Letter to Essential Baby re AVN link

Sent this a few minutes ago. It would be so nice to get a reasonable response! We'll see:


Dear Editor,

I write regarding the article in Essential Baby entitled "Vaccines and Your Child".

I have no complaint about the article, but I am gravely concerned that it links to the Australian Vaccination Network (AVN).

The AVN are currently under investigation by the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission for providing misleading information to parents who are researching vaccination.

I am deeply worried that if this link to AVN is provided by Essential Baby it will give the AVN a credibility that I am convinced they do not deserve.

They are demonstrably anti-vaccination and it would be extremely difficult to find a doctor in NSW (where they are based) who would recommend them as a balanced or reliable source of information on vaccines.

I have personally gone through their claims and found most of them to be outdated or cherry-picked. (I have a BSc/BA Hons and have worked in an industry where we create anti-bodies for research.) I published my (long) findings on my otherwise uninteresting blog - http://emervents.blogspot.com/2009/06/critique-of-avns-10-reasons-to-think.html

I recommend you change the link to the Victorian Government's information page which also has vaccine information available in languages other than English and has links to recent data on vaccine coverage etc. http://www.health.vic.gov.au/immunisation

I look forward to your response.

Sincerely,