Detroit mother prefers jail to vaccinating her kid

Brave vaccine martyr or stubborn fool?

Rebecca Bredow, of the Detroit area, told ABC News that she would "absolutely" rather go to jail than vaccinate her son.

“I would rather go to jail for standing up for what I believe in than vaccinating my child,” Bredow said, adding she believes the decision to vaccinate your child is a “personal choice.”

“I choose not to vaccinate, but that's my choice," she said. “I'm not against vaccines, it's everybody's personal choice."

If you’re willing to go to prison for defying a judge’s order to vaccinate your kid, you’re against vaccines. Further, if she goes to jail for taking a stand against vaccinating her son, she won’t be around to stop him from getting vaccinated by whomever becomes his guardian. That’s 0–2 for logic.

The problem with her position, as with everyone else like her, is that vaccines aren’t a personal choice. They’re a matter of public health. When people choose not to vaccinate, that reduces herd immunity, which makes it easier for vulnerable people (such as the very young, the very elderly, and those too sick to get vaccinated) to fall victim to vaccine-preventable diseases. And then they die. People who reject vaccines aren’t just hurting themselves, they’re endangering the people around them as well. That’s why some countries have started instituting mandatory vaccines with penalties for those who refuse. And that’s how it should be everywhere.

When your “personal choice” puts other people’s health at risk, particularly when that choice is rooted in stubborn denial of science and reality, it’s really no contest.