The Nocebo Effect
When Words Make You Sick

12.7 billion doses of the COVID vaccine have been administered around the world, with nearly 613 million doses in the United States alone. Unfortunately, the vaccine has not been universally accepted, often as a result of the side-effects of the vaccine that were widely discussed in news outlets and amplified by social media, relaying anecdotes of people feeling sick after getting jabbed. But lost in this discussion of side effects and ignored by the CDC, vaccine experts, and the media is the inconvenient fact that a significant portion of these side effects were not actually caused by the vaccine. Instead, they were the result of our negative expectations, the so-called nocebo effect. “The nocebo effect” stems from the Latin word nocere, which translates roughly as “to harm” and can be best summarized as the occurrence of a harmful event that stems from consciously or subconsciously anticipating or expecting it. While there has never before been such a massive demonstration of the nocebo effect as with the COVID vaccine, there are myriad other examples throughout history, and we are just beginning to discover the power behind this phenomenon. In turns enlightening and informative, The Nocebo Effect is the first book to investigate this fascinating phenomenon and offers a wide variety of topics and angles by the foremost researchers in this emerging field.