For Peter, the father of the deceased child and a member of a Mennonite community in West Texas, the death of his child was God’s will. Many in the Mennonite communities of Texas and across the United States do not vaccinate their children, and their anti-vaccination stance is in line with their general religiously informed practice of eschewing modernity and its technological advances. But it is not merely the few sectarian Mennonite communities that still exist in the United States that have taken a stance against vaccination. Mainstream evangelical and charismatic congregations that embrace much of the modern world have also embraced anti-vaccination beliefs. This episode explores the relationship between conservative Christianity, anti-vaccination beliefs, and contemporary right-wing politics.

Sources:

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2025/03/texas-measles-outbreak-death-family/681985/

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/texas/2025/03/24/too-good-for-this-earth-parents-of-child-who-died-in-measles-outbreak-say-no-to-vaccine/

https://www.christianitytoday.com/2013/09/measles-outbreak-megachurch-kenneth-copeland-vaccines/

https://www.npr.org/2013/09/01/217746942/texas-megachurch-at-center-of-measles-outbreak

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUGuJkVgXNA

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/kenneth-copeland-blow-coronavirus-pray-sermon-trump-televangelist-a9448561.html

https://www.ksat.com/news/texas/2025/03/04/west-texans-mennonites-at-center-of-measles-outbreak-choose-medical-freedom-over-vaccine-mandates/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/03/12/measles-vaccinations-texas-pastor-revels-in-schools-state-low-rates/81975293007/

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For many years, the threat of measles, a deadly disease that spreads more rapidly than COVID and regularly took thousands of lives a year, had been effectively eradicated in the United States due to the widespread acceptance of vaccination. The death of a child from measles in West Texas was the first in over a decade and it came as a shock to the American medical establishment that is now grappling with a disturbing reality: the chief public health bureaucrat is a bonafide anti-vaxxer. This episode will explore the genealogy of anti-vaccination beliefs in the United States and how they spread into mainstream politics.

Sources:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1200696/

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8802588/

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1123944/

https://time.com/7205900/anti-vaccination-movement-history/

https://historyofvaccines.org/getting-vaccinated/vaccine-faq/vaccination-exemptions

https://historyofvaccines.org/blog/timeline-of-vaccination-mandates

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-68106-1_2

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/rfk-jr-plandemic-funding-1235173801/

https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-02-02/rand-paul-on-vaccines-most-of-them-ought-to-be-voluntary-

https://time.com/5175704/andrew-wakefield-vaccine-autism/

https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2025/the-evidence-on-vaccines-and-autism

https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-bombastic-19th-century-anti-vaxxer-who-fueled-montreals-smallpox-epidemic/

https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/plague-the-red-death-strikes-montreal-feature

https://www.cascadepbs.org/2020/05/seattle-always-had-anti-vaxxers-even-during-smallpox

https://www.cascadepbs.org/mossback/2025/02/history-vaccine-skepticism-1920s-seattle-rfk-jr

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The viral measles outbreak that began in West Texas has taken the lives of two children and one adult, and has reached over eight hundred cases, with thousands potentially exposed to the disease. This episode serves as a deep dive into the outbreak, when it started, how it spread, and will set the stage for the remaining four episodes.

Sources:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/antoniopequenoiv/2025/05/20/measles-updates-texas-cases-pass-700-as-illness-reported-in-30-states/

https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2025/the-measles-outbreak-in-west-texas-and-beyond

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2025/03/24/data-these-charts-show-how-measles-vaccination-rates-declined-in-texas-public-schools/

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/texas/2025/03/24/too-good-for-this-earth-parents-of-child-who-died-in-measles-outbreak-say-no-to-vaccine/

https://www.verywellhealth.com/measles-outbreak-texas-11682808

https://www.cdc.gov/measles/data-research/index.html

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8828106/

https://www.latimes.com/newsletters/la-me-ln-essential-california-20190507-story.html

https://slate.com/technology/2025/04/measles-cases-epidemic-worst-case-vaccine.html

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/rfk-jr-plandemic-funding-1235173801/

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