Rep. Justin
Price fumbles anti-vax crusade
By
Will Collette
UPDATE: Rep. Justin Price has now stated that since the RI Health Department has rejected his anti-vax argument, "I intend to file legislation that will put the power back in parents' hands," when the General Assembly returns in January. That parental choice works real well in California when anti-vaxxers helped bring back measles as a major public health threat.
Also, Price has come out for stripping Planned Parenthood of funding based on the phony video circulating in right-wing circles that attempts to depict legal activity as legal and Planned Parenthood as an evil place when nearly all of its work is focused on essential women's health services.
Once, quite recently, we had a thoughtful, intelligent state representative for the northern end of Charlestown, plus Richmond, Hopkinton and Exeter, named Larry Valencia.
Also, Price has come out for stripping Planned Parenthood of funding based on the phony video circulating in right-wing circles that attempts to depict legal activity as legal and Planned Parenthood as an evil place when nearly all of its work is focused on essential women's health services.
Once, quite recently, we had a thoughtful, intelligent state representative for the northern end of Charlestown, plus Richmond, Hopkinton and Exeter, named Larry Valencia.
Redistricting
took Charlestown out of his district, but Larry remained a friend to
Charlestown and a working partner to Charlestown’s state Representative, Donna
Walsh.
Alas
in 2014, South County voters went crazy, ousting three of the state’s best
legislators and replacing them with three Tea Party whack-jobs. All three are
bad, but Justin Price, the guy who beat Larry, stands out for his sheer
stupidity.
Whatever
most normal people are for, Justin Price is against, and he usually takes a swig
from the Tea Party jug before throwing out some ultra-right cliché to justify
his position.
His
latest stunt is to take a leadership role in a strange little group of Rhode
Island anti-vaxxers who believe their right to internet-driven delusion trumps
public health.
Price
wants the state Health Department to withdraw its mandate that the state’s
public school seventh graders receive the HPV vaccine, a safe and effective
vaccine that is actually proven to prevent a variety of cancers.
The Seventh Grade is viewed by most doctors and researchers as the best time to give the vaccine for a lot of solid reasons, not the least of which is effectiveness.
But
because this vaccine prevents infection from the HPV virus, which is sexually
transmitted, some hysterical people think this is a government plot to
encourage young children to have sex. Idiots.
It is a vaccine to prevent
infection by a symptomless virus nearly every sexually active person may at
some point be unknowingly exposed to, and thereby prevent HPV-related cancers. I’ll bet Michael Douglas wishes the HPV vaccine was around when he was a kid.
This
is not an issue of the government usurping parental choice any more than dozens
of other science-driven public health decisions we make as a society for the
health and welfare of all over the ignorance of the few. Mindless resistance to
vaccines is already starting to have worldwide
consequences.
Except,
I suppose, if you asked Price and those of his particular mindset about those
many other public health decisions, they’d probably oppose those too. Because,
you know, freedom.
I
had wondered if Price was so jacked up by the idea of vaccination of 7th
graders because that was the last grade he attended. However, according to his official
biography,
he claims to have graduated from North Kingstown High School. Perhaps he was
smoking in the boys’ room the day his health class studied STDs.
So,
in case you are keeping score, Justin Price has distinguished himself in his
freshman year in the Rhode Island House by coming out as a climate
change denier,
an opponent
of gay marriage
even though it is legal, an opponent of affordable
housing,
one of those nuts who thinks that RhodeMap
RI
is Rhode Island’s equivalent of Jade
Helm, and a supporter
of armed insurrection
to overthrow this country. And now he’s also an anti-vaxxer.
Justin Price may be stupid, but he has been busy. Luckily, he’s also ineffective. Plus, his anti-vax campaign isn't getting any traction, even down here in South County, as the Westerly Sun reported.
Justin Price may be stupid, but he has been busy. Luckily, he’s also ineffective. Plus, his anti-vax campaign isn't getting any traction, even down here in South County, as the Westerly Sun reported.
To
get a feel for Price’s view of the world, watch this video:
Justin Price on RhodeMap: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mN0p2bdijEM
The
Health Department, patient souls that they are, will be holding additional
public meetings
for more ranting by the anti-vaxxers.