Croatian Vaccination Appreciation?

Vaccinations have become a bit of a hot button issue of late, earlier this month it was reported that there are a suspected 413 cases of measles in Wales alone and there has just this last week been an outbreak of Measles in New York City affecting more than 20 people, adding credence to the mandatory vaccination debate. You might be wondering just what debate there could be, so let me explain.

In 1998 a study by Dr. Andrew Wakefield linked the MMR (Measles, Mumps and Rubella) vaccine to increased chances of Autism in children. This became quite a problem at the time with a significant drop in immunisation rates in the UK, although the US saw no great change. The paper was subject to much controversy at the time and further investigation by the Sunday Times revealed that Wakefield had several undeclared conflicts of interest, had broken ethical codes and manipulated his evidence. All these findings lead to the Lancet medical journal (the original publishers of the report) partially retracting the findings in 2004, before fully doing so in 2010. Scientific consensus now dictates that their is no link between the MMR jab and Autism.

You would be forgiven for thinking that was the end of the issue, but you would wrong. Over the last few years a small group within America have been campaigning over the so called "dangers" of vaccination and warning parents against immunising their children. These groups have gained momentum recently with celebrities such as, Jenny McCarthy and Kristin Cavallari becoming vocal supporters of the anti-vaccine cause. This has incurred a backlash from leading Medical professionals in the US who claim that these groups have brought about an atmosphere of doubt in a area that should have none. Speaking specifically on this and the recent measles outbreak, a New England pediatrician called the whole situation "sheer lunacy." 

In an article with the Daily Beast he went on to say, "Just over a dozen years ago this illness was considered eliminated in our country, and this year people are being hospitalized for it, all due to the hysteria about a safe, effective vaccine. All based on nothing."

It is in this climate that Croatia's Constitutional Court has decided that all kids have to be vaccinated, regardless of the parents wishes. They have ruled that a Child right to health is above a parents right to make a choice on the issue. This follows countries such as, Slovenia and Latvia that employ mandatory vaccination protocols on their countries children to try and avoid just the issues effecting the UK and USA right now. 

The fact that Measles should be an issue in the Western world in 2014 is frankly ridiculous. Too many parents believed that the eradication of the disease caused by the implementation of the vaccine in 1988, made it a safe climate for them to opt out of the inoculation for their children and not worry for the consequences. This has just caused a climate where a single case of measles, mumps or rubella can spread rapidly through hundreds if not thousands of unprotected minors with potentially dire consequences. 

The application of mandatory vaccinations puts the health of the child above all else, as it always should be. It ensures that preventative diseases cannot be allowed to reemerge through misguided information on the part of a fear nurturing few. Thousand of hours of research have gone into developing these vaccines and countless more in peer review and testing to ensure their safety. 

Giving credence to a discredited paper over the enormous weight of scientific evidence in favor of vaccination in itself adds support to the mandatory injection argument by showing that parent's shouldn't have the right to make wrong decisions.

Until Then.

Sources:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-22277186
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-echochambers-26722871
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/13/thanks-anti-vaxxers-you-just-brought-back-measles-in-nyc.html

The difference between News and Speculation. (Malaysian Flight MH370)

What I do in this blog is not news. That is made clear by the distinct lack of supporting information I usually offer and that fact half of what I write about is merely my opinion. For a story to truly be "News" it is required to contain noteworthy information on a recent event or change. While this was true for the initial disappearance of flight MH370, it has been far from the case since.

The story of flight MH370 is in reality a very simple one, given what we actually know. A Malaysian Airlines flight and its 239 passages has gone missing as it flew from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Communication with the plane was lost at around 2.40am on 8th March over the South China sea and was never reestablished. No wreckage or telling signs of the plane have so far been discovered.

These facts were rapidly established in the immediate aftermath of the planes disappearance, yet in the 11 days since news organisations around the world have been updating their viewers on the situation with constant updates and breaking "news" on the case.  The problem is the story has yet to develop.  

News outlets require viewers. They are no different to any business in this sense, they succeed when more people are using their product than their competitors. This requires news agencies in the world of rolling 24-hour news to take one of two main stances, try and be the most thorough or try and be the quickest. The uptake of the internet as a primary source of news for many means that journalists often have to be the later. When it is so easy to share a story of twitter or any other number of social networking sites the reasons for this become all the more apparent.

In the case of MH370, pressure to deliver that breakthrough peace of granted what is a mysterious story has led to a compromise of the word "News", for a consent to speculate. Be it stories on passports, aeroplane handling or the captain's distate for cuban food (asinine, but you get my point) everything and anything has been reported on a story with no more facts that those which I presented earlier.

