Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University, said, “It’s hard to think of another circumstance when a major public health program was introduced with this much controversy.” The problems with the vaccine rollout have “cast a pall” on other efforts to develop dengue vaccines, he said, and public health experts are worried that the distrust could spill over to other vaccination programs.
“Vaccines have plenty of controversy,” Dr. Schaffner said. “We don’t need to make more.”
Sanofi has said that the risk to people who get the vaccine is still extremely small. Moreover, in those who have previously been infected, the vaccine works well: In people older than 9, it is about 66 percent effective.
But that has not allayed fears in the…
