There are apparently thousands of people out there who think the H1N1 vaccine is some sort of sinister government plot on the order of a second-rate sci-fi TV show.

The paranoid letters and e-mails we’ve been getting lately at the newspaper prompted me to investigate where exactly these people are getting their information from, and the diagnosis is not good.

Most of the sources are from the shady back-alleys of the Internet, where no matter how wacky your opinion, you’ll find someone else who shares it.

According to blogs, “alternative media,” “natural health” and homeopathic websites which are being used as sources in the anti-vaccine information war, the government has a variety of motives for strongly encouraging people to get H1N1 flu shots. Some are at least plausible (to create profits for pharmaceutical companies which support the government) and some are not (to secretly kill people and reduce the world’s burgeoning population).

Most of them rely on something they heard from somebody who heard it from someone who heard it from someone else, and have the gall to call their baseless opinions the “Truth” while repeating untruths such as the claim that vaccines cause autism.

They don’t. There is no accepted scientific evidence showing vaccines have anything to do with autism. A study published in 1998 in The Lancet suggested a link, but it was based on only 12 children, could not be replicated (failing the most basic test of the scientific method) and the authors have since retracted parts of their paper, facing professional misconduct charges.

But the crazy claims don’t end there. Some websites –  and I’m not making this up – even claim the vaccine contains tiny microchips designed by the reptilian aliens which have secretly infiltrated world governments to control us.

By the way, I hear the “V” remake on TV Tuesday was actually pretty good.

But the most insidious sources of misinformation are well-designed websites purporting to be all about “natural health.” They look nice and earth-friendly and use lots of soft colours and airy, friendly fonts to make readers think they’re “green” but I think there’s a lot of brown beneath the surface, if you know what I mean.

One which gets cited frequently calls itself a “natural health collective” with highly editorialized articles written by anyone who wants to contribute. As far as I can tell, nothing is checked, except to make sure articles agree with the site publisher’s point of view.

Another, which appears to be run by some sort of homeopathic organization, preaches against the evils of “Big Pharma” and the medical “establishment” before encouraging visitors to visit the online store, where they can spend money on magic water to make them all better.

Aha, there it is. Nestled in among all the paranoid claims of vaccination machinations is a whole sub-industry of “alternative health practitioners” eager to prey upon people’s irrational fears and sell them magic water. Hucksters and quacks, looking to make a buck from spreading misinformation and mumbo-jumbo.

I did notice one thing all these websites have in common. They all show a profound lack of understanding about how vaccines are made, how flu viruses evolve and how vaccines actually work. Maybe that’s the real problem here. People fear what they don’t understand, but don’t want to make the effort to understand because, you know, science is hard. Either that, or they’re terrified of finding information that might force them to change their opinions. Why let facts get in the way of a good story?

Fine. I know I won’t change anyone’s mind if they want to believe that the vaccine is some government conspiracy. If people don’t want to vaccinate their kids, they don’t have to, and that’s their right in our free society.

But I wish they would do themselves a favour and learn how to think critically about the flu vaccine, and everything else they read for that matter, this column included. Check their sources. Talk to real doctors. Call the BC Centre for Disease Control and get actual facts.

Otherwise, they might as well just say hi to the lizard people for me.