Tag: Jenny McCarthy

Misdiagnosis of Kids with Autism and Vaccine Injury

Awareness of autism has greatly increased in recent years.

Some people are even suggesting that we have gotten to the point where autism is being over-diagnosed.

Remember when folks got upset because Seinfeld said that he might be on the autism spectrum?

Misdiagnosis of Kids with Autism and Vaccine Injury

Although autism might be over-diagnosed in some situations, it is just as likely to be under-diagnosed in others. That’s especially true when you hear about misdiagnosed autistic adults. No, not adults who were misdiagnosed with autism, but adults who are actually autistic, but were misdiagnosed with other conditions, like schizophrenia, anxiety, or personality disorders.

It is also probable that autism is actually sometimes misdiagnosed. That’s right, there are some other conditions that can be confused or misdiagnosed as autism.

“Generation Rescue believes that childhood neurological disorders such as autism, Asperger’s, ADHD/ADD, speech delay, sensory integration disorder, and many other developmental delays are all misdiagnoses for mercury poisoning.”

When Generation Rescue, Jenny McCarthy‘s autism organization, was founded, they believed that autism was caused by mercury poisoning. Actually, not just caused by, but that autism actually was a “misdiagnosis for mercury poisoning.”

No one really seems to believe that anymore, but there are some other conditions that can legitimately be misdiagnosed as autism.

Many people see Jenny McCarthy battling doctors to save or recover her son as being anti-autism.
Some people say that Jenny McCarthy’s son might have been misdiagnosed with autism and might actually have LKS instead.

Consider Landau-Kleffner syndrome (LKS), which is also known as Progressive Epileptic Aphasia or Aphasia with Convulsive Disorder. Children with LKS develop normally, but then have:

  • a severe regression in language functioning, with a progressive loss of speech, especially receptive speech or understanding what other people say
  • seizures, including focal motor seizures, focal seizures that become tonic-clonic seizures, atypical absence seizures, and atonic seizures.
  • behavioral problems, including having poor attention, being hyperactive and aggressive, and having anxiety

LKS can be difficult to diagnose because the seizures can be subclinical (only recognized on an EEG) at first, so the child may have already regressed by the time they have obvious seizures. And they might improve as the seizures are treated.

“After 35 years as a speech pathologist, I’ve seen many children with a diagnosis of autism that turned out to be a combination of language delay, sensory issues and apraxia.”

What If the Diagnosis of Autism Is Wrong?

Other conditions can have signs and symptoms that overlap with autism too (although they also sometimes occur with autism), making a misdiagnosis possible, including:

  • anxiety
  • childhood apraxia of speech – children with this motor speech disorder have a hard time talking
  • language delays
  • selective mutism – only affects children in some situations, like at school, but they talk well at home with close family
  • sensory issues
  • 22q11.2 deletion syndrome – a chromosomal disorder that causes many signs and symptoms, including some that resemble autism

But how can a child be misdiagnosed with autism?

“…inexperienced professionals, with narrow, preconceived notions of what ASD is, may place too much weight on symptoms that although associated with ASD, are not necessarily definitive of ASD. In other cases, and as noted above, problems in social relatedness and social interaction observed during the diagnostic process, may be artifacts of the unfamiliarity and artificiality of the setting itself.”

Barry M. Prizant On the Diagnosis and Misdiagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder

It shouldn’t be hard to imagine that a child could be misdiagnosed with autism, especially as there are more children with suspected autism, including children getting screened at an earlier age, meaning that there is a big demand for autism evaluations.

“Ideally, the definitive diagnosis of an ASD should be made by a team of child specialists with expertise in ASDs.”

AAP on the Identification and Evaluation of Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders

Unfortunately, that can mean that some of those evaluations are being done by health care providers without any added expertise in formally diagnosing autism, including some pediatricians, neurologists, counselors, and social workers, etc.

While many health care providers can evaluate and diagnose autism, from a child neurologist, developmental pediatrician, and child psychiatrist to a child psychologist, speech-language pathologist, pediatric occupational therapist, and social worker, they should all have expertise in autism spectrum disorders (ASDs).

Getting the Diagnosis Right

Why is it so important to get the diagnosis right?

Most importantly, a correct diagnosis means that a child will get the right treatment as early as possible. Also though, in an age when some parents still try to associate vaccines with autism, a misdiagnosis can be especially problematic, perhaps leading to a vaccine injury story.

