Learn from the swine flu fiasco of 1976, detailed in this 1979 “60 Minutes” episode. Fearing a repeat of the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, “the government propaganda machine cranked into action,” “60 Minutes” says, telling all Americans to get vaccinated.

According to “60 Minutes,” 46 million Americans were vaccinated against the swine flu at that time. Over the next few years, thousands of Americans filed vaccine damage claims with the federal government.

As reported by Smithsonian Magazine in 2017:

“In the spring of 1976, it looked like that year’s flu was the real thing. Spoiler alert: it wasn’t, and rushed response led to a medical debacle that hasn’t gone away.

‘Some of the American public’s hesitance to embrace vaccines — the flu vaccine in particular — can be attributed to the long-lasting effects of a failed 1976 campaign to mass-vaccinate the public against a strain of the swine flu virus,’ writes Rebecca Kreston for Discover.

‘This government-led campaign was widely viewed as a debacle and put an irreparable dent in future public health initiative, as well as negatively influenced the public’s perception of both the flu and the flu shot in this country.’”