Western Medicine and Bill Maher

[Sophus]

Let me start by disclaiming I am not familiar with everything Maher has said on 'Western Medicine'. Some of it may be crazy. But in the case of the H1N1 vaccine, he never said it didn't work or that nobody should get it (he actually said some people are foolish for not getting it). His main point seemed to be that there are risks involved. That's hard deny when stuff like this happens:

More people died from the vaccination than from swine flu.
500 cases of GBS were detected.
 The vaccine may have increased the risk of contracting GBS by eight times.
The vaccine was withdrawn after just ten weeks when the link with GBS became clear.
The US Government was forced to pay out millions of dollars to those affected.

He also notes that he doesn't get sick often because of his healthy lifestyle (not that that pertains to the flu). I think it's obvious science would take his side there that living a particular lifestyle is probably the best way prevent health problems. So what's all this complaining about how anti-science Maher is when it comes to medicine?

[Recusant]

Heheh, well I should make a disclaimer as well; I'm not a particular fan of Maher.  I find his smug, smirking snarkiness to be annoying, to put it mildly.  He does occasionally have a decent point to make, but his delivery often spoils it.  Just one person's opinion.

As for his stance on medical matters, I think that anyone who would listen to him for guidance about such things is foolish.  There are questions about mercury content of some vaccinations, for instance, but whether that should be used as a reason to avoid them is not clear.  For anyone who is interested in the subject, I'll post a couple of articles about Maher and his opinions regarding medicine from the Science-Based Medicine blog:

“Oh, come on, Superman!”: Bill Maher versus “Western medicine”

Bill Maher endorses cancer quackery

[DropLogic]

Of all the political satirists on the air today, I would rank Maher among the top 3 most sane and rational.  The bottom line is, he's a comedian who has a platform to express his opinions, and that's all.  Why should it matter what he thinks of western medicine?

[Will]

Maher's argument is that there needs to be a debate, which is highly illogical and dangerous. Science is not a debate where the most compelling argument wins. Science is about compiling mountains of evidence and experimentation and coming to a conclusion which is independently verifiable and predictive.

You know who wants a "debate" about science? Creationists.

[Asmodean]

I disagree with Maher's argument for reasons partly personal, partly objective... OR so I like to think, at least.

For the medicine to evolve, someone has to take risks sooner or later. Maybe a bunch of people even have to die during drug trials. Maybe one day I will be one of that bunch... So what? I am alive today, and modern medicine gives me a fair chance of staying alive tomorrow.

[Ultima22689]

I think people are taking what Bill Maher has said out of context, as pointed out in the OP, Maher has never said vaccines are bad but he feels they should be examined/debated, whatever. What people also have to realize Bill is quite rational and what he means by debate is not a bunch of creationist semantics and intellectual gymnastics, when he says debate I imagine he means between scientists, he strongly supports science and had Carl Sagan's wife on his show a few weeks ago who pulled a +1 for science on the panel. I doubt Maher means a debate between politicians, it wouldn't make sense considering how he regularly praises the awesomeness of science. The last time I saw him talk about it he was trying hard to make that distinction and has called the anti-vaccine craze stupid and has ranted on it in new rules, he isn't anti vaccine, just thinks that scientist should take a look at and possibly improve on them.

[Recusant]

...Maher has never said vaccines are bad...

I refer to one of the articles I posted earlier:

MAHER: I’m not into western medicine. That to me is a complete scare tactic. It just shows you, you can…

KING: You mean you don't get a â€" you don't get a flu shot?

MAHER: A flu shot is the worst thing you can do.

I think that Maher's stance on vaccines is anything but rational.  He's quite willing to spout blatant falsehoods in an attempt to back up his position.  From the same article:

...Maher also parrotted the claim that it was better sanitation, not the polio vaccine, that eliminated polio. This is simply not true. Better sanitation certainly helps decrease the incidence of such diseases, but sanitation was quite good by the 1950s in the United States, just before the polio vaccine was developed; yet polio outbreaks were still fairly common and still quite feared. (People over a certain age will remember polio scares that occurred throughout this country that would shut down public swimming pools and baths before the polio vaccine was developed.) In actuality, better sanitation may have made people more susceptible to severe complications from polio (as cleverly and simply explained in this neat little cartoon), because sanitation made sure that most people were no longer routinely exposed to the virus as children. Also going against Maher’s assertion is the observation that when polio vaccination rates fall, polio returns. It’s the same with other infectious diseases, like pertussis. Unless the disease has been completely eradicated, like smallpox (and thanks to vaccines), whenever vaccination rates fall, the disease will come back.

[DropLogic]

...Maher has never said vaccines are bad...

I refer to one of the articles I posted earlier:

MAHER: I’m not into western medicine. That to me is a complete scare tactic. It just shows you, you can…

KING: You mean you don’t get a â€" you don’t get a flu shot?

MAHER: A flu shot is the worst thing you can do.

