Over the past few years, the devastating effects of the anti-vaxxer movement have become apparent. The disinformation spread by people who believe that vaccines are dangerous and cause autism led to a historic measles outbreak in the U.S. in 2019.
A recent poll found the number of Americans who believe that "it is extremely or very important that parents vaccinate their children" has dropped by 10% since 2001. Currently, 84% of Americans believe it's important to have their children vaccinated.
The anti-vaxxer movement is growing despite the fact there have been over 140 peer-reviewed articles, published in relatively high impact factor or specialized journals that document the lack of a correlation between autism and vaccines.
The need to combat the disinformation spread by anti-vaxxers has become even more important in the COVID-19 era. Reports from major pharmaceutical companies there could be a COVID-19 vaccine ready by within the next few months.
An effective vaccine would help stop the virus that's claimed over 200,00 American lives and help get the economy back on track. But if Americans are hesitant to take the vaccine due to disinformation from anti-vaxxers, the virus could continue to spread indefinitely.
A recent poll found that 35% of Americans wouldn't take a COVID-19 vaccine. Sixty percent said they would and 5% are unsure. Democrats were also more likely to be willing to take the vaccine than Republicans, 71% to 48%.
Earlier this month, Republican senator Mitt Romney of Utah called for an "aggressive campaign" to counter anti-vaxxer disinformation on vaccines.
"There are literally books out there written to describe why vaccines are bad," the Utah Republican said at a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing." And I wonder if it does not make sense for our government to put out a very comprehensive effort to dispel this growing sense of vaccines being bad."
"I don't know how you do that, but it would come to mind that you are doing that with regards to tobacco and massive advertising on TV," the senator continued. "You could have debates, you could call in these people who write these books and have discussions with them, which are publicized. You could have a much more aggressive campaign on social media."
NIH director Dr. Francis Collins responded to Romney's suggestion saying the situation causes "anger" and "frustration" that this "kind of misinformation is so readily spread by people who have another agenda."
Romney should be all too familiar with the thread caused by anti-vaxxers. Utah has rated in the bottom ten of states in the DTaP (diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis), polio, H. influenzae type B, as well as 4, 5 and 7-vaccine series among 19- to 35-month-olds.
The Public Library of Science Medicine rated Salt Lake City and Provo as hotspots for anti-vaccination.
If the government hopes to reverse the growth of the anti-vaxxer movement, it better move quickly. It's been growing even faster than ever due to the COVID-19 pandemic. More people have fallen for anti-vaxxer rhetoric due to their mistrust of president Trump on vaccines, the growing Q Anon conspiracy, and skepticism over the speed in which a potential vaccine can be developed.
"Anti-vaccination sentiment is going into the mainstream," Heidi Larson, director of the Vaccine Confidence Project at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, told the Los Angeles Times. "A lot of people you never would have imagined are now saying that maybe the anti-vaccination lobby has a point."
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Will your current friends still be with you after seven years?
Professor shares how many years a friendship must last before it'll become lifelong
Think of your best friend. How long have you known them? Growing up, children make friends and say they’ll be best friends forever. That’s where “BFF” came from, for crying out loud. But is the concept of the lifelong friend real? If so, how many years of friendship will have to bloom before a friendship goes the distance? Well, a Dutch study may have the answer to that last question.
Sociologist Gerald Mollenhorst and his team in the Netherlands did extensive research on friendships and made some interesting findings in his surveys and studies. Mollenhorst found that over half of your friendships will “shed” within seven years. However, the relationships that go past the seven-year mark tend to last. This led to the prevailing theory that most friendships lasting more than seven years would endure throughout a person’s lifetime.
In Mollenhorst’s findings, lifelong friendships seem to come down to one thing: reciprocal effort. The primary reason so many friendships form and fade within seven-year cycles has much to do with a person’s ages and life stages. A lot of people lose touch with elementary and high school friends because so many leave home to attend college. Work friends change when someone gets promoted or finds a better job in a different state. Some friends get married and have children, reducing one-on-one time together, and thus a friendship fades. It’s easy to lose friends, but naturally harder to keep them when you’re no longer in proximity.
Some people on Reddit even wonder if lifelong friendships are actually real or just a romanticized thought nowadays. However, older commenters showed that lifelong friendship is still possible:
“I met my friend on the first day of kindergarten. Maybe not the very first day, but within the first week. We were texting each other stupid memes just yesterday. This year we’ll both celebrate our 58th birthdays.”
“My oldest friend and I met when she was just 5 and I was 9. Next-door neighbors. We're now both over 60 and still talk weekly and visit at least twice a year.”
“I’m 55. I’ve just spent a weekend with friends I met 24 and 32 years ago respectively. I’m also still in touch with my penpal in the States. I was 15 when we started writing to each other.”
“My friends (3 of them) go back to my college days in my 20’s that I still talk to a minimum of once a week. I'm in my early 60s now.”
“We ebb and flow. Sometimes many years will pass as we go through different things and phases. Nobody gets buttsore if we aren’t in touch all the time. In our 50s we don’t try and argue or be petty like we did before. But I love them. I don’t need a weekly lunch to know that. I could make a call right now if I needed something. Same with them.”
Maintaining a friendship for life is never guaranteed, but there are ways, psychotherapists say, that can make a friendship last. It’s not easy, but for a friendship to last, both participants need to make room for patience and place greater weight on their similarities than on the differences that may develop over time. Along with that, it’s helpful to be tolerant of large distances and gaps of time between visits, too. It’s not easy, and it requires both people involved to be equally invested to keep the friendship alive and from becoming stagnant.
As tough as it sounds, it is still possible. You may be a fortunate person who can name several friends you’ve kept for over seven years or over seventy years. But if you’re not, every new friendship you make has the same chance and potential of being lifelong.