Jenny McCarthy Body Count

Jenny McCarthy, of course, is the very public face of the anti-vaccination movement, which centres around spurious and fraudulent claims about the connection between vaccination and autism. Click on the image to go to the site.

Tom Meggison at Osocio comments:

It’s a simple, brutal and effective “viral” (no pun intended) to underscore the message that real people are dying as a result of illnesses that they could have been immunized against.

The site makes it clear that they don’t really hold Ms. McCarthy personally accountable for all of the deaths, but notes “as the unofficial spokesperson for the United States anti-vaccination movement she may be indirectly responsible for at least some of these illnesses and deaths and even one vaccine preventable illness or vaccine preventable death is too many.”

Belief is not evidence, and the link between autism and vaccines is in the same category as “theories” about chemical contrails and therapeutic touch as valid nursing practice. If there was ever a stronger case for evidence-based practice, I don’t know where it is.