Remember back in the 1970s when many parents blamed the DPT vaccine for causing their kids to have seizures and brain damage? We now know that some, if not many, of them had Dravet syndrome, a genetic condition (SCN1A mutation) in which children develop severe, fever-related seizures before their first birthday.

“We present here the cases of 5 children who presented for epilepsy care with presumed parental diagnoses of alleged vaccine encephalopathy caused by pertussis vaccinations in infancy. Their conditions were all rediagnosed years later, with the support of genetic testing, as Dravet syndrome.”

Reyes et al on Alleged cases of vaccine encephalopathy rediagnosed years later as Dravet syndrome

In addition to the seizures, these children have developmental delays and autism-like characteristics. They don’t have a “vaccine encephalopathy.” Just like autistic kids don’t have mercury poisoning or any kind of vaccine damage.

What to Know About the Misdiagnosis of Kids with Autism and Vaccine Injury

To help avoid a misdiagnosis, if possible, a team of child specialists with expertise in evaluating kids with autism spectrum disorders should see your child with suspected autism.

More on Misdiagnosis of Kids with Autism and Vaccine Injury

What Are the Demands and Goals of the Anti-Vaccine Movement?

So what exactly do anti-vaccine folks want?

What are they trying to do?

Are they trying to scare parents away from getting vaccinating and protecting their kids, hoping to drag us back to the pre-vaccine era?

What Are the Demands and Goals of the Anti-Vaccine Movement?

Of course, some of the folks who are anti-vaccine don’t actually like to be called anti-vaccine. Instead, they prefer to say that they are pro-safe vaccines. So for them, it is rather obvious – they want safer vaccines without toxins.

Now, since vaccines are already safe and don’t contain any toxic ingredients, it would seem like their work is done already, right?

Another goal is having fewer vaccines on the immunization schedule. Jenny McCarthy often pushes the Turn Back the Clock immunization plan, wanting kids to only get vaccines that were on the 1983 immunization schedule, back when kids still died of meningitis, pneumonia, blood infections, severe dehydration, epiglottitis, and cancer from Hib, pneumococcal disease, rotavirus, hepatitis B, hepatitis A, chicken pox, HPV, and meningococcal disease, which are now vaccine preventable.

Other members of the anti-vaccine movement talk about vaccine choice. They want to be able to choose whether or not they should have to vaccinate their kids.

Again, done. No one is forcing parents to vaccinate their kids. We may not have a choice on whether or not your unvaccinated child gets sick and puts someone else at risk for getting a vaccine-preventable disease because they were too young to be vaccinated, had a medical exemption, or their vaccine didn’t work, but you can certainly make the choice to skip or delay any vaccines you want.

“I also warn them not to share their fears with their neighbors, because if too many people avoid the MMR, we’ll likely see the diseases increase significantly.”

Dr. Bob Sears in The Vaccine Book

What are other goals of the anti-vaccine movement?

Johns Hopkins Medicine, which includes the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and the The Johns Hopkins Hospital and Health System went out of their way to correct this anti-vaccine misinformation.
Johns Hopkins Medicine went out of their way to correct this anti-vaccine misinformation about shedding.

Have you heard about the anti-vaccine folks who want to quarantine all kids who have recently been vaccinated for at least six weeks? Why quarantine kids who have been vaccinated? They are worried about shedding…

Would anyone go so far as wanting to ban vaccinations? Yup. So much for vaccine choice.

Some others want to rescind the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act, which they think will help make it easier to sue vaccine manufacturers. That’s one of Andrew Wakefield‘s demands in his movie VAXXED. He and others never mention that if you are suing in civil court, then you must meet a higher burden of proof for vaccine injury than you do in Vaccine Court.

Remember when Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. thought he would be appointed to some special Trump commission on vaccines?

“We want safe vaccines, robust transparent science and an honest and independent regulatory agency focused narrowly on public health rather than industry profit.”

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. on Mercury, Vaccines and the CDC’s Worst Nightmare

Kennedy’s vaccine commission never happened, but that hasn’t stopped him from pushing for an independent regulatory agency.

I’m not sure who would run or be a part of Kennedy’s independent regulatory agency though, as he believes that “Congress, the regulatory agencies, FDA and CDC, the IOM, the NIH, the AAP, the science journals, the university science departments and the press” have all been compromised by Pharma.

