Starting July 1 of 2012, Australian parents will be stripped of family tax benefits if their child is not fully immunized. Once the immunization alterations take effect next year, families who refuse vaccinations will also be refusing up to $2,100 per child in benefits. It seems that this is just one attempt by the Australian government to force vaccinations on children before potentially making it a federal law.

Forced Vaccinations Should be Illegal

Vaccinations are surrounded with quite a bit of negative history. The flu vaccine alone has been tied to convulsions, Guillain-Barre syndrome, and a number of other negative health effects. Gardasil is also a heavy hitter when it comes to serious health problems, with the vaccine leading to many deaths and thousands of hospitalizations. With that being said, how can a government penalize your for not subjecting yourself to these potential dangers?

This tactic executed by the government is simply a way to push vaccines on the population without making full immunization mandatory by law. Being told you must be fully immunized to receive a benefit is not so different from being told you won’t receive any benefits if you have high cholesterol and don’t take Lipitor. The withholding of benefits tactic is pushed by the idea that not only will millions of kids be protected, but a massive amount of money will be saved in healthcare costs. So why not make pharmaceutical drugs mandatory to keep people “healthy”? The truth is the last thing that Australia and most other nations need is more government regulation.

What is Full Immunization?

You may be wondering what full immunization even is, especially if you are planning to have a child. Here is a schedule provided by the Australian government which shows the vaccination requirements for attaining the Family Tax Benefit Part A Supplement. In order for parents and families to experience various childcare benefits, this schedule should be followed – as far as the government is concerned. According to the schedule, 5-7 vaccines should be administered at the 2, 4, 6, and 12 month mark as well as at 4 years. One vaccine which is administered almost every immunization period is the hepatitis B vaccine. Unfortunately this vaccine has been tied to infant death, multiple sclerosis, and autoimmune disorders.

It is also important to note that the Cochrane Database Review, the gold standard within the evidence-based medical model for determining the effectiveness of common medical interventions, does not lend clear scientific support to the theory that flu vaccines are safe or effective.

Shockingly, these authoritative reviews reveal that there is actually a severe lack of evidence demonstrating the effectiveness of influenza vaccines in children under 2, healthy adults, the elderly, and healthcare workers who care for the elderly.

Some other changes should be known regarding future vaccine immunization changes. Starting July of next year, the immunization check will be changed from two and five years of age to one year of age. In addition, children will be required to be vaccinated against meningococcal C, pneumococcal, and chicken pox, all for the first time starting in July of 2013.

Taking a Stand

This government incentive to get vaccinated is only one small move in the game. It is only until enough people stand up and refuse injection for themselves and their children when the next move will be made. If injection becomes federal law, we will undoubtedly see great opposition. Just as no pharmaceutical drugs should be mandatory for the “health and safety” of the population, no vaccinations should be mandatory either. Everyone should always possess the freedom of choice.

The soothing sound of music while in addition to working with a music therapist may help cancer patients not only with reducing anxiety levels in cancer patients, but providing another of other positive benefits. The study is set to be published in the August issue of Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.

WebMD reports:

“The evidence suggests that music interventions may be useful as a complementary treatment to people with cancer,” says Joke Bradt, PhD, an associate professor in creative arts therapies at Drexel University, in a news release. “Music interventions provided by trained music therapists as well as listening to pre-recorded music both have shown positive outcomes in this review, but at this time there is not enough evidence to determine if one intervention is more effective than the other.”

Together with colleagues, Bradt, who has a master’s degree in music pedagogy from the Lemmensinstituut in Belgium, analyzed evidence from 1,891 patients taking part in 30 studies.

Thirteen studies used trained music therapists, who got patients to sing or otherwise participate themselves in music creation or selection. In the other 17 studies, patients listened to pre-recorded music.

In ‘Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It‘, Gary Tabues spends a lot of time debunking the theory that to lose weight we need to exercise more.

He details many studies conducted on unsuspecting laboratory rats, of which I’ll spare you the details. But there was one study that really resonated.

Danish researchers took a group of sedentary, overweight men and women and over 18 months trained them to run a marathon. The findings were very telling. Of the men, there was an average weight loss of something like a few pounds but the women in the study averaged no change to their weight.

Imagine running 26.2 miles (42km) and not losing anything?

This is consistent with my own experience.

A few years ago, I decided to run the Sydney marathon. At the height of my training I was running over 55 miles a week. And while I felt a lot fitter and had more energy, my appetite was enormous. So even though I tried to eat a normal amount of food, I couldn’t help myself. In the end my weight stayed about the same.

But even if exercise isn’t going to solve your weight-loss problems, there are many other benefits to getting off the couch. So don’t cancel that gym membership. Just yet.

1. Increases your energy levels
The more energy you use, the more it feels like you have.

2. Improves the quality of your sleep.
Exercise not only helps you get to sleep more quickly, it also improves the quality of your sleep.

3. Helps combat chronic disease.
Exercise helps improve your blood pressure and cholesterol levels which decreases your chances of suffering from things like heart disease, type II diabetes and certain cancers. Exercise has also been linked with a delayed onset of dementia.

4. Improves your mood.
Exercise promotes positive brain chemistry which means you’ll feel better.

5. Provides relief from anxiety and mild depression.
My Dad has suffered from depression most of his life. These days thankfully, he has it under control. And while the medication helps, he says when he is walking every day he feels so much better than if he isn’t.

6. Improves your sex life.
Both men and women experience more enhanced arousal when they are more physically fit.

7. Makes food taste better.
My boyfriend is Irish and he is always saying that ‘hunger is a tasty sauce’. There’s nothing like physical activity to stimulate your appetite. Well, apart from point number 6.