why do we have to accept the unacceptable? Aren't there any pharmaceutical companies willing to produce the alternative. They would make a ton of money, especially if they advertised -made without aborted cell lines.

"the Kitasato Institute in Japan makes MMR vaccines that are ethically acceptable. Regrettably, the FDA decided not to allow their importation into the United States" The bottom line is government sanctioned monopolies in the form of patents and drug importation restrictions prevent morally acceptable alternatives. The free market otherwise know as laissez fair capitalism would allow morally acceptable alternatives. Unfortunately, too many Catholics including many editors for crisis magazine abhor the free market as a sin, and this is the unfortunate consequence of such the anti-free market gurus.

Did it ever occur to you that the Kitaso Institute receives funding & benefits from the Japanese Government? Do you even know anything about the Health system of Japan? Do not make a golden calf out of the "free market". There's more to life than "free market" economics.

Well genius, the Japanese Government has no money to give away. No
government 'has money'. All governments can do is take money from its
citizens in the form of taxes to "fund and benefit" other institutes or
agencies. Of course people like you can never grasp that concept.
Perhaps I have worked in Japan in the health care system and I know more
about their health care system then you could imagine (would that
change your mind...of course not). You don't have to work in the health
care system of any particular country to understand how it works. Free
markets aren't a golden calf I never said that. A big government person
like you can only bash free markets with nonsensical attacks instead of
making a logical argument. I'm sure you favor statist (or government) interventions
over the free market. Perhaps government intervention your golden calf.
Sorry my friend... I love Chesterton and I agree there is more to life
than money or capital. But the bottom line to economic systems boils
down to two choices free markets or government intervention, and the more government intervention the more communistic and disastrous the economic system. That's
it. Their is no third option utopia, that's for those who go to heaven.
Keep drinking the purple kool aid of big government interventions and
pretending it is what Jesus would want. Ask not what you can do to help
the poor and sick, ask what government intervention can do to
help...did I figure out your moral economic philosophy. Money is no
object to helping those who are less fortunate as long it is other
people's money...right? Thanks for letting me know there is more to life than free markets. I had no idea. I forgot all about chemistry, physics, history, religion, family, etc, etc. You really are a genius and a philosopher! Please share more of your wisdom with me. (Please don't, this is sarcasm, I find you dull, idiotic, and irritating...free markets are not a golden calf...there is more to life than free markets...really...no kidding...Please keep your wealth of knowledge to yourself.)

Sign the petition. Google Merck vaccine petition. (wouldn't let me link it.)

Count me in too.

done.

thanks.

Done! Thank you!

There is a pharmaceutical company willing to produce the alternative run by Dr. Theresa Deisher, PHD of soundchoice.org located in Seattle WA Let's get her name to the politicians who are interested in making safe vaccines available to the American public. Visit the website to learn more.

Thank you for that information. I'll get the word out on their company.

Thank you for calling this out, Dr. Carpenter. As a mother, I want my boys to be vaccinated AND I want the vaccines put into their little bodies to have been derived from ethical sources. It angers me that ethical alternatives exist but are not available. I'm tired of being sold the lie that we must either use the unethical vaccine lines or choose to go unvaccinated. How can I get involved to make the ethical vaccines available to the children of concerned parents like me?

Sign this petition. https://www.change.org/p/ce...

My daughter tried to get the MMR that is made without fetal cells. Her doctor was able to find it. Only problem, they had to buy the entire bottle, something like $400 to $500. But even though they would be using a small amount of it, the rest was NOT to be used by any other parent requesting it. So unfair!! And unethical in its own right.

How did he get it? We tried to apply as a group through COGforLife in 2008 and the FDA turned us down (6000 families during a Rubella epidemic no less!). Are you in the US?

Thanks so much for this article- it's great to see coming from an MD. We asked Merck for 'unbundled' vaccine but to no avail. Our sympathetic pediatrician attempted to find alternatives, also, no success.

Children of God for Life (www.cogforlife.org) has an excellent website to inform all of us regarding vaccines. The doctor in this article knows what Church teaching has said: parents may abstain or demand alternatives. The point is that WE are tasked with finding a way to avoid cooperation.
The Japanese would probably jump at the chance to have imports. Write Congress if you believe we deserve better. The FDA will have a big part to play as well.

