All posts by Daniel Bennett

Growing up as a child I was never really exposed to religion per se, I would be technically considered a third generation atheist. My childhood home in Los Angeles afforded me a great opportunity to observe the cultural complexities others have and how their different religious idolism effected their day to day lives. To me, I see religion as something that people use as a coping mechanism to better understand a world they cannot seem to grasp; a metaphorical crutch on reality. I am often bewildered by what others tell me about their beliefs and how contradictory they can be to contemporary scientific understanding. People are sometimes shocked when I tell them that I myself am an atheist and sometimes they're even confused by this notion. "But you seem like such a nice person", "How could you have served in the military and been an atheist? ", "How can you be so moralistic and not believe in god?" These are the some of the typical questions I get when talking to people when the subject comes up. I have had plenty of people who become almost instantly hostile towards me after they learn that I am a 'non-believer', even when I have been very polite and non-confrontational. I have even had people I had once considered to be my friends stop communicating with me upon learning that I don't aspire to some higher power. When I look at how people use their religion in order to influence and control others I am disheartened by this in many ways. It's wielded like a weapon to channel their hate and discriminatory views into society. To me and many others, some of the things they do in the name of their god are as indelible as the sins they detest so greatly, a great many of people suffer and die due to this. I care about people because life is the most precious commodity in the universe. We have but this one chance to live and isn't that reason enough to care for one another? That is my experience.
Education, Medical, Science

responses to popular anti-vaxer rhetoric

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I made a generic copy/paste that you can all use against antivaxers:

1. The likelihood of ANY “vaccine injury” has less than a 0.01% chance of happening. (Which includes mild reactions)

2. Those scary toxins in the vaccines go through chemical reactions that make them harmless to the body and easy to metabolize. Think about it this way, sodium and chloride on their own will kill you but together you get table salt.

3. The increase in unhealthy children with diabetes, asthma, allergies, cancer, etc. Is far more likely caused by processed foods, chemical cleaners, pollution, sedentary life in front of screens and the age at which the mother gives birth than vaccines.

4. Your vaccines do not have aborted fetal cells in them. In the 60s some vaccines were created using voluntarily aborted fetal cells, but scientists were able to grow the tissue in the lab, so you are about 3 generations removed from that original vaccine.

5. If herd immunity weakens, and dead diseases make a comeback, they have the opportunity to mutate and evolve making current treatment and prevention methods obsolete, so even if you aren’t willing to “light your child on fire to protect another” who is immunocompromised, remember that.

6. Every medication has risk, as a mother you most likely have used birth control even though is doubles and almost triples your risk of stroke and blood clots. Even aspirin has the possible side effect for blindness and kidney failure.

7. The long term side effects of these diseases are far more likely and much worse than vaccines. Once you have the measles, for example, you are at risk for SSPE, a fatal disease that attacks your nervous system.

8. Stop spreading fear and misinformation, you are far more of a risk than any vaccine.

9. There is less than 0.00001% chance that your child will develop encephalitis from the vaccine compared to 1-3 in 1,000 children contracting measles will develop encephalitis concurrent with the measles infection. 10–15% of those children will die and a further 25% will be left with permanent neurological damage. 1 in 1,000 children with measles will develop post-infectious encephalitis, which has a very high fatality rate. >1-10,000 children develop SSPE, which is 100% fatal in almost all cases (the exception being a single child that survived) When it comes to measles vs. the vaccine, it’s no contest.

•As many as one out of every 20 children with measles gets pneumonia, the most common cause of death from measles in young children.

•About one child out of every 1,000 who get measles will develop encephalitis (swelling of the brain) that can lead to convulsions and can leave the child deaf or with intellectual disability.

•For every 1,000 children who get measles, one or two will die from it.

•Measles may cause pregnant woman to give birth prematurely, or have a low-birth-weight baby.

•Ear infections occur in about one out of every 10 children with measles and can result in permanent hearing loss.

•Diarrhea is reported in less than one out of 10 people with measles. Which can lead to dehydration and secondary complications.

•Measles is also responsible for inhibiting immune responses which leaves the sick individual vulnerable to secondary infections.

10. And even if the infection doesn’t kill you, the morbidity complications from measles are life altering. Some people may suffer from severe complications, such as pneumonia (infection of the lungs) and encephalitis (swelling of the brain). They may need to be hospitalized and could die.

