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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   3072 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for February 23, 2025

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When vaccinating your kid (a US citizen) what vaccination schedule should you go with?

  1. The standard US one

  2. The standard of a different country which you think is better run (I picked Denmark)

  3. Something else

I had a discussion with Grok 3 about this, and it seemed like it wanted to defend the US schedule (35 shots) until I pressed it about the Danish schedule (11 shots). Then it claimed that US schedule is necessary in the US because of different socioeconomic conditions. It seems like the US recommendations are based on helping the underclasses. For example, Hep B. My wife doesn't have Hep B. My kid won't get Hep B as a child. But a kid whose mom is a prostitute very much needs to be vaccinated for Hep B at birth.

In any case, after the censorship and disinformation promulgated by the US health agencies during the pandemic, I don't trust them. And clearly there is a corrupting profit motive here too. In this corrupted epistemic environment we simply don't know what the effects of giving kids 35 vaccine shots (plus annual flu and Covid shots) will be. I make no strong claims about vaccine injuries, and I think most vaccines are net positive. But I think, for my child, the Danish schedule + chicken pox is sufficient. At a minimum, I am deadset against any Covid vaccines. Can't say I look forward to arguing with nurses about this.

Where are you getting 11 shots for Denmark? I count 30 shots recommended to all kids up to age 12.

Do you count a shout of DTaP-IPVHib as five shots or one shot? I counted 11 shots, 10 without flu:

  • 3x DTaP-IPVHib
  • 3x PCV13
  • 2x MMR
  • 1x IIV4
  • 1x DTaP-IPV
  • 1x HPV9

The last time I got into it about the vaccine schedule on this forum people insisted on counting each individual vaccine rather than the number of shots. I'm not sure how OP was counting it, but he might have been counting just the number of shots as you say.

It looks like the AI summary is to blame here. It's accurate, but misleading. In Denmark they do get 11 shots and the US they get 35 (+flu and Covid) but part of difference is more shots being combined in Denmark.

So that leaves us with the following diseases which American children are vaccinated for which Danes aren't:

Hep A / Hep B / Chicken Pox / Rotavirus / Covid / Flu / Tetanus (from age 12) / Meningitis (from age 12)

It also looks like Americans also get a few mores boosters and doses for some diseases. So there is still a pretty significant difference.

I recognize I'm unlikely to get any good answers on this forum or anywhere else. It's balancing the small risk of some diseases against the less understood (but probably small) risk of vaccine injury. Unless I get any good reasons not to, I'll just stick to the Danish schedule and call it good. I'll probably also do chicken pox because I personally know 3 people who got shingles before the age of 50. Is this good epistemology? Probably not the best, but neither is relying on the American health system.

I'll probably also do chicken pox because I personally know 3 people who got shingles before the age of 50. Is this good epistemology? Probably not the best, but neither is relying on the American health system.

Chicken pox is "just" utterly miserable to suffer as a kid, but it can be quite dangerous to contract in adulthood. I think that, in a community where most children are vaccinated against chicken pox, it's probably important to get the vaccine because you're that much less likely to catch it as a child.

That makes sense. Put Chicken Pox vaccine into the "definitely yes" category for Americans then. Either that or have a chicken pox party like they did when I was a kid.

I was surprised that Denmark still just lets it rip. I wonder why.

chicken pox party like they

Please don't. Shingles.

Edit: In case you weren't aware Chicken Pox is a type of herpes and therefore once you get it, it never leaves.

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