The World Health Organisation listed the
anti-vaccination movement as one of the
top ten global health threats of 2019. In
1998, British ex physician Andrew
Wakefield published a paper claiming
that the MMR vaccine caused autism.
Despite being later discredited, this
sparked anti-vaccination feeling across
the globe, including in the political
sphere.
For example, in 2011, representative
(and later 2012 presidential candidate)
Michele Bachmann of Minnesota
warned that “innocent little 12-year-old
girls” were being “forced to have a
government injection” to prevent
infection with human papillomavirus
(HPV) and later said the vaccine caused
“mental retardation”. This rhetoric that
feeds off the fears of parents is not only
inaccurate, but manipulative.
Photo by Paul Sancya
Of course, the current issue is the
pandemic. The lack of a vaccine, as well
as the high transmission rate, has meant
COVID-19 has claimed at least 280,000
lives (as of the 12th of May). In many
countries, most notably, America, people
are taking to the streets to protest
lockdown. In many cases this is
understandable – the loss of jobs has
been unprecedented, and people are
struggling to make ends meet.
Nevertheless, there are also many
groups who profess that the data is
wrong, and that COVID-19 is no worse
than the flu. Three states in the US have
been notoriously rife with such riots, and
the president, Donald Trump, tweeted
‘LIBERATE MINNESOTA’, ‘LIBERATE
MICHIGAN’, ‘LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and
save your great 2nd Amendment. It’s
under siege!’