LETTER- Is the city a 'rat lab'?

Dave McNair's article "Sticking point: Required shot catches parents off guard" [News, August 30] raises several issues that could use more community discussion. First, why should school staff be the enforcers of public policies basically hatched and promulgated by the American Medical Association and pharmaceutical companies?

Our school administrators have enough to do as it is: education.

As for the "required" "mandated" shots, there's plenty of evidence that immunization policies are policies, not laws, that immunizations come with considerable risk to children, and that each state has forms parents can sign to have such immunizations waived.

Interested parties can look for themselves. On the term "immunization waiver," for instance, Google provides 1,700,000 hits, the first hit being "Vaccine Waivers By State." It would seem that a significant body of citizens and medical people are not on the "Let's have another vaccine" bandwagon.

For Virginia residents, a down-loadable form is available at vaclib.org/pdf/va.txt, and counsel is available at the Vaccine Exemption Alliance (845-398-0521) and Charlottesville's Rutherford Institute (rutherford.org/Issues/ParentsRights.asp).

Secondly, why should parents and their children be placed at considerable risk for what amounts to an on-going experiment in human biochemistry? How many autistic children do we have now because of Thimerosal (mercury-laden) vaccines? The last estimate I saw was 1.5 million (see Mercury-freedrugs.org). Does this particular TDaP booster contain Thimerosol? The more you look into this vaccine issue, the more convoluted it gets.

But one thing stands out to me. It's profits, not common-sense science, that's behind "mandatory" programs. I want Charlottesville to be a sanctuary for children, not another rat lab facilitated by educators following orders.

Clay Moldenhauer
Charlottesville

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