Viewpoint: Hijacking Jesus: How anti-vaccine fanatics are exploiting religious exemptions and killing children Paul Offit | October 13, 2026

https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2026/10/13/viewpoint-hijacking-jesus-how-anti-vaccine-fanatics-are-exploiting-religious-exemptions-and-killing-children/ Between 1990 and 1991, Philadelphia suffered a large measles epidemic. About 1,400 children were infected, hundreds were hospitalized, and 9 died. The outbreak centered on two large fundamentalist churches in the city, Faith Tabernacle and First Century Gospel, which chose not to vaccinate their children for religious reasons. Among church members, about 500 people were infected and 6 died. Among non-church members in the surrounding community, about 900 were infected and 3 died. Parents in those two religious communities had chosen to put their children and the community’s children at risk, neither of whom had had a say in the matter.