Resist war propaganda ploy
Health workers opt out of vaccine program
By Sharon Eolis, R.N./N.P.
The Bush administration's smallpox vaccination campaign is
part of the drive to mobilize the country for war against Iraq.
This plan is facing resistance from hundreds of hospitals and
thousands of nurses and doctors who are refusing to
participate.
Administration officials had assumed that 500,000 health
care workers would immediately step up and volunteer to take
this vaccine. According to the Centers for Disease Control,
only 687 people in 16 states volunteered in the first two weeks
of the program.
A New York Times' national survey of state health officials,
published Feb. 7, found that more than 350 hospitals were
refusing to participate and many others had not made a
commitment. Nurses' unions in California, Pennsylvania, Rhode
Island, Massachusetts and Texas have advised their members not
to volunteer.
Beverly Hiestand, CWA Local 1168 chief steward for Nurses
United, in Buffalo, N.Y., said that a Feb. 7 memo put out by
the union's national leadership reported that there continues
to be a lot of concern about the program among health care
workers.
In a letter to President George W. Bush on Jan. 23, CWA
President Morton Bahr, representing 100,000 health care and
public safety workers, called for a delay in the federal
vaccination campaign.
"Critical concerns brought to light by experts in the
American medical community, health care workers and medical
scholars regarding the National Smallpox Vaccination Program
raise serious doubts about the safety and effectiveness of the
civilian inoculation plan," said the letter. "In that regard, I
urge you to delay the program until all concerns have been
adequately addressed."
The New York State Nurses' Association has demanded that the
hospitals negotiate terms for compensating nurses who may get
sick and lose work hours as a result of the vaccination.
The Bush administration has decreed that the drug companies
making the vaccine are exempt from having to pay compensation
to victims and families who may suffer side effects and even
death.
The vaccine has more risks than many others because it is
made from a live cowpox virus. The period of contagion is
long--up to three weeks. In this period of exposure, healthcare
workers who are vaccinated are endangering themselves, their
patients, families and co-workers.
The last time smallpox vaccine was used, in the 1960s, there
were 52 life-threatening complications and two deaths per
million people. (New York Times, Feb. 7)
Today more than 50 million people are at higher risk because
they have immune suppression from cancers, HIV/AIDS, lupus,
organ transplants and skin disorders. They should not get the
vaccine or be exposed to those who have.
Dr. Nadia Marsh, organizer of Doctors and Nurses Against the
War, said, "A campaign to vaccinate millions of people in the
U.S. is unnecessary. It's a cynical effort by the Bush
administration to create fear and paranoia in the
population."
She continued, "From a public health perspective it neither
makes sense nor addresses the real medical problems faced by a
growing number of working-class people in this country. Instead
of spending millions of dollars on a disease that does not
currently exist, a large segment of the health care community
is demanding that the funds being used for this vaccine
campaign instead provide health insurance for the 41.5 million
people who are uninsured."
Hillel Cohen, a doctor of public health who is an organizer
of opposition to the Bush vaccination plan, explained, "The
smallpox vaccination scheme imposes a military and police
agenda on public health. The bio-terrorism preparedness program
as a whole provides a cover for military research and
development of biological and chemical warfare agents and
undermines the credibility of legitimate public health
efforts."
More information on opposition to the smallpox vaccination
campaign--including a pledge by health care workers not to get
or give the vaccine--can be found at www.healthworkers.org.
Reprinted from the Feb. 20, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyrighted
under a Creative
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