I did a public talk recently and since I have a compromised immune system my body just did

not take well to being around that many people.

Now, you may be asking: Jessica, if you're ill, why aren't you in bed?

To which I can only say:

I kinda am.

This makeup is a lie.

I feel horrific.

Since I'm feeling terrible thanks to my lack of immunity and also too ill to stop

myself from being overly opinionated on the internet…

I thought I'd make a video about vaccinations!

It's sure to go well.

I doubt anyone will get angry in the comments.

Absolutely no one will call anyone else stupid.

It's FINE (!)

If you're an anti-vaxxer watching me right now, all I ask is that you hear me out and

keep watching all the way to the end.

If you enjoy hearing occasionally confronting factual information in a pleasant British

manner then please do tap the subscribe button underneath the video and make sure to also

hit the bell to be notified when I put out a new video.

[drink]

Oh god I think my face is going to explode

How much lemsip is too much lemsip?

I feel like I got a nose job but it's still wonky.

So: vaccinations…

I've always been quite interested in vaccinations and how they work but mainly just the drama

around them.

Sometimes I fall into the rabbit hole of reading YouTube comments on videos about vaccinating

or not vaccinating and it's honestly fascinating how absolutely confident people are in their

assertions.

I often like to present both sides of an opinion in my videos, even if I personally come down

very heavily on one side, because

I don't know?

I'm quite empathetic and tend to see both sides so sometimes

I sit on the fence and let people express their feelings-

- but not when it can literally kill me!

Hi, meet my line.

Also, anti-vaxxers, I know you mean well, I know you just want the best for your child,

but sometimes the logic you use is insulting to people with autism and other disabilities.

Personally I'd rather risk my imaginary child becoming disabled than becoming dead

but… that's just me.

I don't know...

If you don't know: a Vaccination is the administration of antigenic material to stimulate

an body's immune system to develop adaptive immunity to a pathogen.

My wife has an anatomy degree

To break that down… a vaccine contains an agent that resembles a disease-causing microorganism-

like polio or measles- but is made from a weakened or killed forms of the microbe, or

its toxins, or a protein that you would find on the outside of it.

But it's not the actual bad thing itself.

This is put into your body and once your healthy immune system comes into contact with it nearly

magically it will fight the threat, destroy it and not only that, it will learn to recognise

and destroy associated microorganisms in the future.

Humans are basically magic

So the next time you come across polio or measles your body goes-

Gah

- whatevs, I've seen you before!

- and you're safe.

That's the wonder of science.

Unless you're like me and you immune system just rolls over and plays dead.

So thank goodness for herd immunity!

When no one is immunised a contagious disease will spread quickly through the population.

When some of the population gets immunised a contagious disease will spread quickly through

through the rest of the population

And when MOST of the population gets immunised, the spread of the contagious disease is contained,

protecting the few who can't be immunised.

Me!

Thanks wikimedia for that graphic!

Oh god my head!

But you knew that already, didn't you?

You know what vaccinations are, you know what herd immunity is.

I'm just… background information.

Also, I did Science for Public Understanding at A Level and I loved it.

We learnt about how vaccines were first created: when in 1796 Doctor Edward Jenner noticed

that milkmaids, who had caught the mild disease cowpox,

(because they spent a lot of time with cows)

subsequently never contracted smallpox-

one of the greatest killers of the period.

In order to test this Jenner inserted pus from a cowpox pustule into an incision on

the arm of an eight-year-old boy, James Phipps.

Jenner subsequently proved that having been inoculated with cowpox Phipps was immune to

smallpox.

He submitted a paper to the Royal Society in 1797 describing his experiment, but was

told that his ideas were too revolutionary and that he needed more proof.

Undaunted, Jenner experimented on several other children, including his own 11-month-old

son.

Jenner was widely ridiculed but had the last laugh… because he wasn't dead.

According to the World Health Organisation:

Immunization currently prevents between 2–3 million deaths every year

Global measles mortality has declined by 84%

Have I sold vaccines to you yet?

Because there are some people who aren't buying.

In 2016 The Americas were declared free from measles… but not any more!

Yep, measles has come back.

Despite the WHO declaring that measles vaccine prevented an estimated 21.1 million deaths

worldwide from 2000 to 2017… some people have stopped vaccinating their children.

