Ignorance is the Best Medicine

In mediaeval Europe, which arguably was the last phase of our civilisation to attain pinnacles of cultural hysteria comparable to those we are now achieving, personal hygiene was considered at best a snobbish affectation and at worst a blasphemy against God's lice. Then, when an epidemic struck, the church could burn a few humanists while the children of God went forth and lynched the local Jews, all without besmirching their lily-white Christian conscience. A similar logic is now at work over vaccination, which is subject to "scepticism" from those swamp-dredging idealists who seek to free us from the yoke of oppressive learning and the suffocating bonds of mere factuality. Touting the right of parents to leave their children vulnerable to avoidable diseases, the freedom-fighters have already succeeded in driving up the incidence of measles; although it remains unclear how many right-wing populists have abstained from having their own offspring immunised. Meanwhile the children of Europe continue to die of their parents' credulity; and if we run out of immigrants by the time the next pandemic gets started, no doubt there will still be experts around to take the blame.