It’s being widely reported that more than half of patients in England being offered the swine flu vaccination are turning it down.
A poll of GPs found that generally uptake was around 46% with resistance from pregnant women being particularly high, one GP estimating as little as 1 in 20 pregnant women opting for the vaccine.
Sadly this is the now likely to be the outcome of any large vaccination programme on the back of the misinformation, fear and lies spread by the media and the growing number of anti-vaccination zealots. Swine Flu might not be the pandemic that was originally suggested but how long before something does come along that will cause tens of thousands of deaths? We’ve already seen measles outbreaks on the back of all the MMR hysteria, it’s not a huge stretch of the imagination to think of a situation where life saving vaccines are refused because of the misinformation spread by such people.
Vaccination caries a risk but as with all medication it is a risk weighed against the risk of the disease and the complications caused by that disease, particularly so in vulnerable patients.
What is needed is clear, accurate and open information and education not conspiracy obsessed experiments with herd immunity that give little help and leave blood on the hands of those peddling them.