This Saturday, Mar. 24 at 1 PM ET/10 AM PT, the Peabody and Emmy Award winning online Current TV network will broadcast The Greater Good, an indie documentary that is jump-starting conversations nationwide about vaccine safety and the legal right to make vaccine choices in America. After the broadcast of the 80 minute film there will be a live chat with one of the filmmakers, Kendall Nelson.
Family Experiences and Diverse Group of Experts Featured
Five years in the making by Leslie Manookian, Chris Pilaro and Kendall Nelson,
The Greater Good follows three families impacted by vaccine reactions, including Shannon Schrag and her daughter, Gabrielle, in Kansas, who was injured by Gardasil vaccine; the King family, of Portland, Oregon, and their son, Jordan, who regressed into autism after receiving a series of vaccinations; and Stephanie and Danny Christner, whose infant daughter, Victoria, died after multiple vaccinations in Oklahoma. NVIC’s co-founder and president, Barbara Loe Fisher, is one of many
featured experts in this riveting and carefully balanced discussion of vaccine science, policy, law and ethics that presents different perspectives.
For details on finding Current TV with your local cable and satellite providers, visit
www.current.com. To participate in the live chat after the Saturday broadcast, go to
current.com/greatergood and the live chat window will appear.
The Vermont House Health Care Committee will hold a public hearing on S.199 to remove philosophical exemption to vaccination this Wednesday evening, Mar. 21, from 6:00 to 8:00 PM. Call Loring Starr at the Health Care Committee through the Sergeant of Arms at 802-828-2228 or email her at
lstarr@leg.state.vt.us if you want to testify during the hearing.
To contact your VT legislator and get the latest information on S199, sign up to be a free online user of
NVIC’s Advocacy Portal.
If you live in Vermont, please contact your elected state representatives and ask them and their staffers to watch this critically acclaimed documentary BEFORE they vote on S. 199 to remove the philosophical exemption to vaccination from the state’s public health laws.
There is a bill in California (AB2109) that threatens the personal belief exemption in that state. Learn more by becoming an active user of NVIC’s free online Advocacy Portal, where you can be put in instant touch with the legislators you voted into office on your Smartphone, tablet or computer.
Make your voice heard. Go to
www.NVICAdvocacy.org to read NVIC’s Action Alert about CA AB2109 and take action today.
The Greater Good team has a special matching grant opportunity to raise funds to bring this award winning film to parents, policy makers and healthcare practitioners. Support their community outreach efforts on
IndieGoGo.
If you would like to organize a screening of
The Greater Good in your community, contact the filmmakers at
info@vaccinemovie.org. Many screenings followed by Q&A conversations have already been scheduled. Check for upcoming screenings by clicking
here.
Local CA Board of Ed President Applauds Greater Good Film
NVIC has witnessed mounting attacks on vaccine freedom of choice this year in states like Vermont, Arizona, Colorado and California. One father and current Board of Education President for the San Ramon Valley Unified School District, wrote an open letter on Mar. 16 applauding the responsible positioning of the vaccine safety and informed consent debate in The Greater Good documentary.
Mr. Marvel described his family’s experience with vaccine reactions and emphasized he supported vaccination but also believed that there should be a civil discussion about vaccine benefits and risks for individuals. He encouraged everyone to view The Greater Good and use it as a starting point for discussion.
His letter was published by The Canary Party
here.
By Theresa Wrangham, NVIC Executive Director
Have you had a vaccine reaction? Are you considering giving your child one or more vaccines but would like to know which serious health problems are most commonly reported for those vaccines?
Visitors to NVIC.org can find answers to these frequently asked questions by visiting NVIC’s
vaccine reactions webpage and linking to the premiere vaccine reaction search engine,
MedAlerts. Thanks to the extraordinary efforts of Steven M. Rubin, PhD, a computer scientist for over 40 years and NVIC’s Volunteer Director of Vaccine Research Analytics, MedAlerts answers those very questions and many more.
Most Americans are unaware that, when Congress passed the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986, it required the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to collect information on vaccine adverse events by creating and operating a centralized Vaccine Adverse Event Report System (VAERS). VAERS is a passive post-marketing vaccine safety surveillance system and, since 1990, the VAERS database has stored many thousands of vaccine adverse event reports, which can be accessed and reviewed by the public.
What makes the MedAlerts search engine unique? Outside of the fact that it was the first search engine designed to offer the public an easy way to access and search the VAERS database, it is more user-friendly than the government’s VAERS database search program, called CDC Wonder. MedAlerts offers users a better online experience with increased search capabilities and more powerful reporting features. Also unique to MedAlerts is the ability to download the entire VAERS database (in Microsoft Access format) so that further analysis can be done offline.