Kennedy also wants thimerosal out of vaccines, which, as most people know, is already out of all vaccines on the immunization schedule, including about 100 million doses of flu shots this past year. But like others, he seems to be moving on to aluminum as his new target.

What else?

Fortunately, it is easy to see why the demands and goals of the modern anti-vaccine movement are dangerous, unethical, and unnecessary, and like parents who decide to skip or delay vaccines, will simply put us all at risk for more outbreaks of vaccine-preventable disease.

What to Know About the Demands and Goals of the Anti-Vaccine Movement

Whatever their demands and goals of the anti-vaccine movement, the effect is that they are scaring parents away from vaccinating and protecting their kids from life-threatening vaccine-preventable diseases for no good reason.

More on the Demands and Goals of the Anti-Vaccine Movement

Which Vaccines Contain Antifreeze?

If you are already on the fence about vaccines, there are probably some you want to avoid…

For many parents, that likely means skipping all of the vaccines with toxins, like antifreeze.

Which Vaccines Contain Antifreeze?

Do vaccines really contain antifreeze, the stuff we put in our cars?

“Too many too soon. When I was on this show before, I said we need an alternate schedule. This is too much. We need to get rid of the toxins, the mercury — which I am so tired of everyone saying it’s been removed. It has not been removed from the shots. We’ll get into that later. Aluminum, ether, antifreeze — these are toxic ingredients in shots that need to be removed.”

Jenny McCarthy on Larry King Live

Jenny McCarthy warned folks about antifreeze in vaccines when she appeared on Larry King Live on April 2, 2008 to promote her book, Louder Than Words: A Mother’s Journey in Healing Autism.

“We are treating vaccine injury and the kids are getting better.”

Jenny McCarthy

First things first – autism is not a vaccine injury.

Jenny McCarthy is also wrong about her ideas of toxins in vaccines.

Besides the fact that vaccine ingredients aren’t toxic, the last remaining non-flu vaccines with the preservative thimerosal, a form of mercury, expired in 2003. And there have been plenty of thimerosal free flu vaccines available for kids and pregnant women since then.

Aluminum is used in many vaccines, but again, it is not toxic.

Ether? There is no ether in vaccines. Remember, ether, or diethyl ether was once used as a general anesthetic. At least it was until we developed anesthetics that didn’t blow up.

And antifreeze?

Why do so many anti-vaccine folks think that antifreeze, or ethylene glycol, is an ingredient in vaccines?

It isn’t. Not in any vaccine.

Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey went on a mission to Green Our Vaccines in 2008.
Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey went on a mission to Green Our Vaccines in 2008 and warn folks about toxins in vaccines, like antifreeze and ether.

Remember that toxic antifreeze, ethylene glycol, has a sweet taste, which helped contribute to it harming so many kids. You had a toxic substance that tasted good and which was sometimes stored inappropriately in the garage or kitchen cabinets.

Fortunately, ethylene glycol isn’t used as much as it used to be. Many people now use propylene glycol, which is considered to be a non-toxic antifreeze. Propylene glycol is not used in vaccines either.

Polyethylene glycol (PEG), which is also used in common laxatives, has been used to inactivate flu vaccines and was found in residual amounts in some of those flu vaccines.

And some vaccines do contain 2-phenoxyethanol. Another name for 2-phenoxyethanol is ethylene glycol monophenyl ether. A similar sounding name doesn’t make it the same substance though.

2-phenoxyethanol is used as a stabilizer or preservative in some vaccines.

But neither polyethylene glycol nor 2-phenoxyethanol are antifreeze and neither are toxic at doses present in vaccines.

What To Know About Vaccines with Antifreeze

Vaccines are safe and necessary and do not contain antifreeze or any other ingredients that are toxic.

More on Vaccines with Antifreeze

Which Vaccine Is the Most Dangerous?

In 2002, Dan Rather did a report for 60 Minutes on “The Most Dangerous Vaccine.”

Can you guess which vaccine he was reporting on?

Which Vaccine Is the Most Dangerous?

You are thinking his report was about MMR, the so-called “autism shot,” right?

“And then the nurse gave my son that shot. And I remember going, “Oh, God, no!” And soon thereafter I noticed a change. The soul was gone from his eyes.”

