What do you guys think about copying and pasting the form letter from SafeMinds?

[Guest guest]

What do you guys think about copying and pasting the form letter from SafeMinds

for the comments on National Vaccine Plan that is due today? (Honestly I don't

have much time to write my own, but I just really believe that vaccines are not

safe EVER.....so saying that I want them to make them " safer " feels a little off

to me in a way, you know? I do believe we should just let the body heal

itself....but I feel like we have to start with babysteps with the FDA/CDC and

everything....and this letter seems like babysteps to me.

LMK what you think! Thanks!

Tara

***************

Here is the letter:

(Our address)

March 31, 2009

Attn: National Vaccine Plan RFI

National Vaccine Program Office

Dept. Of Health and Human Services

Room 443-H

200 Independence Ave. SW

Washington, DC 20201

A " safety first " agenda must be the cornerstone of this country's program of

mass vaccination. Rapidly growing doubts undermine public confidence, threaten

the benefits of vaccines, and risk return and spread of preventable infectious

diseases.

1. Sound science. The heart of an effective safety system is sound science.

The vaccine schedule has never been proven safe in animal or human trials that

compare both the acute and chronic health status of vaccinated versus

unvaccinated individuals. The schedule must therefore be regarded as an

unethical experiment. Ethical codes from Hypocrites to Nuremberg and their

modern embodiments in law emphasize the physician's duty to the individual

patient, especially the mandate to avoid harm, and must not be replaced or

overwhelmed by one-size-fits-all industrialized medicine or a public health

preference for herd immunity. The NVP must include an extensive research program

that entails both prospective [e.g., National Child Health Study] and

retrospective studies in humans and animals. It must be a comprehensive

program, not just a single study, and must include research on mechanisms of

immunity and adverse effects and investigations on how to prevent and treat

adverse effects.

Adequate safety science is decades late. Gaps in our knowledge have and will

continue to undermine public trust, as well as over-interpretation and " spin "

put on the flawed and fraudulent studies conducted and funded by CDC. The

continued benefits of mass immunization cannot be justified by " acceptable "

levels of collateral damage. The burden of both acute and chronic

vaccine-caused injury must be determined and continuously monitored so that

changes can be made in vaccines (e.g., removal of heavy metals and viral

interaction), the schedule (e.g. spreading out multiple vaccines), public health

policy (e.g. greater reliance on anti-virals and other prophylactic measures),

administration, and screening of children with a genetic susceptibility to

minimize adverse effects. This is not only an ethical obligation but a legal

duty as set forth by Congress in Section 27 of VICA.

2. Independence. As noted above, the ethically required studies on the safety

of the vaccine schedule have never been done, primarily because those charged

with safety research are also charged with vaccine development and promotion, a

certain conflict of interest. CDC has conducted and/or funded a series of

studies purporting to disprove any connection between vaccines and autism.

These all suffer from serious design and methodological flaws including

over-interpretation of results. In one major study, Safety of

Thimerosal-Containing Vaccines, Verstraeten et al (2003), protocols and

inclusion/exclusion criteria were changed following initial results that showed

an association between mercury in vaccines and neurodevelopmental delays

including autism. Documents obtained under FOIA revealed that this post hoc

data manipulation was done after review of initial findings in a secret meeting

with vaccine companies explicitly to conceal any " signal " of adverse events.

These revelations of scientific fraud have been detailed in Evidence of Harm by

Kirby and in articles by F. Kennedy, Jr. The lead author

eventually published a retraction of any " no causation " interpretation in

Pediatrics and called for additional research.

The safety system must be completely independent of CDC, the agency charged with

promoting vaccines. Structural separation of safety from promotion has been

implemented long ago for agencies such as the National Transportation Safety

Board, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, and the Nuclear Regulatory

Commission to avoid both the appearance and reality of conflicting interests.

Tom Insel, Chairman of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee and

Director of NIMH, explained at an IACC meeting January 14 that HHS has a

conflict of interest in conducting vaccine safety research because it is the

" client " in Vaccine Court in order to help CDC delete a comprehensive program of

vaccine safety research from the strategic plan for autism research.

Accordingly, a new Vaccine Safety Commission must be established which is

independent of HHS. It should have a separate budget from Congress of at least

$100 million annually.

3. Meaningful oversight. Vaccine policy is presently set by three committees

composed almost exclusively of representatives from public health, academia,

industry, and stakeholders with a financial interest in increased consumption of

vaccines, with only token representation from parents and the vaccine safety

advocacy community. The new Vaccine Safety Commission must be overseen by

parents, the only group with an unyielding commitment to the health of their

children and by representatives from the vaccine safety community. Parents who

favor full vaccination and parents who have concerns over vaccine safety share a

common interest in the safest possible schedule. Avoiding acute and chronic

adverse effects is absolutely crucial to maintain high coverage rates thereby

reducing the risks from infectious disease. The Commission should have

available advice from industry, academia, doctors, and public health

professionals, but the final decisions must be left with those most committed to

healthy children and those free of both the appearance and reality of financial

conflicts.