Learning how to use MedAlerts couldn’t be easier.
Online documentation educates new and seasoned users about the use of all features and MedAlerts also provides a monthly blog on vaccine reaction trends, which many subscribers have found to be a valuable learning tool. You can
subscribe free of charge.
Some of the more recent improvements to MedAlerts include:
- Flexible age groupings when analyzing search results for vaccine reaction reports in specified age groups;
- Improved vaccine reaction symptom searches using the full MedDRA (standard system of symptom classification);
- Changes to the search form to be more compatible with the CDC’s Wonder program;
- Incorporation of vaccine dose information in vaccine reaction report searches;
- Integration of census data for state population density normalization.
With a search performed every 5 seconds and an additional 100,000 hits per week, the success of MedAlerts over the past 10 years is truly remarkable. MedAlerts continues to be the premiere VAERS search engine and is used by everyone from concerned parents to CDC vaccine researchers. NVIC is grateful to Steven Rubin for volunteering his time to be a member of our team and for providing this valuable public service.
MedAlerts, like any internet application, is constantly evolving. If there are improvements that you would like to see, please
email Steven with your suggestions. If you have never used MedAlerts, why not take it for a spin right now?
Frontline Re-broadcasts “The Vaccine War” Mar. 20 at 10 PM (originally broadcast April 27, 2010).
At a Feb 29, 2012 meeting of the FDA Vaccines & Related Biological Products Advisory Committee, NVIC went on the public record as opposing the fast-tracking licensure of future pandemic influenza vaccines. Vicky Debold, PhD, RN, NVIC’s volunteer Director of Patient Safety and Research, who has served as the Committee's consumer member since 2008, and NVIC President Barbara Loe Fisher both urged the Committee to apply high regulatory standards to the licensing of both seasonal and pandemic influenza vaccines.
Informed Public Expects High Licensing Standards
“The informed American health care consumer expects FDA vaccine licensing standards demonstrating the safety and effectiveness of new vaccines, including those developed for pandemic influenza, to be very high,” said Fisher during public comment time. ”If the regulatory standards are too low and the pre-licensure scientific data is limited because everything is put on an accelerated “fast track,” the informed public will question and resist using those newly licensed vaccines – even if the heel of the boot of the state is used to try to force compliance with federal recommendations and state mandatory vaccination laws.”
“Do The Very Best Science Possible”
Dr. Debold stated during the Committee deliberations that “As a general principle, what the public is looking for is the most rigorous [licensing] process possible,” she said. “The public is hearing things like ‘inferred’ efficacy, ‘inferred’ effectiveness, surrogate clinical endpoints [where] the endpoints are not clear, brand new manufacturing processes that involve [new] cell types and genetic engineering…,my advice is to do the very best science possible.”
License New Adjuvants Separately
Chris Downey, NVIC’s volunteer Director of Database Management, also made a public comment and urged the Committee to license new adjuvants, such as squalene, separately. Pointing out that adjuvants ramp up the immune response and could potentially pose health risks for individuals with sensitive immune systems, he said ” As a parent of a child with a serious food allergy, I really want to see adjuvants licensed separately.”
The bill (S.199) to remove philosophical exemption to vaccination in Vermont passed the Senate and there will be a House hearing on the bill on Mar. 21.
Vermonters, who want to keep the philosophical exemption to vaccination and oppose S. 199, should sign up for the free online NVIC Advocacy Portal and personally contact their representatives today.
If you have been harassed or threatened for making a vaccine choice,
post your story on NVIC’s Vaccine Freedom Wall.
Vaccine exemptions are being threatened in Vermont, California, Arizona and other states. If you want to fight for the freedom to make informed, voluntary vaccine choices in your state, sign up to
become a user of the free, online NVIC Advocacy Portal here.
More on Vaccines and Their Dangers. New American. Feb. 29, 2012.
The Battle to Defend Vaccine Exemptions is Worth Fighting. Age of Autism. March 5, 2012.
Doctor Wins Fight to Clear His Name: High Court Judge Overturns the GMS’s Ruling. Daily Mail Online. Mar. 7, 2012.
VT Senate Moves to Remove Philosophical Exemption to Vaccination. Bennington Banner. Mar. 3, 2012.
Goats Genetically Engineered to Carry Vaccine in Milk. Houston Chronicle. Mar. 2, 2012.
FDA Approves First 4-Strain Flu Vaccine. CBS News. Mar. 1, 2012.