A Canadian woman who has been active in the anti-vaccination movement has decided it’s time for her to leave and change course. The reason? All seven of her children–four of whom are completely unvaccinated–now have whooping cough.
Tara Hills, writing on the blog site “The Scientific Parent,” said she is??emotionally, a bit raw. ” She also admitted that in addition to her children being in quarantine, they may also have exposed her five-month-old niece to whooping cough.
Hills, added that her fear of vaccinating her children has caused them tremendous suffering, writing:
?My youngest three children were coughing so hard they would gag or vomit. I’d never seen anything like this before. ?Watching our youngest struggle with this choking cough, bringing up clear, stringy mucus ? I had heard of this before somewhere. ?My mom said I had it when I was a kid. I snapped into ?something is WRONG? mode.?
Shortly after the kids began exhibiting symptoms she was unable to diagnose, Hills said she did research on the Internet and realized her refusal to vaccinate her children had led to their sickness:
?We had vaccinated our first three children on an alternative schedule and our youngest four weren’t vaccinated at all. ?We stopped because we were scared and didn’t know who to trust, ?Was the medical community just paid off puppets of a Big Pharma-Government-Media conspiracy? ?Were these vaccines even necessary in this day and age? Were we unwittingly doing greater harm than help to our beloved children? So much smoke must mean a fire so we defaulted to the ?do nothing and hope nothing bad happens? position.?
The chagrined mother now says she hopes her experience can serve to help others realize the important and necessity of vaccinating their children:
?Right now my family is living the consequences of misinformation and fear. ?I understand that families in our community may be mad at us for putting their kids at risk. ?I want them to know that we tried our best to protect our kids when we were afraid of vaccination and we are doing our best now, for everyone’s sake, by getting them up to date. ?We can’t take it back ? but we can learn from this and help others the same way we have been helped.?
