NVIC Vaccine News

Pediatricians Turn Well Baby Checkups Into Vaccine Battlegrounds

By Barbara Loe Fisher
Published November 05, 2018 in Medical Policy


I remember when I took my first-born baby to the pediatrician for his first checkup 40 years ago. Like most young Moms, I looked up to my pediatrician and completely trusted him. I did everything he told me to do, never questioning his expertise or doubting him, believing that he would never recommend or do anything that would put my baby in harm’s way.

Much has changed since 1978. Back then infants and children were getting half as many vaccines as they do today.1 Parents had no information at all about vaccine risks and failures. We just followed the doctor’s orders.

parent and baby with doctor

Today, the subject of vaccination is the most often discussed health topic in America. Not a day goes by without mothers and fathers being reminded that the health of the nation depends upon making sure their children get every one of the 69 doses of 16 CDC recommended vaccines exactly on schedule. 2 3 4

CDC Vaccine Schedule: A Commandment

These days, that CDC vaccine schedule is no longer being viewed simply as a recommendation, it is being treated as a commandment. We are told it is our patriotic civic duty to get our children vaccinated and ourselves, too. The implication is that we are committing treason if we don’t.5

These days, a well baby checkup can be a frightening and gut-wrenching experience for a new Mom bringing her baby to the pediatrician’s office. That is because, with the approval of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), many pediatricians have taken the hardline position that they do not have to discuss vaccination with parents or, if they do, they can threaten them with dismissal from the practice for not obeying a direct order.6 7 8

Almost No Medical Contraindications to Vaccination

The National Vaccine Information Center is regularly contacted by mothers reporting that pediatricians are refusing to provide medical care to their babies if they decline or ask to delay even one of the two dozen doses of nine vaccines that CDC officials order pediatricians to give infants in the first year of life.9 10 This schedule includes a hepatitis B vaccination on the day of birth and eight more doses of vaccines given at the two-month well baby checkup.11 12  It is an early childhood vaccine schedule that, in 2013, the Institute of Medicine concluded has not been adequately studied for safety.13 14

Because public health officials have eliminated almost all medical contraindications to vaccination, pediatricians are insisting on re-vaccinating children who have had serious vaccine reactions, including convulsions.15 16 They are writing off vaccine reactions as unimportant, even after children regress further and further into chronic poor health following each series of vaccinations.17 18

Sacred Trust Between Pediatricians and Mothers Broken

dominate

Pediatricians’ offices have become ugly battlegrounds. Intelligent, well-informed and loving parents asking legitimate questions about vaccination are being belittled and treated with disrespect and contempt by too many pediatricians robotically implementing the CDC’s inflexible vaccine schedule in clear violation of the informed consent principle.

Don’t take my word for it, go to NVIC’s Cry for Vaccine Freedom Wall and read report after report of just how terrifying pediatric check-ups have become. The sacred trust between mothers and pediatricians fostered by mutual respect and shared decision-making has been broken. Sadly, the admiration and trust that mothers used to have for family pediatricians is melting away and being replaced by fear.

Doctors are not our masters. We pay them well to do a job, not to exploit and terrify us. Discrimination, coercion and force have no place in modern medicine or in public health policy.19 20 21 22 23 24

Injustice, Suffering and Social Reform

believe

Every social reform movement in history has been shaped by injustice and suffering. Suffering is often the greatest catalyst for change, and change will come if we believe it is possible. Working to successfully reform vaccine policies and laws that cause suffering is not an impossible dream.25  It will be done if we believe it can be done.

It is time to let our elected representatives know that we want them to put legal boundaries on the authority that doctors and public health officials wield in our society.

Learn more about what you can do to protect your human right to informed consent to vaccination on NVIC.org and NVICAdvocacy.org 26 27

It’s your health. Your family. Your choice.

References:

1 CDC. Recommended schedule for active immunization of normal infants and children 1983.

2 U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Recommended Immunization Schedules for Persons Aged 0 Through 18 Years, United States, 2018.

3 Kempe A, O’Leary S et al. Physician Response to Parental Requests to Spread Out the Recommended Vaccine Schedule. Pediatrics 2015; 135(4).

4 Radcliffe S. Not in My Office: Pediatricians Debate Treating Unvaccinated Kids. Healthline Feb. 5, 2015.

5 Thompson D. More parents believe vaccines are unnecessary. Health Day Aug. 29, 2016.

6 American Academy of Pediatrics. Medical Versus Nonmedical Exemptions for Child Care and School AttendancePediatrics August 2016.

7 Edwards K, Hackell JM. Countering Vaccine Hesitancy. Pediatrics 2016; 138(3).

8 Nelson R. New AAP Policy on Patient Dismissal for Vaccine Refusal May "Erode Solidarity" Among Pediatricians. Infectious Disease Advisor May 24, 2018.