4. Transparency. The present secrecy surrounding vaccine safety data is

anathema to public confidence. The taxpayers have paid for the FDA/CDC VAERS

system and the CDC's Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD) since 1991, and they are

hailed as the premier databases for assessing vaccine safety. Yet these vital

data are kept secret from the public and researchers independent of CDC and

industry. For example, critical VAERS data on vaccine distribution, necessary

to calculate adverse event rates, is withheld by FDA, who claims it is an

industry " trade secret " . Indeed, in part to keep VSD away from FOIA and

Congressional subpoenas, CDC moved the database to the " custody " of a trade

association of HMO's. Petitioners' counsel and their experts can't even gain

access to VSD for purposes of effective case presentation in Vaccine Court. In

2005, IOM recommended transparency of VSD but to date these data remain a

closely guarded secret.

VSD and all industry data submitted pre- and post-licensure to FDA must be made

public on an ongoing basis. CDC, NIH, and Congress have noted serious flaws in

VSD. It should be upgraded from " administrative " (billing records) to a

research quality database by, e.g., linking mothers and children, including

maternal exposures, long-term tracking of children and their health outcomes,

standardized diagnostic criteria, and inclusion of unvaccinated children and

their waiver status. Appropriate debates over interpretation should occur in

the open scientific literature and not behind closed doors.

5. Accountability. The new Vaccine Safety Commission must have the authority to

clear vaccines for inclusion on the schedule, remove them from the schedule, and

approve the Vaccine Information Statements on risks and benefits and other

information which by law must be given to parents and patients prior to

vaccination. Moreover, vaccination must remain voluntary, not only because this

is a basic ethical requirement, but because the right of refusal is a powerful

motive toward safer vaccines. Religious, medical, and philosophical exemptions

must be available in every state.

6. Honesty and integrity. HHS has conceded (in secret settlements) and the

Vaccine Court has held (in at least 12 published decisions) that vaccines can

cause autism. The question now shifts to how many children have been injured

and what are the appropriate biomarkers to use in determining entitlement to

compensation. Yet, HHS dishonestly states as late as a February 20 statement:

" The government has never compensated, nor has it ever been ordered to

compensate, any case based on a determination that autism was actually caused by

vaccines. " Such denial is unacceptable and is guaranteed to undermine public

trust. HHS must publicly admit, and include on VIS's and other materials that

vaccines can cause autism. Such admission will help stimulate necessary safety

research and encourage parents to work with their pediatricians to take

precautions where indicated. VIS's must also clearly state that the safety of

the schedule has not been proven by comparison to unvaccinated animals and

humans, and that the schedule must be regarded as experimental. They should

also describe the health status of children included in industry trials and

state that safety has not been verified in less healthy children; and list the

contraindications and adverse events as contained on the FDA-approved label.

Communicating the benefits of vaccines without accurately disclosing their risks

and gaps in safety knowledge is dishonest and further undermines public trust.

7. Adequate Safety net. No vaccine or schedule can be made perfectly safe. To

preserve the benefits of full vaccination, society has a legal and ethical duty

to generously compensate those injured by vaccines, in effect " collateral

damage " in the war against infectious disease. The tort law system under state

law is the traditional means of motivating product safety and compensation of

the injured. Congress replaced this with the Vaccine Court and VICP in 1986 in

order to serve the twin goals of protecting industry from " excessive " litigation

and protecting public confidence in vaccines by implementing a non-adversarial

family-friendly no-fault compensation program. The failure of VICP to largely

achieve this second goal is and will continue to undermine public acceptance of

full vaccination. Necessary changes include: making the program optional;

increasing the statute of limitations to at least the traditional state limits;

preserving the right to " opt out " of the program before or after decision to

pursue traditional tort remedies; faithfully implementing the Congressionally

mandated lower burden of proof by resolving scientific doubt in favor of

petitioners; providing for discovery and juries; providing timely compensation

to lawyers and expert witnesses; no limits on compensation for pain and

suffering or death; and providing that awards to children will be administered

through trusts independent of Government.

An effective safety system, as outlined above, is an essential part of the

National Vaccine Plan.

Sincerely,

Tara

" Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the

world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has. " - Margret Mead

" It's difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends

upon his not understanding it. " -Upton Sinclair

[Guest guest]

So where do we go? I love this letter. It's exactly what we need. I'd

really like to never hear the word 'vaccine' again but that is not likely to

happen. I just want freedom from using their product.

Nita (crew chief) and the crew: 16, Jon 14, 12, 10,

7, Christian (7/16/03 to 8/22/04), 3 and Isaac, 1

http://momof6.dotphoto.com <http://momof6.dotphoto.com/> for not

necessarily current pictures

http://nitasspot.blogspot.com

Learn from the mistakes of others. Trust me... you can't live long enough

to make them all yourself.