The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.
Why would a mother reject safe, potentially lifesaving vaccines for her child?
Popular writing on vaccine skepticism often denigrates white and middle-class mothers who reject some or all recommended vaccines as hysterical, misinformed, zealousor ignorant. Mainstream mediaand medical providers increasingly dismiss vaccine refusal as a hallmark of American fringe ideology, far-right radicalization or anti-intellectualism.
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But vaccine skepticism, and the broader medical mistrust and far-reaching anxieties it reflects, is not just a fringe position.
Pediatric vaccination rates had already fallen sharply before the COVID-19 pandemic, ushering in the return of measles, mumps and chickenpox to the U.S. in 2019. Four years after the pandemic’s onset, a growing number of Americans doubt the safety, efficacy and necessity of routine vaccines. Childhood vaccination rates have declined substantially across the U.S., which public health officials attribute to a “spillover” effectfrom pandemic-related vaccine skepticism and blame for the recent measles outbreak. Almost half of American mothers rated the risk of side effects from the MMR vaccineas medium or high in a 2023 survey by Pew Research.
Recommended vaccines go through rigorous testing and evaluation, and the most infamous charges of vaccine-induced injury have been thoroughly debunked. How do so many mothers – primary caregivers and health care decision-makers for their families – become wary of U.S. health care and one of its most proven preventive technologies?
I’m a cultural anthropologist who studies the ways feelings…
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