James Lyons-Weiler
IPAK Public Health Policy Initiative
What if told you that vaccinologists know that the TdaP vaccine can create asymptomatic carriers of healthcare workers, of moms, of older siblings, of grandparents, and that their solution to the problem was to begin vaccinating pregnant women with TdaP in a attempt to see if newborn pertussis diagnoses (infections accompanied by symptoms) could be curbed?
Or that TdaP vaccination in pregnant women was never tested until ACIP’s recommendation on this new public health policy was adopted?
And what if I told you that recent mumps outbreaks blamed on so-called “anti-vaxxers” may well be due to the aging of the mumps portion of Merck’s MMR?
Or what if I told you that the Acting Health Commissioner of New York City incorrectly stated to Bronx families – and to a city councilman that asymptomatic measles infections and transmission do not occur, but that ample studies not only show that it occurs, but also that in highly vaccinated populations, asymptomatic transmission is the most common form of transmission of measles?
And what if I told you that the safety of the vaccination of premature infants in the NICU against Hepatitis B has never been tested for safety?
Or that not all vaccines have been tested for association with autism, and that causality cannot be established with association studies anyway?
What if told you that synergistic toxicity has been established for fluoride and for aluminum hydroxide – both of which are added to drinking water for different reasons?
Or that the food in public schools may be harmful to your child’s health?
Individuals who are involved in public health policy formation and application should be sure to perform due diligence on factors that influence their position on public health policy. And they should be prepared, in the name of their duty to public health, to help society find viable alternative when the policies in place are back by selected science, not reflective of the full body of knowledge, or are based on no science at all.
The IPAK Public Health Policy Initiative (PHPI) is a new initiative via which the public can become directly involved by empowering the education of policy makers, legislators and members of the judiciary on the realities of the issues they are asked to make decisions about. Without thorough and objective policy analysis, our society will continue to have to endure public health policies that are not founded upon science, reason and logic. The net result is that the public will eventually come to know about the flaws of the policies as a direct result of observing harmful attendant consequence of ill-formed policies.
As founder of IPAK and the IPAK PHPI, I invite submissions that evaluate public health policies, legislation, and judicial rulings on whether they are fully informed by the peer-reviewed scientific literature. When public health policy lacks a credible and sound scientific basis, people will get hurt. Our publishing model employs the Creative Commons license, and our aim to secure sufficient public support so article preparation charges are zero or kept to an absolute minimum.
Authors are invited to submit original work as Editorials, Opinion Articles, Review Articles, and Policy Analyses, and Critiques of Studies. Citations should be listed as Works Cited and follow the simple format of: Author, Name, Year. Title, Journal volume page numbers with a hyperlink to the full text if available or to the publication outlet’s URL for access.
It is my intention and great hope that the free and open discussion of public health policy in the US and worldwide will become more fully informed by the analyses contributed by the scholars who choose to participate. Only full and original pieces will be considered for publication.
Please send all manuscripts to editorphpi@ipaknowledge.org