On another related note: Check out (google?) a Dr. Teresa Diesher or Deisher out of Seattle. Sound Choice research, I believe. She has some DOCUMENTED scientific vaccine reactions associate with injecting someone else's DNA into your child.

... and what about the horror of CJD Disease when humans inject / consume other humans' flesh (see http://soundchoice.org/ and see article on Pepsi-co use of human aborted tissue as "flavour-enhancer") - as cannibals of the past soon found out to their horror? Or are we repeating their same old tragic mistake? See also the inherent DANGERS of the "new" vaccinations (containing DNA from aborted babies) from pharmaceutical companies who have no time for morality.

No. One evil NEVER justifies another evil (however "positive" it may sound at first).
Otherwise the "civilised" world is NO BETTER than Hitler (zealous follower of atheist Friedrich Nietzche who promoted Eugenics, ethnic cleansing, mass murder) and NO BETTER than "militant atheists" Stalin and Mao Tse Tung, Pol Pot, Caesescu, etc. who followed the same path).

So these tunnel-visioned pharmaceutical companies (taking the shortest-cut to their greedy commercial bottom-line) MUST be confronted immediately - or (if the politicians lack the courage to help us) - these companies must be comprehensively publicly named and shamed and the truth told.

Dr Theresa Deisher

http://soundchoice.org/

In today's world with all the health options we don't need forced mandatory vacinations to children just born out of the womb.... We need to re-look at this - this is America....

Direct link to that petition is here: https://www.change.org/p/ce...

Thank you for writing this and explaining it so clearly, I had been researching this all week and I think this article is the perfect resource to use in order to understand the problem we are facing, I also appreciate the solution offered. We now know what we can do to demand ethical and safe vaccines for our children

This will affect everyone because as natural cases of measles, mumps, and rubella wane, vaccinated people are losing their immunity. Vaccines work best when the body gets an immune boost from reexposure to the virus. They're already talking about the possible need for a third dose as an adult.

This points exactly to my question: Why are vaccinated folks concerned about non-vaccinated? It's not like THEIR kids are going to get measles.

But if what you are saying is correct, then the non-vaccinated who are actually getting the virus are doing a FAVOR to boost the immunity of the long-ago vaccinated. Is this a fair statement?

"Beth" asks why vaccinated folks should care about those who go unvaccinated.

Wow.

She should Google "herd immunity".

I think there is a general frustration and anger over the prolonged debate regarding autism and a general anger that the unimmunized are endangering babies and people who are immunocompromised. I don't think these people are generally worried about themselves unless they have an infant, and very few people are aware that "wild" cases boost vaccine-induced immunity. I think the medical community knows, but their solution is simply to suggest more and more boosters instead of rethinking whether a vaccine should be mandated.

Wide-spread vaccination may put babies at more risk depending on the disease, though. Diseases like Chicken pox (and Mumps?) are (were) generally considered benign childhood diseases but more serious in adulthood. When the mother has had a natural case of these, has her own immunity reinforced by other cases around her, and then breastfeeds her baby, she passes on antibodies which give the baby immunity to these diseases until the baby stops nursing. It is unclear whether women vaccinated as children and then not exposed to the virus at all have enough immunity to pass on sufficient antibodies unless they are revaccinated close to the birth of their child. These vaccines might be better off being available but selectively used so that children can catch the diseases naturally, and anyone who didn't catch it as a kid gets a dose when they're 15 or 18 or whatever age the diseases start to get more serious to protect themselves. Great Britain, in fact, weighed the benefits and risks of the Chicken Pox vaccine and decided that eliminating full-blown cases of chicken pox would reduce the immunity in adults and increase the incidence of shingles in the elderly. They decided that the handful of children who would be saved was not worth the price for the elderly.

Obviously, Rubella and Polio are different in their outcomes and severity, and there is a good case for trying to reduce the incidence of these diseases in the population.

And obviously, what I've said here presumes moral vaccines and simply questions what their best use is.

"Terri77's" reply displays deep knowledge plusses and minuses of the current answers modern medicine has to offer. Alas, she has the wrong *question*.

The government of the UK is making decisions about Chicken Pox as if today's medicine were the only medicine that we would ever have. For example, they assume that we will never have a Chicken Pox vaccine as protective as enduring (and surviving, which is not guaranteed) a case of the disease. They are also assuming that total *eradication* of Chicken Pox, as we have with smallpox and are close to achieving with polio is impossible.

