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Medical Racism: The New Apartheid

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Medical Racism: The New Apartheid is a 2021 video production that promotes conspiracy theories about COVID-19 vaccines. Distributed by the anti-vaccination group Children's Health Defense, it alleges the COVID-19 vaccination efforts are a cover to conduct experiments on the African American and Latin communities. Public health communication experts say the video presents past injustices committed against African Americans in order to make debunked anti-vaccination claims more believable.

At the urging of disinformation experts, the film was removed from Facebook.[1]

Production and release

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The hour-long video was released on 11 March 2021, on the website of Children's Health Defense. A trailer published on Instagram was viewed more than 160,000 times.[2][3]

The group's president, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is credited as a producer, as well David Centner's Centner Productions, Nation of Islam's Tony Muhammad, anti-vaccination author Curtis Cost, and the CEO of anti-vaccination group Urban Global Health Alliance, Kevin Jenkins.[2][3][4] The video was directed by David Massey.[4]

Assertions

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The video anchors its narrative in past abuses against African Americans, such as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study and other instances when ethical violations have been committed against minorities as part of medical studies. With those historical facts as background, the video continues with what has been described by public health communication experts, as conspiracy theories, notably debunked claims from the anti-vaccination movement.[5][2][3][6]

According to the central assertion of the video, the United States government seeks to harm ethnic minorities through COVID-19 vaccines. The video repeats long-discredited claims that some cases of autism are somehow linked to the MMR vaccine.[3] Conclusive studies have shown vaccination does not increase the probability a child will develop autism.[7][8]

Similarly, the video misrepresents a 2014 preliminary study indicating Somali immigrants to the United States may have higher levels of antibodies against rubella than the general population. The video falsely concludes this study proves African Americans are receiving higher doses of vaccines, a leap of logic that isn't based on any data.[3] It also repeats anti-vaccination stories about Bill Gates and the Centers for Disease Control.[2][3][6]

Viewers are being told African Americans are naturally immune from COVID-19, while in fact the community has been hard hit by the pandemic from the beginning.[9][2][10] They are also told taking vitamin D supplement protects against the disease, a common but misleading statement of anti-vaccination activists.[9][11][12]

The video ends with Kennedy requesting the viewers disregard information dispensed by health authorities and doctors, and reinforcing the narrative that components in COVID-19 vaccines are unsafe.[3] Contrary to Kennedy's assertions, the safety of common COVID-19 vaccines has been well documented and complete assessments published by health authorities.[13][14][15] Vaccines widely distributed in the United States have received authorization based on clinical trials that included a significant number of Black people.[3]

Participants

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Medical historian and Yale professor Naomi Rogers, said she feels "used" because she unwittingly participated in what turned out to be "an advocacy piece for anti-vaxxers". While her statements that appeared in the film were accurate, they are embedded in a wider narrative that she had "enormous problems with" and that the racial justice issues she fervently supports were "twisted for the purpose of this anti-vax movement."[16]

Dr. Oliver Brooks former president of the National Medical Association, regrets appearing in the film because, despite African American legitimate concerns based on past medical mistreatment, Brooks supports getting vaccinated.[16]

Possible impact on public health

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The video does not actually present evidence that vaccines are unsafe in any way, but attempts to stir up distrust in health authorities, doctors, and the government in the African-American and Hispanic communities, a common strategy of the anti-vaccination movement.[3][17] This is despite the 1974 National Research Act which is a federal law giving out ethical guidelines for medical research on human beings. A lot of medical institutions have made race and ethnicity a protected group for medical research, making discriminatory studies like Tuskegee almost impossible to be implemented in the present-day.[citation needed]

The American anti-vaccination movement has long courted minorities, adapting the language of civil rights to paint vaccination initiatives as a threat or an injustice. Actual injustices such as the Tuskegee study make these false narratives more believable for vulnerable communities. Perhaps a result of this tragedy, vaccination rates for those segments of the population are often somewhat lower than average.[2] Experts say that by targeting Black Americans with messaging linking COVID-19 vaccination with the Tuskegee study and other instances when ethical violations have been committed against minorities as part of medical studies, the video's producers are likely to hurt the Black community by increasing vaccine hesitancy within that vulnerable population.[2][5][18] Meanwhile, racialized communities have been hit harder by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to socio-economic factors, with mortality rates among Black, Hispanic and Native Americans nearly triple the rate of White Americans.[2][10]

See also

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Other videos promoting medical conspiracy theories

