this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2023
211 points (96.5% liked)

politics

18832 readers
6108 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
  2. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  3. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  4. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
  5. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  6. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

I'm not a big fan of Nick Gillespe, but he wiped the floor with RFK Jr. here.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] MisterThePlague 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

To broaden this beyond "income level 4" (I'm using Hans Rosling's categorization system instead of First, second, third world), banning thimerosal has a huge impact on worldwide vaccination efforts. It's cheaper to supply multidose vials to lower income level places for numerous reasons, the major of which are: less packaging, and less infrastructure (refrigeration) required.

So it's not even a matter of "well if 'we' (read: those in the US, Europe, etc) don't really use/need it, why not just ban it anyways, just in case?" This is a common rebuttal to what you posted about the US not needing it due to the accessibility of refrigeration and speed with which vaccines are used, so it's very important to remind people they are not the only people on Earth. "We" aren't the only ones to consider. It's very difficult for people to grok the worldwide impact of selfish, fear-based, seemingly small decisions, but this is why people who want to rid the world of vaccine-preventable infections are so frustrated with the antivax conspiracies. It's not just an individual parent and their child in isolation. We live in a society. They are making decisions that impact everyone, and that's not hyperbole.

All that being said, it DOES have an impact on the level 4 countries that ban it in childhood vaccines. It makes them more expensive because they're single dose. Someone is ultimately paying that cost, be it taxpayers, insured folks, or private individuals.

A source: https://web.archive.org/web/20230529131751/https://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/17/health/experts-say-thimerosal-ban-would-imperil-global-health-efforts.html

And from WHO:

WHO policy is clear on this issue, and the Organization continues to recommend the use of vaccines containing thiomersal for global immunization programmes because the benefits of using such products far outweigh any theoretical risk of toxicity.

https://www.who.int/teams/health-product-policy-and-standards/standards-and-specifications/vaccines-quality/thiomersal

ETA: thiomersal is a synonym. Same stuff.