The Vaccine Wars: Documentary Analysis

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The Frontline video “The Vaccine Wars” aims to convince doubting parents and anti-vaccine groups and associations that the benefits of vaccines highly outweigh the detriments through facts, scientific research, and the take of several specialists on the issue. The problem arrives as PBS attempts to do so while creating an unfair equity between two non-equally warranted positions (pro-vaccine and anti-vaccine), starting from the title “War”; which I will later discuss in more detail. By the most part, the documentary presented facts about vaccines, trying to avoid opinion and anecdotal experience, which seems to be the safeguard of so many anti-vaccines activists. The show was structured, mainly, in several interviews with professionals in …show more content…

Dr. Paul Offit (M.D.) later goes on to assert how vaccines have increased our lifespan by 30 years, and successfully eliminated killer diseases for the most part. The documentary then presents what can be the result of failing to vaccinate, exemplifying the outbreak of measles in Disneyland in December 2014. Jennifer Margulis is presented with an alternate point of view in vaccines, stating that she would rather have her children contract the diseases like every other human being from previous centuries, than submit to the risks of vaccination. Professionals fear that because diseases are not prevalent, the lack of fear is inclining parents to not vaccinate their children, this is a disaster waiting to …show more content…

The video also successfully demonstrates the significance of addressing the parents’ decision to agree or refuse to vaccinate their children, as it is likely to jeopardize the health of their children. It not only attends the risk unvaccinated children undergo, but how they are potentially risking the welfare of other children, and children yet to be born by rekindling the extinguished flame of many diseases. Overall, the report was mainly focused on scientific evidence and facts. This is nothing to be disenchanted about, as it is more uncommon than the audience would like. This lead me to assimilate the video, for the most part, as accurate. However, even though it relied primarily on scientific fact, I had a problem with its compensation of information. Often, I criticize arguments that only present one side of the coin, but this documentary employs false balance; that is presenting both sides of an issue as though they have equal weight. In this case, the pro-vaccine position is supported by extensive scientific research, hence, is logically the most common stand. By claiming the issue, a “War” in the title, the directors are balancing the opinions of scientist, doctors, researchers, and public health experts with the opinions of misguided, confused parents, and anti-vaccine activists as equally legitimate. The problem

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