A Cure For Anti-Vaxxers

Health professionals need to consider better ways of informing parents about vaccinating children

- Barbara Rath

IN A WORLD OF POST-TRUTH politics, more and more parents are concerned that the health risks of vaccines outweigh their benefits. Too many people believe, for instance, that the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine could be linked with autism, despite numerous scientific studies to the contrary. A growing anti-vaccine movement, in which parents opt out of vaccinations for their children, has led to dangerous outbreaks of whooping cough, measles and other preventable diseases.

To counter misleading and outright false information on vaccines, health experts must find better ways to explain to the public why we know that vaccines are relatively safe and helpful to society.