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Bullying, Rude and Discriminatory Doctors who Forget Vaccines are a CHOICE

A southeastern Ontario mother has sent a complaint against an emergency room doctor for allegedly refusing to treat her unvaccinated four-year-old daughter.

Brianna Warrhunter took her child to hospital in Trenton Wednesday after a daycare worker noticed an “unexplained rash,” the Trenton woman wrote in a complaint to the Ontario Medical Association.

Warrhunter said Dr. Amber Hayward Stewart began to examine her daughter and asked when the girl had her most recent immunizations.

Warrhunter said she told the doctor her daughter didn’t have immunizations as she and the father are ““conscientious objectors” of immunizations.

“Her tone turned from friendly to rude,” said Warrhunter, alleging the Trenton Memorial Hospital doctor promptly stopped the exam and left the room saying she could not help the girl.

“How were we to go about finding out if she is contagious if no one at emerg will attempt to diagnose her based on the fact that she is not immunized? I did not seek medical attention for my child for us to be demoralized, judged and lectured like I myself am the child,” said Warrhunter.

“In Canada we have the choice to immunize or not and we choose not to.”

Warrhunter and her daughter left without a diagnosis and went to another hospital.

“The doctor was professional and was aware that my child was not immunized… and assured me it was not contagious and provided a note for my child’s daycare,” said Warrhunter.

Quinte Health Care spokeswoman Susan Rowe said she could not speak about the individual case citing patient confidentiality concerns.

“There is no information I can give you from the doctor’s perspective or that of other health care provider that might have been involved,” said Rowe.

She did say Quinte Health Care, which operates Trenton Memorial Hospital, does not have a specific policy or protocol for doctors to follow in regards to providing care for unvaccinated children – physicians can make the choice to refuse care for unvaccinated children.

Source: C News, 30th July 2012 – http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2012/07/30/20045121.html

Discrimination at the Doctor’s Office

Doctors dedicate themselves to helping others. But how selective can they be in deciding whom to help? Recent years have seen some highly publicized examples of doctors who reject patients not because of time constraints or limited expertise but on far more questionable grounds, including the patient’s sexual orientation, parents’ unwillingness to vaccinate (in surveys, as many as 30% of pediatricians say they have asked families to leave their practice for this reason), and most recently, the patient’s weight.

Sometimes these refusals are couched in terms of a physician’s conscientious beliefs or appear to be attempts to encourage behavior the physician deems desirable. In other cases, the physician seeks to justify such actions using outwardly neutral terms. For example, the Massachusetts doctor who recently decided to reject all new patients weighing more than 200 lb claimed that she needed to protect her staff from injuries.1 Similarly, 14% of obstetrics–gynecology practices polled by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel in 2011 said they have set weight limits for new patients, citing reasons ranging from lack of specialized equipment to fear of malpractice suits over complications caused by obesity.

Despite the varied rationales, patients who are rejected are likely to feel discriminated against. Unlike physicians who refuse to provide a particular service across the board, so that no patient can argue that he or she has been treated differently from others, the physicians in these instances do treat certain patients differently because of their personal characteristics. Of course, physicians ought to tailor their behavior to patients’ characteristics when doing so is medically relevant, but differential treatment based on negative moral judgments about patients should not be tolerated. Indeed, the American Medical Association’s Ethical Rule 10.05 permits refusal of services that are beyond the physician’s competence, not medically indicated, or “incompatible with the physician’s personal, religious, or moral beliefs” but emphasizes that physicians “cannot refuse to care for patients based on race, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or any other criteria that would constitute invidious discrimination.”

Legal standards largely accord with this formulation, with some additional nuance. Although physicians owe substantial duties to their existing patients, including an obligation to avoid abandonment, initiation of a doctor–patient relationship is voluntary for both parties. There is, however, an important exception: physicians may refuse a prospective patient only for a reason that is not prohibited by contract or law. Local, state, and federal laws prohibit certain types of discrimination against patients.

Source: Full article here: N Engl J Med 2013; 368:1668-1670, May 2, 2013  http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1211375?&

Pediatricians: ‘Get Out of Our Office’

Don’t be surprised if you start hearing a very hard line from your family doctor. Increasing numbers of physicians are turning away families that refuse to vaccinate, and it’s not always in a pleasant tone. Pediatricians are even going to so far to hang a sign indicating “get out of my office” for those parents who refuse to vaccinate.

For those who have chosen to delay or reject vaccines for preventable diseases, physicians have said they actively seek to protect other patients. Several physicians make it very clear to patients, even in early visits, that the unvaccinated are unwelcome. Upon first glance, such treatment may seem unethical; however, the American Association of Pediatrics (AAP) in an effort to protect patient lives has deemed it ethical to dismiss patients who refuse vaccination.

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-lambert/vaccines_b_4811232.html

Doctor Curses at Parent of Vaccine Injured Child in a Restaurant

http://vaccineimpact.com/2013/doctor-verbally-assaults-parent-in-restaurant-for-choosing-not-to-vaccinate/

Health Department Slam Mother for Organising Picnic at Zoo for Unvaccinated Children – Zoo Welcomes Everyone

AN anti-vaccination event for mothers and their unimmunised children at Melbourne Zoo has sparked concern from parents and health authorities.

A Melbourne mother advertised the event on Facebook on Saturday, asking other anti-vaccination parents to gather at the zoo on Wednesday.

She proposed that the event be moved to next weekend — when hundreds of families are likely to pack the zoo — if too many parents were working.

“Out of bad things great things happen,” the post said.

“I so want to put this on council websites as an event for anti-vaccine Moms (sic) and bubs catch up.”

Health authorities dubbed the post irresponsible.

In a statement, Melbourne Zoo director Kevin Tanner said: “The zoo is a public facility and open to everyone wishing to come to enjoy our wonderful wildlife”.

The Herald Sun understands public venues like the zoo are powerless to stop anti-vaccination meetings because of anti-discrimination laws.

Source: The Herald Sun, 10th January 2016.

Health Dept Go Nuts When Unvaccinated Kids Have Picnic at Zoo

VAN UK’s Comment:

This is pure discrimination because every day of every year, there are unvaccinated children going to school, sports centres, cinemas, shops and other public places.

The UK vaccine coverage figures show that 94.3% were fully vaccinated with the primary series in 2013-2014 which means that an average of 6 children per 100 are either completely unvaccinated or on a selective vaccine schedule, which means that many people will know or have contact with an unvaccinated or partially vaccinated child, even if they are not aware of their status.

Not only that, but many older children and parents are not what would be classed as ‘fully vaccinated’ as they haven’t had any shots for years or their shots wore off but there isn’t the same hysteria if they decide to visit a zoo.

This is clearly just another way to whip up hysteria among parents to increase vaccine uptake.

NHS Vaccine Uptake Statistics

Waning Immunity to Pertussis Following 5 Doses of DTaP

Adult immunization rates significantly lacking

What One Mother Had to Go Through to Refuse Hep B Vaccine for Her Newborn