from the but-it-often-rhymes dept

The apocryphal quote supposedly from Mark Twain is one of my favorites: “History does not repeat, but it does often rhyme.” Now, there is no evidence that Twain ever actually authored these words, but it’s incredible how true they tend to be regardless. And when it comes to the current measles outbreak that is ravaging the country, and the Northeast in particular, they seem incredibly apropos.

We’re suffering this outbreak for many reasons: the anti-vaxxer agenda being rendered directly into the federal government, the distrust in medical professionals and science that has been purposefully fostered by bad actors, and a general apathy for vaccinations. But if you want to know why it’s gotten worse and not better, the answer to that is singular: inaction by the federal government.

And if you go back to 1991, the last time the country suffered a measles epidemic this significant, you can read news stories that don’t exactly mirror our current situation, but they do rhyme.

A breakdown in the vaccination system caused the nation’s worst measles epidemic in decades, and more epidemics may occur unless the system is changed, a Federal advisory panel said today.

The panel, the National Vaccine Advisory Committee, said in a report, “The principal cause for the epidemic is failure to deliver vaccine to vulnerable preschool children on schedule.” It said the health care system created “barriers to obtaining immunization and fails to take advantage of many opportunities to provide vaccines to children.”

It’s a similar story today, of course. Though, unlike today, I don’t have any reason to believe that governmental failures in 1991 that led to the measles epidemic at the time were purposeful. In fact, federal officials at the time responded to this report not by lambasting state officials with conspiracy theories and political attacks, but by acknowledging the report’s accuracy and promising to do better. There’s no indication that the federal government at the time attempted to hide cases and deaths from measles, unlike the current administration under RFK Jr.

No, this was federal advisors and federal officials working off the same set of facts and combining their efforts to make things better. And better things actually got. This was, by the way, a time when the Executive Branch was also Republican.

Dr. Bart, director of the National Vaccine Program Office of the Department of Health and Human Services, said the Bush Administration had been waiting for the report and would quickly plan to follow as many of the panel’s recommendations as possible.

“We have a huge increases and deaths due to measles for the first time in two decades,” he said. “We also think there is some acute deterioration of the health care system, and we fear that this may be a warning flag for other problems to come.”

Dr. Henderson said that immunization “is the simplest procedure in the entire medical armamentarium, and is by far the most cost effective of all the medical interventions we have.” If we cannot provide the simplest and most cost effective thing we have, he said, “what does that say about our health system? It is clear that we have a problem.”

Well, then at present we have a problem. A bigger one, actually. The story at present isn’t one of government bureaucracy failing simply because big governmental systems are slow and lethargic generally. In this case, the causes of vaccine hesitancy and under-vaccination is the plan. It’s what the leadership of our health agencies are striving for.

There is no argument otherwise. Kennedy has said the government is doing a great job on the measles question, even as thousands are infected and people are dying. We’ll get into this more separately, but Kennedy also has, in the middle of this outbreak, created a federal program to financially incentivize the reporting of vaccine injuries.

If disease is the enemy of Americans, then Kennedy is a traitor. He’s giving aid and comfort to that enemy, plain and simple. It’s why the measles outbreak is getting worse, not better. It’s why other health conditions are on the rise, such as pertussis and mumps.

What is happening right now is insane. What makes it more insane is that the lessons we learned from the last time we engaged with this enemy are barely 35 years old. Universe willing, November will pave the way for Congress to actually do something about it all.

Filed Under: anti-vaxxers, cdc, epidemics, hhs, measles