always good. First, there is an increased utilisation of vitamin C, and this, particularly when associated with dietary deficiency or failure of intestinal absorption, may precipitate deficiency of vitamin C in the blood. This deficiency lowers immunity, and the vaccine adds to this temporary lowering. An infection such as pneumonia or gastro-enteritis is likely …. Thus an infant may die a few days after being immunised." The extra strain on the immune system can be provided by an infection, or it can be other vaccines administered around the same time.

Whatever the mechanisms involved it is at least now proved that many infants who are nutritionally compromised do die after immunisation.

The major reason for the use of measles vaccination is the prevention of the side-effects of the disease (which are, incidentally, very, very, rare in well nourished children) such as encephalitis. The official estimation is that children who contact measles suffer encephalitis about once in 1,000 cases. This is disputed, however, by such workers as Dr Mendelsohn, who claims that this may be true in children living in poverty and malnutrition but does not relate to well nourished children in hygienic conditions, where the level of this complication of measles itself is likely to be no more than one in 100,000.

Evidence regarding vitamin A deficiency in such children is well established and shows that:

• those children who have the worst symptoms during and following measles have lowest levels of vitamin A
• such children are the most likely to develop eye symptoms during measles
• they are also the most likely to have a fever above 40*C and require hospitalisation
• they are the children most likely to die from measles
• supplementing with vitamin A dramatically reduces the risks of severe illness or death associated with measles
• this has been demonstrated in Africa where a 700% reduction in children dying from measles followed vitamin A supplementation

The truth is that the vaccine itself carries a high risk of producing encephalitis, as well as other serious conditions such as subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, which is always fatal, involving as it does a hardening of the brain substance.

Conclusion

Information gained from other sources than the official advertising campaigns urging us to get vaccinated show a worrying and totally different picture. Official sources are generally quick to dismiss such studies and reports without proper independent investigation. Although there is a genuine attempt to reduce child morbidity and mortality, we must never lose sight of the hidden gains for people and organisations working in this area, such as financial rewards from the sale of millions of vaccines, status from the claim to have played a major part in improving the populations health, a place in history, etc. Sponsorship for studies regarding vaccination programmes is not without it’s ties; rewarding results are what is expected. Statistical information can easily be manipulated to suit one’s purpose, and the greater the pressure on having to find a particular result the greater the need to find it by whatever means necessary.

The key factor in having a healthy and efficient immune system is a good nutritional status. Given the right backing your immune system will keep you healthy, because it will have the resources to learn properly from its experiences, and to be at full capacity to attend to invaders. Artificial attacks on that immune system are not only extremely costly in terms of energy wastage, but are also by-passing the normal learning processes of the body which leaves it more vulnerable than before. As a result of vaccination the person is first subjected to a massive unnatural onslaught which drains great amounts of energy away from other duties, and is then left in a more fragile state than it was before as a result of an inadequate learning process; hence, the high figures showing re-infection of vaccinated people.

The long-term future will show us the answer. In the mean time we continue to introduce more and more unnatural health methods in our lives, the result of which can not be known for many decades. It is sad to see how little we are willing to learn from past experiences, and how eager we are to dismiss anything that might threaten that artificial world we have created.

Remember, no vaccination is compulsory;

scare mongering is effective in putting the blame on you;

you may be the only one who has your health at heart.

Dr Patrick Quanten MD

January 2000