Re: Market Failures, Monocultures, and Dead Kids (Oh My!)

[camcc@abraxis.com (Alec)]

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At 07:11 PM 3/18/97 -0600, William H. Geiger III wrote:
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*|In <9HHR4D12w165w@bwalk.dm.com>, on 03/18/97 at 06:21 AM,
*|   dlv@bwalk.dm.com (Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM) said:
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*|>camcc@abraxis.com (Alec) writes:
*|
*|>> Tim,
*|>>
*|>> There would be more room if your sig weren't so long. :->
*|
*|>Guys with short dicks use long sigs.
*|
*|>> As you know, every year there are a certain number of child deaths as a
*|>> result of reactions to state-mandated innoculations/vaccinations.  Gone
too?
*|>>
*|>> Perhaps the difference, or rationale, here is the possible spread of
disease
*|>> to others, rather than trying to protect the individual from himself.
*|
*|>Suppose X chooses to innoculate their kids and Y chooses not to innoculate
*|>their kids against, say, polio; and Y's kids get it. They're not going to
*|>give it to someone whose parents chose to innoculate them. (This is a kind
*|>of borderline example, not unlike circumcision.  The individual affected
*|>by the choice is too young to understand what it's all about, but doesn't
*|>want to be stuck with a needle. Why are the parents more qualified to make
*|>decisions for him than the state?)

*|
*|The issue of who is more qualified is irrelevent.
*|
*|The parents are the ONLY ones who have a right to determin the welfare of
*|their childern. If the parents determin that the risks of reaction to the
*|innoculation outways the benifits that choice is their's and their's alone.
*|

Not in every case do the parents have the right to determine what treatment
shall be performed or whether it shall occur at all. More often than not the
courts have allowed medical treatment for the child who is not able to
consent to such treatment for himself.

In many instances courts have stepped in to authorize blood transfusions for
children of Jehovah's Witnesses, who follow Biblical injunctions not to "eat"
blood (Gen. 9:4). Recently the Church of Christ Scientist [?] has been under
societal and governmental attack for insisting on substituting healers for
medical teams even in cases of children afflicted by cancer accompanied by
apparently unbearable pain.

Parents most certainly are not the only ones to determine the welfare of
their children; society has assumed a significant role and typically moves to
protect the child from the parents or from the _beliefs_ of the parents.

Alec
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