People Who Object to Vaccines Do Not Have a Good Sense of History

Currently, a disease that I have not heard of in at least 40 years has made a come back.  When I was a child, every child eventually caught the measles, the chicken pox, and the mumps.  There was, to my knowledge, no vaccine for these childhood diseases.  Of course, everyone received the small pox vaccination, and thank God that method of saving people from small pox had been discovered some 50 years before.  Polio was still a scourge for many, and while all five of us had the polio vaccine, there has one young girl in our church who did not have the vaccine and had, as a result, contracted the disease. So, I have a healthy respect for the people who develop new vaccines, and I take the vaccine for the flu each year.  Having had a case of the flu several years ago, I really don't want to get it again.

There are people who have religious objects, based, I am convinced, on an erroneous reading of the Bible.  Christian Scientists believe that to accept medical hel is to show a lack of faith in God.  This sort of thinking though leads to such ideas as not having or using firearms, or not having a fire extinguisher in your kitchen, or indeed taking other steps to protect yourself.  On the other had Jesus says "you shall not tempt the Lord."   Still, I can understand these objections even though I think they are wrongheaded.

The objections I can not understand is the people who thing that somehow the vaccines present a greater risk than the disease they prevent.  But only a generation ago, some children died of these diseases.  Parents who want to protect their children from everything so not realize that their growing bodies need stresses to protect them later.  Using antibacterial soaps, and keeping children's environment sterile actually weakens their immune systems.

At The Federalist Elad Hakim writes that New York City Has A Good Legal Case For Mandating Vaccines As mentioned above, the God of the Bible does not want his people to not take reasonable steps to protect themselves. That is why Rabbis are saying they see no religious objections.  Orthodox Jews probably have many objections to Mr. De Blasio leading their city.  I would too.  but, this is not one of them.