Military Personnel Banned From H1N1 Vaccine Sites
Something to hide?
"If you want to draw attention to a problem, try hiding it. That's the strategy of several military bases when it comes to the H1N1 vaccine.
Shortly after the Pentagon announced that all Armed Services personnel would soon be facing a mandatory H1N1 vaccination program, I started receiving email from soldiers, airmen, marines and sailors because of a previous story I had written on the anthrax vaccine. Mandatory vaccine programs are a sensitive subject in the military, so it's not a huge surprise that swift and visceral reactions to the program gained speed.
With a vaccine that was so new and little known about it, like many Americans, troops were heading to the web to find answers to their very legitimate questions -- not only for themselves, but for their families who have the option of receiving the vaccine on base. What they found instead is that several websites and blogs with key information asking critical questions had been blocked from their viewing.
Among those that were repeatedly mentioned as blocked sites are the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC), the site for Gary Matsumoto's book Vaccine-A, and vaccine expert Dr. Meryl Nass. NVIC is a national, non-profit founded in 1980s that, through public education, advocates "vaccine safety and informed consent protections in the mass vaccination system." Matsumoto's site contains a forum in which thousands upon thousands of service members have posted testimonies regarding their experiences with the anthrax vaccine. And Nass is one of the world's foremost experts on vaccines who has testified in front of Congressional committees -- and, I might add, never has had a malpractice suit brought against her.
The Center for Disease Control (CDC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) sites, however, are all available for military personnel. The official word from governmental agencies is welcome but critics, regardless of whether they were considered experts, are not."
"If you want to draw attention to a problem, try hiding it. That's the strategy of several military bases when it comes to the H1N1 vaccine.
Shortly after the Pentagon announced that all Armed Services personnel would soon be facing a mandatory H1N1 vaccination program, I started receiving email from soldiers, airmen, marines and sailors because of a previous story I had written on the anthrax vaccine. Mandatory vaccine programs are a sensitive subject in the military, so it's not a huge surprise that swift and visceral reactions to the program gained speed.
With a vaccine that was so new and little known about it, like many Americans, troops were heading to the web to find answers to their very legitimate questions -- not only for themselves, but for their families who have the option of receiving the vaccine on base. What they found instead is that several websites and blogs with key information asking critical questions had been blocked from their viewing.
Among those that were repeatedly mentioned as blocked sites are the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC), the site for Gary Matsumoto's book Vaccine-A, and vaccine expert Dr. Meryl Nass. NVIC is a national, non-profit founded in 1980s that, through public education, advocates "vaccine safety and informed consent protections in the mass vaccination system." Matsumoto's site contains a forum in which thousands upon thousands of service members have posted testimonies regarding their experiences with the anthrax vaccine. And Nass is one of the world's foremost experts on vaccines who has testified in front of Congressional committees -- and, I might add, never has had a malpractice suit brought against her.
The Center for Disease Control (CDC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) sites, however, are all available for military personnel. The official word from governmental agencies is welcome but critics, regardless of whether they were considered experts, are not."
posted by nolocontendere at 6:19 PM
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