Vegans join anti-vaxx campaign, say children should not be given vaccines as they are made from animal products
Vegans have reportedly appealed to people to stop vaccinating their children citing that the shots are made using animal products.
Reports have stated that the influenza vaccine, distributed in Australia and New Zealand, is grown as a virus in the yolk of fertilized hen eggs. However, each dose of the vaccine approximately contains just one microgram of egg protein.
Animal activists, regardless of the minuscule amount, have argued that children should not be given these vaccines.
One vegan, taking up the quest to stop other vegans from taking the vaccines, wrote on the Reddit thread r/Ask Vegans, saying: "The vaccine only works on a few select strains."
"These are not necessarily the ones that could infect you. Have a think about whether you really need a flu vaccine in the first place," the user wrote, according to a Daily Mail report.
In a similar post shared on a Facebook group for Australian vegans, one vegan campaigner claimed that vaccines contain blood from unborn calves.
The person wrote: "Vaccines aren't vegan — never have been." She shared a picture of what appeared to be a calf with a needle through its heart along with the caption, according to reports.
"When pregnant cows are slaughtered they put a needle in the heart of the unborn calf to drain his blood for vaccines," the post read on the Facebook group read.
However, many people in the group disagreed with her stance citing that she should first talk to people who have lost their loved ones to multiple diseases that could have been averted with vaccines.
"Anti-vaxxers need to speak to people who lost loved ones to polio before the vaccine, or people who were left with permanent disabilities," one person wrote while another said: "How come every anti-vaxxer claims to have tons of peer-reviewed studies but never actually links any?"