Anti-vaxxers How to Challenge a Misinformed Movement

Jonathan M. Berman

eBook - 2020

A “clear and insightful” takedown of the anti-vaccination movement, from its 19th-century antecedents to modern-day Facebook activists—with strategies for refuting false claims of friends and family (Financial Times)Vaccines are a documented success story, one of the most successful public health interventions in history. Yet there is a vocal anti-vaccination movement, featuring celebrity activists (including Kennedy scion Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and actress Jenny McCarthy) and the propagation of anti-vax claims through books, documentaries, and social media. In Anti-Vaxxers, Jonathan Berman explores the phenomenon of the anti-vaccination movement, recounting its history from its nineteenth-century antecedents to today’s activism, exa...mining its claims, and suggesting a strategy for countering them.After providing background information on vaccines and how they work, Berman describes resistance to Britain’s Vaccination Act of... more