Bachmann: HPV Vaccine makes You Mentally Retarded - She Must Have Had An Armful Then

Bachmann: I'm Not Responsible For The Words Coming Out Of My Mouth
By Adam Serwer
Sep. 23, 2011



In a television interview after the GOP presidential debate on September 12, Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, who was attacking Texas Governor Rick Perry over his decision to mandate that adolescent girls receive a vaccine for HPV, made the shocking suggestion that the vaccine caused "mental retardation." This is what Bachmann said:

"There's a woman who came up crying to me tonight after the debate. She said her daughter was given that vaccine.… She told me her daughter suffered mental retardation as a result. There are very dangerous consequences."

On Thursday night, Bachmann was asked directly about those remarks, which, as my colleague Tim Murphy reported, are not only completely false but could have serious health consequences by dissuading people from vaccinating their children. Asked about her validating paranoid junk science, Bachmann disavowed all responsibility, insisting that she was just the messenger.

Well, first I didn't make that claim nor did I make that statement. Immediately after the debate, a mother came up to me and she was visibly shaken and heart broken because of what her daughter had gone through. I so I only related what her story was.

Bachmann went on to explain a far more justifiable objection to Perry's decision, namely that the mandate was really about his desire to help a campaign contributor.

For what it's worth, Bachmann's excuse is also false. She said that there "are very dangerous consequences" that come from mandating the HPV vaccine, and in context, it's clear she's referring to the false assertion that the vaccine causes mental problems. She wasn't merely "relaying" false information, she was endorsing it. Instead of simply admitting that it was wrong to validate and amplify a conspiracy theory, Bachmann basically said she's not at all responsible for making sure anything that comes out of her mouth is actually true. This is a shockingly glib response for someone who wants to run the most powerful country in the world. Mother Jones

Update:

Pediatrician: "The Problem is People Like Michele Bachmann" More, including this MP3



''I'm not a doctor, I'm not a scientist'' Michele Bachmann

''I'm not against religion, I'm against maniacs'' Brian Cox

h/t Maren

Why You Don't Want Rick Perry Making Decisions About Your Sex Life (Illustrated)

Update: Perry and the HPV Vaccine: Selling Women's Health (and Everything Else) to the Highest Bidder more

Why You Don't Want Rick Perry Making Decisions About Your Sex Life

The belief that sex is "immoral" pushes Conservatives to support abstinence-only, sex-is-immoral education and policy, even though it is proven to be harmful.
By Amanda Marcotte
August 22, 2011

Governor Rick Perry of Texas has thrown his hat into the presidential contender ring, and his nascent campaign has quickly came to demonstrate why the blurring of the distinctions between church and state are so dangerous, especially to women. His campaign has surprisingly been even more of a demonstration of this than that of Michele Bachmann’s, even though the mainstream media consensus is Bachmann is more of a theocrat. Part of the reason is that Perry has been the governor of Texas for over a decade now, and his experience and power as an executive has simply given him more chances to blur the lines….and more reasons to be called out for it.

The incident that got the most attention was Perry’s prayer rally in Houston, TX, where Perry, in what many (including myself) consider a flagrant violation of the First Amendment, led 30,000 evangelical Christians in a day of prayers for the state and the nation. Perry’s contempt for constitutional restrictions on government establishing an official religion throws into stark relief how much the anti-choice movement, to which he is currently pandering as hard as he can, is basically just one arm of an overall theocratic movement in the U.S. to wed state to a very particular interpretation of the Bible.

To begin with, Perry did show some sign of willingness to separate church and state while governor, when he issued an executive order requiring girls in Texas entering the 6th grade to be vaccinated against HPV. This is how it should be. Regardless of one’s personal religious convictions about female sexuality, when you’re the governor, your job is not setting the religious dogma for the state, but prioritizing the public's health. HPV is a public health issue (just because you personally may feel contracting HPV is just desserts for having sex, the people you pass it to may not be burdened with such anti-sex superstitions) and Perry acted like an executive handling this public health issue, and not a theocrat foisting his own sexual judgments on his citizens.

From a previous comment of mine:When I started reading about Perry's stance on the HPV vacine, (£300/$600 per patient) I thought, he's being a bit progressive here, until that was, I read about his connection to Merck.

