About fifteen years ago in high school, I was opposed to getting vaccinated. I wasn't going to renew my vaccinations, and I was dead set on not getting my kids vaccinated. I didn't get sick that often, maybe a 24-hour cold once a year. I attributed it to having a naturally strong immune system, and that I wouldn't give in to the Big Pharma money-grubbing scheme of using "temporary artificial immunity" in place of a "permanent natural immunity."
Sure you guys have heard and groaned at this before.
I advocated it, used myself as an example, and was pretty darned confident in where I stood.
My biggest hit was when I said "I haven't been immunized since I was 10, and I've never been severely sick." Which was partially true. I got pneumonia when I was 9, and got very heavily medicated to fight it off. I was the usual yearly flu, ear infections, a few colds a year, the expected illnesses. But during high school, despite never getting vaccinated, I never got sick.
Or so I thought. Turns out I did get immunized again in high school when I moved back into the United States. Probably forgot about the whole thing because I was severely jetlagged when driven to the doctor's office.
As mom explained this to me years later, I then did the whole Big Pharma conspiracy thing, making money with artificially weakened vaccinations.
Mom, a former nurse, and quite tired of my shit at this point, said "That scary evil Big Pharma evildoer would be a lot richer if we had to buy treatments for all those diseases that vaccine prevents."
Since then I've been more researched on the matter. Seeing the issue blow up over the last year has also exposed me to both a slew of solid arguments in favor of vaccinations, as well as the danger of not doing so. Most importantly, I should just be grateful that I have a naturally robust immune system, and not bastardize this blessing by attributing it to a dangerous practice.
But it was my mom, and that one line of reasoning that Big Pharma would get a lot more money by refusing vaccines, that turned me back to reality.