And he still does the rounds, giving talks and presentations. In a few cases, preventable infectious diseases saw localised increases after he rolled through.
Vaccines are, in a way, responsible for anti-vaccine sentiment by creating a world so free of major infectious diseases that people aren't properly scared of them.
Even if vaccines did increase the risk of autism: if you explained what autism was to someone from the 18th century, and told them they could prevent their children from getting measles (or smallpox!) through a vaccine, but they shouldn't, because it had a chance of making their children autistic, they'd look at you like you were a fool.
After all, before vaccines, variolation protected against major smallpox infection by making you ill and potentially even killing you... and people willingly paid to go through it.
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u/MacRoach86 Jan 31 '25
Yep and then moved to America.