Combating societal amnesia about disease and vaccines ...Middle East

A child’s cheek shows the characteristic rash associated with measles. (Photo courtesy of the CDC)

When I was a small child in the dark ages of the early 1960’s, one of my favorite toys was a huggable, pillow-like stuffed animal handed down by my older brother that bore the rather uncomplimentary name “Measly Cat.” Interestingly, as I look back, the name was not a reference to the cat’s small size or low overall status in the family toy collection.

Rather, the seemingly unflattering nickname was a reference to the fact that the cat was covered with red spots – the kind that just about every child in mid-20th century America knew were associated with a common and extremely nasty illness: measles.

That even very young kids were well-aware of measles and the threat it posed at the time should come as little surprise. Prior to the first measles vaccine in 1963, the United States experienced an average of 3-4 million cases of the illness every year. In the late 1950’s – a time in which the U.S. population was roughly half of what it is today – that meant that as many as 2% of all Americans became ill with the disease annually.

And lest anyone mistakenly look back at those numbers through rose-colored glasses as merely indicative of a benign and bygone rite of childhood, they should be reminded of the fact that those millions of infections led to nearly 50,000 hospitalizations,1,000 cases of encephalitis, and 400-500 deaths – many of them gruesome – annually. At the time, measles was among the nation’s leading causes of childhood mortality.

Unfortunately, it’s increasingly clear that just such a form of societal myopia and amnesia have taken hold in the U.S. in recent years, as millions of modern Americans – many of them young parents with no memory of past measles epidemics, but plenty of exposure to internet urban mythology – have opted not to vaccinate their children against it and other illnesses.

The tragic result: after having been eradicated in the U.S. and throughout most of the world at the outset of the 21st century, measles is back and wreaking more havoc. In 2025, there were dozens of outbreaks and nearly 2,300 confirmed cases across the nation and quite likely, many, many more. At last check, measles is back on the march in most U.S. states – including North Carolina.

Making sure Americans wake up to the current dangerous situation (and that they look back accurately on the bad old days and the miraculous way in which the measles vaccine interrupted a dreadful global phenomenon) is the mission of a relatively new and important national nonprofit education and advocacy group called Grandparents for Vaccines.

As one of the group’s volunteer leaders, retired Ohio pediatrician Dr. Arthur Lavin explained to me in a recent radio/podcast interview, societal amnesia is one of the strange and vexing side effects of vaccines.

As vaccines accomplish their mission and eliminate an illness, people are understandably happy and quick to forget about it. Who among us remembers much today, if anything, about once horrific and deadly plagues like smallpox or polio?

Now add to the mix the unfortunate 21st century phenomenon in which self-proclaimed experts and snake oil sellers can use social media to undermine genuine science with anecdotes and shoddy research and dramatically exaggerate (and spur fears about) the real but minuscule risks of vaccines, and it doesn’t take much for a deadly genie to escape the bottle in which it had been contained. This is made even easier in a time like the present in which distrust of large institutions is high and modern, “what’s-in-it-for-me?” consumerism has so thoroughly trashed the once popular (and conservative!) idea that we all bear a duty to make at least some small sacrifices for the common good.

That’s where we find ourselves today, unfortunately, as one of the crown princes of the mostly well-meaning but profoundly misguided “anti-vaxx” movement, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., has been turned loose by President Trump to spread disinformation and bad policy as head of the nation’s Department of Health and Human Services.

The almost certain result to come: the continued revival and spread of once contained or declining illnesses in the name of consistently debunked theories that vastly exaggerate the dangers of vaccinations.

Fortunately, groups like Grandparents for Vaccines and its fast-growing collection of volunteers are working hard to push back with facts, data and accurate memories. As the group notes on its website:

Let’s hope they meet with rapid and widespread success so that measles, and any number of other dangerous communicable diseases, remain (or are soon returned) to a place in which the nation’s children need never give them more than a fleeting thought.

Hence then, the article about combating societal amnesia about disease and vaccines was published today ( Tuesday 17/02/2026 - 01:17 PM ) and is available on NC news line ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.

Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Combating societal amnesia about disease and vaccines )

Also on site :

• KLOS-FM host Uncle Joe Benson, one LA radio’s legendary voices, dies at 76
• A Trump Call Ignited Saudi-U.A.E. Feud
• Tupperware’s Beautiful 5-Bowl Set Is a Hit of Nostalgia For Fans Who Say, ‘It Reminds Me of the One My Mom Had’