The Jenny McCarthy Body Count

Perhaps in response to Jenny McCarthy's afore-mentioned comments on allowing killer diseases to come back so that the non-effect of vaccines on autism can be avoided, a guy called Derek Bartholomaus has decided to keep a running count of vaccine-preventable deaths. He's called it the Jenny McCarthy Body Count. Since she seems quite comfortable to accept that her views on vaccination will inevitably result in deaths, it seems appropriate that she should be given moral responsibility for what that means. Although Ms. McCarthy can not of course be held directly responsible for a full share of all such deaths, you get the general gist. She's in a position where her word has enormous influence, and in the case of opinions on vaccination, that influence extends to people who have no regard for her views or who many never have heard of her. The anti-vaccination movement is resulting in preventable deaths, and they had better accept that reality.

Jenny McCarthy image by Flikr user gamerscoreblog and licensed under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 License.

As A Parent, I Just Know Chemical X Isn't Safe

I'm not sure why people should care what Jenny McCarthy thinks about autism or parenting, but they do care. I disagree with how she views autism. She talks of healing, of recovery, as though autism were in some manner analogous to a physical or mental disease rather than, as I view it, a kind of human mind that is not well accommodated for in a society in which it was once rare. If that were all she had to say, then I suppose we could consider this a strong difference of opinion. But of course there's more.

Jenny McCarthy on Autism and Vaccines

I do believe sadly it's going to take some diseases coming back to realize that we need to change and develop vaccines that are safe. If the vaccine companies are not listening to us, it's their f___ing fault that the diseases are coming back. They're making a product that's s___. If you give us a safe vaccine, we'll use it. It shouldn't be polio versus autism.

All I can do is sigh. Jenny McCarthy is a high-profile human being, so her views carry weight. The least she could do is honour the responsibility that carries and keep up with the scientific evidence, the expert views. But instead she continues to push the tired old vaccines = regressive autism canard, whilst suggesting that parents should be prepared to accept the resurgence of diseases which kill and maim people. McCarthy feels secure enough in her knowledge of vaccination and autism biology that she can make that undoubtedly harmful claim. She's basically making herself an expert opinion, without having to do the hard work that would really require.

I have a radical suggestion. Jenny McCarthy should present herself as an expert on things in which she is experienced. So parenting, sure. We may disagree with her, but she can certainly have that. Parenting with an autistic kid? Same deal. Virology? Vaccination? Autism biology? Cohort studies? Meta analyses? Risk factors? When she starts citing the studies, the analysing the data that back her up, rather recycling the anti-vaccination nonsense, I might start listening to her views on those.