Download Vaccines A Reappraisal Richard Moskowitz MD Mary Holland 9781510722569 Books

Product details Hardcover 312 pages Publisher Skyhorse; 1 edition (September 19, 2017) Language English ISBN-10 1510722564

Vaccines A Reappraisal Richard Moskowitz MD Mary Holland 9781510722569 Books Reviews

• This book is profoundly disturbing, as it should be, since having an informed conversation about a topic that so fundamentally challenges our beliefs is hard. The idea that we can and should prevent illness, and that we have a way to do this (by vaccination programs) is so fundamental to modern medicine. But if vaccines don’t even do what they’re supposed to do we are really confounded and faced with a very disorienting dilemma. We thought we knew! We thought we had the answer!
  
  I am reminded of the story of a guy named Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis, a Hungarian physician, who introduced the notion of hand-washing in obstetric clinics, in Germany in the 1840’s. He proved that doing so diminished the rates of maternal death by puerperal infection significantly (maternal death was high in hospitals then when physicians went from dissecting cadavers to delivering babies without washing their hands in between). This was before germ theory was understood, but he had proof that the rates of infection and mortality were significantly reduced if doctors simply washed their hands with chlorinated lime solutions before attending births. Despite various publications of his results, where hand washing reduced mortality to below 1%, Semmelweis's observations conflicted with the established scientific and medical opinions of the time and his ideas were rejected by the medical community. When a paradigm is shifting and we don’t have all the new understanding we need, AND when powerful interests are involved (whether these be pride, smug arrogance, or big money), making changes is difficult. Ironically, we do know a little more about germ theory these days, but it turns out vaccinating people may not be the best way to prevent disease. Au contraire, it seems to be contributing to a new epidemic of chronic and debilitating auto-immune diseases.
  
  Vaccines, A Reappraisal was written by a rigorous physician who has stood up to “business as usual” many times in his career, when he’s seen something dangerous, wrong, or immoral, as well as when the “science of the day” is not matching up to actual results. The evidence he presents in this book more than raises concerns about the safety and efficacy of vaccinating people. His suggestions for “moving forward” given current policy are reasonable and thoughtful. One such recommendation (recently implemented in Sweden) is that “all routine vaccinations for children and adults alike be made optional.” His years of careful observation, concern, research, intelligence, compassion and pragmatism are obvious in this book, which I hope will be read and studied by every family physician, pediatrician and parent as they sort out the difficult decisions surrounding one of our society’s most treasured beliefs in modern medicine. In spite of very large and overwhelming issues, he seems dauntless in upholding his place to inform and inspire us to healthy “seeing” in this quagmire of difficult information. He gives us the science by which vaccines are held to a certain standard of truth. He gives us a glimpse into the complexity of human health, even intimating that we might be more than “science.” He clearly has respect for people, their experiences and choices, and he strives to help them live into their own fullness. The penultimate sentence of his book moves me and gives us a sense of the light from which the book is written. Dr. Moskowitz honors “giving full attention to the actual lived experience of [his] patients; recognizing the elements of health and well-being that lie hidden in or [are] inaccessible to them; and offering the relevant science and most suitable medicine to assist and enhance their own innate self-healing capacity.” In short, he cares from a scientific and a moral base that hold human health care to a much higher standard, which makes the vaccine issue worth our very serious contemplation.
• Vaccines – A Reappraisal (Skyhorse 2017) is a seminal, earth-shaking work that should be read by every practicing primary care physician and by every parent or parent-to-be of a child. Although I do not agree with every interpretation or proposed solution to the serious questions Dr. Moskowitz raises about vaccines and current policies about them in the United States, the experience represented (50 years of practice) and the research reviewed are a treasure tome worthy of serious consideration. More importantly, questions raised by the author deserve some answers.
  
  I speak from the perspective of being a board certified pediatrician having been in private practice for 31 years and 11 more years as a faculty member of a major medical center teaching pediatric residents in a community teaching program. In 2013 I retired from pediatric primary care to go into practice as an integrative medicine physician and in 2016 achieved a new board certification in integrative pediatrics. Parents often inquire about vaccines, and I will recommend this book for those who have serious questions, along with The Vaccine Friendly Plan (Ballantine Books 2016) by pediatrician Dr. Paul Thomas and Ph.D. Jennifer Margulis.
  
  From years of studying both sides of the hot-bed issue that vaccines represent in contemporary society and 31 years in pediatric practice, much of what Dr. Moskovitz describes I was already familiar with. He rightly calls out prevailing practices in the area of informed consent concerning vaccines and many ways in which this long held principle has been sacrificed to what is in essence political correctness about vaccine safety and effectiveness. Simply to raise questions about vaccine safety or of vaccine effectiveness have become “toxic” to the point of subjecting any who dare to question being subjected to various forms of rebuke or outright censure. The prevailing notion that vaccines are, without qualification, “safe and effective” is belied by the available scientific evidence. This is not to be construed that I am “anti-vaccine” as so often is applied to anyone who raises questions. I am among a growing number of experienced and well-read physicians who believe informed consent concerning vaccines and unresolved issues of vaccine safety and effectiveness deserve an open, respectful dialogue. Much of public contemporary debate is polarized, disrespectful, and in too many cases, uninformed.
  
  I would like to challenge in a collegial tone my fellow physicians who deal with vaccines to consider the remarkable material in this book and to be open to a rational process of digging beneath the oversimplified veneer of vaccine safety and effectiveness that dominates our profession. Equally important, I urge you to look carefully at the bedrock corollary issue of Informed Consent. Much can and must be done to improve both of these areas.
  
  Bose Ravenel, M.D., F.A.A.P., B.C,I.P.