I heard Dr. Sanjay Gupta on the Late Show recently. Dr. Gupta pointed out that “vaccines are 90% effective. I don’t think we can celebrate that enough. They were developed so fast and are so effective it is astonishing. It will fundamentally change science. It will change the pace of medical innovation. Those mRNA vaccines may be therapies for cancer in the future.”

And yet surprisingly, many people don’t trust them! Not only that, they don’t even want to take them. They are turning their backs on one of the wonders of science! Instead people turn to friends for medical advice. They listen to friends who get their information from dubious sources on the Internet instead of these astounding scientists who have been working their hearts out to help us. How can this be?

i know someone who does not trust vaccines, yet she believes that leading Democrats are kidnapping young children and drinking their blood , because she read it on the Internet.  She believes stuff like that rather than leading scientists around the world.

Vaccines are one of the greatest wonders of modern science. In the 19^th century 95% of all people died from infectious diseases. Now in the 21^st century only 5% of people die from infectious diseases. Vaccines are one of the main reasons that people in the 20^th century lived twice as long on average as those in the 19^th century. And this is mainly because of vaccines. And yet so many people distrust them. How can this possibly be the case?

Sadly, many people don’t believe in the vaccines. They think they are risky. Some are waiting for the rest of us to take them and test them out like guinea pigs. They want us to blaze a trail while they wait to see if they are safe. I have talked to people who take this approach.

Many people were suspicious of them because of how quickly scientists discovered vaccines for Covid-19. I know I was one of them. But there were things I did not know. Scientists have been working on the mRNA vaccines for about 10 years before anyone heard of Covid-19.

Anti-vaxxers used to warn us that vaccines were very dangerous because they required insertion of the virus into our bodies to generate an immune response. That does sound risk doesn’t it. These new technologies “teach” our cells how to make the proteins that will trigger an immune response to the new coronavirus SARS- CoV-2. They don’t require the insertion of the virus into our bodies. Anti-vaxxers should be rejoicing! Then our own bodies make the anti-bodies to recognize the virus when it appears in our bodies at a future time.

This is such amazing technology developed by scientists we should be immensely grateful. Yet too many people are suspicious. while we believe outrageous stuff from the Internet. That is a dreadful pity.