I wish it were April 1st...

...And I could write all of this off as a hoax.  But it's not, and I can't.

I have always held that people who opposed vaccination for their children were dangerous. It seems some of them are far more dangerous than I thought.

If the anti-vaxers simply endangered their own children by refusing to get them vaccinated for disease, that would be sad. (It would also be child abuse, in my opinion, but I don't write the laws on this.)  They put not just themselves and their children at risk: they endanger everyone who cannot be vaccinated for these diseases for medical reasons as well. I suppose one could avoid people who oppose vaccination like, well, the plague...

Unless you're a postal worker, as it turns out. There are now people sending infected items through the mail so that the infections their children carry can be passed along to the children of other anti-vaxers.

My mind reels at this idiocy. As Mike the Mad Biologist states, the only thing that separates this from bioterrorism is the intent, which the pathogens aren't affected by.

It is clearly illegal.  Exactly which law it falls under, I am not sure: I would guess it would probably fall under several, including the PATRIOT Act and the 2002 Bioterrorism Preparedness Act.  If nothing else, it is clearly against postal regulations.

Not that these people care.


I want prosecutions, dammit.  If these people can't be brought in on child abuse charges (and I can see reasons why that is infeasible) for what dangers they expose their own children to, they at least should be held accountable for endangering others who do not share their crackpot views.