Anti-Vaxxers Are Spreading, And Everyone Is At Risk

Byron Shire has the lowest vaccination rate in Australia, with just half of all five-year-olds being vaccinated in Mullumbimby, and around 60% in nearby Byron Bay.

Most people don’t realise that the anti-vaccination movement actually got its footing in Australia right there in the Byron Shire.

The Australian Vaccination Network, an anti-vaccination group, was set up in Bangalow in the 1990s, and it shows.

Sure, Byron has always had a hippy image, fed by groups of people wanting to get away from the grind, into an organic and off-the-grid lifestyle of beach bumming and free love. Australians of alternative-lifestyles flock there, and in this group an unfortunate seed has been planted. It’s a seed of distrust: against the mainstream, against modern medicine, against the conspiracy of ‘Big Pharma’ and against everything vaccination.

In fact, you’ll regularly see high profile anti-vaccination speakers making their way through Byron Shire, endorsed by the public and by businesses. David “Avocado” Wolfe has a sold out event happening this week at a local business, the owner of which hopes Wolfe will be sharing his anti-vax message. In December, the Mullumbimby Civic Hall hosted a film night, showing Vaxxed, the conspiracy film by Andrew Wakefield, the discredited doctor behind the original autism/vaccination study. Viewers were enthusiastic in their support, and unwavering in their belief.

Like a cult, the anti-vaccination movement has spread insidiously across Australia, boosted by the masses love of alternative health, an industry that thrives on confirmation bias. Businesses and individuals are all making money pushing people to believe that vaccinations are bad for us, despite the avalanche of contradictory evidence. Yes, not everyone involved in the alternative lifestyle trade is in on it, we know. But there’s no doubt that large groups are, and it’s hurting Australia.

Why?

Because the 2008-2012 whooping cough epidemic was traced back to the Byron Shire.

You remember that place right? Where one in two children are vaccinated? Well that rippled out, and as a result the number of whooping cough cases in Northern NSW were four times the state average. In that epidemic, two babies who were too young to be vaccinated, and who relied on herd immunity, died. In 2008 it was a four-week-old named Dana McCaffery. In 2011 a nine-week-old named Kailis Smith.

Mums Targeted 

Unfortunately, in the war against the truth where lies are reinforced so much that they become the truth to those that speak them, mums are a big target.

The Mullumbimby Home Birth Group has not once, but twice in the last 18 months, hosted professional anti-vaxxer Stephanie Messenger to give talks to new mums about vaccinations. Messenger is known among people who believe in vaccination as that crazy person who wrote a book about the health benefits of measles. The book was called: Melanie’s Marvellous Measles.

Oh, and she also claims that it was vaccines that killed her son back in 1977, despite the fact that her doctors informed her the child had a rare, and ultimately fatal, genetic disorder called Alexanders Disease.

Despite this she’s still speaking at a council hall in Mullumbimby, and claims she will:

“Present evidence that the government mantra that vaccines are safe and effective is nothing more than propaganda. You will go home with handouts on where to dig deeper for the real answers to do with vaccination”

How about you dig deeper at your doctor’s office, where a health professional with more than a decade of dedicated study under their belt has sworn an oath to protect your health and the health of the community?

No? It’s just a thought.

Fighting A Hard Fight

Of course, there are those working against the anti-vaccination movement, particularly the blatant targeting and peer pressure that is levelled against new mothers.

Local mum Alison Gaylard was a part of a group who formed the Northern Rivers Vaccination Supporters in 2012 after both her daughters caught whooping cough during the epidemic. She says she remembers the intense peer pressure she faced not to vaccinate as a new mum, and said it was overwhelming.

“I can remember at one mum and bub group, it was about nappy options and it was run by the local baby shop and the topic got around to vaccination. My friend and I said ‘well why wouldn’t you vaccinate?’ and these people were dumbfounded. I was shunned by some people and for a long time I didn’t fit in anywhere,” she told the Daily Telegraph.

Another volunteer of the Northern Rivers group is Heidi Robertson, a mum of two. She says that the group is dedicated to supporting those who decide to vaccinate, in as non-confrontational a way as possible.

“We are trying to encourage people not to be fearful, to speak up in favour of vaccination and turn the tide on what has become a social norm around here.”

However, with Pauline Hanson’s recent high-profile comments about vaccination, and with the massive backlash being levelled on the government by anti-vaxxers over the idea of No Jab, No Play become nationwide, it’s pretty clear the tide isn’t turning yet.

Until then we need to remember that sometimes, even parents with the best intentions can harm their children by choosing not to vaccinate. Often when they’re confronted with the reality of how serious and deadly the diseases are that we vaccinate against, minds are changed. However, those speaking out against vaccinations are still the ones yelling, so it’s time that vaccination supporters yelled a little back.

Please vaccinate.