Trump has found supporters among some of the most dangerous and disreputable members of society. We know that white supremacists, Russian presidents, xenophobes, and homophobes all consider him an ally. And among the latest group to see him as a champion are the members of the anti-vaccine movement.
President Trump’s embrace of discredited theories linking vaccines to autism has energized the anti-vaccine movement. Once fringe, the movement is becoming more popular, raising doubts about basic childhood health care among politically and geographically diverse groups.
To be fair, parents certainly have the right to make choices for their children that they think are appropriate and in the best interests of their health and well-being. But when these choices endanger others and are discredited by science, at what point do they become unreasonable? And when exactly did science and medicine become the enemy of the right? Is it when they became the Moral Majority? Surely, they can find a way to believe in religion and science at the same time.
Public health experts warn that this growing movement is threatening one of the most successful medical innovations of modern times. Globally, vaccines prevent the deaths of about 2.5 million children every year, but deadly diseases such as measles and whooping cough still circulate in populations where enough people are unvaccinated.
Of course, Trump has no knowledge of such matters as science, public health, or even facts, but that has never stopped him from supporting ridiculous conspiracy theories. Even with renowned neurosurgeon Ben Carson as a potential cabinet pick. Perhaps now would be a good time to make Ben’s experience in medicine useful.
Scores of large-scale, long-term studies from around the world since then have proved that there is no connection between vaccines and autism. But the suspicion lingers. Its strongest form is a stubborn conspiracy theory that doctors, scientists, federal health agencies, vaccine-makers and the worldwide public health community are hiding the truth and are knowingly harming children. [...]
A leading conspiracy theorist is Andrew Wakefield, author of the 1998 study that needlessly triggered the first fears. (The medical journal BMJ, in a 2011 review of the debacle, described the paper as “fatally flawed both scientifically and ethically.”) Wakefield’s Twitter handle identifies him as a doctor, but his medical license has been revoked. The British native now lives in Austin, where he is active in the state and national anti-vaccine movement.
Trump has met with Wakefield, who attended an inaugural ball and told supporters afterward that he had received “tremendous support” for his efforts and hoped to have more meetings with the president.
The good news is that the vast majority of parents do vaccinate their children. However, the anti-vaccine movement is growing and the personal beliefs of these parents is posing a huge danger with diseases that had been previously eliminated now making a comeback.
Measles was eliminated in the United States more than 15 years ago, but the highly contagious disease has made a return in recent years, including in Texas, in part because of parents refusing to vaccinate their children. A 2013 outbreak in Texas infected 21 people, many of them unvaccinated children.
Increasingly, the right seems to be the party that embraces anti-intellectualism and alternative facts. And while we can’t make them believe the same things we do, it is extremely precarious to allow them to tout conspiracies and fraud as fact when they endanger the public. We need to put a stop to this by educating folks right away. Let’s start with the Conspiracist-in-Chief in the White House and work our way on down.