Well, eradication will certainly not be possible so long as their are health care systems like the UK's NHS that prioritize the known today vs. the possible better tomorrow.

1/3 of all Americans will have a bout with shingles sometime in their lives. There is today safe and effective treatment for shingles, a drug called Valtrex. The only problem is that one must take the first dose of the drug so close to the first onset of symptoms that one essentially needs to have a bottle of the drug in one's hand when one first notices the signs of a shingles attack.

I was traveling with a 37-year-old colleague in America's Silicon Valley when she became aware that she was having her second attack of shingles in her life. Her first was at 19 and cost her a semester of college. She didn't happen to have a bottle of Valtrex with her so I gave her mine. She did not even miss a day of work.

I had a similar experience with pertussis. Even though I am always fully up-to-date on all my vaccinations, the whooping cough vaccine depends on "herd immunity". There were enough anti-vaxxer granola-eaters at my children's private school that pertussis swept through it. None of my (vaccinated, of course) children got it, but I did.

In adults, pertussis is a very serious disease. A west coast colleague who was similarly victimized by parents who decline vaccination for their kids already had two broken ribs by the time she was able to get in to see a doctor and start on a course of azithromycin. She missed three weeks of work because the antibiotic is not at all effective if not taken on first onset of symptoms. My first strange "barking" (not "whooping" like in children) cough hit at 10PM and I took my first dose of azithromycin at 10:04PM, because, of course, I had it with me. By 4AM my coughing had stopped.

So sorry. I am a "Jacksonian" American when it comes to mankind's oldest and most-remorseless enemies: Disease, Injury, and the Incapacitation That Comes with Aging. I am entirely uninterested in sacrificing the lives of a "few" American children for improvements in the health of "many" aged half a century or more from now. I want to fight a war of annihilation against all identifiable disease targets, and chicken pox does not escape my list.

I am so sorry. I completely misread your comment.

Uninterested in sacrificing the lives of "a few," American children? What is wrong with you? What if we sacrifice yours? Sorry, I just lost all of my diplomacy, reading this.

Thank you for your thoughts JediWonk.

I question whether it's at all possible to eradicate the Chicken Pox with a live-virus chicken pox vaccine. Chicken pox is unique in that it continues to live in the host. Anyone with shingles can infect someone who has never had chicken pox or has low enough immunity to have a reoccurring case. The vaccine doesn't eradicate the disease, it simply tries to introduce kids to a mild version of the chicken pox. If you have studies showing that the live-virus from the vaccine *does not* take up residence in the nerves, please do pass that on, but otherwise, you have to assume that every dose of chicken pox vaccine is simply reintroducing the chicken pox into the environment and that it may show up again later unless you reinforce the immunity. Unfortunately, the shingles vaccine is not that effective at reinforcing immunity in the older populations since the elderly have reduced immune systems or possibly since injections bypass half of the immune system. Would a nasal spray be more effective or is this a battle we can't win at all with a live-virus vaccine?

This is different from Smallpox, where the live-virus vaccine contained a *different* virus.

It's also different from how we're approaching polio which is to start with the oral polio vaccine (OPV) which contains live polio viruses and then transition to an inactivated polio vaccine (IPV). Eventually, you hope that you've prevented anyone from catching new cases, and vaccinate with the IPV until there's no more live polio in the environment.

Chicken pox is also different from Measles and Rubella, where people don't harbor these diseases after their infection. But there is always the lingering question with any measles outbreak as to whether a child who was recently vaccinated was shedding the virus and started the outbreak. We know that with many of the live-virus vaccines, the recipients can shed the virus for up to 6 weeks--sometimes longer if the recipient is immunocompromised. Again--I question whether we can possibly eradicate any disease using a live-virus vaccination that reintroduces the virus itself to the environment.

One other thing, I sometimes wonder if we're playing wack-a-mole here. Studies show that childhood cases of Measles, Mumps, and Chicken Pox prime the immune system and reduce the host's chances of getting cancer later. Given that the childhood (age 0 to 19) cancer rate is 1 in 500 in the US, (up a bit from 30 years ago), later may not be adulthood. You may not be able to win the battle against deadly childhood diseases. Sadly the choice may end up being cancer or measles, take your pick.

Thank you so much for this reply!

