“A lot of people had no clue how toxic the [vaccine misinformation] environment was,” says Heidi Larson, who studies vaccine hesitancy at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. “People who were taking vaccines for granted got exposed [to misinformation], and now there’s no turning back.”
In the oil towns of west Texas, a measles outbreak is spreading. Gaines County, where the flare-up began, had the state’s third-highest share of children exempt from measles and other vaccines for religious or philosophical reasons last year
The Covid pandemic has provoked a fresh wave of hesitancy. According to VCP data, between 2018 and 2023 confidence in vaccine safety, importance and efficacy fell by about 20% in the UK.
In this episode of Take as Directed, J. Stephen Morrison speaks with Dr. Heidi Larson on why vaccine confidence is currently in crisis.