Vaccine Anxieties: Global Science, Child Health and Society (Science in Society Series)

216 Pages·2007·1.14 MB·English

by  Melissa Leach

Vaccine Anxieties
For our mothers, Penny and Jane
Science in Society Series
Series Editor: Steve Rayner
James Martin Institute, University of Oxford
Editorial Board: Gary Kass, Anne Kerr, Melissa Leach, Angela Liberatore,
Jez Littlewood, Stan Metcalfe, Paul Nightingale, Timothy O’Riordan,
Nick Pidgeon, Ortwin Renn, Dan Sarewitz, Andrew Webster, James Wilsdon,
Steve Yearley
Vaccine Anxieties
Global Science, Child Health and Society
Melissa Leach and James Fairhead
A Web of Prevention
Biological W eapons, Life Sciences and the Governance of Research
Edited by Brian Rappert and Caitrìona McLeish
Democratizing Technology
Risk, Responsibility and the Regulation of Chemicals
Anne Chapman
Genomics and Society
Legal, Ethical and Social Dimensions
Edited by George Gaskell and Martin W. Bauer
Nanotechnology
Risk, Ethics and Law
Edited by Geoffrey Hunt and Michael Mehta
Vaccine Anxieties
Global Science, Child Health and Society
Melissa Leach
and
James Fairhead
EARTHSCAN
London • Sterling, VA
First published by Earthscan in the UK and USA in 2007
Copyright © Melissa Leach and James Fairhead
All rights reserved
ISBN-13: 978-1-84407-370-2 paperback
ISBN-13: 978-1-84407-416-7 hardback
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Leach, Melissa.
Vaccine anxieties : global science, child health, and society / Melissa Leach and James Fairhead.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN-13: 978-1-84407-416-7 (hardback)
ISBN-10: 1-84407-416-1 (hardback)
ISBN-13: 978-1-84407-370-2 (pbk.)
ISBN-10: 1-84407-370-X (pbk.)
1. Immunization of children–Complications–Great Britain. 2.
Immunization of children–Complications–Africa, West. 3. Vaccines–
Political aspects–Great Britain, 4. Vaccines–Political aspects–Africa,
West. 5. Vaccines–Social aspects–Great Britain, 6. Vaccines–Social
aspects–Africa, West. 7. Vaccines–Health aspects. I. Fairhead, James,
1962– II. Title.
[DNLM: 1. Vaccines–Africa, Western. 2. Vaccines–Great Britain. 3.
Anxiety–Africa, Western. 4. Anxiety–Great Britain. 5. Vaccination–
Africa, Western. 6. Vaccination–Great Britain. 7. World Health–Africa,
Western. 8. World Health–Great Britain. QW 805 L434v 2007]
RJ240.L43 2007
614.4’7083–dc22
2007025359
The paper used for this book is FSC-certified and totally
chlorine-free. FSC (the Forest Stewardship Council) is an
international network to promote responsible management
of the world’s forests.
Contents
List of Figures vii
Acknowledgements ix
List of Acronyms and Abbreviations xiii
1 Introduction: Global Technologies, Personal Worlds 1
2 Analysing Vaccine Anxieties 15
3 Body, Body Politic and Vaccination in the UK 45
4 Anxieties over Science: Arguing MMR in the UK 83
5 Body, Body Politic and Vaccination in West Africa 101
6 Anxieties over Science: Engaging Vaccine Trials in The Gambia 139
7 Conclusions 161
References 177
Index 193

List of Figures
3.1 A British baby receiving her MMR vaccination 50
3.2 A setting for MMR talk: Mothers and babies in a post-natal support
group in the UK 62
5.1 A group discussion among mothers during field research in
rural Gambia 103
5.2 Vaccination during a mobile infant welfare clinic, The Gambia 111
5.3 Twins in rural Gambia wearing their protective amulets 117
6.1 The blood testing room in a district hospital, Upper River Division,
The Gambia 145
6.2 Medical researchers on a village visit during the pneumococcal
vaccine trial in The Gambia, checking the health of enrolled
children 149

Acknowledgements
This book is the result of several forms of partnership and collaboration. As
joint and equal co-authors, we embarked on this attempt to understand vaccine
anxieties as a result of two convergent pathways: as anthropologists researching
environmental issues over a 15-year period in West African worlds where health
issues were often a greater priority and local understandings often linked both;
and as parents bringing up young children in southern England at a time of
anxiety around the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine. Two focused,
collaborative research projects enabled us to bring these two pathways together,
and to engage with research partners, health authorities, scientists and parental
support groups to conduct studies that spoke to their concerns.
The first of these was a project on ‘Childhood Vaccination: Science and Public
Engagement in International Perspective’, kindly supported by the Science in
Society Research Programme of the UK Economic and Social Research Council
(ESRC grant L144250051). This combined research on parental thinking and
practices around vaccination and MMR in Brighton, UK, and around both
routine vaccination and vaccine trials in The Gambia. In the UK, anthropologist
Michael Poltorak was a central member of the research team, helping to design the
study and carrying out most of its interviews in Brighton. In acknowledgement
of this core role and lead authorship of an article on which it draws (Poltorak et
al, 2005), he appears as a co-author of Chapter 3. Jackie Cassell brought public
health and survey expertise to the study, helping to design the survey component
and analyse its findings, while Catherine Mercer helped with statistical analysis.
Angela Iversen, Surrey and Sussex Local Health Protection Agency, helped
us to identify and approach general practitioner (GP) practices, and to make
the study relevant to the work of local health authorities. These team members
appear as co-authors of papers reporting on specific aspects of the Brighton
study’s findings (Poltorak et al, 2005; Cassell et al, 2006b). We owe many thanks
to the numerous parents, health professionals and local institutions in Brighton
who participated in and helped facilitate the study. We are grateful to the UK
study’s advisory group, Graham Bickler, Health Protection Agency; Joanne
Yarwood, Head of Immunization Information, Department of Health; Mark
Jones, Director of the Community Practitioners’ and Health Visitors’ Association;