doiSerbia

Anti-vaccinationists and their arguments in the Balkan countries that share the same language

Radovanović Zoran (Academy of Medical Sciences, Serbian Medical Society, Belgrade)

The objective has been an analysis of anti-vaccination situation in the language-related Balkan countries. Mass and organized opposition to vaccination in this part of the world is a relatively recent phenomenon. It has been an offshoot of the respective ideas from the West, associated with New Ageism, postmodernism, and similar worldviews, but particularly beefed up by MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella) vaccine fear in the late 1990s. The four key local leaders from four countries have been selected to represent the whole diversity of the Balkan anti-vaccination scene. Each of them exerts his/her influence throughout the region. The result is that vaccination coverage has substantially decreased in many areas. Outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases that have to follow sooner or later would eventually, at least temporarily, bring a blow to the credibility of anti-vaccinationists. We already witnessed such a trend in Bosnia and Herzegovina where vaccines were not readily available during the Bosnian wars in 1990s. As a result, major epidemics of measles, mumps, and rubella recently took place all over the country. A dynamic balance between the influence of anti-vaccination movement and the incidence of diseases, characterized by an inverse relationship (the more damaging impact of vaccine opponents on public health, the more cases of diseases, and vice versa) has been a pattern that health services have to deal with.

Keywords: anti-vaccinationists, vaccination, the Balkans