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References

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  1. ^ Murphy, Hannah; Venkataramakrishnan, Siddharth; Stacey, Kiran (March 15, 2021). "Facebook and Twitter resist calls to ban anti-vaxx campaigner". Financial Times. Retrieved 2023-06-15.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Zadrozny, Brandy; Adams, Char (11 March 2021). "Covid's devastation of Black community used as 'marketing' in new anti-vaccine film". NBC News. Archived from the original on 18 March 2021. Retrieved 18 March 2021.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Hale Spencer, Saranac; Fichera, Angelo (11 March 2021). "RFK Jr. Video Pushes Known Vaccine Misrepresentations". Factcheck.org. Annenberg Public Policy Center. Archived from the original on 12 March 2021. Retrieved 21 March 2021.
  4. ^ a b "New Movie from Children's Health Defense, Medical Racism: The New Apartheid, Premieres Today". Cision. 11 March 2021. Archived from the original on 15 March 2021. Retrieved 17 March 2021.
  5. ^ a b Callaghan, Timothy; Moghtaderi, Ali; Lueck, Jennifer A.; Hotez, Peter; Strych, Ulrich; Dor, Avi; Franklin Fowler, Erika; Motta, Matthew (4 January 2021). "Correlates and disparities of intention to vaccinate against COVID-19". Social Science & Medicine. 272: 113638. doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2020.113638. PMC 7834845. PMID 33414032.
  6. ^ a b Zadrozny, Brandy; Adams, Char (11 March 2021). "Covid's devastation of Black community used as 'marketing' in new anti-vaccine film". NBC News. Archived from the original on 14 March 2021. Retrieved 15 March 2021.
  7. ^ Maglione MA, Das L, Raaen L, et al. (August 2014). "Safety of vaccines used for routine immunization of U.S. children: a systematic review" (PDF). Pediatrics. 134 (2): 325–37. doi:10.1542/peds.2014-1079. PMID 25086160.
  8. ^ Hviid, Anders; Hansen, Jørgen Vinsløv; Frisch, Morten; Melbye, Mads (5 March 2019). "Measles, Mumps, Rubella Vaccination and Autism". Annals of Internal Medicine. 170 (8). Annals of Internal Medicine / American College of Physicians: 513–520. doi:10.7326/M18-2101. PMID 30831578. S2CID 73474920. Retrieved 7 March 2019. The study strongly supports that MMR vaccination does not increase the risk for autism, does not trigger autism in susceptible children, and is not associated with clustering of autism cases after vaccination
  9. ^ a b Jarry, Jonathan (16 April 2021). "The Anti-Vaccine Propaganda of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr". McGill University Office for Science and Society. Archived from the original on 17 April 2021. Retrieved 26 April 2021.
  10. ^ a b Recht, Hannah; Weber, Lauren (20 January 2021). "Black Americans Are Getting COVID Vaccines at Lower Rates Than White Americans". Scientific American. Archived from the original on 18 March 2021. Retrieved 18 March 2021.
  11. ^ COVID-19 rapid guideline: vitamin D (PDF) (Technical report). National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE). December 2020. ISBN 978-1-4731-3942-8. NG187. Retrieved 22 February 2021.
  12. ^ Evidence reviews for the use of vitamin D supplementation as prevention and treatment of COVID-19 (PDF) (Report). National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE). December 2020.
  13. ^ Robertson, Lori (27 February 2021). "A Guide to Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 Vaccine". Factcheck.org. Archived from the original on 21 March 2021. Retrieved 21 March 2021.
  14. ^ McDonald, Jessica (22 December 2021). "A Guide to Moderna's COVID-19 Vaccine". Factcheck.org. Archived from the original on 19 March 2021. Retrieved 21 March 2021.
  15. ^ McDonald, Jessica (9 December 2021). "A Guide to Pfizer/BioNTech's COVID-19 Vaccine". Factcheck.org. Archived from the original on 19 March 2021. Retrieved 21 March 2021.
  16. ^ a b Will, Stone (June 8, 2021). "An Anti-Vaccine Film Targeted To Black Americans Spreads False Information". NPR: All Things Considered. Retrieved July 18, 2021.
  17. ^ "The Anti-Vaxx Playbook" (PDF). Center for Countering Digital Hate. 2020. Archived (PDF) from the original on 30 December 2020. Retrieved 3 January 2021.
  18. ^ Guynn, Jessica (10 March 2021). "'We are going to have to save ourselves,' Black community fights deadly COVID vaccine conspiracy theories". USA Today. Archived from the original on 19 March 2021. Retrieved 21 March 2021.

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