Washington Post Won’t Say Why Trust In Vaccines Is Gone – OpEd |
The Washington Post recently published a detailed investigation showing that childhood vaccination rates across the United States are falling sharply, particularly for measles. Fewer counties now meet the 95 percent coverage level commonly associated with herd immunity, and millions of children attend schools in communities below that threshold.
On the basics, it’s true that routine childhood measles shots are among the most effective measures for keeping that particular infection at bay. But the Post’s analysis fails where it matters most: it cannot explain why trust has collapsed so broadly, so persistently, and so rationally for many ordinary people.
Instead, readers are offered a familiar diagnosis. Distrust of authorities. Political polarization. Misinformation. Backlash against mandates. All of this is curiously detached from responsibility. The article describes the consequences of distrust without confronting its causes.
That omission is not accidental. It reflects a broader unwillingness among elite media and public health institutions to reckon honestly with Covid-era failures. And without that reckoning, efforts to restore vaccine confidence are unlikely to succeed.
This is not an argument against vaccines. It is an argument about credibility.
During the Covid-19 period, public health authorities repeatedly overstated certainty, minimized uncertainty, and treated legitimate scientific disagreement as a threat rather than a feature of good science.
Claims about vaccines preventing infection and transmission were presented as settled fact, not evolving hypotheses. When those claims........