For some reason the development of the internet and 21st Century news broadcasting has meant that it is unacceptable to just report that a story has seen no updates. Concocting a web of half-truths and conjecture to distort and pervert a story is acceptable, because, well, then at least there's always something "new" to say.

Get it?

Until then.

Sources:

http://www.heavy.com/news/2014/03/malaysian-airlines-flight-mh370-beijing-missing/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-26644085

Happy 25th Birthday Internet!

Back in 1989 nobody had ever heard of Twitter or Facebook, Cyber-bullying could be misconstrued as science fiction robot warfare, and yet still surprisingly no one wanted to see pictures of what you had for lunch that day. This was all back in the dark, dark time before the creation of the world wide web. 

The Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) went online in December 1969, creating a link for research and education between four major U.S Universities. The technology was also harnessed for defence reasons, connecting the country in the event that conventional means were unavailable.

The technology took a big step forward in 1972 with the creation of e-mail and then again in the next year with the creation of Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP). IP addresses allow easier access to a network and felicitate the ability for File Transfer Protocol and downloading files from a remote server.

The term "internet" was first used in 1982, but it was on March 12, 1989 is when I took another major step forward. Sir Tim Berners-Lee was working at Swiss physics laboratory CERN (Better know for its later work with the Large Hadron Collider) when he presented a technical blueprint for "the world wide web."

The response from his seniors was "Vague, but exciting."

Berners-Lee pressed CERN into creating an online telephone directory for the laboratory, and this began to show people the potential of the idea he had created. The innovation created through hypertext that allowed hyperlinks into a for of net like structure, a web if you will.

It was not until 1993 that Marc Andreeson created the first web browser Mosaic, that the technology really took off, as Prof Murtagh head of computer science as De Montfort University, says, "The web made the transfer and sharing of documents quicker and easier, and it still does today."

...and that's why I'm subjected to your damned food pictures. So, Happy Birthday to the internet 25 years old (But if you ask me you don't look a scratch over 21)

Until Then.

Sources:
http://news.sky.com/story/1224176/world-wide-web-celebrates-25-years
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0193167.html

Couch Co-op Cop-out? (Is local multiplayer gaming in decline?)

As long as there has been home console gaming, there has been co-operative gaming. Numerous early platforms games were developed with the specific intention to be played by more than one individual (...and were often poor or exceptionally difficult if played alone, Contra anyone?) Now as the medium continues to grow and grow, the scope for multiplayer has exponentially increased with the development and uptake of online gaming. The popularity of multi-million selling franchises such as, Call of Duty and Battlefield originates from the competitiveness of online multiplayer action, where players can test their skills against the best the game has to offer. As these online multiplayer games continue to grow, the inverse seems to be true of local multiplayer gaming. But is local multiplayer actually dying out?

In an editorial on just this issue back in 2011, Co-Optimus (A website devoted to multiplayer gaming) argued that statistic show that local multiplayer gaming was not dying out, but had steadily grown between 2007-2011. The misconception or myth that this was the case could be attributed to the faster and far more rapid growth of online gaming making it seem the case. Of course this was back in 2011 which in the rapidly developing world of home gaming can seem a generation ago, (indeed given the release of the WiiU, Xbox One and PS4 it actually is.) and multiplayer gaming has certainly undergone some changes since.

A issue not raised in Co-Optimus' overtly positive study on the issue was the range of video games available for multiplayer gaming. While certain genres of games such as, sports and first-person shooters naturally lend themselves to co-op, other genres such as role playing games and action-adventures have to be more intelligent in the way they incorporate multiplayer gaming. An argument can be made that as games themselves become more intricate and complicated this becomes an even finer issue. Multiplayer gaming on a single console is more taxing for the processing ability, this can effect frame rate and slow down the game. (as was an issue in Left 4 Dead 2.) This often means there is a need to restrict what multiplayer gaming can do whether it means to force the players to stay close to each other, or remove it from certain games completely.

There is no doubt that online is the present and future of the gaming industry, as companies continue to guide their products to support a level of online functionality. This gives these games a bigger selling factor and more replay-ability, not to mention an avenue for more profits through online micro-transactions. (I'm looking at you EA) Still for many gamers, me included, there is a place for local multiplayer (and maybe even offline, perish the thought) gaming that isn't a kick about on FIFA or shooting people in the face on Call of Duty, we just have to hope that AAA games studios can keep recognising that were still out here and not rely solely on indie developers who have been the main source of quality local multiplayer gaming over the last few years. We live in hope.

Until Then.

Sources:
http://www.co-optimus.com/editorial/940/page/1/is-couch-co-op-gaming-dying.html