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Posts feedMeasles - a short history lesson
The UK Health Security Agency recently issued a press release, warning that too few children were vaccinated against measles. With the benefits of vaccination and a developed healthcare system, it is easy to forget that measles was often a fatal disease for young children. Table 1 shows just how deadly measles was at the start of last century without vaccination:
Orders of magnitude
At the beginning of April, the MHRA published an analysis of vaccine safety reports in the UK and concluded that despite now finding increased evidence of rare blood clots following administration of AZD1222 from AstraZeneca (consistent with previous reports from Europe) the benefits of vaccination still outweigh the risks.
An abundance of clots?
As David Spiegelhalter (2021) points out, blood clots happen all the time: "at least 100 every week" in a population of 5 million.
Immune response
The resurgence of measles in Europe signals something of a confidence crisis in the area of vaccination, and not for the first time. Mass panics of this sort are not new, but the reach of modern hysteria is aided by technology.