More Truly Shitty Headlines From The NYT: "Debate Over Vaccinations Intensifies." Jesus Christ . .
LOS ANGELES — A measles outbreak that began at Disneyland is spreading across California and beyond, prompting health officials to move aggressively to contain it — including by barring unvaccinated students from going to school in Orange County. The outbreak has increased concerns that a longstanding movement against childhood vaccinations has created a surge in a disease that was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000.
Health officials said 59 cases of measles had been diagnosed in California as of Wednesday, with an additional eight related cases spread through Utah, Washington, Oregon, Colorado and Mexico. Among those infected are five workers at Disneyland, where the outbreak was spotted in mid-December; 42 of the 59 California cases have been linked to the Disneyland outbreak.
The cases were a continuation of what health officials said was a worrisome increase in measles in Orange County and other places where parents had resisted the urging of health professionals to inoculate their children. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 644 cases of measles from 27 states last year, by far the largest number since 2000. Before measles vaccines became commonplace in 1963, about three million to four million Americans a year contracted the disease, the agency said, and 400 to 500 died from it.
The latest outbreak has renewed a heated debate about an anti-vaccination movement championed largely by parents who believe discredited research linking vaccines to autism, or who believe that the risks of some vaccines, including the measles inoculations, outweigh any potential benefit. “We can expect to see many more cases of this preventable disease unless people take measures to prevent it,” said Dr. Gilberto F. Chávez, the deputy director of the California Center for Infectious Diseases. “I am asking unvaccinated Californians to consider getting vaccinated against measles.”
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http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/22/us/measles-cases-linked-to-disneyland-rise-and-debate-over-vaccinations-intensifies.html
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