A Virtual Conversation with Science Journalist Seth Mnookin, Author of The Panic Virus Wednesday, June 3, at 7 pm EDT on Zoom.

[David Levine]

Science Writers in New York Presents  A Virtual Conversation with Science Journalist Seth Mnookin, Author of The Panic Virus Wednesday, June 3, at 7 pm EDT on Zoom

Science Writers in New York is excited to have as our guest journalist Seth Mnookin, author of The Panic Virus: The True Story Behind the Vaccine-Autism Controversy.

In 1998 Andrew Wakefield, a British gastroenterologist with a history of self-promotion, published a paper with a shocking allegation: the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine might cause autism. The media seized on the story and, in the process, helped to launch one of the most devastating health scares ever.

Since that time, Wakefield has been revealed as a profiteer in league with class-action lawyers, his paper was retracted, and he lost his medical license. Meanwhile numerous studies involving tens of millions of children failed to find any link between childhood vaccines and autism. Yet the myth that vaccines somehow cause developmental disorders has not only persisted—it now threatens to become official U.S. policy. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist and Wakefield ally, is the country's Secretary of Health and Human Services, and measles, the most infectious microbe known to humanity, has seen a shocking resurgence.  The modern vaccine crisis touches on everything from public health to mass communication, but at its most essential level, it raises important questions about how we, individually and as a society, decide what counts as truth.

About Seth Mnookin

Science journalist Seth Mnookin is a professor of science writing and the director of the Graduate Program in Science Writing at MIT. He was a 2019-2020 Guggenheim Fellow. His book The Panic Virus: The True Story Behind the Vaccine-Autism Controversy, won the National Association of Science Writers “Science in Society” Award and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.

Seth is also the author of the New York Times bestseller Feeding the Monster, about the Boston Red Sox, and Hard News, a Washington Post Best Book of the Year. He began his career as a music critic and has covered everything from rare diseases and the Iraq War to Stephen Colbert and Batman.

When: Wednesday, June 3, 7 pm EDT Register: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_O6p46XO9R8KudPGRE0pPzw#/registration

Best,

David

David L. Levine

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