11. It’s not about YOU and “your freedoms”… It’s about everyone else. Stop seeing this as the government trying to regulate your lives. It’s the government enacting a law that protects people. I’ve written to several law makers about this subject and they thankfully agreed that we should have mandatory vaccine requirements to protect the general population. You don’t complain about DUI laws… this really is no different.

12. Since 1988 only 20,522 petitions for vaccine injury compensation have been filed. Of those, only 6,465 were deemed credible and paid out. While the dollar amount was high, the number of cases is much more compelling. Are you going to stop using aspirin for your children because one girl had a terrible, awful reaction where she lost most of her skin and was awarded $63 million? No because it was a very rare reaction. No drug is one size fits all. Unfortunately, some will have adverse reaction but I’ll take the odds of less than 7k vaccine injuries over the last 20 years versus contracting any of these diseases.

Opinion, Science

California’s glyphosate ruling crosses ethical lines.

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A California court is not peer-reviewed science. What we are having here is the legal system unethically crossing the lines into scientific endeavor. If you wanted the courts to be fair, how about place in the courts a bunch of subject-matter experts.

You can tell people that dihydrogen monoxide is an absolutely dangerous chemical that caused a person’s cancer and that every single person that had cancer was exposed to dihydrogen monoxide.
(dihydrogen monoxide is the chemical name for water) The problem is, when you don’t know what science is, you make bad decisions because you were uninformed and uneducated in the subject matter.

We do not have courts make a medical diagnosis, we do not have courts making decisions on how airplanes fly and are designed, we do not have courts making mathematical decisions for engineering, but apparently we now have courts determining scientific matters when it comes to chemicals.

This is not how science works folks! Science is not an ad populum endeavor, it is based upon empirical evidence and years of peer-reviewed research. To use a court case based upon the opinion of non subject matter experts to determine the outcome of what a chemical is or is not responsible for is absolutely pseudoscience and should hold absolutely no grounds. This is a slippery slope and by doing this they are simply adding grease to it.

Uncategorized

BREAKING NEWS: ISIS hold Santa Claus hostage after terrorist cell shoots down sleigh.

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BREAKING NEWS:
A bombshell report from the Pentagon shows that Santa Claus has been kidnapped by ISIS members somewhere in Syria around the Middle Euphrates River Valley. The report stated that ISIS probably used a rocket propelled grenade to down St. Nicks’ sleigh and drone footage shows what looks to be a crash sight with several dead reindeer.

A propaganda film was identified on an ISIS website showing Santa Claus tied to a chair with an ISIS member making demands to the west to convert to Islam immediately or suffer death. In the video they stated that they would make Santa Claus and the western world would “pay for his (Santa Claus) perversion and that he will be punished dearly for his actions.”

Santa Claus read a script with a gun to his head, pleading with world leaders to immediately implement Sharia law and apologizing for his apparent crimes against Islam and the prophet Mohammed.

At this current time, no information was available on the current condition of Santa Claus but officials at the Pentagon stated the situation looked grim. President Donald J. Trump is scheduled to have a press briefing in the morning when more information becomes available.

Uncategorized

​Twas the Night before madness…

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I don’t celebrate Christmas, I don’t have a Christmas tree in my living room, there’s nothing outside dangling that is festive, I don’t say merry Christmas and only say Happy holidays out of obligation, in all honesty, I sincerely hate this time of year. Let me elaborate so you all don’t think I’m just being depressed or cynical.

For one, as probably all of you may know, I’m an outspoken atheist. For me this time of year is a constant reminder of how people’s deeply held superstition still persists and is quite literally forced in your face in December. The whole aspect of the Christmas season is a Frankenstein holiday, nevertheless Christians never seem to figure this out. They celebrate a holiday that the person they are celebrating… wouldn’t even celebrate.

