AHS needs to get it right with vaccinations
AHS needs to tighten safety protocols after child accidentally given HPV vaccine
Any parent might well be concerned if his or her child were vaccinated at school without parental consent. I’m about as pro-vaccination as it gets, but I would have been upset if someone had given my kid a shot without checking with me first. I might have been even angrier if it had happened by accident.
Now, imagine you’re John Tomkinson.
Tomkinson is a former chairman of St. Thomas Aquinas Roman Catholic Schools, a division southwest of Edmonton. Back when he was a Catholic school trustee, he was opposed to allowing Alberta Health Services to administer Gardasil, the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, in his district’s schools.
HPV is a sexually transmitted infection linked to genital warts, cervical cancer and cancers of the throat and genitalia.
Gardasil is a safe and effective way to combat those cancers.
But Tomkinson believed administering the shot was contrary to Catholic values.
Nonetheless, the school board voted to allow AHS to administer Gardasil.
But the district came up with a strong “hands-off” policy — one that Tomkinson helped write — which allowed AHS to use school district space to administer the vaccine, but only with the specific consent of individual parents.
But Monday, something went sideways.
Tomkinson’s son was accidentally given a dose of Gardasil at his school in Wetaskiwin — without the consent of his parents.
“We’re furious,” said Tomkinson. “My wife called me at work, in tears and angry. This can’t be undone.”
“Alberta Health Services called it ‘an unfortunate error.’ Well, I think an ‘unfortunate error’ is when one of my kids spills milk at the supper table.”
Tomkinson and his wife have had their kids immunized against the usual childhood diseases.
But his personal concerns about Gardasil aren’t just religious. He doesn’t believe the vaccine has been administered long enough for there to be good data about its long-term health effects.
Now, he’s outraged his child was immunized without his permission.
“There’s a reason we have to consent. Yes means yes and no means no. And the government has no right to medicate children without parental consent.”
“AHS apologizes to the family and those affected by this error,” the agency said in an email Wednesday.
“We appreciate that immunizations are a sensitive issue for some, and that is why we have processes in place to ensure that we gain consent from parents before immunizing a child. Vaccination errors are extremely rare. We are reviewing this incident to better understand what happened, and to help us prevent such errors in the future.”
Now, I don’t think for a minute this was some government plot to vaccinate Tomkinson’s son by stealth. Despite Tomkinson’s concerns, the HPV vaccine is an effective tool to fight cervical cancer, which kills hundreds of Canadian women every year.
I don’t think it encourages promiscuity; I think it reduces needless suffering. I made certain to have my daughter vaccinated when she was young. I’d encourage any other parent to do the same.
But that’s not the point. The Tomkinsons made a different choice. I don’t agree with their choice or their reasoning. But the decision was theirs alone to take. I can’t blame them for feeling betrayed by a health-care system that was supposed to protect them, but which violated their freedom of conscience instead.
We shouldn’t have an immunization clinic run so casually that mistakes like this can happen. Some children are severely allergic to the ingredients in particular vaccines. Some have medical conditions that make certain immunizations dangerous. The consequences of an error such as this could be fatal in other circumstances.
Tomkinson is an air traffic controller. Preventing accidents is literally his business. And he’s unimpressed with what he’s seen of the AHS safety culture.
“The last time something like this happened, AHS said they were going to put more checks in place. That’s obviously not working. They need to change their processes, not just spout platitudes.”
Tomkinson’s not wrong. We need better safety protocols, because there’s another important public health issue at stake. There’s already far too much generalized anti-vax sentiment out there, far too many people who’ve been fed nonsense conspiracy theories about the dangers of immunization.
When AHS makes a mistake like this, it makes doubters and cynics more suspicious. If we want people to have faith in the health-care system, it has to be worthy of their trust.