Media induced anti-vaccination sentiment can even affect health workers, vaccine researcher says

Opposition to vaccination, which has been induced in large part by media scare stories, extends even to healthcare workers, a vaccine expert and co-inventor of a rotavirus vaccine told a research meeting this week.

Paul A Offit, professor of vaccinology and paediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania, was addressing a meeting in Washington, DC of the American Society for Microbiology, on the subject of biodefence and emerging diseases.

He described the efforts that were needed at his own hospital, the 600 bed Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, to achieve 100% vaccination for seasonal influenza among its 10 000 workers.

Many of the hospital patients were particularly vulnerable because they were too …