Antivaccine Mindsets Led to a Completely Avoidable Measles Outbreak
If you've been following the recent Disneyland measles outbreak, you know that approximately 50 cases of the formerly eliminated disease have been linked to the Southern California theme park. However, US health officials have declared that the outbreak was "completely avoidable," placing blame on antivaccination advocates and fearmongering within parenting circles. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, discussed the baseless cause of these fears and how to combat them when dealing with antivaccine parents:
"Well, what we have to do is continue to underscore and emphasize the importance of vaccination but also to underscore the fact that the reason for not vaccinating . . . this issue that the risk of a measles vaccine is so great that it overrides the benefit that you could get from protecting your child is just not true. Because the evidence that was put forth years ago about various adverse events associated with measles vaccination, from different types of disease to autism, have been completely disproven by a number of scientific bodies, independent bodies, that have shown that. And yet they still cling and reinforce each other that, in fact, measles vaccines and other vaccines really shouldn't be given because they're dangerous. That's just unfortunate and leads to the kind of thing that we're dealing with right now."
Though it was declared eliminated in 2000, the year 2014 saw more than 600 individual measles cases — a resurgence for which Dr. Fauci and other disease professionals hold the antivaccine movement responsible. Watch what the doctor has to say about the growing epidemic within unvaccinated communities.