12 - The Victorian Roots of Vaccine Hesitancy

Publication Number: 2010.12

Michael Kuduk, University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Lexington, KY, United States

Background: Current anti-vaccine sentiments are adversely affecting patient care and public health in many ways and are likely to contribute to the re-emergence of diseases once thought controlled. Concerns about the safety of vaccines have been articulated since the first vaccines were given in 1796. Many of those same concerns form the basis for modern day rationales for vaccine hesitancy and refusal. A deeper understanding of the reasons for Victorian era vaccine hesitancy will help to inform the development of more effective patient-centered pro-vaccine discussion strategies and counseling techniques.

Objective: To demonstrate that antivaccine sentiments voiced in Victorian times still exist today and form the theoretical basis of several modern antivaccine arguments.

Design/Methods: A general review of available information yielded two significant resources which reflect the anti-vaccine thoughts of their respective eras - anti-vaccine pamphlets written by Dr. Alexander Ross (Ross, A.M. Stop! A Pitiable Sight! National Library of Canada, 1885, and The Anti-Vaccinator, Montreal, 1885) and an anti-vaccine booklet written by Parents Educating and Advocating for Children's Health (The Vaccine Safety Handbook, P.E.A.C.H., 2017). Common themes were explored and language from each source is compared in table 1. Examples from each document regarding vaccine safety are presented in figure 2.

Results: Many of the concerns voiced by the 2017 authors were also articulated in 1885. Common themes included attributing decreased disease incidence to improved sanitation and not vaccination, concerns about dangerous ingredients in vaccines, concerns about mandatory vaccine policies and government overreach, concerns that vaccines do not decrease and in fact increase the diseases they are supposed to prevent, and minimizing the severity of vaccine-preventable illnesses. Other common themes relate to misunderstanding of both germ theory and how the human immune system functions, as well as violation of human bodily integrity.

Conclusion(s): Many of the anti-vaccine theories postulated in 1885 or earlier are still being disseminated today and form the foundation of the modern anti-vaccine movement. Practitioners should familiarize themselves with these theories so that they can provide effective and family-centered information to counteract this misinformation and allow families to make informed, unbiased choices about vaccinations.

Table 1
Comparison of language from Victorian era and modern era anti-vaccine pamphlets

Figure 2
Comparison of images from Victorian era and modern era anti-vaccine pamphlets