Jenny McCarthy on Oprah

It was around the time that the “media’s MMR hoax” was in high gear.

“Whatever you think about Andrew Wakefield, the real villains of the MMR scandal are the media.”

Ben Goldacre on The MMR story that wasn’t

But 60 Minutes had already done a segment on “The MMR Vaccine” with Andrew Wakefield back in 2000.

The smallpox vaccine was considered the most dangerous as President Bush decided whether or not it was necessary to vaccinate millions against this deadly disease.
The smallpox vaccine was considered the most dangerous as President Bush decided whether or not it was necessary to vaccinate millions against this deadly disease.

No, this story was about the smallpox vaccine.

And if you had to rank vaccines from safest to most dangerous, then yes, you could say that the original smallpox vaccine, the one with the most side effects, is the most dangerous.

Fortunately, that very same smallpox vaccine helped eradicate smallpox and few of us need to even think about getting a smallpox vaccine. It is still given to some folks in the military though and is available if necessary.

The story was about a plan to vaccinate many more people, including hospital workers. At the time, there was a worry about terrorist attacks using smallpox.

“Here’s another way to do it. We can make the vaccine. Make sure we understand who’s going to get it, who’s going to be giving it. Then wait, wait for there to be one case of documented smallpox somewhere on the face of this earth and then we can move into vaccinating people, large numbers of people.”

Paul Offit, MD

Not everyone was on board with the plan though. Dr. Offit, for one, didn’t think that it was a good idea to start vaccinating people for a threat that we didn’t know would appear, especially since the older smallpox vaccine had more side effects than other, more modern vaccines.

Again, that doesn’t mean that the smallpox vaccine is dangerous.

Smallpox is dangerous and deadly. If there is a risk that you could get smallpox, then you would much rather have the smallpox vaccine, even with its side effect profile.

And fortunately, a new attenuated smallpox vaccine, Imvamune, is also available and has less side effects. Two other smallpox vaccines, ACAM2000 and APSV, which are similar to the original DryVax vaccine that was used in the US, are also still being used until Imvamune is formally approved by the FDA.

Vaccine preventable diseases are dangerous.

While they aren’t 100% without risk, vaccines, from rotavirus to HPV, are safe and necessary.

What To Know About the Most Dangerous Vaccine

All vaccines are safe and effective, but if you had to rank them, the original smallpox vaccine would be the most dangerous because it has the most side effects.

More on the Most Dangerous Vaccine

 

The Sharyl Attkisson Journalism Award

With rare exception, the media has long played a big influence in feeding the anti-vaccination movement.

“The media created the MMR hoax, and they maintained it diligently for 10 years.”

Dr. Ben Goldacre Bad Science

It didn’t start with Andy Wakefield and his MMR hoax though.

John Birch (B) and the other anti-vaccine heroes of the day on their way to fight the vaccination monster.
John Birch (B) and the other anti-vaccine heroes of the day on their way to fight the vaccination monster.

Satirical prints that were printed in the very early 1800s showed people getting vaccinated and sprouting horns or turning into cows. And long after that, just before Wakefield got folks scared of the MMR vaccine, another doctor in England got them scared of the DPT vaccine.

Dr. John Wilson took to the media to scare parents because he had “seen too many children in whom there has been a very close association between a severe illness, with fits, unconsciousness, often focal neurological signs, and inoculation.”

What followed was a drop in DPT vaccinations in many countries and vaccine lawsuits, even though his study was later found to be seriously flawed, with most having no link to the DPT vaccine.

The Media’s Role in Pushing Vaccine Misinformation

Many people don’t realize the role that the media plays a big role in fueling the anti-vaccine movement.

We recently saw that when folks had to be reminded that Oprah gave a very high platform to Jenny McCarthy and her views that vaccines caused her child to become autistic, even though she admitted on Oprah’s show that “she missed signs of Evan’s autism,” after telling everyone earlier that he had developed autism after getting his MMR, the “autism shot.”

“And then the nurse gave my son that shot. And I remember going, “Oh, God, no!” And soon thereafter I noticed a change. The soul was gone from his eyes.”

Jenny McCarthy on Oprah

Maybe these people and organizations should be recognized when they use false balance and poor reporting to promote pseudoscience and anti-vaccine talking points to scare parents away from vaccinating and protecting their kids.