Okay, anti-vaxx people

Opposition to vaccination has existed as long as vaccination itself, it's not a new trend

There are a variety of reasons why: including sanitary, religious, scientific, and political objections.

There are a lot of angry voices on both sides-

There's a LOT of shouting

- and often disabled or immunocompromised people are talked ABOUT but we're not that

often listened to.

So hi.

I'm going to avoid calling people names or saying anyone is stupid, which is what

these discussions often dissolve into.

In truth I think we're all just trying our hardest to do our best, right?

Others might not agree with me but I think we're all lovely people.

It's even on my merch… [ding]

- What?

I'm ill, I'm allowed to plug my merch.

[grunts] my head is killing me

So let's review: vaccines and the herd immunity it creates are keeping me alive.

Vaccines will also help keep your own child alive.

Many people object to vaccinations because they believe it violates their personal liberty-

their right to do with their own body as they choose.

Which… fair.

Okay.

Sure.

I'm a firm believer in your body being yours to do with as you please… unless you're

hurting someone else with your body.

In which case it isn't.

You might own your own body but you don't own the air around it, you don't own the

potential for cross-contamination, you can't actually stop that from happening.

I love that the internet opens up the possibilities of coming into contact with opposing opinions

to my own.

I enjoy watching videos on YouTube that express political positions I don't agree with.

I think it's important to humanise the feelings we're often quick to villainise.

I genuinely believe that we're all trying our hardest to do our best… it's just

that we veer off in different directions...

I was partly inspired to make this video by an internet wormhole I fell into the other

day: I stumbled upon a website full of parent's accounts of the terrible illnesses their children

had been struck down with that occurred either around the same time they had been vaccinated

or months- even years- later, but which they felt clearly correlated.

I read their descriptions of the illnesses their children had been stricken with: “excessive

fatigue; headaches; muscle weakness and pain; joint weakness and rash that resembled

a sunburn; loss of concentration; and numbness and tingling in her hands and feet.”

Hmm

They all report that their seemingly normal children suddenly became rapidly ill and that

the medical profession wouldn't take them seriously.

And you know what…?

I've heard it all before.

Go to any website dedicated to supporting people with a chronic illness, hell read the

comments in most of my videos!

We've been here before.

We've done this.

We've been horribly ignored and begging for answers as to how this is happening and

what we can do to stop it and please, oh please, can we just know why?

I get how awful that is, I do, believe me, I've been through it myself… you're

asking 'who is the true villain?'

But I don't believe that vaccinations are the baddie.

Might it be: a health system that is run for profit and ignores medical problems it can't

make money from?

Yes.

Quite possibly.

We've been ignored for so long that not only have we lost trust but we've started

to turn upon those who should be helping us- who ARE trying to help us, but are working

within a semi broken system.

Anti-vaxxing is just a symptom of systemic lack of faith in our institutions.

People reject established science and medicine thanks to a growing awareness that corporations

are greedy and corrupt.

How can we trust a pharmaceutical company that massively inflates the price of... insulin-

and thus cuts off the supply to people who can't afford it?

I get that it's difficult to then trust that that company

when they say they genuinely wants to do good

and when they come for your baby with a huge needle… it's hard for belief that they

have good intentions to be the default.

BUT.

Mistrust of modern doctors is a completely separate issue to the belief in Edward Jenner's

science of vaccinations.

Please hold that in your mind.

If you've read a-

- discredited

- medical article about the MMR vaccine giving children autism and thus don't want your

baby to have it then (A) autism is not worse than death and (B) those injections can be

given individually.

Also: (C) Your child might be fit and healthy, they might survive one of those diseases…

but what about the ill child in their class who can't be immunised?

Well [clears throat]

Measles: Diarrhoea, vomiting, laryngitis, bronchitis, pneumonia, seizures, deafness,

blindness, hepatitis, meningitis, brain damage, death

Mumps: infection in the testicles or ovaries, meningitis, pancreatitis, brain infection,

deafness Rubella: arthritis, brain infection, and for

foetuses: heart problems, deafness, blindness, liver damage, intellectual disability, death.

You can control how many people your decision will affect.

Being a parent is scary.

So is the life of an immunocompromised person.

Just saying.

I've definitely terrified myself after reading all that out so… that's good (!)

Thank you for watching today's video, please share to raise awareness and subscribe…

To make up for the anti-vaxxers who will unsubscribe!

See you in my next video!