Reporting on key Nebraska K-12 education issues on a daily basis from Susan Darst Williams, a writer who lives at the base of Mount Laundry, Nebraska. To subscribe to this blog's mailing list, and see a variety of other education features and information, visit the main education website, www.GoBigEd.com
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Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Posted
11:05 AM
by Susan Darst Williams
BIG PHARMA BACKING OFF
MANDATORY SEX DISEASE SHOTS
It was outrageous: the governor of Texas signed an executive order requiring all sixth-grade girls to get vaccinated against the sexually-transmitted disease, Human Papilloma Virus, or they can't be in public school. Yes, HPV is thought to be a big cause of cervical cancer. But here's the deal: you can't get HPV by sneezing and sniffling, but by having SEX. Sure, sixth-grade girls go to bed with someone every night -- THEIR TEDDY BEARS!!!
Not only that, but where does the GOVERNMENT come off outvoting PARENTS on their own children's health prevention, especially when you can only catch this disease by having SEX, which the vast majority of parents are doing a far better job than the schools in telling kids not to HAVE?!?!?
Well, the normal people caused a hooboo, and now the silly governor is backing down, and according to the Wall Street Journal, the pharmaceutical company that pushed all of this through, Merck & Co., is backing down, too.
The Journal report revealed that the vaccination, Gardasil, costs $360 for three doses. Ouch!
Besides the stupidity and the cost, parents and physicians were concerned about exposing children to unforeseen side effects of the vaccine, which was recently OK'ed by the Food and Drug Administration. Apparently, HPV is on the wane. And it doesn't affect kids or young women, anyway.
Good thing this one was headed off before it spread to Nebraska. At least, one would hope.
Comments:
A very nice reader, well into her adult years, has privately disclosed that she has HPV, but has had exactly two sexual partners in her lifetime -- she has been married twice.
Fortunately, hers has been treated, with very little chance of cancer developing. But she wants to alert readers to the fact that you can be convinced (as she and I are) that it is dead wrong for government to mandate a vaccination for a sexually-transmitted disease as a condition of attending compulsory school, while at the same time you can be in favor of (which she is, and I am not) of obtaining a vaccination on an optional basis for yourself or your teenage or young-adult children.
Here's a good factual analysis of the issue by the Family Research Council: http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=IF07B01&f=WA07C01
I'm not liking vaccinations in general, and this one in particular, not only because of the health risks inherent in any kind of invasive procedure such as injecting something into your body through your skin, but also because of the likelihood that too many people will assume that sex outside of marriage is OK and safe because they have had those three shots for $360 of "protection." No, it is NOT, and the HPV epidemic is just one more element of proof to that truth. It just makes me sad to see what sex has been reduced to, in issues like this: something illicit and dangerous, rather than something that's wonderful and totally safe.
I continue to favor the practice of chastity by young men and women until marriage. Young people may want to remember, if they are thinking of going to bed with someone, that they have to imagine that they're in that bed with ALL the other sex partners that person has ever had. That's the reality of these sexually-transmitted diseases. You just don't want any part of anyone who's in to sex outside of marriage.
Remember the old adage: two's company, and three (or more) is a crowd. 'Nuff said? :>)
Fortunately, hers has been treated, with very little chance of cancer developing. But she wants to alert readers to the fact that you can be convinced (as she and I are) that it is dead wrong for government to mandate a vaccination for a sexually-transmitted disease as a condition of attending compulsory school, while at the same time you can be in favor of (which she is, and I am not) of obtaining a vaccination on an optional basis for yourself or your teenage or young-adult children.
Here's a good factual analysis of the issue by the Family Research Council: http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=IF07B01&f=WA07C01
I'm not liking vaccinations in general, and this one in particular, not only because of the health risks inherent in any kind of invasive procedure such as injecting something into your body through your skin, but also because of the likelihood that too many people will assume that sex outside of marriage is OK and safe because they have had those three shots for $360 of "protection." No, it is NOT, and the HPV epidemic is just one more element of proof to that truth. It just makes me sad to see what sex has been reduced to, in issues like this: something illicit and dangerous, rather than something that's wonderful and totally safe.
I continue to favor the practice of chastity by young men and women until marriage. Young people may want to remember, if they are thinking of going to bed with someone, that they have to imagine that they're in that bed with ALL the other sex partners that person has ever had. That's the reality of these sexually-transmitted diseases. You just don't want any part of anyone who's in to sex outside of marriage.
Remember the old adage: two's company, and three (or more) is a crowd. 'Nuff said? :>)
" . . an executive order requiring all sixth-grade girls to get vaccinated against the sexually-transmitted disease, Human Papilloma Virus, or they can't be in public school."
Is this an easy opt-out for home educators?
Rolly
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Is this an easy opt-out for home educators?
Rolly
# posted by 
: 9:19 PM
: 9:19 PM