Faith Healing Does Not Prevent Death From H1N1 Influenza
A few weeks ago, an anguished blog on TPM recapitulated a news story from the Midwest. According to the news reports, two parents who believed in the power of faith healing watched their 11-year old daughter die from uncontrolled diabetes while they prayed for her recovery without seeking medical help.
The responses of commenters were extraordinary in their outrage at this act of parental negligence, in some cases expressing a fury that was almost palpable. One comment called the parental decision "premeditated murder" and demanded the severest penalty legally possible.
A recent Washington Post/ABC news poll reported that only 52 percent of parents polled said they would have their child vaccinated against the H1N1 influenza virus when the vaccine became available. Scaled to the larger population, that unwillingness translates into tens of millions of children at increased risk for serious illness and death. The H1N1 virus is unusual in that its threat to the elderly is less than that of seasonal flu, but its lethality in children is much higher. Already in the U.S., at least 96 and probably more children have died from H1N1 flu, and the epidemic is still growing -
On the other hand, the vaccine appears to be efficacious, based on antibody responses and parallels with similar flu vaccines - H1N1 Vaccination - as well as safe - Vaccine Safety - CDC and Vaccine Safety - WHO . It therefore appears that many more children may be condemned to death if current resistance to vaccination persists.
I hope it's clear that I use the term "condemned to death" metaphorically. I don't denounce the parents, who undoubtedly care deeply about their children's health. Rather, I would make the following point. Among these millions of reluctant parents, I expect there have been thousands or more who encountered the news story about the faith healing couple, and who reacted with the same outrage I described above. And yet, negligent deaths among children from faith healing in the U.S. are likely to be fewer - probably far fewer - than deaths from infectious diseases that would have been averted by vaccination. If they are not, faith healing is a far worse threat to this nation's health than most of us realize.
What is ironic, of course, is that if one asks either the faith healing believers or the vaccine rejectionists about their decisions, each expresses equal faith in the rational nature of their decisions, with the corresponding view that those who criticize are biased and closed-minded. Indeed, the choices are often justified on the basis of testimonial evidence - the paralytic who walked again after a faith healer touched him, or the child who died the day after vaccination - even though we also know that when the claims are subjected to rigorous scrutiny, none of the evidence supports the claims of efficacy for faith healing or excessive risk for vaccination.
The issue of vaccination in general is too broad to address here, except to say that the viral nature of Internet rumors combined with a natural suspicion of government and of authority figures tend to reinforce the understandable skepticism of individuals urged to take action for their own good. The H1N1 threat is severe enough, however, and the dangers to children great enough, to emphasize that in this case, the innocent will be destined to suffer, and on rare occasion to die, if well-intentioned but misguided suspicion of vaccination is not countered.
In that sense, the guilty parties may ultimately be less the well meaning but misinformed parent, and more those of us with some knowledge of public health who don't do our job. That means providing accurate information, but it also means treating the lay public with respect rather than an accusatory attitude, so that they respond favorably to our attempts at education. When I used the term "condemned to death" earlier, I emphasized that I did not mean it literally. But even as I reread what I wrote, I find it too willing to pin blame on others, particularly if we antagonize those whom we wish to convince. When it comes to condemning children to death, we must be careful that we're not the ones doing the condemning.
