Autism is the best known irrational fear of Antivaxxers but it's much more complicated than that. Fear and distrust of vaccinations have been around starting in the late 1700s. Jefferson and Washington loved vaccines and Washington made vaccination mandatory for the continental army - the first mass immunization. By the 1820s a number of states made vaccination mandatory.
The main reasons for antivax beliefs are:
1. Distrust of medical community (esp. big pharma);
2. Belief in "alternative medicine" by the aged-urine and colloidal silver drinking, crystal-hugging dingbats of the homeopathy crowd ("yogurt cures HPV" - I assume eating the yogurt - also check out "GOOP" by some idiot former celebrity of some kind);
3. Safety and ethical/morality concerns like the irrational fear of thimerosal and antiabortionist's fear of using vaccines made by cell lines which were started decades ago using aborted-fetal cells;
3. Conspiracy wingnuts that think the government and all of the world's medical scientists and practitioners are in a conspiracy together faking various health issues including well known diseases (polio was a hoax . . . jfc smdh).
The scariest thing about antivaxxers is that it is growing among young people (29 and under). We are failing miserably as a society in terms of raising intellectually competent adults capable of critical thinking.
And antivaxxers used to be primarily the poor (<$25k annual income) and poorly educated, but has grown - thanks to the internet and our mildly retarded population and culture - and now includes a lot of well-off, college educated yuppies who with a little knowledge do a lot of damage.
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