Vaccine But Not Heard

To many of us, the rapid arrival of the Covid vaccines achieved an oxymoronic status of legendary proportions: It was a scientific miracle. But somehow, the life-saving (and normality returning) work of vaccines did not increase trust in vaccines. In fact, many Americans seem less sure of their value today than before the pandemic. Consider the case of Peter. “Peter said that he has doubts about vaccines too. He told me that he considers getting measles a normal part of life, noting that his parents and grandparents had it. ‘Everybody has it,’ he told me. ‘It’s not so new for us.’ He’d also heard that getting measles might strengthen your immune system against other diseases, a view RFK has promoted in the past. But perhaps most of all, Peter worried about what the vaccine might do to his children. ‘The vaccination has stuff we don’t trust,’ he said. ‘We don’t like the vaccinations, what they have these days. We heard too much, and we saw too much.'” Tom Bartlett in The Atlantic (Gift Article): His Daughter Was America’s First Measles Death in a Decade. This is the story of a personal tragedy. It’s also the story about a trend that threatens more of them. “A recent poll found that nearly one-third of all Republican and Republican-leaning voters, for instance, think that routine inoculations are ‘more dangerous than the diseases they are designed to prevent.'”

+ NYT (Gift Article): Kennedy Links Measles Outbreak to Poor Diet and Health, Citing Fringe Theories.

+ Meanwhile… National Institutes of Health to cancel grants designed to study vaccine hesitancy.