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Anti-immunization sentiment predates vaccinations used today, dating back to the process of variolation used in the early 18th century.3 However, the most current iteration of the “anti-vaccine movement” can be traced to the publication of the now-retracted 1998 paper by Andrew Wakefield linking the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine to autism.5,6 Current drivers of the anti-vaccination movement include the modern-day availability of medical information – once accessible only to medical professionals – through digital means (eg, the Internet and social media); a shift in perspective between the doctor as the expert to shared decision-making, with the patient playing a role in guiding treatment; religious or ideological beliefs; celebrities, politicians, and public figures; and lack of trust in medical experts
Are you old enough to remember visiting friends in their iron lungs due to polio?
This measles epidemic going on now is getting worse due to a-holes not being vaccinated. That spreads the disease, endangers newborns and leads to deaths
There is a lot of misinformation about the anti-vaccine movement. The OP's link got it right that it started with variolation, pre-smallpox vaccine.
I became an RN in 1970. I don't know what was going on in vaccines much before that. I do not remember there being much of an anti-vaccine movement in Pittsburgh, PA in the early 70s when I worked there; however Allegheny County has historically had rather low vaccine rates, probably due at the time due to apathy rather than anti-vax sentiment.
By the late 70s when I was working in downstate Illinois, the apathy was high and pertussis rates were going up. Even back then we said that vaccines were too good at their job, made people forget how awful some of these diseases can be, if not deadly. This at a time when polio, measles and rubella were still endemic in the US. In the very late 1970s, the anti-vax movement started cranking up big time. This is a good overview: https://www.newsweek.com/history-ant...nation-1358403
The measles outbreaks in NY appear to be winding down, and I suspect that the efforts of Nurse Practitioner Blima Marcus mentioned in the link in the OP paid an important part in the one in NYC.
Rockland County has had one new case each of the last two weeks, NYC has had three.
We really need to require proof of immunity to measles for people entering the US from countries where the virus is known to be circulating.
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