Texan legislator pushing anti-vaccine bill wrongly suggests measles can be treated with antibiotics | New



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"When I grew up, I had a lot of these diseases," Zedler recalled, according to the Texas Observer. "They wanted me to stay home, but to be sick in bed, it did not look like anything."

"They mean people are dying of measles," he added. "Yes, in third world countries, they are dying of measles, and today, with antibiotics and these kinds of products, they are not dying in America."

Antibiotics, used to treat bacterial infections, can not kill viruses.

Zedle could not be contacted immediately for comment.

Eight measles cases have been confirmed in Texas this year, according to State Department Health Services. One of them has been reported in Denton County.

There is no known cure for measles, a highly contagious virus that has made millions of patients sick in the United States every year. Instead, health professionals try to prevent the disease by administering the MMR vaccine to children, and some exposed people, such as pregnant women, may receive an injection of protein called immunoglobulin (globulin serum) to try to prevent it. counteract or reduce it. the symptoms, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Public health experts warned against spreading misinformation about vaccines. The anti-vaccine movement is partly fueled by fraudulent research from 1998 claiming to demonstrate a link between a preservative used in vaccines and autism. In the current measles outbreak in the Pacific Northwest, where anti-vaccine groups are active, more than 60 cases have been reported in Washington and Oregon.

Earlier this month, Darla Shine, wife of the White House's director of communications, Bill Shine, went to Twitter to say that diseases like measles, mumps and chickenpox "keep you going." healthy and fight cancer ". His statement sparked public health experts' concern that such erroneous allegations could cause harm.

Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health, said Wednesday morning at a hearing before the Energy and Commerce Chamber, false information on the Internet. Committee.

"People who have read this information may not know it's wrong," Fauci said. "They may be well-intentioned, but spreading false information is a major problem."

Before the introduction of measles vaccine in 1963, between 3 and 4 million patients contracted the disease each year in the United States and 400 to 500 deaths, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In 2000, nearly four decades after parents began vaccinating their children, measles was declared eliminated in the United States.

Data from the CDC show that between 2000 and 2018, there was an average of 140 measles cases per year. Three deaths were reported during this period, one in 2002, one in 2003 and one in 2015.

Legislation is introduced every year to facilitate the withdrawal of childhood vaccinations. However, research has shown that most of the bills adopted support public health. According to a study published late last year by the American Journal of Public Health, researchers who analyzed vaccine legislation proposed and promulgated between 2011 and 2017 found that the draft laws on vaccines were more likely to become vaccines, although a slightly higher number were considered to be bills. anti-vaccine.

A number of state measures would make it more difficult for parents to withdraw from immunization, the Washington Post reported on February 25:

"In Washington State, where the most serious measles epidemic of the last two decades has injured nearly 70 people and cost more than a million dollars, the lawmaker of Washington said: State has taken two measures that would prohibit parents from availing themselves of personal or philosophical exemptions to avoid immunizing their school. " Both have bipartite support despite strong anti-vaccination sentiment in some parts of the state.

"In Arizona, Iowa and Minnesota, lawmakers have introduced similar measures for the first time, and the effort has elicited a moving, sometimes ugly response from those protesting against what is happening. 39, they considered as attempts to undermine their rights.Of opponents to the Arizona bill, which died quickly, they described the number of requirements for more stringent vaccines as a holocaust and compared the godfather of the bill, who is Jewish, to a Nazi.

"In Vermont, lawmakers are attempting to abolish the religious exemption granted by the state four years after the elimination of the philosophical exemption." In New Jersey, where lawmakers have attempted in vain to tighten religious exemptions, a bill to repeal it entirely has recently been amended by the General Assembly.

Lindsey Bever, the Washington Post

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