Is anyone surprised or shocked that the spanking new Homeland Security Law includes a provision protecting the drug company Eli Lilly from lawsuits? No, this has nothing to do with vaccines in production for the fight against terrorism. This Scrooge clause shields Eli Lilly from litigation over vaccines routinely given very young children, vaccines that have been linked ineradicably in the minds of many parents to the development of autism in their little ones. To me, this protective exemption typifies so much of what’s wrong with present-day America: bad science, bad medicine, and corporations denying any culpability for either.

Recently The New York Times reported that the Bush administration’s plans for vaccination against smallpox would have to be throttled back because there was such a small supply of vaccinia immune globulin (VIG), the single known antidote to severe adverse reactions from the smallpox vaccine. Back in 1968, when smallpox inoculations were still routine, studies found one life-threatening reaction in 20,000 to 67,000 inoculations. In these cases the cowpox that forms the basis of the vaccine proliferates wildly, but instead of producing just fevers and sore arms, it "leaves its victims scarred, blinded, or sometimes dead."

Now, however, the predictions are for one serious reaction per 8,000 inoculations, which makes the need for VIG far more pressing. The likelihood of a life-threatening reaction has increased not because the vaccine is "stronger," but because, as the Times noted, far more Americans have immune systems weakened by disease or immuno-suppressive therapy and far more have eczema than in 1968, when studies of adverse reactions were last done.

Recently the Times went so far as to suggest that millions of Americans should not be vaccinated for smallpox because of pre-existing ailments that put them "at risk for serious side effects." This includes an estimated fifteen million Americans who have eczema, over two million suffering from rheumatoid arthritis, another two million with lupus, over half a million with HIV and AIDS, nearly a quarter of a million who have organ transplants, and the 1.3 million new cases of cancer diagnosed each year.

This vastly understates the problem.

Many disorders are immunologically-mediated, meaning that the immune system is intimately involved in the disease process. Immunologically-mediated diseases such as asthma and diabetes are also far more widespread now than they were three decades ago, and many if not most people with immunologically-mediated disorders must be considered immuno-compromised, hence more vulnerable to adverse reactions from vaccinations of any type.

The very important question no one seems to be asking is why are disorders of the immune system so much more common now than even a generation ago — so much more common that there is a three- to eight-fold increase in the number of serious reactions likely to occur to smallpox vaccine?

Years ago, I thought homeopaths crazy for opposing routine vaccinations. Now, understanding their reasoning and seeing it confirmed by the rampant increase in chronic immunologically-mediated diseases, I have to agree. Quite apart from the questionable validity of the smallpox threat, we vaccinate too often, too young, and with too little regard for the potential damage we are doing.

Dr. Timothy Dooley, N.D., recently voiced what many homeopaths believe: that the runaway increase in both autism and asthma is largely attributable to massive, indiscriminate vaccination of our young. Yes, mercuric preservatives like thimerosal, the basis of much litigation against Eli Lilly, may be partly to blame, but injecting foreign proteins into immune and nervous systems too immature to tolerate them is the real culprit. Don’t we know enough about developmental physiology to realize how risky this is? To me, the "science" of it is on a par with medicine’s credo, until fairly recently, that preemies and newborns didn’t feel pain or require anesthesia for operations.

There’s a nasty confluence of commercial and cultural values that makes us unquestioningly accept the notion that all disease is bad and symptoms nuisances that need not be endured. It blinds us to the purpose and real value of childhood ailments like measles, mumps, and chickenpox: the immature immune system must be challenged to develop properly. So vaccines that relieve our children of the itchy scabs of chicken pox or the swollen parotids of mumps may leave them more vulnerable to meningitis later.

Yes, there are vaccines, like that against tetanus, that serve a useful purpose because they protect against diseases for which there are no treatments. But much of the rest is overkill, figuratively and maybe even literally. Vaccinations and ever-growing use of pharmaceuticals and antibiotics have not made us healthier as a people, any more than fast foods have made us better nourished.

Dale C. Moss is a writer and consultant in classical homeopathy who lives in Massachusetts. She does not plan to receive a smallpox vaccination.

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