Of course he had to take it all back, claiming it was all a mistake and that he should have left the decision to the legislature, knowing full well the fundamentalist-heavy state legislature would have killed the requirement. The fact that Perry feels he has to apologize for putting the health of Texas girls ahead of fundamentalist over-the-top hatred of female sexuality--hatred that now runs so deep that they support letting 4,000 women a year die of cervical cancer rather than do anything that could be construed as accepting that sex happens---is just one example of how much the theocrats have taken control of our political process. And how they intend to flex that power by attacking the very concept of a healthy sexuality.

Also indicative of the problem was Perry’s response to a question about sex education in light of empirical evidence that abstinence-only doesn’t work. Perry, unable to deal with the conflict between the demands of fundamentalists that secular government promote their dangerous views of sex as deeply sinful and the demands of public health, flubbed the question. Paul Waldman of the American Prospect explained the flub:

Liberals may think that conservatives support abstinence education because they believe it will reduce teen pregnancy, when the truth is that stopping teen pregnancy is at best a minor consideration for conservatives. If there’s going to be any discussion of sex in school at all, they believe it ought to express the categorical moral position that sex is vile and dirty and sinful, until you do it with your spouse, at which point it becomes beautiful and godly (you’ll forgive a bit of caricature). The fact that abstinence-only education is far less effective at reducing teen pregnancy than comprehensive sex-ed isn’t something they’re pleased about, but it doesn’t change their conviction about the moral value that ought to be expressed……

Not sure if this guy has aspirations to become a Republican Governor, but he certainly seems qualified for it when you read the details of his manifesto.

So while it’s true that Rick Perry is not a particularly smart guy, the difficulty he has here comes from the fact that his stance on sex education is about 95 percent moral and 5 percent practical.

Waldman's right, but the problem runs even deeper than liberal empiricism vs. conservative “morality.” (I question a “morality” that hates something as life-affirming as sex, and believes that it’s so sinful it should result in disease, life destruction, and even death for people who engage in it outside of their incredibly strict parameters.) The problem goes right to the separation of church and state. The belief that sex is “immoral” isn’t a standard-issue moral belief shared across cultural or religious differences, unlike other moral beliefs such as the wrongness of murder or stealing. This is a question of religious freedom, and whether or not religious beliefs that sex is wrong should be imposed on minors. Standing with religious freedom means standing with comprehensive sex education and mandatory HPV vaccines, on the grounds that people who get these things will still be free to believe sex is wrong. In fact, whether or not your religion teaches that sex is dirty, you still benefit from vaccination and education---that way, if you slip up and have sex, you can have a clean, pure guilt trip of self-hatred without having a bunch of unnecessary health problems. And if you ever get over your commitment to such a misanthropic, sex-phobic faith, you will be able to start your new, sex-positive life with a clean bill of health.

But even more for the rest of us, we should have secular, evidence-based policy instead of fundamentalist faith-based policy not just because it has better health outcomes for everyone, but also because the belief that church and state should be separate was baked into our Constitution right from the beginning. Alternet

Amanda Marcotte co-writes the blog Pandagon. She is the author of It's a Jungle Out There: The Feminist Survival Guide to Politically Inhospitable Environments.

Footnote: I need to check out the full HPV story in Texas. The connection to Merck link that I posted only mentions Perry instigating the program and little else.

Update: If you check out the claiming it was all a mistake (video) link above, all is explained. But what did strike me about Rick's grovelling performance was just how Romneyesque he was. Hard to tell the buggers apart. You will find previous Mitt Romney under the Mormon tag.

For my sentiments on the subject there is this.

Human Papilloma Vaccination For All UK Schoolgirls

This is how socialist medicine works, it works well, and it works even better when the pious and the sanctimonious, who should be more concerned with their daughters health than with her maidenhead, don't enter into the equation.

Given the high cost of the three injection course, £300/$600 for every girl in the country this has to be one of the best examples of preventive socialist medicine in the entire history of the National Health Service.

It is government action like this that rekindles a little of my long lost national pride. more

H/T Maren

One In Four US Teens Has A STD

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It's hardly surprising given all the junk science and lies the sanctimonious fucktards of religious America feed their kids. That a nations youth finds itself in this sorry state of affairs is simply terrible, the figures are truly appalling.