I hope your physical goes well. Keep in mind that before getting a booster, you can ask your doctor to test your immunity. If your immunity is high, you wouldn't need a booster anyways.

The number of parents choosing not to use the MMR vaccine began to rise long before 2009. Thanks to Oprah and Jenny McCarthy, many parents were convinced that the vaccine was harmful. Yes, there is a small minority of conscientious objectors out there. But the damage to herd immunity was done long before 2009.
Yes, some cell lines have been tainted. But further production of the vaccines, does not rely on the continued supply of human cell lines. That is, choosing to vaccinate American children does NOT require the occurrence of abortion. Unfortunately, not receiving the vaccines can put the children of the conscientious objectors at real risk. Talk about a rock and a hard place. I respect their courage in making a pro-life statement, but putting their innocent babies in danger is a high price to pay. If the only option to protect my baby is a less-than-pure one, am I obliged to protect the baby? Or focus on the taint, and let the health of the innocent be damned?
To fix the FDA's decision, you must start with electing a pro-life president. Unless you figure out a way around it. Just imagine : a black market of wholesome vaccines. There is money to be made there.

But these childhood diseases are not going to kill the baby. The immoral vaccines could cause debilitating diseases, yes, like autism in some sensitive individuals. So you propose to cannibalize unborn babies for their parts, so that you might have better health? This is immoral. The ends do not justify the means. Murder is immoral, suffering is not. The Nazis had the same thought, that the deadly eperiments and using of the bodies of fellow human beings would bring benefit to the favored Aryans. Also, the Church has said that Catholic doctors must object to the immoral vaccines. All I here is the sound of crickets from most of our 'Catholic' doctors. The drug companies are committing grave sin. Where is the protest of the pharmaceutical companies by Catholic parents?
The chicken pox and shingles vaccination was grown in tissue from an aborted baby. The DNA from that baby is every vaccination. Think about the auto-immune disease increase we have seen all over the US!
If the lampshades made from the skin of the Jewish and Catholic prisoners at Dachau were the only lampshades available, I would not use them. Ditto for the mattresses stuffed with human hair! What a sick culture we have where otherwise good people have no qualms about supposedly benefiting from the murder of children! No to Nazi medicine

You are dead wrong
Measles kills babies
Pertussis kills babies
HIB disease kills babies
Get your facts straight

"Those same public figures would serve us better by helping to promote the manufacture or importation of vaccines that are derived ethically." Amen Dr. Carpenter.

And to be clear, it wasn't just one abortion that was involved in these cell lines but up to 40 each. See Dr. Leiva's article regarding these cell lines:

http://www.cogforlife.org/r...

Google "merck vaccine petition" and sign it!

I respect parents' decision to refuse vaccines that come from such sources if they do so on ethical grounds, but how would we analyze such a situation using the principles of cooperation of evil? People who use such vaccines are merely materially cooperating with evil rather than formally cooperating, correct? One could also argue that they are cooperating remotely rather than proximally to the evil, right? Thus, if there is no other vaccine available for a particular disease, would it be reasonable for parents' to vaccine their children, but also demand for a more ethically sound alternative?

The key idea is that we demand an alternative. It IS already out there, but not enough voices clammoring for it......yet.

There are three relevant facts, as I see it.
1. The vaccine was unethically cultivated long ago from the cells of an aborted child, and is still cultivated from the same cell lines. No further injury is done to that child or any other by continuing to cultivate those cell lines, so any cooperation with the original evil is remote and not proximate.)

2. While a more ethical alternative exists, it is unavailable for
purchase. If it were available, one might be culpable for choosing the
unethically-derived vaccine. Since it is not, any cooperation with evil
is material and not formal.

3. Obvious and grave injury will be done to (some unspecified number of) other children by refusing to use this vaccine in the absence of a more ethical alternative. The duty to protect one's own family and community must be considered, as the likely harm of not vaccinating typically falls upon another and not the individual deciding whether to vaccinate.

