Vaccines: researchers must keep on track of science

Americans who don’t want to vaccinate are increasingly getting their way: A June study found that, over the past decade, the number of philosophical vaccine exemptions rose in two-thirds of the states that allow them.

What drives these wrongheaded decisions is fear — fear that vaccines are somehow dangerous, even though research shows the opposite. And these choices have consequences. The 2015 Disneyland measles outbreak sickened at least 125 people, many of them unvaccinated.

As a science journalist, I’ve written several articles to quell vaccine angst and encourage immunization. But lately, I’ve noticed that the cloud of fear surrounding vaccines is having another nefarious effect: It is eroding the integrity of vaccine science.

In February I was awarded a fellowship by the nonpartisan Alicia Patterson Foundation to report on vaccines. Soon after, I found myself hitting a wall. When I tried to report on unexpected or controversial aspects of vaccine efficacy or safety, scientists often didn’t want to talk with me. When I did get them on the phone, a worrying theme emerged: Scientists are so terrified of the public’s vaccine hesitancy that they are censoring themselves, playing down undesirable findings and perhaps even avoiding undertaking studies that could show unwanted effects. Those who break these unwritten rules are criticized.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/04/opinion/sunday/anti-vaccine-activists-have-taken-vaccine-science-hostage.html

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The goal is to protect the public — to ensure that more people embrace vaccines — but in the long-term, the approach will backfire. Our arsenal of vaccines is exceptional, but it could always be better. Progress requires scientific candor and a willingness to ask inconvenient questions.

Here’s a case that typifies this problem and illustrates how beneficial it can be when critical findings get published. In 2005, Lone Simonsen, who was then with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and her colleagues published a study in JAMA Internal Medicine showing that the flu vaccine prevented fewer deaths than expected in people over 65. ...