NYT: 'In Talking to Parents About Vaccines, Pediatricians Navigate a Sea of Misinformation'

See excerpts below; reaction from Kayla Hancock, Director of Protect Our Care’s Public Health Project: *“RFK Jr.’s national smear campaign against vaccines and America’s pediatricians has sparked a misinformation epidemic— leaving parents confused and children more susceptible to preventable diseases. Kennedy’s fear campaign against science may be good business for his bottom feeding lawyer friends, but it’s exploding everyone’s health costs and seriously harming children’s health.” *

*KEY POINTS FROM THE NYT: *

In Talking to Parents About Vaccines, Pediatricians Navigate a Sea of Misinformation March 11th / By Apoorva Mandavilli

Across the country, clinicians like Dr. Parker, who also holds a doctorate in nursing practice, are contending with a sharp rise in vaccine hesitancy. They are trying to do what is best for children’s health while staying sensitive and supportive, even as they bear the brunt of parents’ mistrust and confusion.

[..]

Now vaccine skepticism emanates from the highest echelons of the U.S. government. Over the last year, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his associates have questioned the safety of childhood vaccines, made false statements about their effectiveness and rescinded recommendations for routine vaccination against a half-dozen diseases.

And despite the fact that pediatrics is the lowest paid medical specialty — as pediatricians are quick to point out — Mr. Kennedy and others have portrayed its practitioners as greedily promoting vaccines in order to earn fat profits.

In a survey by the health research group KFF in September, 16 percent of parents said they had skipped or delayed at least one childhood vaccine other than for flu or Covid-19. And doubts about vaccines are increasingly spilling into refusal of other mainstays of pediatric medicine, including antibiotics, medications like Tylenol and diagnostic procedures like spinal taps.

At a hospital in Boise, Idaho, for example, three infants died last year after their parents declined a shot of vitamin K, administered to newborns to prevent bleeding, said Dr. Amanda Lee, a pediatrician there.

Parents have always had questions about vaccines, but Dr. Lee and other pediatricians say they are now finding their expertise to be sometimes powerless against the flood of misinformation.

[…]

Under Mr. Kennedy’s direction, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention changed its website to say that “studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism.” The website previously said rigorous studies had not found a link between vaccines and autism.

The revised language, Mr. Skaggs said, was “one of the main things” that made him change his mind about vaccines.

Some shots, like those against measles, have long been a target of anti-vaccine groups, which have falsely linked them to autism. But hesitancy has now spread even to stalwarts of medical practice, like the vaccine against polio. As a result, pediatricians may find themselves spending an entire visit explaining the rationale for a single shot, shunting aside many other important topics.