I think that Maher's stance on vaccines is anything but rational.  He's quite willing to spout blatant falsehoods in an attempt to back up his position.  From the same article:

...Maher also parrotted the claim that it was better sanitation, not the polio vaccine, that eliminated polio. This is simply not true. Better sanitation certainly helps decrease the incidence of such diseases, but sanitation was quite good by the 1950s in the United States, just before the polio vaccine was developed; yet polio outbreaks were still fairly common and still quite feared. (People over a certain age will remember polio scares that occurred throughout this country that would shut down public swimming pools and baths before the polio vaccine was developed.) In actuality, better sanitation may have made people more susceptible to severe complications from polio (as cleverly and simply explained in this neat little cartoon), because sanitation made sure that most people were no longer routinely exposed to the virus as children. Also going against Maher’s assertion is the observation that when polio vaccination rates fall, polio returns. It’s the same with other infectious diseases, like pertussis. Unless the disease has been completely eradicated, like smallpox (and thanks to vaccines), whenever vaccination rates fall, the disease will come back.

My wife got a flu shot, and had to take a full week off of work she got so sick.  It started literally 6 hours after her shot.  My mom had the same thing happen to her.  
I haven't gotten a flu shot, and I'm fine.
I am not saying that I'm against vaccines...I think it's important that babies get them.

[Sophus]

I disagree with Maher's argument for reasons partly personal, partly objective... OR so I like to think, at least.

For the medicine to evolve, someone has to take risks sooner or later. Maybe a bunch of people even have to die during drug trials. Maybe one day I will be one of that bunch... So what? I am alive today, and modern medicine gives me a fair chance of staying alive tomorrow.

Sacrifices are one thing if it's lab rats. Numbers are a lot different when it's your own life. Personally, I'm not willing to roll the dice when it's not necessary. If I don't have the virus I'm not about to take the chance of dying from something that's suppose to protect me.

[Sophus]

I refer to one of the articles I posted earlier:

MAHER: I’m not into western medicine. That to me is a complete scare tactic. It just shows you, you can…

KING: You mean you don’t get a â€" you don’t get a flu shot?

MAHER: A flu shot is the worst thing you can do.

In this article Bill wrote he says,

Vaccination is a nuanced subject, and I've never said all vaccines in all situations are bad.

I also like this section from it:

Someone who speaks eloquently about this is Barbara Loe Fisher, founder of the National Vaccine Information Center. I find her extremely credible, as I do Dr. Russell Blaylock, Dr. Jay Gordon and many others, but I shouldn't have even mentioned them because I don't want to be "the Vaccine Guy"!! Look it up yourself, and stop asking me about it -- I'm already the Religion Guy, and that's enough work!

Anyway, Ms. Fisher is someone who says she is not "anti-vaccine," but just has a lot of questions about the long term effect of using a lot of vaccines. After devoting her life to studying this, she says that the influenza vaccine studies that have been done "are not persuasive in proving that a seasonal flu shot provides immunity." She also points out "that what we need, but do not yet have, are studies of vaccinated vs unvaccinated children."

It seems he simply has a different opinion about whether the risks always outweigh the benefits, which isn't something Shermer discussed much in his open letter to Maher.

[joeactor]

I watch Bill Maher on a regular basis, and like much of his show.

However, he does get a bit rabid at times, and medication/vaccines are often the target.

I've heard him equate all medicines to poison (on several occasions).

Well, I guess water is a poison if taken in sufficient quantity.

As for "what we need, but do not yet have, are studies of vaccinated vs unvaccinated children."...
Man, talk about experimenting on a population.  I'd rather go with the evidence from previous unvaccinated societies.

I get a Flu shot (almost) every year.  Mild symptoms for a day or two, then I'm good.

Anecdotal evidence is just not reliable - either for or against vaccines.

2 cents,
JoeActor

[Ulysses]

I highly recommend 'Bad Science' by Ben Goldacre, he writes about why evidence based medicine is under threat from people like Maher and others who do not understand how vaccines work.

Vaccines have saved literally millions of people since they first were developed. No one suffers from Polio anymore thanks to vaccines. Sure there will be a side effect every once in a while but it really pisses me off when people dismiss them out of hand just because they don't bother to look at the evidence...

[Recusant]

Latest on the issue of vaccines and their relation to autism:

From CNN "Retracted autism study an 'elaborate fraud,' British journal finds":

An investigation published by the British medical journal BMJ concludes the study's author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, misrepresented or altered the medical histories of all 12 of the patients whose cases formed the basis of the 1998 study -- and that there was "no doubt" Wakefield was responsible.
"It's one thing to have a bad study, a study full of error, and for the authors then to admit that they made errors," Fiona Godlee, BMJ's editor-in-chief, told CNN. "But in this case, we have a very different picture of what seems to be a deliberate attempt to create an impression that there was a link by falsifying the data."

EDIT:  To clarify; Wakefield is the person who is largely responsible for the latest revival of the anti-vaccination flapdoodle  (guess who were among the first to rail against vaccines a couple of centuries or so ago?  Yes, church leaders) which has been taken up as a sort of cause by such celebrities as Maher and Jim Carrey, to mention two.  For those who may not know much about it, one place to start is the Wikipedia article on the MMR vaccine controversy.

[Whitney]

I'm glad the fraud study is making the national news...so many parents are avoiding important vaccinations for their children due to unnecessary fears.  If that trend keeps up and gets larger the herd immunity will be weakened and diseases we thought were stamped out could start to return.

[Voter]

Western medicine is the third leading cause of death in America, so Maher's right to question it. It's very good at a few things, such as trauma care, diagnostics, and certain infectious diseases. It's pretty bad at others, notably degenerative diseases.