The ‘International Chiropractors Association’ (ICA) has just issued a statement entitled “International Chiropractors Association Affirms Policy on Health Freedom“. On the background of the fact that US President Biden, issued a series of Executive Orders related to mandating federal employees and federal contractors to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, the ICA try to explain their position regarding vaccinations. Here are a few passages from this statement:

…In a world of public health that promotes evidence-based decision making, we see the importance of natural immunity being ignored and replaced with a totalitarian approach of compulsory vaccination.  At a time when the Surgeon General says misinformation has become an urgent threat to public health, misinformation is now being used in an attempt to discredit the chiropractic profession, the International Chiropractors Association, and all chiropractic patients who desire to focus on improving health naturally. After enduring 18 months of shutdowns, lockdowns, flattening the curve, masking, limitations of speech on social media; and a cancel culture environment that threatens the basic freedoms our country was founded upon in 1776, ICA will not compromise on the importance of protecting health freedom…

The ICA Policy on Immunization and Vaccination has remained unchanged for almost 50 years and clearly states:

“The International Chiropractors Association recognizes that the use of vaccines is not without risk and questions the wisdom of mass vaccination programs.  Chiropractic principles favor the enhancement of natural immunity over artificial immunization.

The ICA supports each individual’s right to select his or her own health care and to be made aware of the possible adverse effects of vaccines upon a human body.  In accordance with such principles and based upon the individual’s right to freedom of choice, the ICA is opposed to compulsory programs which infringe upon such rights.

The International Chiropractors Association is supportive of a conscience clause or waiver in compulsory vaccination laws, providing an elective course of action for all regarding immunization, thereby allowing patients freedom of choice in matters affecting their bodies and health.”

The International Chiropractors Association maintains that all healthcare interventions, including the chiropractic adjustment, are associated with some level of risk and that every individual is entitled to be informed of those risks, no matter how insignificant. All individuals must retain the freedom to accept or reject any healthcare product, procedure, or medication including vaccinations.  The International Chiropractors Association therefore strongly opposes the use of medical mandates that violate personal sovereignty, violate the principles of informed consent, and constrain the rights of patients to make their own health care choices…

The ICA encourages the recognition that natural efforts to enhance the innate immune system ability to adapt to novel viruses are grounded in science and rejects the notion that the patients’ freedom to rely on naturally acquired immunity is not based upon unscientific beliefs.

The ICA rejects the premise that the chiropractic profession’s long history of promoting health freedom and supporting conscientious exemptions is based upon unscientific or non-mainstream beliefs…

I find this statement clear as mud and have the following questions:

• Do the ICA recommend vaccinations?
• In particular, do they encourage their members to get vaccinated with the COVID-19 vaccines?
• Do they advise to recommend COVID-19 vaccinations to their patients?
• Or do they think that natural immunity is preferable and advise their members and patients accordingly?
• Do they believe that spinal manipulation enhances natural immunity?
• Do they think that spinal manipulations are an effective alternative to COVID-19 vaccinations?
• Do they believe that scientific evidence trumps dogma or vice versa?
• Which of the two should, according to their conviction, must influence the decision-making processes in healthcare?
• If the ICA object to misinformation about COVID, why do they not stop their members from promoting it?
• What makes them think that information about the possible adverse effects of vaccines upon a human body is unavailable?
• If the ICA recognizes the risks of spinal manipulation, why do they not inform the public about them regularly and objectively?
• If the ICA knows about the importance of informed consent, why do not all of their members adhere to it?
• And finally, why do the ICA insist on the term ‘international’ in the name of their organization, if they purely deal with the US situation?

I do not expect the ICA to give me the answers to these questions. But perhaps their Wiki page goes some way towards answering some of them: “… The ICA supports the efforts of the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC).^[13] The NVIC is known for promoting false and misleading information about vaccines, in particular the discredited claim that vaccines cause autism.

The ICA’s annual conferences have featured anti-vaccination propaganda. In 2018 Guest Speaker Beau Pierce (Pierce co-produced a series entitled Vaccines Revealed) hosted a session entitled Vaccines Revealed.,^[14] and Jeff Hays, known for producing the anti-Vaccine propaganda Vaccines Revealed, was invited to host a session the 2017 ICA Council on Chiropractic Pediatrics Annual Conference. In 2016 the widely discredited anti-vaccination propaganda film VAXXED was shown at a conference sponsored by the ICA’s Council on Chiropractic Pediatrics …”

SAY NO MORE!