Eighteen percent have HPV virus, the same HPV virus that can be nullified with a vaccination when administered to girls before they become sexually active, the same vaccination that the good Christian parents don't wish their daughters to have in case it might encourage promiscuity in their darling little girls.

It makes my fucking blood boil.

One in four teenage girls in the United States has a sexually-transmitted disease, a study has indicated.

The study, by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), found an even higher prevalence of STDs among black girls.

Researchers analysed data from a nationally representative sample of 838 US girls aged 14 to 19.

A virus that causes cervical cancer - HPV - was the most common, followed by chlamydia, trichomoniasis and herpes.

The CDC says the study is the first in its kind to examine the prevalence of common sexually transmitted diseases among adolescent girls.

It found that nearly half of the African-American girls surveyed had at least one STD, while the rate was 20% among white and Mexican-American teenagers.

Human papillomavirus, or HPV, affected 18% of the girls surveyed, chlamydia 4%, trichomoniasis 2.5%, and herpes simplex virus 2%.

Screening recommended

The CDC's Devin Fenton said it was a serious issue because the diseases could lead to infertility and cervical cancer.

"Screening, vaccination and other prevention strategies for sexually active women are among our highest public health priorities," he said.

The CDC is recommending annual chlamydia screening for all sexually active women under 25, and HPV vaccines for girls aged 11 to 12, followed by booster injections.

John Douglas, the CDC's head of STD prevention, says screenings are underused because teenagers often do not think they are at risk.

Analysts say some doctors are also reluctant to discuss screening with teenage patients because of confidentiality concerns, knowing parents would have to be told of the results.End source

Previous

Going Down? Be Careful

I'm not sure I like my new role as a tabloid blogger, it's all a bit scummy. I will give it a wee while longer and then assess the whole thing.

ATLANTA - The sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer in women is poised to become one of the leading causes of oral cancer in men, according to a new study.

The HPV virus now causes as many cancers of the upper throat as tobacco and alcohol, probably due both to an increase in oral sex and the decline in smoking, researchers say.

The only available vaccine against HPV, made by Merck & Co., is currently given only to girls and young women. But Merck plans this year to ask government permission to offer the shot to boys.more

Human Papilloma Vaccination For All UK Schoolgirls

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This is how socialist medicine works, it works well, and it works even better when the pious and the sanctimonious, who should be more concerned with their daughters health than with her maidenhead, don't enter into the equation.


Given the high cost of the three injection course, £300/$600 for every girl in the country this has to be one of the best examples of preventive socialist medicine in the entire history of the National Health Service.

It is government action like this that rekindles a little of my long lost national pride.

Schoolgirls in Britain will be vaccinated against the virus that causes cervical cancer from September 2008, ministers have announced.

This goes further than recommended by experts, with all aged 12-13 eligible, and a catch-up campaign up to 18.

It is thought that vaccinating against human papilloma virus (HPV) could save hundreds of lives in the UK each year.

The vaccine is given in three injections over six months at a cost of around £300 a course.......

Other European countries including Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Italy, France, Norway, Luxembourg and Belgium have approved a vaccination programme.

Experts said the programme would be more expensive than all other childhood immunisations and the benefits would not be seen for decades, but eventually it would be worth the cost.More

Bill Maher on HPV and the fundies.

Why I hate Religion. Chapter One Zillion And Two: HPV Vaccine

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I was going to make the end of the headline read HPV Vaccine And The Bloody Catholics, but although this story features a Catholic school board it's not just the Catholics that are embracing near Islamic values when it comes to their daughters.


I feel like screaming, but I will say this to all the fuckedup repressed sanctimonious religious cocksuckers that are against vaccination, you don't own your daughter, you have a duty to your daughter before any duty to some imaginary celestial super being. Do what is right, the question of choice shouldn't enter into the equation, not in a million years.
Your daughters are going to get laid, get used to the idea.

Local Catholic parents will have the choice whether their daughters will get a new HPV vaccine to prevent cervical cancer at their schools later this autumn.

The Windsor-Essex Catholic District School Board says the policy addresses concerns that providing the shot may be seen as condoning premarital sex, while at the same time following a provincial directive that the potentially lifesaving vaccine be made available. more

h/t Fark