A look at the long history of vaccines, yesterday, today and still to come. Once largely an issue for parents and children, vaccines now occupy a central space in the very heart of our national conversation. We've all been forced to think about this subject closely for over two years. In the absence of a COVID-19 vaccine, thousands of deaths from a single virus once again swept the earth. Millions of Americans now suffer from the aftermath as they cope with the effects of long haul COVID. Life Before and After Vaccines moves the reader from the early history of vaccines into modern conversations about this subject. In the book, the author connects the dots between the modern anti-vax movement and previous anti-vax movements. She will help readers understand the history of vaccines and the equally long history of vaccination opposition. Life Before and After Vaccines also explores the many large and small ways that lack of access to vaccination has meant societal change, and includes updates on several of the topics in the author's previous work.
Stacy Mintzer Herlihy is a freelance writer and public health advocate based in New Jersey. Herlihy is a Shot@Life Champion and founder of New Jersey Parents For Vaccines. Herlihy's books include Your Baby's Best Shot: Why Vaccines are Safe and Save Lives (Rowman & Littlefield, 2012), which was a finalist for Foreword Reviews Book of the Year, Teens and Smoking: Your Questions Answered (2020), and Corporations That Changed the World: Disney (2022).
Chapter One: Viruses Are Not Our Friends. They Hate Children And Everyone Else. Chapter Two: They Bombed Cotton Mather's House Chapter Three: The Founding Fathers Were Intensely Pro Vaccine: You'd Be Too If You Had Children Die of Smallpox Chapter Four: Summering With Polio: Life Before the Modern Childhood Vaccination Schedule Chapter Five: The Cutter Incident and The Swine Flu Epidemic That Never Happened: Making Vaccines and Making the Occasional Mistake Chapter Six: Maurice Hilleman and His Chickens Save Millions of People a Year Chapter Seven: The Drive to the Pediatrician's Office is More Dangerous Than Any Vaccine Chapter Eight: Some Vaccines are Profitable. Some Are Not. We Can Do a Better Job Providing Access to All of Them. Chapter Nine: The Man Who Made Parenting Harder: The Story of Andrew Wakefield Chapter Ten: Why is Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Devoting His Life to Cheering On Preventable Diseases? Chapter Eleven: The Anti Vaccination Industry Profits From Spreading Lies on Social Media Chapter Twelve: A Vaccine For Type I Diabetes: Why We Might Have Cures For Diseases That Still Terrify Us Today Chapter Thirteen: Vaccine Voices: Speaking Out For Public Health Chapter Fourteen: Combating Vaccine Hesitancy And Applauding Those Who Go For It: How to Convince People Needless Suffering is a Truly Bad Idea Chapter Fifteen: I Would Get This Vaccine in My Eyeball: How the COVID-19 Vaccine Rescued Us All Chapter Sixteen: Diseases Don't Stand Still. Neither Does Vaccine Science. Bibliography Notes Index About the Author
