Group Dedicated to Safeguarding Informed Consent

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: December 20, 2016
CONTACT: pr@picphysicians.org

Los Angeles, Calif.—Parents and doctors—not politicians—should be making medical decisions for children. A newly launched nonprofit called Physicians for Informed Consent (PIC) is now joining the cause to get the government out of some of the most important conversations parents have with their pediatrician. PIC is committed to protecting the rights of parents to make medical decisions for their children, and safeguarding doctors’ professional responsibility to act ethically and in the best interests of their individual patients.

PIC is dedicated to raising public awareness about the problems posed for both parents and doctors by mandatory vaccination laws. In June 2015, Gov. Jerry Brown signed SB277, one of the most expansive and intrusive mandatory vaccination laws in the U.S. These laws discriminate against families who, in the best interest of their child’s health, do not follow the CDC’s recommended schedule. Politicians have forced their way into the conversation about one of the most important medical decisions families will make in consultation with their doctors.

“I started researching the childhood vaccine schedule when I was pregnant, and my husband and I decided not to follow the CDC’s recommended schedule. When SB277 passed, I felt like our personal medical decisions were under attack,” stated Dr. Shira Miller, who founded Physicians for Informed Consent in 2015. “Fortunately, I found a doctor who had the necessary knowledge to evaluate the risks vaccines posed to my children, but I realized the average parent was not going to seek an in–depth personalized vaccine risk evaluation and would just do whatever their child’s school was now saying needed to be done in order to attend.”