Australia’s peak doctors’ group has slammed anti-vaccination activists for telling pregnant women the flu shot isn’t safe.
The Australian Vaccination-skeptics Network ramped up its campaign against the influenza injection after 60 Minutes told the story of a Victorian mother, Sarah Hawthorn, who almost died last year after giving birth in a coma to her son Axel.
‘Nothing but biased, fear mongering tactics in the public eye by using innocent people’s circumstances to promote and scare the public into using an untestable new vaccine is an uncontrolled mass experiment with no sound way of knowing the health consequences for our children or the community,’ it told its 6,350 Facebook followers.
The Australian Medical Association (AMA) president Michael Gannon said pregnant women with the flu were ending up in intensive care.
Australia’s peak doctors’ group has slammed anti-vaccination activists for telling pregnant women the flu shot isn’t safe (Victorian mother Sarah Hawthorn pictured)
The Australian Vaccination-skeptics Network ramped up its campaign against the influenza injection after Sixty Minutes told of how, Sarah Hawthorn, who almost died last year after giving birth in a coma to her son Axel (both pictured)
‘I am very concerned that this information is being fed to women who are having babies, as the AMA would like to see a dramatic increase from last year’s uptake to an 88 per cent uptake this year,’ Dr Gannon told News Corp Australia.
‘I can only hope that women listen to their health providers rather than disingenuous claims online. The flu vaccine saves lives.’
His condemnation of the anti-vaccination group came as the federal government embarked on a program to give free vaccines to pregnant women, including FluQuadri, Fluarix Tetra and Afluria Quad.
The Vaccination-skeptics Network suggested the federal government was ‘pushing a new flu vaccine’ when the previous ones had been ‘unsuccessful’, even though new vaccines were developed every year to prepare for influenza mutations.
60 Minutes told of how Sarah Hawthorn, 33, came close to death and did not even know her newborn, Axel, had been born for the first two of months of his life as she fought for her own
The 60 Minutes story told of how Sarah Hawthorn, 33, came close to death and did not even know her newborn, Axel, had been born for the first two of months of his life as she fought for her own.
She spent three months in intensive care where her husband, Rob, prepared her funeral.
The Victorian woman was eight months pregnant when she became run down and contracted the deadly virus which forced doctors to deliver her son six weeks prematurely.
A Brisbane strain of the flu last year claimed 1100 lives, with the World Health Organisation be included in a new super vaccine.
The Australian Medical Association said pregnant women with the flu were ending up in intensive care and slammed anti-vaccination groups (Facebook post pictured)