Friday, May 16, 2014

Want to end the fear of Vaccines

Today, I came across a story that Ohio has a outbreak of the measles.  This is due to the anti-vaccination crowd getting their fear out that vaccination causes Autism.  With such fears running rampant, all I hear from the Skeptics Guide to the Universe (SGU) of studies that say that it don't cause autism.  Yet as they say point out how foolishly the population is not taking their shots, they can't seem to grasp the reason why the anti-vaccination crowd is winning. 

The Answer was conveniently pointed out on the SGU, when  they played a sound bite of Vani Hari telling her first hand experience on how she removed azodicarbonamide from her diet and she felt better for doing so.  So how is the myth that vaccinations cause autism?  Because you have first hand accounts from parents telling the world that my kid was normal before he took the vaccine.  Now instead of actually investigating the cases one by one, they ridicule them and they pointed out and rightly so how screwed up Andrew Wakefield studies was flawed, but this act is not helping out at all. 

First hand experience is a stronger force than any statistic out there and to prove it, here's my experience.  I rarely get a flu shot and from my last experience, I reluctantly got one back in 2011.  About 2 weeks later, I was sick and missed work for a week.  Now I was able to see the doctor and I got an inhaler alleviate my symptoms.  But because I missed a week of work and during the busiest time of year, I lost out on money and because of that experience, I will no-longer go buy a flu shot.  Now if you give me one for free, sure, I'll take it, but reluctantly because I cannot afford to miss a week of work.  I have no proof that the flu shot caused my symptoms, but I can only say well I got this and after I took the shot, well this happened.

Now lets go back to the parents of the children who from first hand accounts have autism because they took a vaccine.  You cannot solve this problem with a study, you cannot throw out stastics and say it ain't true because the first hand account, though rare, and probably made up, goes against what those statistics say.  Autism is one of those condition as viewed as a killer for kids,  He has Autism, well he's simply dead and useless, a drain on the family resources.  All these parents know is that before he took the shot, my kid was fine and healthy, he took the shot, and now he's dumb and retarded.  And because of these first hand accounts, we now have a measles epidemic going on in the USA.   

So how do we solve this problem?  We can do what we've been doing over and over again and expecting a different result which saying that these first hand accounts are untrue because we have the statistics, or we can prevent the problem of first hand accounts by providing proof to the parents and giving them first hand experience.  My solution is this, before parents take their kids to get shots, we get the kids tested for Autism.  With that proof, the parents can build a case if in the off chance that after the shots, they show symptoms of Autism which according to the knowledge that is already out there, quite unlikely.  It's that simple, but I don't see anybody going to practice this idea anytime soon.

Sources for Story....
http://www.theskepticsguide.org/podcast/sgu/450

http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/eating-yoga-mats/

http://www2.aap.org/immunization/families/autismwakefield.html

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/ohio-measles-outbreak-spreads-to-record-level/



Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Low Payed Teachers and the NFL Ref strike.

Hey folks, I'm happy to be back. The Christmas rush is finally over and with my hours cut in half, I have more time to write this blog. So expect a few more this month and my goal which is a biweekly post of this blog should get rolling in the month of March.

Before the new year ended, I came across some stories about how some kids, Kindergarners to be exact were getting charged with sexual harrasment. I know that prime time TV has been horny since as long as I can remember, but that nightly sitcom shouldn't be giving hints into the personal relationships of 4 and 5 year olds. At that age, we don't get why we have a penis, we just know we do and some of us know that girls just don't have one. The example I personally have is looking at the naked body of my best friend newborn sister at that age, I told her mom that one day a penis will pop out of that thing. So if I'm saying at the age of 5 that girls will one day get a penis, then I will safely assume that kids at the age of 5 don't have sex on the brain. That comes around age 11 and with growth hormones in milk, maybe age 9 today.

But this isn't the first case of stupidly happening in our public schools, we constantly hear of some stupid decision of a principal suspending a kid for the most common thing. The latest story of a kid getting sent home because of a questionable haircut. Now we're all use to these stories, after all, the first such story I heard here in San Antonio was a kid getting sent home for having the Batman symbol etched into his head. This happen when the first Batman movie came out in the early 90s so by now we are use to such stories. So instead of having the kid sit down in the back of the classroom or having a camera set up to show the parents how disruptive the haircut is,  of course not, we get the kid suspended.

Now we can talk all day about how screwed up our schools an complain and complain, but here's a thought. Maybe we're under paying our teachers. Now I'm not asking for NBA type salaries, I am asking for decent wages. And to think this is not the main reason let's look to other professionals where they bring in unqualified low paid people.

Back in 2012, the NFL referees went on strike. Now they weren't  complaining about the pay but the lack of replacements.  While the Refs were striking, we saw the screwed up calls, and the late-nite talk shows making comedy skits of the whole debacle. But at the same time, some people did notice the simple fact that professionals are what you need for the job and ended the strike with provisions of bringing new blood into the NFL.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khzSPpmCf1Q&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Now lets bring this back to teachers and education. Here we have an underpaid staff force to work long hours at low pay. Sure the schools like to say we'll pay for your education, but in the end, if your talented and you have a chance of getting a better job at a place that pays more, well where are you going to go? And that is what it comes down to, in business, if you want to smartest, most talented people working for you, well you're going to have to pay them, but with education, well the schools already get to much money. It come down to what the late George Carlin said, we're getting a system that keeps you smart enough to work the machines and nothing more. Lets not forget where GM put it's Volt plant, in a socialist communist country called Finland where by the way they pay their teachers $100,000+ a year. I don't know about you, but if you cannot connect the dots because you failed this back in elementary, well I can't help you.