3 Reasons Not To Trust The American Medical Association on Vaccines
Updated
By Jefferey Jaxen
The American Medical Association (AMA) has taken what many view as an aggressive stance in order to remove several sacred and time-honored barriers to pharmaceutical products with known dangers. One would think that this impetus may be coming from only minority voices representing radical views unbecoming of a professional healthcare system. Shockingly, it is being championed by the AMA itself causing many to question its motives and whose interest the association is ultimately looking out for.
#1 HYPOCRITICAL VIEWS ON EXEMPTIONS
In June, the AMA announced it would throw its lobbying clout behind state and federal efforts to end personal and religious exemptions from vaccinations for children entering schools. Under its new policy, the AMA says it will be seeking more stringent state and federal immunization requirements to allow exemptions only for medical reasons. The group has feinted protecting only medical reasons for which doctors can write exemptions. However, the AMA is apparently tone-deaf to the larger movements happening in American states. California Senate Bill 276 is aiming to take those medical decisions/reasons out of the doctor’s discretion and professional judgement and leave it up to nameless bureaucrats who have no contact with the patient. In its press release, the AMA also signaled it will be acting as a marketing arm of for-profit pharmaceutical products stating:
“The AMA also intends to support the dissemination of materials on vaccine efficacy to states as part of the effort to eliminate non-medical exemptions.”
In a show of medically-privileged hypocrisy, while the AMA grandstands to take away the Constitutionally-granted freedom of religion for all American families, they still openly allow their own members and the greater medical community to freely exercise several rights being removed from families. Written in the AMA’s own Code Of Ethics Opinion 8.7, they state:
“…physicians should accept immunization absent a recognized medical, religious, or philosophic reason to not be immunized.”
#2 NO RESPECT FOR PARENTS
Is there a compelling reason to trample protected religious rights to force for-profit products with known dangers? Why does the AMA get to direct and choose which protected classes get to exercise freedom of religion in America?
If working to remove the American bedrock of religious rights from American parents wasn’t questionable enough, the AMA is also aggressively attempting to remove the parents themselves from medical decisions involving their children. While medications, medical procedures and medical decisions involving children enjoy parental involvement, proper informed consent and freedom to choose without coercion, vaccination is rapidly having those tenets stripped away.
At the same June policy meeting, the AMA press release states it, “will encourage state legislatures to establish comprehensive vaccine and minor consent policies.” the press release continues by stating the AMA “will support state policies allowing minors to override their parent’s refusal for vaccinations.”
No age limits were referenced in the press release as to what constitutes a “minor.” Beyond removing the ‘barrier-parent,’ the question of age appears to be the other uncomfortable talking discussion the mandatory vaccine crowd doesn’t like approaching.
At a recent hearing in Washington, D.C. bill B23-0171 involving minor children consenting to vaccination without parental consent was heard and discussed. According to this proposal, a minor shall be deemed meeting the informed consent standard if the minor is able to comprehend the need for, the nature of, and any significant risks ordinarily inherent in the medical care. The consensus and strategy from the proponents of the bill appeared to be avoidance of going on record citing an absolute age while leaving the decision solely up to the physician.
The medical community is strictly bound by the guidance of the U.S. Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which states, using HPV vaccination as an example, “All girls and boys who are 11 or 12 years old should get the recommended series of HPV vaccine. The vaccination series can be started at age 9 years.” Under proposed and future legislation, will physicians default to 9 years old to begin injecting kids with a controversial HPV vaccine without parental consent or knowledge?
#3 MANDATORY PARTICIPATION IN VACCINE TRIALS
In a forgotten 2012 article published in the AMA Journal of Ethics Policy Forum, the authors asked the question ‘Should Participation in Vaccine Clinical Trials be Mandated?’ The jaw-dropping idea floated by the authors and promoted by the AMA dangerously ignores hard-won protections granted by the Nuremberg Code, The Declaration of Helsinki, and several others right up to modern-day. In brief, the article argues that because of a “distressing decline in the numbers of healthy volunteers” and the “modest financial remuneration” the idea of mandatory involvement in vaccine trials isn’t “as outlandish as it might seem.” Comparing the idea to military conscription and jury service, the article tries to massage the historically-uncomfortable idea of bringing back forced participation in medical trials. Using the epitome of Orwellian languaging, suggests a “more palatable and realistic option is a policy of “mandated choice.” Needless to say, this idea may not have been able to get off the ground in 2012 before the media-hyped measles red scare opened the door for industry to create and exploit medical and legislative opportunities to increase their [mandatory] consumer base. Yet in today’s current frenzy where no time-honored policy, law or ideal is safe from the all mighty needle, will the AMA throw its full weight behind “mandated choice”?
Far from a independent association championing physician and parental rights and ethics, the AMA is highly conflicted.
The New American reported:
“The AMA has garnered a reputation for serving as a sort of union for doctors, and a union will always seek to protect the financial interests of its members…The AMA is a top-dollar lobbying force, spending $400 million on lobbying efforts since 1998, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, more than any other company or group except the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Realtors. And at least one-fifth of its budget comes from drug companies through an arrangement known as “licensure” — a system in which the AMA sells information to Big Pharma so that pharmaceutical companies can market their products to doctors.”
Do you trust the AMA when it comes to their vaccine policy stances?