The Sharyl Attkisson Journalism Award

Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey went on a mission to Green Our Vaccines in 2008.
Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey went on a mission to Green Our Vaccines in 2008.

Remember Sharyl Attkisson?

Sharyl Attkisson was an investigational reporter for CBS News.

She is best known for defending Andrew Wakefield and trying to promote a connection between vaccines and autism.

In her honor, we will be awarding a Sharyl Attkisson Journalism Award for the folks in the media who have done the best job in promoting myths and fake controversies about vaccines and have used false balance in their interviews and articles to scare parents:

  • Lea Thompson for her anti-vaccine documentary DPT: Vaccine Roulette
  • Robert Kennedy Jr. for his now retracted “error-laced” expose about vaccines and autism (Deadly Immunity) that appeared in both Salon and Rolling Stone
  • the Huffington Post before 2012, when the “The site arguably features more scientific quackery than any other mainstream media outlet.”
  • Phil Donahue – before Oprah, we had the Donahue show, where Phil Donahue gave a huge platform to the first anti-vaccine celebrity pediatrician (no, not Jay Gordon or Bob Sears), Robert Mendelsohn. He also featured Lisa Bonet, of The Cosby Show fame, on his show back in 1990, when she told everyone that she wasn’t vaccinating her daughter.
  • ABC’s Good Morning America for giving a platform to Cindy Crawford and her celebrity pediatrician, Jay Gordon, MD
  • Oprah for giving such a huge platform for Jenny McCarthy
  • Katie Couric for her segment on Now with Tom Brokaw and Katie Couric about DPT “hot lots” in 1994, her 2008 segment, “How Independent Are Vaccine Defenders?,” on the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric, and her more her more recent segment on the HPV vaccine on her daytime talk show, Katie.
  • Larry King for his interviews with Bill Maher, Jim Carey, and multiple interviews with Jenny McCarthy on  CNN’s Larry King Live
  • NBC’s The TODAY Show for rebroadcasting DPT: Vaccine Roulette to a national audience and more recently, giving a platform to Robert DeNiro to discuss his views about vaccines and autism and the movie VAXXED
  • ABC’s 20/20 for their segments about the hepatitis B vaccine, Who’s Calling the Shots?, and for another segment featuring Jenny McCarthy
  • ABC’s Nightline for their segment on vaccine injury featuring Barbara Loe Fisher
  • CBS’s 60 Minutes for their segment,The MMR Vaccine, featuring Andrew Wakefield
  • Lisa Liddane for her 2006 article in the Orange County Register, Asking questions about vaccinations, which features Bob Sears and talks about toxins and reasons why parents want to delay vaccines, devoting little space to why it is not necessary and very dangerous
  • Matt Lauer for his hour-long episode, A Dose of Controversy, on NBC’s Dateline, in which he interviewed Andrew Wakefield
  • Michelle Woo for her article in the OC Weekly, Dr. Robert Sears Takes on Both Sides of the Great Vaccination Divide, which claims he has found “a middle ground in America’s war on vaccinations”
  • the Des Moines Register for posting an article, Effectiveness, safety of vaccines questioned, by Eileen Dannemann, the founder of an anti-vaccine website
  • the Portland Tribune editorial board for their piece, Our Opinion: Vaccination issue begs for open debate, in which this free, weekly paper basically repeated many anti-vaccine talking points
  • David Bruser and Jesse McLean at the Toronto Star for their now retracted 2015 article, HPV vaccine Gardasil has a dark side, Star investigation finds,  which claimed that the HPV vaccine is unsafe
  • Frederik Joelving and Susan Matthews for the Slate article, What the Gardasil Testing May Have Missed, which claims that the clinical trials for Gardasil weren’t designed properly and based on anecdotal evidence, implies that it is causing women to develop POTS

Do you know anyone who deserves a Sharyl Attkisson Journalism Award?

What to Know About the Sharyl Attkisson Journalism Award

In addition to fake news about vaccines, we see a lot of poor reporting and false balance by some reporters and organizations that leads parents to think that there is still a real debate going on about the safety and importance of getting vaccinated and protected.

More On the Sharyl Attkisson Journalism Award:

Vaccines – The Simpsons Did It

From chicken pox parties and conspiracies about using flu shots to control our minds to vaccine injury stories, The Simpsons did it.