That being said, it doesn’t take that much applied critical thinking and a minor understanding of geological and historical knowledge to realize that according to the ridiculous book known as the Bible, never mentioned an exact date for this supposed birth; but what we do know is that historically the Romans did their census in the spring and shepherds don’t leave their flocks out at night in the winter, especially since it sometimes snows in Bethlehem during the the winter. So from a historical position, if Jesus did exist, he would have been born in spring. The story of Jesus’ birth is also borrowed mythology as well, born of a virgin, in a manger, a brilliant star in the sky guiding wise men visiting from a far, all borrowed stories from other religions (then again a lot of stories from the Bible are borrowed stories). And being born in the middle east in December, where the altitude in Bethlehem is 2,500 ft above sea level and has an average late December temperature of 42°f, you’d think there would be more emphasis on keeping a newborn warm during this time of year. So that’s why I scoff at Christmas from the very premise of it.
The history of Christmas is just as dubious, especially when it comes to Christmas tradition. Getting people to embrace the Christian religious beliefs did pose a challenge to earlier followers of this religion, especially in European areas where they held their own religious beliefs and traditions in December. We know that in an effort to make the Christian religious beliefs more acceptable to the Europeans in the late Iron age, they had to adopt traditional times of celebration that other religions had. Yule, Winter solstice, Ziemassvētki, etc. were pagan traditional holidays this time of year. And in an effort to convert the people of these religious beliefs, the Christian Church adopted the customs and traditions of these holidays in an attempt to make the Christian religion more appealing (and it worked).
So with all this being said, now you know why I refer to it as a Frankenstein holiday. But this isn’t just what bothers me about this holiday season, this is more of an irritation to me. It’s the people themselves that really get under my skin as well as the expectations society has that really erks me.
People are at their most hypocritical point this time of year. They pretend to be happy and helpful with a desire to help their fellow man (which sometimes they do for this short period of time), but mostly they come across as pretentious and fake with a holier-than-thou attitude. For some reason people feel like they need a special occasion to help one another, and they aren’t really doing it for the right reasons; they’re doing it because they themselves feel like they need to appease a bearded white man that knows if they’re good or bad and will either punish or reward them for their efforts or there by lack of (sound familiar?). So they smile with tongue in cheek and pretend to be merry and joyful and scoff at those of us that dare roll our eyes.
This is where Christians are at their most loudest, their pinacle of bigotry this time of year and it’s truly pathetic. Masquerading around like they’re being oppressed and screaming there’s a “war on Christmas” and how they’re being so undoly discriminated against if anyone dares to tell them to kindly keep their religious beliefs to themselves. The arrogance this time of year makes me only gain in my disdain for the holiday season, but just when you think this couldn’t sound any worse than it is; society and capitalism ensures to add insult to injury.
We lie to our impressionable children and tell them a white bearded man will reward them with toys and treats if they behave (sound familiar?). And we constructed a grandiose back story about this character we call Santa Claus with it’s own customs and traditions that dazzle children and gives them hope (sound familiar?). All to eventually find out that it was all just a lie to keep them in line. Why do we do this to them when we know it’s wrong? (Maybe it’s because society tells us it’s ok)

And with that lie we the parents need to deliver on that promise, and dig ourselves into a financial hole by spending money we don’t have! But wait, just when you think this couldn’t be any worse, it does!
To add to the financial burden and pain of the societal expectation to buy treats and gifts for our children, we also do the same for our family, friends, acquaintances and coworkers, because if we don’t you’re an asshole! And businesses capitalize on this and assault your senses with a barrage of Christmas music and decorative displays  and just short of fumigating the air with the scent of cinnamon and pine; all in an attempt to get you to spend more of your hard earned cash that you really should be using for other things like bills. What’s worse is people buy right into this hook, line, and sinker and spend that money on holiday sales to the point that businesses mark their growth on just this month alone.
It’s pure chaos and hypocrisy wrapped in colorful paper with bow of insanity on top. But remember if you’re not singing joyful merry Christmas tunes then people have a name for this as well Ebenezer Scrooge… Bah-Humbug!
So happy holidays to you all, I hope a reindeer display falls on your head so maybe I won’t have to hear merry Christmas… again.

– Daniel Fisk Bennett

Atheism, Logic and reason, Opinion

Response to the “Perfect Earth”

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Have you ever actually looked at our planet? How many places on Earth would actually kill you if you were there? How many places on Earth are lethal to life in general, let alone human life? I’m sure in your natural state (meaning completely naked and unaided) if we dropped you just about anywhere from where we originally evolved from you would eventually die due to the environment.

So let’s talk hypothetically, if we dropped you in the center of Antarctica (or any other living animal for that matter) you would quickly freeze dry within a few minutes. I’m sure if we put you on top of Mount Everest (or any other animal for that matter) you would suffocate and die (if not freeze to death very rapidly first.) If you were put on the bottom of the ocean (which by the way makes up 70% of the earth’s surface) you and many other animals would instantly die ( FYI you would be crushed by the sheer pressure of the water before you could drown). I’m sure if we put you on the middle of a salt flat somewhere in the Kalahari Desert you would eventually die and completely dehydrate into a mummy, same goes with most other animals.