Hi Craig,

To your first point, I have two thoughts.... One is that the passage of time does not diminish a sinful act. From Donum Vitae (I, 4: 1987) "The corpses of human embryos and fetuses, whether they have been deliberately aborted or not, must be respected just as the remains of other human beings." Using vaccines produced from aborted fetal cell lines shows a profound disrespect for the remains of these unfortunate children and exploiting these babies for profit violates the teachings of our Church. Two, by receiving these vaccines and not taking a stand we enable a culture of acceptance that tells Merck and other manufactures that this practice is acceptable and rewards them financially from those acts over and over again. It is erroneous to think that no new fetal tissue is or will be needed to develop vaccine cell lines. We now know that the current MMR vaccine cultured on WI-38 has a finite life. The cell line will eventually die out and will need to be replaced. A cell line dubbed PER C6 was obtained from an 18 week old fetus aborted in 1985, was developed by a Dutch Pharmaceutical in 1995, and has been licensed by other pharmaceutical companies who desire to develop new vaccines. It’s my understanding that Johnson and Johnson/Crucell is using PER C6 to create their Ebola vaccine. And there are two Ebola vaccines being developed in the United States for use worldwide and they are also being cultivated on newer aborted fetal cell lines (HEK 293). There are other Ebola vaccines in the works outside of the US that use Vero cell or chicken eggs or even plant material but only these three have initial approval from the FDA. Until we create a market for moral vaccines, pharmaceutical companies will have no reason to provide moral alternatives.

In Peace,

Jen

Jen, good reply. Passage of time doesn't obviate the sin, but the damage is already done; refusing to use the vaccine doesn't undo the damage nor do it all over again. The cultivated cells aren't still a part of the aborted child, any more than cells of mine cultivated in a petri dish at the infectious-disease lab are still part of me.

As for Big Pharma having the world over a barrel, I agree but would prefer to convince these companies to do the right thing for the sake of good public relations. Corporations don't set out to be evil, and generally prefer to be viewed as good citizens. I disagree that you can effectively 'create a market' by abstaining from vaccination, as if it were of no more import than abstaining from makeup and shampoo tested on animals. Agreeing to let others get sick for your own moral ends is like gambling with someone else's money.

I don't think I was being blunt enough.

1) If you rely on herd immunity -- that is, the probability that most in your community are immune to the diseases in question -- then you too are consciously benefiting, albeit by proxy, from the murder of an aborted child. You want to be morally pure, move somewhere where you can live like Damien of Molokai, free from the corruption of the immunized.

2) "... what better way is there?" Catholic hospitals and universities could, you know, use some of their expensive research facilities to fund and develop an ethical vaccine. But they have abandoned the love they had at first (Rev 2:4), and are too busy serving their new master the Democratic Party as it renders control over every individual's health decisions to Washington. If the government then goes after parents who choose 'wrongly' regarding their children's health care, let it be known that the Catholic Left was first in line demanding the government be handed that power.

3) The last six years have amply proven that the US government does not give a damn what the people want in health care. You're more likely to get results petitioning Merck.

Your "equations" are missing two vital factors. First, you have to factor in the seriousness of the disease you are trying to prevent in your own children. (E.g. if your child is healthy then chickenpox is not serious during early childhood, but the older the child gets, the more serious it is and thus the more urgent the need for vaccination becomes.) Secondly, as a society, we can protect the infants and immunocompromised people among us by vaccinating our healthy children. These are much greater goods than participating from such a great, great distance as the development of these vaccines. I would go so far as to say we have an ethical DUTY to vaccine, while at the same time demanding ethical research in the future.

I concur, speaking as someone who inexplicably got the chickenpox at 22 years old (short version: 105-degree fever at the start, 40 pounds lighter by the end). While I didn't know the chickenpox vaccine was unethically-derived, when the time came you bet my son was vaccinated.

The Vatican has responded to this issue. The Congregation on the Doctrine of the Faith issued a letter entitled "Moral Reflections on Vaccines Prepared from Cells Derived from Aborted Human Fetuses." It is widely available on the internet. I believe that its conclusion agrees with yours.

The analysis was done by the Pontifical Academy for Life here:

http://www.catholicculture....

It is remote material cooperation, and we are obliged to object to the use of aborted fetal cells in vaccines. They can be used "on a temporary basis" if someone is in grave danger, but to refuse them entirely is a morally sound option. Note that the current situation regarding aborted fetal cells will be permanent if everyone doesn't starting speak up. It's been going on for decades, and the companies have interpreted the silence of the last four decades and to be complete approval. Of course, before the internet, you'd have had to go to a library to figure out what MRC-5 was. right? It's not like anyone really knew.

Two good articles on how to interpret the PAFL document here:
http://www.catholicculture....

and

http://www.catholicculture....