So I have seen and read of few blogs and posts (and a TV program on bbc iplayer) from some scientists, that seems to make many assumptions as to why the general public do not totally embrace the wonderful world of the scientific community and the lap up everything they say. They seem to feel this is because people are ignorant, ill educated and pron to panic.
This is not to say this is not true. It also leaves out large chunks of history and incidents. The fuck up's of science are still fresh within the minds of many people who remember "science" telling them smoking was safe, healthy and cool. Vaccines are a good idea, but many of them were tested on the general public (on children in particular) with devastating results. Yes they got better, but it doesn't erase the social memory. Now I delayed (I didn't refuse) the MMR when my daughter was very little. She never got mumps, measles or rubella. Now some people might think this a knee jerk reaction to "bad science" and celebrities. Firstly I couldn't give a stuff what other people do or do not do but autism as a side effect is pretty serious stuff. Autism is a serious and life long condition that can tear families apart. The other reason I made the choice to delay the combination vaccine was it was given to really young children. I didn't think having virus after virus after virus (they timelag like that) was particularly healthy. The risk of these diseases, and the threats they face to healthy Western child is minimal. While a tiny percent of people who caught these illness only three died. Yes it is a tragedy. However when you look at the statistics the IMMUNIZE OR DIE scare tactics look dubious at best.
People do not blindly trust science because "science" tends to work for people who have a vested interest one way or another. Woe betide you if you do not tow the line. Professor David Nutt gave them facts they didn't like, so they fired him.
Ah but science is based on facts. Good. Great.
Here are some facts.
ADR means Adverse Drug Reactions.
Institute of Medicine, National Academy Press, 2000
Lazarou J et al. JAMA 1998;279(15):1200–1205
Gurwitz JH et al. Am J Med 2000;109(2):87–94
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Over 2 MILLION serious ADRs yearly
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100,000 DEATHS yearly
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ADRs 4th leading cause of death ahead of pulmonary disease, diabetes, AIDS, pneumonia, accidents and automobile deaths
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Ambulatory patients ADR rate—unknown
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Nursing home patients ADR rate— 350,000 yearly
The problem with facts is what is chosen as important, relevant and deduced from them and who benefits most from them.
Nobody is holding Government funded adverts to prevent these deaths though they are more than many cancers and drink driving. In fact nobody is saying anything.
From DDT, Thalidomide, BSE, food scares, the conflicting veiws on things like statins and don't get started on Body Mass Indexing (just doesn't work but is part of most medical tests). I am not wary of science because I am ignorant. I am not anti GM food because I am ill educated, but because do not believe sudden changes to Eco-systems that took millions of years to evolves careful together is fundamentally a good idea. We cause so many problems because we think we know best.
BSE was caused because we feed infected sheep to cows. Scrapie is a disease the effects sheep and lambs nervous system. In our greed to make cattle grow faster than intended and give more milk we gave them protein pellets. What new diseases will we create with GM food?
The assumptions that people do not embrace everything "science" tells them is not down to "herd mentality". It is insulting that the general public are subjected to ridicule when they are cautious, with long memories of the awful long term mistakes that individuals and systems within the scientific communities have made.
Science gets lots of things right. The world is a much better place for it. It however is made up of people and they make mistakes all the time. They are not always right and the consequences when they are dire.
Stop telling me I am an idiot because I can remember the fuck ups. Stop telling me that I am part of "herd mentality" when I research, look to get informed and THINK about the health and well being of my family far more people who agree with you!
You can not fix you serious PR mess by blaming other people. If their are trust issues look to your own practices and get back to me then.
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