The Bottom Line

• When you or your child is injured by a vaccine, the risks are 100 percent, and you will be left to deal with the consequences. Those who make and give vaccines are protected from liability in civil court, and federal vaccine injury compensation is very difficult to get.

• There is no guarantee that a vaccine will, in fact, protect against an infectious disease or that exposure to an infectious disease will cause a complication, injury or death. Good health is about so much more than vaccination and preventing experience with infectious disease.

• Vaccines are pharmaceutical products that carry a risk of injury or death that is greater for some than others. The right to informed consent to medical risk-taking is a human right. Empowering ourselves with information and taking responsible action to protect the right to exercise voluntary, informed consent to vaccination in America is one of the most important actions we can take as citizens to protect our freedom.

• Don’t let anyone force you or your child to take a vaccine without your voluntary, informed consent.

• If a doctor denies you or your child medical care because you want to make vaccine choices, find another doctor.

• If a doctor threatens you, or if a government official denies a medical or religious exemption that you have legally filed, find an attorney to help you.

• If you don’t like the vaccine laws in your state, contact your elected officials and work to change them.

Together, we can educate the public and reform vaccine laws in America to protect the right to make informed, voluntary vaccination decisions for ourselves and our children.

For More Information ...

• Diseases & Vaccines -- A list of diseases that have vaccines, selected stories about the diseases and the vaccines, and other links to find information about them.

• Vaccine Manufacturers’ Product Inserts

• State Laws & Vaccine Exemption Information

• Become a Vaccine Choice Advocate in your state to protect vaccine exemptions

• If you have been harassed for your vaccine choices, make a report here

About the Author

Barbara Loe Fisher is the co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, and the author of "The Consumer's Guide to Childhood Vaccines" and "Vaccines, Autism & Chronic Inflammation: The New Epidemic."

Founding NVIC in 1982 with parents of vaccine injured children, she developed strategy for and led a national, grassroots movement and public information campaign to institute vaccine safety reforms and informed consent protections in the public health system.

Her book, DPT: A Shot in the Dark, which she co-authored with Harris Coulter, Ph.D., was the first major, well documented critique of America's mass vaccination system calling for safety reforms and the right to informed consent to vaccination.

She has served as a consumer representative for more than 15 years on vaccine advisory committees and has testified in state legislatures and in Congress, as well as represented consumers in many scientific and other forums as an advocate for vaccine safety and informed consent protections in the mass vaccination system.

She is a consumer voice for vaccine safety and informed consent issues on radio, television and in print and Internet news reports on the science, regulation, policy, and ethics of vaccine policy and law. During the past three decades, she has debated more pediatricians and U.S. public health officials on the subject of vaccine risks and informed consent on television, radio and in other public forums