By the way salt flats in deserts are not very uncommon as deserts make up some 33% or a 3rd of earth’s non water covered surface. That’s just short of 10% of the entire earth’s surface when you include the water of the oceans. So that means 20% of the earth’s surface is left… but that also includes other things like tundra, artic and subartic, mountains, temperate zones, rainforests, and tropical regions. In our natural state, we can only survive in tropical regions. Tropical regions comprise approximately 7% of the earth’s dry land surface or just short of 2% of earth’s total surface and sustains over 50% of all species, that’s not very much space… In-fact if you just stand out in the sun long enough you would eventually die due to exposure… These are simple facts.

There are very few areas where a human can naturally survive, and those areas are filled with very large predators that evolved to eat us. For a place that was supposedly so perfectly created for us, it sure seems to want to kill us a lot; and has a great deal of completely uninhabitable areas and areas that are inherently dangerous to we fragile humans… So much for that intelligent design hypothesis you had.

-Daniel Bennett

Opinion

Dan’s Rant on Fad Dieting

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There’s a woman here that is one of our clients that happens to be a vegan…how do I know she’s a vegan? She won’t stop fucking talking about it and it’s purported moral and health benefits.

It pains me to hear nonsensical ideology and woo presented as facts from what’s really just a lifestyle choice (and more power to you if it makes you happy). We get it, you’re a vegan and a business woman who’s income allows you to eat fad food and enjoy an eccentric diet that gives you a smug sense of self- gratification and moral superiority in your quest for who’s the healthiest person in the room. In all honesty, I see it as a form of middle aged image insecurity.

Guess what, your genetics already has your count down timer set and there’s only so much you can do to extend it, “welcome to the lottery.” So while you stuff you face with chickpeas, kale chips, gluten free bread, and wash it down with fluoride free alkaline water from Japan; I’m going to enjoy my burger and fries, with a coke because guess what lady, you only live once; enjoy it and for fucks sakes smell the flowers every once in a while. You’ll be happier and who knows, you might even live a little longer in doing so.

Opinion, Woo

The problem with E.T.

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It’s statistically possible (and likely even in our own solar system) for there to be life on other planets, even intelligent life for that matter. But because our universe is so vast, the likelihood of our species making any contact with another intelligent alien species is extremely remote… I’m just being realistic.

The next closest star Alpha Centauri takes 4 years for its light to reach us, this would make space travel very difficult for the long distances it would take to make physical contact. And even if they had the technology to visit, what would compel such a highly advanced alien race to seek us out?

Here’s the problem with our simplistic view on aliens in the universe. Typically pop culture displays them as being only about a few hundred years more advanced than we are. The reality is the universe is vastly old, 13.4 billion years and counting. It would not be entirely improbable that a potential visiting alien species would be millions of years more advanced than us.

A species that was theoretically 5 million years more advanced than us would be unfathomably ahead in technology and we wouldn’t even comprehend the advancements that they were making. There would be technology we would have no idea would be even possible. As for those ancient aliens conspiracy theories, it is laugh worthy to think that a highly advanced alien species would visit this planet and not leave a massive technological imprint on our species in the process; that is if they did decide to help us out.

It’s safe to assume that any reasonable person has at one time or another gazed up at the night sky and dreamed of what or  who was out there just waiting to be discovered. Afterall, it would be fantastic to finally answer the question “are we alone in the universe?” Optimistically most likely we aren’t, but chances are we will never meet. Even if they did visit us, would we even know it or be worth their time?

Woo

AAPN on Chiropractic

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“Chiropractic is a freak offshoot from osteopathy. Disease, say the chiropractors, is due to pressure on the spinal nerves; ergo it can be cured by “adjusting” the spinal column. It is the sheerest quackery, and those who profess to teach it make their appeal to the cupidity of the ignorant. Its practice is in no sense a profession but a trade – and a trade that is potent for great harm. It is carried on almost exclusively by those of no education, ignorant of anatomy, ignorant even of the fundamental sciences on which the treatment of disease depends.”
Journal of the American Medical Association, 1913

Chiropractic is considered to be one of the most accepted forms of quackery practiced in alternative medicine and, unfortunately, ACTUAL medicine as well. It is responsible for major injuries like arterial tearing/strokes, major nerve damage, fractures, infections due to poor sanitation practices, haphazard and poor regulatory practices, poor or incorrect medical advice, and every year is associated with preventable death and serious bodily harm.

