Facebook allows the group to exist.
Facebook groups that routinely traffic in anti-vaccination propaganda have become a resource for people seeking out a wide variety of medical information — including about the ongoing flu season.
Facebook hosts a vast network of groups that trade in false health information. On "Stop Mandatory Vaccination," one of the largest known health misinformation groups with more than 178,000 members, people have solicited advice for how to deal with the flu. Members of the group have previously spread conspiracies that outbreaks of preventable diseases are "hoaxes" perpetrated by the government, and use the groups to mass-contact parents whose children have died and suggest without evidence that vaccines may be to blame.
One recent post came from the mother of a 4-year-old Colorado boy who died from the flu this week. In it, she consulted group members while noting that she had declined to fill a prescription written by a doctor.
The child had not been diagnosed yet, but he was running a fever and had a seizure, the mother wrote. She added that two of her four children had been diagnosed with the flu and that the doctor had prescribed the antiviral Tamiflu for everyone in the household.
"The doc prescribed tamiflu I did not pick it up," she wrote.
Tamiflu is the most common antiviral medication prescribed to treat the flu. The drug can ease symptoms and shorten the length of illness, but concerns about side effects are common even outside anti-vaccination echo chambers. The flu has hit children particularly hard this season. Pediatric hospitalization rates are higher than normal, and 68 children have died, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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A Facebook spokesperson said in an emailed statement: "This is a tragedy and our thoughts are with his family and loved ones. We don't want vaccine misinformation on Facebook, which is why we're working hard to reduce it everywhere on the platform, including in private groups."
This week, the state of Colorado suffered its second pediatric flu death of the season. The first, in January, was a school-aged child outside the Denver metro area. The second, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, was a 4-year-old boy from Pueblo.
Now, just days after his death, questions are swirling about whether more could have been done to save him amid reports that his mother followed misguided advice from members of an online anti-vaccine group.
Four-year-old Najee's mother told CBS affiliate KKTV that her son was a vibrant boy who always made people laugh.
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In early February, two of Najee's brothers tested positive for influenza. And according to a GoFundMe set up by the family, Najee's mother took his 10-month-old brother to the emergency room with a fever of 104 degrees. Upon their return home, she gave the boys baths and sent 4-year-old Najee and his 5-year-old brother to their room to put on pajamas.
Minutes later, the 5-year-old came out and told his mother that "Junior," as Najee's family affectionately called him, was asleep. His mother then discovered him lying on the floor, pale, where he had apparently suffered a febrile seizure as a result of a flu-related fever.
She called 911 and started CPR. Najee was eventually airlifted to a hospital in Colorado Springs. According to the family's GoFundMe, Najee was taken off life support on Wednesday.
Now, screenshots from an anti-vax Facebook group called "Stop Mandatory Vaccination" are circulating online, and they appear to show that the week before Najee died, his mother sought advice on how to treat her sons' illness. Members of the group advised giving the boys vitamins, botanicals, and fruits and vegetables rather than the Tamiflu that their doctor prescribed.
In the thread, which has now apparently been scrubbed from the group's Facebook page, the mom wrote, "The doc prescribed tamaflu [sic] I did not pick it up." One user advises, "You're better off taking Vitamin D and C, Elderberry, Zinc, and eating lots of fruits and vegetables."
"Ok perfect I'll try that," she responds.
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Later in the conversation, which can still be viewed in screenshots published by the Colorado Times Recorder, the panicked mother notes that she has been using the elderberry, peppermint oil and Vitamin C that the group members recommended, but her sons' fevers are still not breaking.
"Any other tips I'm terrified for another seizure," she writes. "Please no hard comments I am a momma freaking out all alone in this with a family who believes in none natural ways so I'm going through alone and they are making me feel bad for not putting him on Tamiflu."
"Boil thyme on the stove," a group member chimes in. "Vit C until diarrhea."
The group, which has more than 178,000 members and 10,000 posts in the last 30 days alone, is run by a self-proclaimed "advocate for natural living" named Larry Cook, whose website slogan is, "Vaccines don't save lives, healthy immune systems do!"
The family did not want to comment to KKTV about whether Najee had gotten a flu shot, but the mother mentioned in the Facebook exchange that two of her other sick children had not. Research has shown that most children who die from the flu had not been vaccinated.
After news of Najee's death broke, Cook took to his Facebook group to put the blame on Children's Hospital Colorado Springs for the tragic outcome.
"Mom says they were treated poorly by the hospital, and of course, never offered any real treatments that would have likely cured her boy," he wrote.
"EXACTLY!!" one of the group's members responded. "You just have to nourish the body which hospitals do not do. They just poison."
The question rippling through social media today, however, is whether the true poison in this case was the misguided advice offered to a very sick boy's mother.
"I'm hurting so bad right now and so is his dad and brothers," Najee's mother told KKTV 11 News on Thursday. "Our whole family is hurting and it feels like we failed him because we did what we had to do."