The Simpsons on Vaccines and Vaccine Preventable Diseases

The Simpsons have been on the air since 1989 – just before I started medical school.

Since then, as with many other topics, they have done ahead of their time when it comes to vaccines.

Mr. X let everyone know about that flu shots were being used to control people's minds!
Mr. X let everyone know about that flu shots were being used to control people’s minds!

Consider that the episode “The Computer Wore Menace Shoes,” in which Homer creates a fake conspiracy website (Mr. X) and gets kidnapped by a mysterious group for stumbling upon a secret about how flu shots are given to control people’s minds, first aired on December 3, 2000. That’s long before Alex Jones and other folks started pushing these very same types of conspiracy theories about vaccines!

Jenny McCarthy appeared in The Man Who Grew Too Much episode to endorse an anti-GMO movie and make Lisa realize being against GMOs was unscientific.
Jenny McCarthy appeared in “The Man Who Grew Too Much” episode to endorse an anti-GMO movie and make Lisa realize being against GMOs was unscientific.

And the episode about chicken pox parties, “Milhouse of Sand and Fog,” came out way back on September 25, 2005. That’s before Jenny McCarthy appeared on Oprah and before Bob Sears wrote his “vaccine” book!

Vaccines – The Simpsons Did It

How many episodes of The Simpsons have mentioned vaccines or vaccine-preventable diseases?

  1. An unvaccinated Lisa gets the mumps.
    An unvaccinated (the kids don’t get caught up on their shots until season 12) Lisa gets the mumps.

    “Bart’s Dog Gets an F” – sixteenth episode of Season 2 in which Lisa gets the mumps.

  2. “Lisa’s Pony” – eighth episode of Season 3 in which Homer comes up with a way to save money on luxuries – “Well, you know, we’re always buying Maggie vaccinations for diseases she doesn’t even have!”
  3. “Kamp Krusty” – first episode of Season 4 in which Lisa visits Dr. Hibbert “to get boosters for malaria, German measles, encephalitis, and Hansen’s disease” before heading to camp.
  4. “Lisa’s First Word” – tenth episode of Season 4 in which Dr. Hibbert, at Lisa’s checkup, holds up a giant needle and gives him a “rubella inoculation” when he asks for a lollipop.
  5. “Marge in Chains” – twenty-first episode of Season 4 in which a man is looking for a cure and eats a bee, thinking it is a vaccine.
  6. “Lady Bouvier’s Lover” – twenty-first episode of Season 5 in which everyone sings the Armour Hot Dogs jingle at Maggie’s first birthday party and Milhouse, with spots on his face, sings “even kids with chicken pox” love hot dogs.
  7. “Much Apu About Nothing” – twenty-third episode of Season 7 in which Cotton Mather is the first thing that Apu reads from Homer’s history notes from 9th grade.
  8. “Take My Wife, Sleaze” – eighth episode of Season 11 in which Homer and Marge go to a 1950s-themed restaurant that sell polio dogs.
  9. “Homer vs. Dignity” – fifth episode of Season 12 in which Homer, after coming into some money, is able to get his kids caught up on “six years’ worth of inoculations,” including an “anti-polio shot,” which was much bigger than the “regular” polio shot.
  10. “The Computer Wore Menace Shoes” – sixth episode of Season 12 in which Ned Flanders reads a fake post from Homer on his Mr. X website about how flu shots are given as a form of mind control and he says “They’re controlling our minds with flu shots. I knew it. Well, kids, now aren’t you glad that we don’t believe in inoculations?” as his kids are shivering because they are sick and have fever. Homer is later kidnapped and taken to a secret island for revealing the conspiracy.
  11. “Bart-Mangled Banner” – twenty-first episode of Season 15 in which Lisa and Bart go see Dr. Hibbert (“Children, you should be grateful you live in a country where childhood diseases have been practically…”) to get their vaccines, but Bart escapes. Bart eventually gets his shots, but has a temporary side effect, his ‘earholes’ swell shut…
  12. “Sleeping with the Enemy” – third episode of Season 16 in which Milhouse has the measles.
  13. Free cat flu vaccinations at Springfield General Hospital!
    Free House Cat Flu vaccinations at Springfield General Hospital!

    “Milhouse of Sand and Fog” – third episode of Season 17 in which Homer has a chicken pox party for the kids in the neighborhood after Maggie gets chicken pox.

