Tag Archives: anti-vax

The Daily Beast reports: Anti-vaxxers have long used GoFundMe to raise money to spread their dangerous message—but now the site is cutting them off, The Daily Beast has learned. “Campaigns raising money to promote misinformation about vaccines violate GoFundMe’s terms of service and will be removed from the platform,” spokesman Bobby Whithorne told The Daily Beast. Last week, the American …

The Louisville Courier-Journal reports: In a move experts say is medically unsound — and can be dangerous — Gov. Matt Bevin said in a radio interview Tuesday that he deliberately exposed all nine of his children to chickenpox so they would catch the disease and become immune. “Every single one of my kids had the chickenpox,” Bevin said in an …

Time Magazine reports: An Italian politician who opposed mandatory childhood vaccinations has been hospitalized with chickenpox. Massimiliano Fedriga, who is part of the far-right League party, was under observation for four days earlier this month after getting chickenpox, according to local news reports. It’s an ironic twist in fate for Fedriga, who opposed the introduction of the so-called Lorenzin law …

The Dayton Daily News reports: As other states are facing outbreaks of childhood diseases such as measles and mumps, Ohio lawmakers are considering legislation that would require school districts to tell parents how easy it is to opt out of immunizations. When schools notify parents of immunization requirements, they would be required to spell out available exemptions, according to a …

USA Today reports: A federal judge today denied issuing a temporary injunction that would have allowed 44 unvaccinated children to go back to class at the Green Meadow Waldorf School, citing Rockland County’s “unprecedented measles outbreak.” “The plaintiffs have not demonstrated that public interest weighs in favor of granting an injunction,” U.S. District Court Judge Vincent Briccetti said in federal …

The Daily Beast reports: An unvaccinated Oregon boy became the first person in over 30 years to contract the deadly tetanus infection in the state. The 6-year-old boy was playing on a farm when he cut his head, according to a case report by the CDC. His parents cleaned and stitched the wound at home, but a week later, he …

Yahoo News reports: Anti-vaccination activists, some with their (presumably unvaccinated) children, packed the Dirksen Senate Office Building Tuesday morning for a hearing that they hoped would vindicate, or at least recognize as legitimate, their fear that protecting their families from measles runs the risk of something worse, including autism and other disorders. As the doors closed on the room where …

The Hill reports: An Arizona state lawmaker said this week that state-mandated vaccines are a “communist” value. State Rep. Kelly Townsend (R), in a lengthy Facebook post on Thursday, warned that measles outbreaks are going to result in Arizonans having to “give up our liberty, the very sovereignty of our body.” “I read yesterday that the idea is being floated …

The Texas Observer reports: Texas state Representative Bill Zedler doesn’t understand the fuss over the resurgence of infectious diseases. “When I grew up, I had a lot of these illnesses,” he said, listing measles, mumps and chickenpox. “They wanted me to stay at home. But as far as being sick in bed, it wasn’t anything like that,” said Zedler, an …

The Guardian reports: Scepticism about the use of vaccines for children has risen across Europe in line with votes for populists, according to a study, which proposes that public health officials should track populist parties in opinion polls as a proxy signal for vaccine hesitancy. Big surges in the number of measles cases and deaths map to countries where populist …

Buzzfeed News reports: YouTube on Friday said it would prevent channels that promote anti-vax content from running advertising, saying explicitly that such videos fall under its policy prohibiting the monetization of videos with “dangerous and harmful” content. The move comes after advertisers on YouTube pulled their ads from these videos, following inquiries from BuzzFeed News. “We have strict policies that …

Raw Story reports: Darla Shine, the wife of White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Communications Bill Shine, went off on an unhinged Twitter rant against vaccinating children on Wednesday. Shine was apparently set off on her Twitter rant by watching a CNN report on a major measles outbreak that has hit the state of Washington, where vaccination rates for …

The Associated Press reports: Anti-vaccine activists packed an Olympia, Washington public hearing Friday to oppose a bill that would make it harder for families to opt out of vaccination requirements for measles, mumps and rubella amid the state’s worst measles outbreak in more than two decades. An estimated 700 people, most of them opposed to stricter requirements, lined up before …

Newsweek reports: The World Health Organization (WHO) has listed vaccine hesitancy—the delay in acceptance or refusal of vaccines despite their availability—as one of its top 10 health threats facing the world in 2019. The phenomenon has taken hold in a number of countries around the world in recent times, and notably in the U.S. as well. Data from the Centers …

The Asheville Citizen Times reports: A chickenpox outbreak at a private school now ranks as North Carolina’s largest since a vaccine for the virus became available more than 20 years ago, health officials say. As of Friday, 36 students at Asheville Waldorf School had contracted the varicella virus, known to most as chickenpox. The school has one of the highest …