Jenny McCarthy has racked up a sizable body count.

Her message consists of the baseless claim that the MMR vaccine (which protects against the measles, mumps and rubella) is responsible for the increasing number of diagnoses of autism. McCarthy’s professed reasoning for her claims? Her “mommy instinct” and her “University of Google” education.

McCarthy asserts that a preservative in the MMR vaccine, thimerosal, has brought about the apparently increasing rates of children with autism.

This claim really began with a researcher, Andrew Wakefield, and his publication of an article in the journal The Lancet purporting to show a link between the vaccine and autism.

The FCC decided to remove the preservative just to be safe. Contrary to the beliefs of the anti-vaccinationists (or “anti-vaxxers”), the rates of autism did not decrease in the slightest following thimerosal’s removal.

There are three insurmountable problems with McCarthy’s position.

First, a wealth of honest, well-designed studies have shown there to be no link between autism and the MMR vaccine or thimerosal.

Anti-vaxxers claim these studies are nothing more than the pharmaceutical equivalent of the comical research done by Big Tobacco. This is a purposeful, malicious falsehood.

Columbia University, the California Department of Public Health and the UK Medical Research Council are just a few among the numerous and diverse group of organizations independently coming to the same conclusion through their research: There is no evidence for a connection between thimerosal and autism.

“Big Pharma” must have wide influence and deep pockets to infiltrate all of these organizations.

Second, Wakefield was discovered by the Sunday Times to have manipulated his original research in order to produce the conclusion he desired.

Along with this indictment of Wakefield’s research, the coauthors of his study retracted their support of the findings, and The Lancet publicly removed its endorsement of the article.

Finally, the increasing autism rates that the anti-vaxxers point to as the plague of the twenty-first century are likely to be caused by our expanding the definition of autism to include more people, coupled with our ever-increasing ability to find and diagnose children with autism.

The science behind the issue is clear. No connection has ever been found between autism and any ingredient in vaccines.

Despite their complete lack of supporting evidence, the anti-vaxxers continue to proselytize their anti-science message on “Larry King” and “Oprah,” engage in libelous attacks against scientists and, most appallingly, endanger their own children.

There is something sympathetic in McCarthy’s blind crusade.

The courage of a mother doing whatever she can to protect her child or, even better, other people’s children is one close to our hearts. In the face of such imagery, science and calm reasoning seem almost inappropriate.

How dare I tell a mother what’s best for her child?

But the danger is not contained only to the children of the anti-vaxxers. Every child is put at risk because of this message.

Because vaccines don’t work on everybody, a certain small percentage of the population depends on everybody else having working vaccinations.

Since most people won’t get the disease because of the vaccine, they also won’t spread the disease, allowing for a herd immunity to protect this small group of individuals when vaccines are unable to do so.

If McCarthy’s beliefs were benign, if they were self-contained and caused no real damage (like believing the moon landing was a hoax or that there are fairies in your garden), she could be considered a minor annoyance and easily ignored.

If only that were the case.

Her anti-vaccination mania is not only inaccurate, but dangerous. Children are not being given the vaccinations required to protect them from serious, life-threatening diseases. Measles and the mumps are not something we can ignore.

McCarthy’s message is worse than being good old-fashioned nonsense.

It’s a weapon. I cannot think of a more sinister creation than a weapon that harms children alone, and McCarthy is guilty of spreading its damage as far as possible.

It’s true that her position is understandable. Her child has autism, after all, and she is just trying to make sense of it any way she can.

I’m quite sure she doesn’t mean to cause this kind of harm. Her casualties are accidents of her own gullibility and inability to engage in critical thinking. Her tale is a cautionary one.

The slightest bit of skepticism would have protected hundreds of children from diseases that were nearly wiped out by the very vaccines that are denied to them.