Measles outbreak raises concerns over anti-vaccination movement | Society

A measles epidemic that has spread from southwestern Washington to other parts of the Pacific Northwest has highlighted low vaccination rates in the region and the danger the disease poses to the region. unvaccinated children.

This development has raised concerns that parents who deliberately choose not to vaccinate their children – due to scientifically unhelpful concerns that vaccination can harm them – lead to epidemics that could easily be avoided.

Washington Governor Jay Inslee recently declared the state of emergency in response to an increasing number of measles cases in the city of Vancouver, located in Clark County, south of 39. ;State.

As of January 29, the Clark County Public Health Unit had 36 confirmed cases of measles and 12 suspected cases. Twenty-five cases involved children under 10, 32 affected individuals had not been vaccinated, and the remaining four had unconfirmed immunization status.

The CCSP also identified various exhibition sites, including schools, health centers and restaurants. A number of evangelical churches and Christian academies in the Vancouver area were among the most prominent sites.

On the other side of the Columbia River in Portland, Oregon, a confirmed case was identified on January 29th. The exhibition sites included a church; the Moda Center, where Portland Trailblazers play NBA games; and the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, a popular attraction for children in the city. Another case has been confirmed in King County, which contains Seattle.

Childhood vaccination rates in Clark County are low and much lower than in previous decades. Between the 2004-2005 and 2017-2018 school year, the vaccination rate for kindergarten children in Clark County increased from 91.4% to 76.5%.

The state laws of Oregon and Washington require that students who attend a school or attend other institutions than their homes be vaccinated against various diseases. But, unlike other states, where parents can seek medical waivers in Oregon and Washington, parents can seek waivers for religious or philosophical reasons quite easily.

They do it in significant numbers. According to the CDC, in 2018, 7.5% of kindergarten children had a non-medical immunization exemption. In Washington, this percentage was 3.9%.

Dawn Nolt, badistant professor of pediatric diseases at Doernbecher Children's Hospital in Portland, said that while measles was only rarely fatal, it "has serious consequences" for the short-term health of its victims. She added that measles is also highly contagious and that it will extend to 90% of unvaccinated people exposed to a vector of the disease.

She noted an increase in what practitioners call "hesitation about the vaccine" and she added, "I wonder if the advent of social media has strengthened the anti-vaccine movement."

Nolt said that parents hesitating about the vaccine are in a spectrum. Some people completely refuse vaccines. Some choose between vaccines based on their beliefs about those that are harmful. Others accept vaccines, but only according to the chosen schedule, based on fears about "overloading" the infant's immune system with multiple vaccination.

She also said that the refusal stems from a number of different motivations. Some parents have security problems. Some are resistant to authority or government. And some "believe in conspiracy theories about vaccination and its consequences".

"Vaccine hesitancy" is now a global concern that the World Health Organization has identified as one of its major threats to global health in 2019.

The measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine has been the subject of "anti-vaxxer" awareness campaigns. In 1998, the discredited doctor Andrew Wakefield published in the Lancet fraudulent research that suggested that the vaccine could play a role in autism.

A number of doctors and medical authorities have directly attributed the subsequent decline in vaccinations in many parts of the western world to the publication of Wakefield's material, which suggests that there is a link between vaccines and autism.

Wakefield is revered by many members of the anti-vaccination movement, which seems to be growing. Now living in the United States, he has spoken at rallies of alternative health practitioners and, in 2016, made an anti-vaccination propaganda film.

Nolt, meanwhile, said that the approach of the problem of hesitancy to vaccination was changing.

"In the past, when providers talked to parents who were hesitant about the vaccine, we tried to be logical and bombard them with facts. It does not always work, "Not said.

"Now we are not talking about the vaccine and its safety," says not. "Now we are talking about the disease."