Anyone my age vividly remembers when Dr. Jonas Salk developed his vaccine for infantile paralysis, ie. Poliomyelitis. It was 1954 and Dr. Salk instantly became a hero and household name. Polio was a scourge to a generation, both children and parents. With no prophylaxis and definitive treatment, it was a disease feared by everyone. The March of Dimes, the fundraising entity for polio research, was founded in 1938 by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who was himself disabled after surviving polio.
Back in the 1950’s, the general public saw people like Dr. Salk as extraordinary humanitarians whose research saved the lives of millions of children. Dr. Salk’s research and discovery were generational miracles that erased an often-fatal disease. The trend continued with vaccines for measles, mumps, and rubella (German Measles), diseases that potentially had serious consequences.
Vaccines continued to be held in high regard as new formulations for other diseases came into the public discourse. Smallpox was declared globally eradicated by the World Health Organization in 1980, and polio, although not globally eradicated, has been 99% contained since 1988. Cases still occur in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The first adverse problem associated with vaccines that I personally experienced was in 1976, when a swine flu epidemic occurred at Fort Dix, New Jersey. Fearing a swine flu pandemic, officials authorized a swine flu vaccine be mass-produced, and over a 10-week period it was given to 43 million Americans. The pandemic fizzled, but instead, an outbreak of vaccine-induced Guillain-Barré syndrome occurred forcing cancellation of the swine flu vaccine program.
Then, in 1998, an article appeared in the Lancet medical journal linking MMR vaccine to autism. Public reaction to this report was overwhelmingly negative, and officials are still trying the quell the flood of anti-vaccine sentiment that resulted. The allegation was clearly proven untrue, The Lancet retracted the claim, and the lead author of the article lost his medical license for medical misconduct.
In the meantime, new vaccines appeared on the market for Hepatitis B, Hepatitis A, chicken pox (varicella), meningococcus bacteria, human papilloma virus (HPV), Herpes Zoster (shingles), Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), Rotavirus, and worst of all, SARS-CoV-2, or Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2, or COVID-19. When the COVID-19 pandemic began, the gloves came off, and established medical norms were ignored. This was the deadliest virus mankind had ever faced and the response to it was subdued panic that changed medical information and public health forever. Information and facts were hard to come by. Recommendations changed weekly, and daily, and almost, hourly. Mistrust, distrust, and skepticism were everywhere. New vaccine technology was met with rejection because people feared adverse reactions from vaccines that had undergone very little scrutiny.
COVID-19 vaccines seem to have more adverse reactions than any previous vaccine except for swine flu. Pericarditis and myocarditis in adolescents were the most frequent serious reactions occurring in every 1-3 cases per 100,000 doses. Anaphylaxis occurred in 5 cases per 1 million doses. Thirty-eight deaths were ascribed to the COVID-19 vaccines (far fewer than I would have thought).
The FDA and the CDC maintain the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, VAERS, for short. It’s a “safety surveillance program for adverse events that occur after immunization.” It is a passive system meaning health care professionals must submit information which is stored in the system for retrieval and use later. If patterns are detected, the system prepares alerts to inform professionals. My personal experience with this system has been underwhelming. I reported to VAERS that the night my wife had her first COVID-19 vaccination, she had several hours of severe pain in her left wrist. Later, I had shingles after taking doses of both Zostavax and Shingrix. I thought both of these events deserved reporting, but apparently VAERS was not impressed because they never called to get details. I was disheartened. Oh, well. Medicare never offered a plausible explanation for a denied payment so why should I expect normal behavior from any government agency.
“Anti-vaxxers” are everywhere, today. In my day, they were rare. Political and philosophical differences plus just plain old mistrust of some public agencies engendered by their behavior during the COVID pandemic have changed a once-revered system into a cadre of defenders of the public trust. That change in attitude fostered by COVID vaccines has carried over to long-tested, proven vaccines that have shown efficacy for decades. These miracle drugs, which I still think they are, have been tainted by their association with COVID. Hopefully, vaccines are gradually regaining the respect they deserve because they have saved millions of lives worldwide for the past century.
References: Coles S. Vaccine Adverse Effects: An Overview Am Fam Phys 2026 April;113(4):339-348.
www.google.com/view-article/jonas-salk-polio-vaccine
www.google.com/view-article/vaccines-autism
www.google.com/view-article/vaccine-adverse-event-reporting-system
