An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All

Submitted by EC_Admin on October 26, 2009 - 11:10am

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/10/ff_waronscience/

A Wired article discussing the impact of parents opting out of vaccinating their kids.

October 26, 2009 - 11:24am

EC_Admin

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As a parent whose kids are fully vaccinated...

I think the medical community brought some of the anti-vaccine backlash on themselves by giving parents so little information about vaccines. The attitude from my otherwise very respectful pediatricians has been something like "you will vaccinate because we tell you to" with very little discussion about what vaccinations they recommend or why.

I disagree with the idea of mandates, because the problem has been that the process has been too top-down. If the pro-vaccine side wants to get more kids vaccinated, they need to learn from the anti-vaccine side, and start talking to parents about benefits and risks in an intelligent way.