I have never earned one penny from any pharmaceutical company. I will never accept one penny from them either. Ever.

Vaccination is a public health issue because influenza is a highly contagious disease. If you don't vaccinate your child, his or her schoolmates are much more likely to become ill. That is why some places (New York, for example) are making the vaccine mandatory for school children.

I started to write about science and medicine at the Washington Post, in the early days of the AIDS epidemic.

Your dollar cheeseburger isn't a dollar if you factor in what it's going to cost in health care.

I have never earned one penny from any pharmaceutical company. I will never accept one penny from them either. Ever.

Benjamin Franklin refused to have one of his children vaccinated against smallpox. The four-year-old boy died, and Franklin wrote later of how mistaken he was to expose him to the needless risk.

In the Internet age, with the screaming on the radio, etc., it is hard to know what to believe and who is informed and who is not.