Andrew Wakefield, Del Bigtree, and other prominent anti-vaccine advocates unleashed fear and toxic misinformation last night at a well-attended symposium in New York’s Rockland County. The area is currently grappling with one of the largest and longest-standing measles outbreaks in the country, mainly in its tight-knit, ultra-Orthodox Jewish community.

The Monday, May 13 event was reportedly promoted by targeted robocalls and billed as being a “ highly informative night of science and discussion addressing your concerns, fears, and doubts.” But according to reporters who attended the event, the speakers made numerous unsubstantiated and egregiously false claims—as usual. In one instance, Brooklyn Orthodox Rabbi William Handler reportedly made the unsubstantiated claim that getting measles, mumps, and chickenpox reduces the risk of cancer, heart disease, and stroke by 60 percent . He did not provide a citation.

Handler is known for making shocking statements about safe, life-saving immunizations. He told Vox last year that “parents who ‘placate the gods of vaccination’ are engaging in ‘child sacrifice.’” Last night, he reportedly suggested that public health campaigns and emergency orders aimed at halting the current outbreaks were actually rooted in religious discrimination. “We’re being demonized,” he reportedly said to the mostly Orthodox crowd. He also claimed that New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is a German and a “very, very sneaky fellow.”

Andrew Wakefield appeared at the event via video conference, spreading his usual fear and nonsense. Wakefield, a disgraced former gastroenterologist, is sometimes described as the father of the current anti-vaccine movement. In a fraudulent and now-retracted 1998 study, he claimed to have found a link between the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism. Despite that link being completely unfounded and numerous quality studies debunking any connection, the harmful myth persists. In 2010, Wakefield was stripped of his medical license in the UK after the medical council determined he committed fraud and abused children in his care.

“I want to reassure you that I have never been involved in scientific fraud,” he said at the outset of his appearance last night. “What happened to me is what happens to doctors who threaten the bottom line of the pharmaceutical companies and who threaten government policy,” he explained, despite the fact that pharmaceutical companies make little money on vaccines. “Now, I want to let you know that you have been misled” he went on, launching into a conspiracy theory about how the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is misleading people.

The list of falsehoods and bunkum unfurled at the conference goes on to include suggesting that measles and other vaccine-preventable illnesses are harmless (they can be deadly, in fact); that the MMR vaccine and those who have been vaccinated are the ones spreading measles (they’re not; nearly all of those sickened in the current outbreaks are unvaccinated children); and then of course Wakefield’s central falsehood, that the MMR vaccine is linked to autism.

“Not welcome here”

Such an anti-vaccine event at the epicenter of a raging measles outbreak echoes the derided tactics anti-vaccine advocates used several years ago to fuel an outbreak in vulnerable Somali immigrant community in Minnesota.

At the time, Siman Nuurali, a Somali American clinician at Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, called the tactics “ abhorrent .”

“It’s remarkable to come in and talk to a population that’s vulnerable and marginalized and who doesn’t necessarily have the capacity for advocacy for themselves, and to take advantage of that,” she said.

Hours before Monday’s event in Rockland, County Executive Ed Day, Ramapo Supervisor Michael Specht, and Rabbi Chaim Schabes released a joint statement condemning the event:

Tonight’s event and the misinformation being shared at it runs counter to every statement from the medical experts and elected officials of our county. This type of propaganda endangers the health and safety of children within our community and around the world, and must be denounced in the strongest language possible. The MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine is safe and effective and is the only way to prevent the measles. The over 20,500 MMR vaccinations given in Rockland since the outbreak began in October of 2018 clearly demonstrate that the combined outreach and education efforts of the Rockland County Department of Health, local officials and many religious leaders have had a significant effect and show that this anti-vaccination message is not welcome here. It is unfortunate that these outsiders are targeting our community and attacking our right of self-determination. The group sponsoring this event does not represent the people of Rockland County. We urge our residents to continue to ignore these attempts to exploit our differences and ask that they stand together as one Rockland in defense and support of our community. We stand for vaccination.

Rockland County has been battling the measles outbreak since last October, tallying 225 confirmed cases. Eighty percent of the cases are in unvaccinated people, mostly children.

As Rockland officials and community leaders tried to quash the event’s impact Monday, the CDC released the latest nationwide figures for measles cases. The total for 2019 so far is a startling 839 cases, affecting 23 states. That total is 75 cases higher than last week’s and the highest total since 1994. There are currently 10 outbreaks ongoing around the country, largely driven by anti-vaccine misinformation and pockets of unvaccinated children. Health experts fear that if these outbreaks continue to flare and splinter, measles will once again circulate continuously in the US.