# Stupid ignorant pigheaded parents who refuse vitamin K shots for their newborns. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 29, 2014, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-ignorant-pigheaded-parents-who-refuse-vitamin-k-shots-for-their-newborns/694297 "2014-07-29T03:09:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2014, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-ignorant-pigheaded-parents-who-refuse-vitamin-k-shots-for-their-newborns/694297/101 "2014-08-06T21:07:43Z")
> [@Doctor\_Why\_Bother](#): > > I’m as hardcore anti-quack as they come, but I think this is an excellent point. Given the sheer volume of shameless hucksters on the net, there are relatively few good science writers out there, and even fewer free resources. Anti-vaccinationists present their case using brightly coloured, user-friendly, interactive, professionally designed websites that address the readers directly and use every rhetorical trick under the sun to convince them their irrational fears are justified. Pro-science websites, by contrast, are often either dry and academic or outright condescending, and either way they have a marked tendency to preach to the converted. As educational resources for anti-quack keyboard warriors like me, they’re great. For convincing frightened parents that, say, vaccines are safe and effective they’re about as much use as Anne Frank’s drum kit. Seth Mnookin’s book The Panic Virus delves into this a little bit. People like Mercola are able to get away with claiming everything under the sun because they don’t care if they’re right or wrong and they’ve taken all the teeth out from the FDA and the FTC in terms of regulating ‘supplements’. Jenny McCarthy can say “Vaccines will kill your babies, run up your electricity bill and email your porn folder to your grandmother” because there’s no feedback loop to encourage honesty and adherence to what the data shows. A CDC scientist on the other hand, understands statistics and is loathe to make sweeping statements because generally the data doesn’t show that 100% of the time something happens or something doesn’t happen. They can’t say that vaccines are 100% perfect or 100% effective because it’s not true, but if they say vaccines are safe within a margin of some numbers, they get accused of being wishy-washy and hiding in statistics. I don’t think this is a problem that can be solved with a PR agency. Realistically the answer is to figure out how to cultivate a more scientifically literate public. ---
**Author:** ![Morgyn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morgyn/32/3041_2.png) [@Morgyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgyn)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2014, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-ignorant-pigheaded-parents-who-refuse-vitamin-k-shots-for-their-newborns/694297/102 "2014-08-06T21:08:34Z")
> [@Squink](#): > > You know, if you feed rats a vitamin [K deficient diet, they’ll start eating their own poop](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6845355). What comes out, must go in. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2014, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-ignorant-pigheaded-parents-who-refuse-vitamin-k-shots-for-their-newborns/694297/103 "2014-08-06T21:51:11Z")
> [@Mince](#): > > To such people, I ask the logical follow-up: “Then what is Mali, Angola, Egypt, Botswana, and Kenya?” (Wrong) answers vary. States and provinces. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-ignorant-pigheaded-parents-who-refuse-vitamin-k-shots-for-their-newborns/694297.md?page=5)