The history of chiropractic began in 1895 when Daniel David Palmer of Iowa performed an apparent neck adjustment on a partially deaf janitor, Harvey Lillard. Mr. Palmer claimed that this subtle neck adjustment completely restored Mr. Lillard’s hearing; although this makes absolutely zero anatomical sense as the nerves for your hearing do not intersect your neck. This experience led Palmer to open a school of chiropractic two years later. Rev. Samel Weed later coined the word “chiropractic” from Greek roots.

Similar to the idea of chi practice where they believe in energy flow disruptions causing the root of all illness, “vertebral subluxation” is the misalignment of the spinal column which leads to body dysfunction, disease, and interferes with the bodies “innate intelligence”. Granted many chiropractic care providers choose to ignore the origins and bases for chiropractic, the problem is there are major inconsistencies with care provided by Chiropractic clinicians.

Chiropractors are not medical doctors or medical professionals and have a very short schooling period that varies from school to school depending on that particular institution’s ideology and curricula. A United States Department of Education staff analysis found that the Council on Chiropractic Education (CCE) was not in compliance with 44 of the criteria for accrediting agencies outlined in the Code of Federal Regulations. This included failure to comply with regulations governing conflicts of interest, record keeping, processing of student complaints and the adequacy of its site review of accredited chiropractic colleges. The schooling they do receive has shown to be suspect and contrary to accepted scientific facts and evidence. A survey of a 1999–2000 cross-section of students of CMCC reported that fourth-year students opposed vaccination more strongly than first-year’s, with 29.4% of fourth-year’s opposing vaccination. So when it comes to being a “healthcare provider” this is extremely contradictory and dangerous.

Chiropractic Care and Placebo have historically scored about the exact same but there has been an egregious lack in clinical trials and studies. The research on chiropractic has been far from rigorous unsurprisingly. One of the problems is that studies of spinal manipulation therapy (SMT) can’t be double blinded, and it is very difficult to even do single blinding. So most studies resort to non-manipulation control groups like “usual care” or “wait list” or “pain medication.” Those studies are practically guaranteed to lead to false positive conclusions: they make SMT look more effective than it would look if you could provide a control that patients couldn’t distinguish from real SMT. This has been one of the ways Chiropractic has been able to get away with their claims consistently without having to provide burden of proof and efficacy. Chiropractic usually goes hand-in-hand with naturopathy, homeopathy, acupuncture, herbalism, holistic care, and other unfounded alternative medicine practices.
Therefore Chiropractic is not a recognized form of Medical Science and is not based upon empirical evidence but on anecdotal testimony.

One of the best ways to see this is by using what is known as Hill’s criteria. Sir Austin Bradford Hill established contemporary epidemiology as strength (strength of association), consistency, specificity, temporality (temporal sequence), dose response, experi-
mental evidence, biological plausibility, coherence, and
analogy. They form the fundamental prerequisites and assessment criteria of the cause-effect relationship. In reguards to Chiropratic, Hill’s criteria are the most commonly used epidemiologic model for suggesting a causal link for any diagnostic or treatment approach. There is a significant lack of evidence in the literature to fulfill Hill’s criteria of causation with regards to the chiropractic subluxation. No supportive evidence is found for the chiropractic subluxation being associated with any disease process or of creating suboptimal health conditions requiring intervention. Regardless of popular appeal this leaves the subluxation construct in the realm of unsupported speculation. This lack of supportive evidence suggests the subluxation construct has no valid clinical applicability.

Sources:

http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/chirostroke.html

Coroner’s Jury Concludes That Neck Manipulation Killed Canadian Woman.

Did chiropractic neck manipulation kill Katie May?

http://www.chirobase.org/15News/lewis.html

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264410X08009511?via%3Dihub

Dept. of Education to Council on Chiropractic Education: “Straighten Up!”

An epidemiological examination of the subluxation construct using Hill’s criteria of causation, 2009

https://chiromt.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/1746-1340-17-13?site=chiromt.biomedcentral.com

A Credible Placebo Control for Chiropractic Research

Conspiracy, Education, Medical

There Is No Conclusive Evidence That Cannabinoids Actually Cure Cancer

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On the subject of cannabis:

Many healthcare providers can agree that cannabis can alleviate some symptoms associated with cancer, like pain and nausea, as well as the side effects associated with the various kinds of cancer treatments available. But there is no conclusive evidence that it targets any one of the thousands of different and unique types of cancer systemic to the human population. Cancer isn’t just a simple disease: it has multiple causes and multiple ways of causing death and bodily harm. The drugs that can treat these various cancers can be extremely diverse, and one drug that will work with one particular type of cancer won’t work with another. In addition to the many varieties of cancers, each person has unique genetic characteristics which must be taken into account when designing a treatment plan.