9 Radcliffe S. Not in My Office: Pediatricians Debate Treating Unvaccinated Kids. Healthline Feb. 5, 2015.

10 ABC-TV (Denver). More Doctors Refusing to Treat Unvaccinated Children. Nov. 2, 2015

11  National Vaccine Information Center. 50 Doses of 14 Vaccines Before Age Six? 

12 Fisher BL. Is the Childhood Vaccine Schedule Safe? National Vaccine Information Center Oct. 1, 2017.

13 Institute of Medicine Committee on the Assessment of Studies of Health Outcomes Related to the Recommended Childhood Immunization Schedule. Summary: Health Outcomes (p. 5-6) and Conclusions About Scientific Findings (p. 11) and Review of Scientific Findings (p. 75-98). The Childhood Immunization Schedule and Safety Stakeholder Concerns, Scientific Evidence and Future Studies; Washington, D.C. The National Academies Press 2013.

14  NVIC. National Vaccine Information Center Supports Three of Five Recommendations of New IOM Report on U.S. Childhood Immunization Schedule Safety and Calls for Transparency. Business Wire Jan. 16, 2013.

15 CDC. Recommendations and Guidelines of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP): Contraindications and Precautions. Table 4-2. Conditions incorrectly perceived as contraindications or precautions to vaccination (i.e., vaccines may be given under these conditions). Sept. 14, 2018.

16  CDC. Febrile Seizures Following Childhood Vaccinations, Including Influenza Vaccination. Nov. 2, 2017.

17  Fisher BL. Blackmail and the Medical Vaccine Exemption. National Vaccine Information Center May 18, 2018.

18  Fisher BL. Do You Know How to Recognize a Vaccine Reaction? National Vaccine Information Center Aug. 27, 2018.

19 Berezow A. Jail 'anti-vax" parents . USA Today Jan. 28, 2015.

20 Mathews J. Unvaccinated Families Addresses Should Be Made PublicTime Magazine Feb. 13, 2015.

21 Danziger PD, Diamond R. The Vaccination Double StandardSlate July 25, 2016.

22 Fentiman LC. When it comes to vaccines, rich parents get away with child neglect. Washington Post May 10, 2017.

23 Fisher BL. Class and Race Profiling in the Vaccine Culture War. National Vaccine Information Center July 17, 2017.

24 Caceres M. Professor Says Parents Have No Right to Refuse Vaccines for Their Children. The Vaccine Reaction Oct. 31, 2018.

25  Fisher BL. Guide to Reforming Vaccine Policy and Law. National Vaccine Information Center 2017.

26  Fisher BL. The Moral Right to Conscientious, Philosophical and Personal Belief Exemption to VaccinationNational Vaccine Advisory Committee May 2, 1997.

