WBZ TV in Boston about to show a segement "Is Guardasil really safe"

[HughMoran]

It sounds like some have been seriously injured by the shot. It's coming up in a few minutes here...

[notadmblnd]

1. I wrote a paper on it

and came to the conclusion that it is not safe. There have been reported deaths. I wouldn't let a child of mine have the vaccine.

[HughMoran]

2. They noted that some have suggested giving it to girls as young as 11

The woman expert was basically saying "no way". One woman was paralyzed (at least temporarily) after having the shot.

Looks like your conclusion is correct.

[notadmblnd]

3. I know and there are no studies as to long term effects or how long

the vaccine is effective, meaning it could give a false sense of security. Young women thinking that they're protected from HPV when it may not be the case.

[Truth4Justice]

12. Yeap! DES mothers were assured that this was a "safe" medication in the 1950's too.....

A former GF of mine had the T shaped uterus that DES was capable of causing. Needless to say she didn't have to worry about birth control, since few women with that DES abnormality can have children normally, if at all. She has never been able to give birth to any children at all.

http://www.desaction.org/desdaughters.htm

[varkam]

4. Well, the media is pretty good at scaring people.

In fact, it is one of the things that they are best at.

[trotsky]

5. Wait a minute.

Are you telling me that our trusted media, who can always be counted on to tell the truth, will from time to time exaggerate or misrepresent a story just to draw attention and sell advertising space? C'MON, NO WAY! GARDASIL IS TEH EVUL!

[varkam]

6. Hard to believe, I know.

And while on the subject, the media also does a terrible job of science reporting (which, IMO, is part of the reason for the really terrible nature of scientific literacy among many consumers of news). For example, there seems to be an unwritten rule in the media that you treat ideas as neutral. In other words, if there were a story on, say, the Flat Earth Society, the story probably wouldn't say how crazy these people are, but would rather treat their position as tenable but fall short of endorsing it.

[beam me up scottie]

7. Yep, they already scared two of my friends badly enough that they don't

even want to make informed decisions regarding the vaccine. They're positive it will kill or cripple their daughters.

Unfortunately, the religious dis-info designed to prevent them from using birth control was also successful, they neither planned nor particularly wanted their girls and were still teenagers when they gave birth.

[varkam]

8. That's nice

Long live ignorance!

[beam me up scottie]

9. Most of the time I feel like such a bitch for thinking what I'm thinking about these women.

Because I genuinely like them and care about their daughters. I know they're not completely to blame for being so stupid,

but Jesus Cracker Christ, I can't get through to them no matter what I say, and it frustrates me to no end.

The mother of one of them gave birth at 17, she was unmarried and thrown out of the house, so I'm dealing with three current generations of ignorance and Zeus knows how many previous ones.

[HughMoran]

10. Was it wrong to show the woman who was paralyzed after taking it?

I'm not sure if you think the media only scares people, or are they right in their reporting and that can save lives? Are you being sarcastic and I'm just not getting it - lol?

[varkam]

11. I didn't see it, so I can't really comment on it...

but rather I was commenting on the media in general. They tend to blow things out of proportion. All medical procedures have risks, and I'm assuming that, even if the vaccine was the cause, paralysis is very rare. The media, however, loves juicy stories like that and tend to report on them. Unfortunately, though, that makes the average individual think that they happen much more frequently than they actually do via the availability heuristic. Take plane crashes, or crime, for example - it's the same mechanism. People think that both of those things happen much more frequently than they actually do.

I'm not saying that the media can't save lives, but I am saying that there's a lot of grey area in between. At it's best, the media acts as a valuable check on various institutions. At it's worst, it's fear-mongering, pure and simple.

[hedgehog]

13. Expect a lot of dramatic music and leading questions ahead of

every commercial break!