The study people like to cite is this one:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4171598/

When you look at the actual facts, cannabis isn’t a miracle cure. The conclusion in the paper states that the  study was inconclusive and needed more research. The paper makes no mention of cancer cell destruction, either. It does talk about slowing down metastasizing factors, but not actually killing cancer cells themselves. It even acknowledged that in some cases cannaboids enhanced tumor growth:
“Furthermore, endocannabinoids- AEA and 2-AG are broken down into secondary metabolites like prostaglandin (PGE2) and epoxyeicosatetraenoic acid (EE) which enhance tumor growth and metastasis in diverse cancer types.”

Even if it was shown to have an effect on receptor sites or outright kills pancreatic cancer cells for example, without damaging the surrounding tissue, that’s still just 1 cancer out of many other varieties with multiple variables. With that being said another study even showed that cannabinoids actually had carcinogenic factors that increased the risk of pancreatic as well as other cancers for that matter:

http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/64/6/1943.short

“In contrast, Grand and Gandhi recently presented a case study of acute pancreatitis induced by cannabis smoking, indicating that cannabinoids may be a risk factor for pancreatic cancer.”


Above are test results that presents a potential link to cancer from cannabinoids. See the above citation for further information.                                 

Thinking a plant or a single chemical can cure cancer is ridiculous and shows a fundamental lack in understanding medical science. Cannabis has become the new herbalism that quacks and charlatans are using pushing without any evidence to back up their claims.

So in, conclusion, there are specific cancers that cannabinoids may have an effect on reducing metastasis in cancer cells but in others it enhances tumor growth. The current state of the research does not support cannabis as a miracle cancer cure, or even a particularly effective cancer treatment.

A typical method utilized by alternative medicine and quacks are using the plea to emotion to bolster their position rather than using empirical evidence.

Can’t we just agree that it’s simply fun to enjoy without all the nonsense attached to it?

Medical, Social, Woo

Whooping In Washington

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KitsapPeninsulaAreaMap02
In Washington state, here in the United States, pertussis (whooping cough) caused nearly 200 campers to be sent home early after whooping cough prompted the YMCA of Greater Seattle to close the overnight camp on the Kitsap Peninsula. This is yet another dangerous example of the rejection of vaccine uptake. The rise of misinformation and alternative medicine has been increasing and the rejection of science-based modern medicine has been gaining momentum. As we know, vaccines work by stimulating our immune system to produce antibodies (substances produced by the body to fight disease) without actually infecting us with the disease. They trigger the immune system to produce its own antibodies, as though the body has been infected with a disease. There have been many factors leading to this decline: a lot of this has to do with celebrities endorsing fallacious claims; Oprah Winfrey, Dr. Oz, Jim Carrey, Jenny McCarthy, for example. All this was due to a former British Gastroenterologist named Andrew Wakfield and his fraudulent study published in the Lancet articles.

The best way to prevent pertussis (whooping cough) is to get vaccinated. There are vaccines for babies, children, preteens, teens, and adults. The childhood vaccine is called DTaP, and the pertussis booster vaccine for preteens, teens, and adults is called Tdap. Pertussis is a highly contagious bacterial disease. Initial symptoms are usually similar to those of the common cold with a runny nose, fever, and mild cough, followed by weeks of severe coughing fits. After a fit of coughing, a high-pitched whoop sound or gasp may occur as the person breathes in, and may last for 10 or more weeks, hence the phrase “100-day cough”. A person may cough so hard that they vomit, break ribs, or become very tired from the effort. Children less than one year old may have little or no cough and instead have periods where they do not breathe. Infection in newborns is particularly severe.

Pertussis is fatal in an estimated 1.6% of hospitalized US infants under one year of age. First-year infants are also more likely to develop complications, such as: pneumonia (20%), encephalopathy (0.3%), seizures (1%), failure to thrive, and death (1%) perhaps due to the ability of the bacterium to suppress the immune system. Pertussis can cause severe paroxysm-induced cerebral hypoxia, and 50% of infants admitted to hospital suffer apneas. Reported fatalities from pertussis in infants increased substantially from 1990 to 2010. There is no excuse for these kind of vaccine preventable diseases.

Sources:

http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/state/washington/article93698202.html

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pertussis

https://www.cdc.gov/pertussis/