  14. “The Fool Monty” – sixth episode of Season 22 in which everyone in town waits in line to get a vaccine for the House Cat Flu.
  15. “The Town” – third episode of Season 28 in which after moving to Boston, Marge asks someone if they vaccinate their kids (“of course!”) to make sure that they are progressive, “but not stupid progressive.”

The Simpsons isn’t the first show to include messages about vaccines and vaccine-preventable in their episodes.

Remember the Brady Bunch measles episode?

Like other TV shows, they are consistently sending a message about vaccines that is helping folks understand that vaccines work and that they are safe and necessary.

What to Know About The Simpsons and Vaccines

While some of the humor and jokes in The Simpsons are rather subtle, their message about getting vaccinated and protected against chicken pox, mumps, measles, rubella, and other vaccine preventable diseases certainly isn’t.

More on The Simpsons and Vaccines

Worst Vaccine Books

There are many books to help you get educated about vaccines and avoid getting influenced by vaccine scare stories and anti-vaccine talking points.

Some can even help you understand why you are afraid of vaccines.

Worst Vaccine Books

Unfortunately, if you simply search Amazon for books about vaccines, you are going to be hit with a list of anti-vaccine books. These include books that push their own made-up, so-called alternative immunization schedules and use misinformation about vaccines to scare you away from vaccinating and protecting your kids.

“Robert Sears became interested in vaccines as a medical student after reading “DPT: A Shot in the Dark,” a 1985 book that argued that the whooping cough vaccine was dangerous… Sears said the book, which helped spark a backlash against vaccines, exposed him to ideas he wasn’t hearing in school.”

Paloma Esquivel on Vaccination controversy swirls around O.C.’s ‘Dr. Bob’

While it is obvious that some are anti-vaccine, with stories about wild conspiracy theories, and that they have no scientific basis for their recommendations, it is also easy to see how others can fool parents, not knowing that the books “rely on the same tired old fallacious arguments that have been heard before and rejected by knowledgeable scientists.”

“…the book is also dangerous in the way in which it validates the pervasive myths that are currently scaring parents into making ill-informed decisions for their children.”

John Snyder on Cashing In On Fear: The Danger of Dr. Sears

These books, which are often described as anti-vaccine, include:

  • Alfred Russel Wallace played a big role in the antivaccination movement in the late 19th Century.
    Many of today’s anti-vaccine books use the same arguments from the 19th century anti-vaccine movement.

    The Big Autism Cover-Up: How and Why the Media Is Lying to the American Public by Anne Dachel

