Anti Vaccine : Part VII

This spring saw the first death from measles in the United States in 12 years.

                                                       

More and more parents have been refusing to immunise their children.

The influence of a loose group of fringe campaigners against immunisation - "anti-vaxxers", as they're known -

has been spreading.

Brian Deer is an investigative journalist for the British newspaper The Sunday Times.

"There was a paper published in February 1998 in The Lancet and basically what it said was that there was a group of parents

who brought 12 children to a hospital in North London here in England.

Those parents said that they gave their child the MMR [measles, mumps and rubella] vaccine :

and within 14 days, eight of the families said their child had developed the first signs of autism. 

Juniper Russo now writes a blog, Back From Nature, in which she advocates evidence-based healthcare.

Like journalist Brian Deer, she's faced a vicious backlash and even threats from anti-vaxxers for changing her views.

But at one time there was no question in her mind:

vaccinations were a conspiracy. 


                           

 

"I thought that the government wasn't to be trusted

and I very much believed in the idea that there was this big organisation called Big Pharma

and I thought that people would be willing to make my child sick to make a dollar."