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Antivaccine nonsense Clinical trials Medicine

Undermining the childhood vaccine schedule with EBM fundamentalism

“Not antivax” COVID contrarian Dr. Vinay Prasad demonstrates why skepticism is necessary and how evidence-based medicine (EBM) fundamentalism harms childhood health by inadvertently (I hope) echoing a very old antivax trope about randomized clinical trials for the childhood vaccine schedule, you know, to “rebuild confidence.”

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Politics

The Brownstone Institute embraces old antivax lies about measles

The Brownstone Institute long ago went full anti-COVID-19 vaccination. Now it’s embracing old antivax tropes about the measles vaccine. This was inevitable.

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Antivaccine nonsense Politics Popular culture Pseudoscience Skepticism/critical thinking

Monitoring COVID-19 vaccine safety during a pandemic

Last year, the Trump administration essentially disbanded the National Vaccine Program Office, folding it into an office focused on infectious diseases. Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. What does this mean for monitoring the safety of the soon-to-be-approved COVID-19 vaccines?

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Skepticism/critical thinking

Quoth Dr. Prasad: “It would not be difficult” to do an impossible VAERS study

Dr. Vinay Prasad recently attacked an epidemiological study published in JAMA Open Network reporting that people in red states are more likely to report vaccine injuries, claiming that it “would not be difficult” to do a much more rigorous study.

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Antivaccine nonsense Medicine

Autism prevalence increases to 1 in 36, and antivaxxers freak out…again

The CDC updated its estimates for the prevalence of autism spectrum disorders. Predictably, antivaxxers blame the increasing prevalence of ASDs reported, particularly in Black children, on “environmental factors,” which is antivax code for, “Vaccines are to blame.”