27  Fisher BL. Why is Informed Consent to Vaccination a Human Right? National Vaccine Information Center June 28, 2018.

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14 Responses to "Pediatricians Turn Well Baby Checkups Into Vaccine Battlegrounds"
Commenter Name
Kellie Boyle
Posted: 11/13/2018 12:37:44 PM
Nice piece, Barbara. I think it also would have been helpful to add that pediatricians have little to no medical training in vaccine reactions or safety and that they are financially incentivized to give as many vaccines as possible through insurance bonuses and the need to recover the cost of their inventories. I've found that these two points are key to shaking the pedestal upon which pediatricians are typically set by parents.
Commenter Name
Dayle
Posted: 11/13/2018 1:24:32 PM
in 1973 my daughter was given the MMR vaccination and 48 hours later suffered a major stroke. The foremost pediatric neurologist in my city at the time told me my daughter would be totally paralyzed on her right side and nothing could be done about it. If I couldn't deal with that he suggested I put her in an institution. I believed in the plasticity of the brain and so the next 16 months were devoted to PLAY. Even though my daughter was not yet two, kids from the neighborhood who were 4 and 5 knocked at our door and wanted to play. The fun that went on in our toy room, painting on the walls, smushing clay and playdoh into fun shapes, every cool toy ever made there in the room and ready to be played with, made that toy room "famous" in our neighborhood. Just before her second birthday she was walking...dragged her right leg a bit but WALKING. She used her right arm and hand but had no "pincer" movement. She talked in full sentences, used personal pronouns; if you asked her to draw a picture for you using a red and blue crayon, she would choose the red and blue from the pack and construct amazing drawings. Kennedy Krieger institute opened. We were sent there for "evaluation." After two hours with my daughter, I was told by this group of medical specialists "your daughter has a physical disability and you are trying to compensate by making her intellectually superior." !!! I then asked the doctor this: "So, if every parent of a healthy, normal child invested all of the time playing with and stimulating the brain of their children between six months and 2 years that "I" did, then we would have a nation of geniuses is THAT what you are telling me??? Vaccinations are CRIMINAL and licensed medical professionals who use and support them are worse!!
Commenter Name
Kim Clark
Posted: 11/13/2018 1:50:54 PM
Thank you, Barbara, for being a hero in being our voice out there to end this practice. Next year I will be getting kicked out of my pediatrician's office due to refusal to vaccinate, and I feel helpless and I know I have no rights, even though the vaccine policy is inconsistent with my state law that allows personal exemption. I guess the way to look at it is at least my children rarely go to the doctor, anyway, because they are healthier than most fully vaccinated kids we know, so that is probably another reason why they don't want our business anymore.
Commenter Name
CATRYNA WHITE
Posted: 11/13/2018 3:59:25 PM
"We are told it is our patriotic civic duty to get our children vaccinated and ourselves, too. The implication is that we are committing treason if we don’t." Well, for me....treason it is!!!
Commenter Name
Colorado
Posted: 11/13/2018 5:28:54 PM
We simply opted out until such time as these products can be sold without needing to manipulate representative governance to do so. In a free market people purchase products because they're effective. In a socialist society, you have to purchase certain products because it's the law. The social score program is here, resist now. Vaccines would have never made it this far without compulsory insurance anyways. If it came down to the dollar or the shot, people would save the dollars. All those scary consequences of not having kids vaccinated, well, nothing happened, all hype.
Commenter Name
Gerry
Posted: 11/13/2018 6:37:18 PM
Just stop depending on doctors who do not comprehend the word "treat and cure" and self treat yourself. They have one motive (money). I have not been to an MD since the late 70's and I am still alive. Start studying natural healing, diet, etc and treat yourself.
Commenter Name
Steve
Posted: 11/15/2018 11:07:46 PM
I have been a PA-C for 13 years. I give ALL of my parents unbiased information on vaccines. Where do I find the statistics that actually 'stick'? It is getting crazy how unprofessional Pediatricians are getting. What can I do as a PA-C to learn more?
Commenter Name
Julie
Posted: 11/16/2018 3:53:49 AM
Excellent article and video. I am glad that my children were born in the 70's and 80's, when less vaccinations were given, even then I would not give my children the whooping cough vaccination after seeing a tv documentary about its ineffectiveness and the dangers linked to it. I did get some angry comments from family members even then. New mothers will not see anything like that documentary on tv today, all negative information regarding vaccines are covered up. You need to dig deep and stand up for yourself to find out the truth about vaccines in today's world. I really feel for all new mothers faced with these decisions while receiving one sided information from all mainstream sources. I now watch as my grandchildren get vaccinated regularly and just hope that they will not have adverse reactions to the vaccines. I have tried to talk to my son and daughter in law about it but they get very angry.
Commenter Name
Nick
Posted: 1/24/2019 6:59:32 PM
Vaccines are the greatest medical fraud ever conceived. The entire program has devolved into a criminal operation, being operated more like organized crime than medicine. They use fear and coercion to sell their toxic products that they have no liability for. For instance, Peter Hotez, a notorious vaccine pushing doctor, stated in the LA Times that "Measles is a dire price to pray for leniency about vaccination, Hotez cautioned, calling the illness “one of the most serious infectious diseases known to humankind.” What a massive lie that is. Before the measles vaccine was introduced in 1963, the mortality rate was .23 deaths per 100,000 cases of the measles, roughly one death per 400,000 cases. Hardly something to fear. Yes, our children need protection. Not from what used to be common childhood illnesses that have lifetime, natural immunity and bolsters their immune systems, but from an out of control pharmaceutical industry that is blinded by greed, and using corrupt legislators across the country to attempt to eliminate all rights to refuse worthless vaccines, that do nothing but harm. Yes, there is a battle going on, for your medical freedom.
Commenter Name
Pft
Posted: 3/7/2019 4:54:56 PM
Many pediatricians are offered sizeable bonuses should their patients adhere to the CDC vaccination schedule. One example was patient compliance rate of 63% got one Doctor 400 dollars per patient yielding 400,000 dollars per 1000 patients. Fall below 63% and he gets zip. Thats probably why they want to get rid of patients who wont comply with the schedule. A thorougly corrupt system
Commenter Name
Cameron Jackson
Posted: 6/4/2019 6:06:38 AM
Absolutely loved this post! I really appreciate your efforts for writing such a post which consist of all the relevant info about the topic. Having read this I thought it was very enlightening. Thanks for sharing valuable information and it such a very helpful for me. Keep Posting Similar articles.
Commenter Name
Roslyn Ross
Posted: 1/7/2020 7:40:51 PM
Only in America is there something called a well baby checkup. Only in America does the medical industry invent and dictate such a process. Don't go. Easy. Your baby is well. Stay away from doctors.
Commenter Name
Kimberly Reed
Posted: 9/12/2023 12:00:09 PM
Hello, I am currently trying to find a pediatrician that will not force vaccinations on my baby. I am being told I need to get the MMR vaccine before he turns 15 months or I have to go elsewhere. Is there a database or something I can do to find a doctor in my state (currently Massachusetts) that will not force this upon us? Any help is greatly appreciated! Click on the link below for resources from our NVIC website. https://www.nvic.org/resources/wellness-holistic-health
Commenter Name
Jennifer Patitucci
Posted: 10/14/2023 7:49:16 AM
How do I find a list of vaccine-friendly pediatricians in my area? Thank you!
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