[arjie]

Pity you got whacked. I think people read the "you will survive even getting the disease" and assumed you were anti-vax when the reasoning is second order: if the First World won't use these drugs it signals danger to those who don't have the tools to independently verify.

An interesting angle, though I wouldn't say I agree. As one example, I believe all of us in India routinely receive the BCG vaccine against TB right after birth. It's not routinely done in the US (unless I'm wrong and don't remember it). The US choosing not to do it doesn't make Indian people want to not get it.

More likely, there's something else that's making people worried about the standard vaccines.

[rich_sasha]

I wonder if India is different to other places. One, if you look at education levels vs GDP per capita, India seems an outlier to the positive. Education seems to be (?) very good for a relatively poor country.

But then my understanding is that there's in particular higher levels of distrust against Western medicine in parts of Africa, following the AIDS epidemic.