  • The Business of Baby: What Doctors Don’t Tell You, What Corporations Try to Sell You, and How to Put Your Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Baby Before Their Bottom Line by Jennifer Margulis
  • Callous Disregard: Autism and Vaccines–The Truth Behind a Tragedy by Andrew Wakefield and Jenny McCarthy
  • Dissolving Illusions: Disease, Vaccines, and The Forgotten History by Suzanne Humphries MD
  • Don’t Vaccinate Before You Educate by Mayer Eisenstein
  • DPT: A Shot in the Dark by Harris L. Coulter and Barbara Loe Fisher
  • Dr. Mary’s Monkey: How the Unsolved Murder of a Doctor, a Secret Laboratory in New Orleans and Cancer Causing Monkey Viruses are Linked to Lee Harvey Oswald, the JFK Assassination and Emerging Global Epidemics by Edward T. Haslam
  • Emerging Viruses: AIDS and Ebola: Nature, Accident or Intentional? by Leonard Horowitz
  • Evidence of Harm by David Kirby
  • Fowl! Bird Flu: It’s Not What You Think, by Sherri Tenpenny, D.O.
  • Germs, Biological Warfare, Vaccinations: What you Need to Know by Gary Null
  • Healing and Preventing Autism: A Complete Guide by Jenny McCarthy and Dr. Jerry Kartzinel
  • Healing Our Autistic Children: A Medical Plan for Restoring Your Child’s Health Paperback by Julie A. Buckley
  • Horrors of Vaccination Exposed and Illustrated by Chas. M. Higgins, M.D.
  • How to Prevent Autism: Expert Advice from Medical Professionals by Dara Berger
  • Jabbed: How the Vaccine Industry, Medical Establishment and Government Stick It to You and Your Family by Brett Wilcox and Kent Heckenlively J.D.
  • Lethal Injections Why Immunizations Don’t Work and the Damage they Cause, by William Douglass, M.D
  • Louder Than Words: A Mother’s Journey in Healing Autism by Jenny McCarthy
  • Miller’s Review of Critical Vaccine Studies: 400 Important Scientific Papers Summarized for Parents and Researchers by Neil Z. Miller
  • Melanie’s Marvelous Measles by Stephanie Messenger
  • Mother Warriors: A Nation of Parents Healing Autism Against All Odds by Jenny McCarthy
  • Queer Blood: The Secret AIDS Genocide Pit, by Alan Cantwell, M.D.
  • Raising a Vaccine Free Child, by Wendy Lydall
  • The Sanctity of Human Blood: Vaccination is Not Immunization, by Tim O’Shea, D.C.
  • Saying No to Vaccines: A Resource Guide For All Ages, by Sherri Tenpenny, D.O.
  • Shaken Baby Syndrome Diagnosis on Shaky Ground, by Viera Scheibner, Ph.D.
  • Some Call it AIDS: I Call it Murder, The Connection Between Cancer, AIDS, Immunizations, and Genocide, by Eva Snead M.D.
  • Thimerosal: Let the Science Speak: The Evidence Supporting the Immediate Removal of Mercury–a Known Neurotoxin–from Vaccines by Jr. Robert F. Kennedy and Mark Hyman M.D.
  • Vaccination: 100 Years of Orthodox Research Shows Vaccinations are a Medical Assault on the Immune System by Viera Scheibner, Ph.D.
  • Vaccine A: The Covert Government Experiment That’s Killing Our Soldiers – And Why GIs Are Only the First Victims by Gary Matsumoto, Ph.D.
  • The Vaccine Book: Making the Right Decision for Your Child (Sears Parenting Library) by Robert Sears, MD
  • Vaccine Epidemic: How Corporate Greed, Biased Science, and Coercive Government Threaten Our Human Rights, Our Health, and Our Children by Louise Kuo Habakus and Mary Holland
  • The Vaccine-Friendly Plan: Dr. Paul’s Safe and Effective Approach to Immunity and Health-from Pregnancy Through Your Child’s Teen Years by Paul Thomas M.D. and Jennifer Margulis
  • Vaccine Illusion by Tetyana Obukhanych
  • Vaccine Safety Manual for Concerned Families and Health Practitioners by Neil Z. Miller
  • Vaccine Whistleblower: Exposing Autism Research Fraud at the CDC by Esq. Kevin Barry and Dr. Boyd E. Haley
  • Vaccines 2.0: The Careful Parent’s Guide to Making Safe Vaccination Choices for Your Family by Mark Blaxill and Dan Olmsted
  • Vaccines: A Reappraisal by Richard Moskowitz MD and Mary Holland
  • Vaccines Are They Really Safe and Effective? by Neil Z. Miller
  • Vaccines: An Ounce of Prevention? Or a Pound of Death? by Keidi Obi Awadu
  • Vaccines Are Dangerous: A Warning to the Black Community by Yoshua Barak
  • Vaccines: The Risks, the Benefits, the Choices, a Resource Guide for Parents by Sherri Tenpenny, D.O.
  • The Virus and the Vaccine: Contaminated Vaccine, Deadly Cancers, and Government Neglect by Debbie Bookchin and Jim Schumacher
  • What The Pharmaceutical Companies Don’t Want You To Know About Vaccines by Todd Elsner, D.C.
  • When Your Doctor Is Wrong, Hepatitis B Vaccine and Autism by Judy Converse, M.P.H., R.D
  • What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Children’s Vaccinations by Stephanie Cave, M.D.

Most parents will likely have few illusions of what these books are really about, even after simply reading the titles or seeing the names of the authors.  For the rest, just read some of the reviews below.

And if you are looking for books to help you make the right decision about vaccinating your kids, try these other vaccine books instead.

What To Know About the Worst Vaccine Books

These vaccine books, many of which are featured on Amazon, mostly rely on the same arguments that vaccines are full of toxins that will poison your kids, that vaccines don’t even work, and that vaccines aren’t even necessary. They are just what you need if you are looking for help to justify your decision to not vaccinate your kids.

More Information on the Worst Vaccine Books: