To be fair, a lot of the debating is about what to make young children do, not about what people-old-enough-to-decide-for-themselves should decide. Young immune systems, they say, are more prone to twitchiness.

I *did* spend my first decade or so wallowing in filth, and perhaps that was for the best. It's a distinct possibility that--unlike, say, polio prevention--we should not force cold prevention on children too young to understand why it's important, at least not until we invent a less suffering-filled method of raising healthy immune systems.

...I'd be more comfortable with that possibility if people routinely *reached* the stage of understanding why it's important.