Meet Bernard and Lisa Selz, the wealthy New York City couple who has donated millions to the anti-vax movement
Bernard Selz (right), 79, is a graduate of Columbia University and the manager of Selz Capital, a hedge fund he founded in 2003.
The Selzes are known philanthropists.
They've made donations to organizations that support the arts, education and environmental conservation through their personal foundation.
According to the NYU Institute for Studies of the Ancient Worlds' website, Bernard serves on several boards, including the World Monuments Fund and The Frick Collection.
Their foundation is called the Selz Foundation. It does not have a website that Business Insider was able to find.
But in 2012, The Washington Post reports, the Selz Foundation began to focus on anti-vaccine organizations, starting with a donation to Andrew Wakefield.
In 2012, the gave a $200,000 gift to a legal fund for anti-vax activist Andrew Wakefield. The reason for the foundation's shift is unknown.
As Business Insider's Erin Brodwin previously reported, Wakefield published a study linking the measles vaccine to autism in 1998. Wakefield was convicted of professional misconduct in 2010 and his license was revoked. The Lancet, the journal that published the study, retracted it twelve years after publishing it.
The Selzes later donated $1.6 million over several years to two organizations founded by Wakefield.
The money was used to help fund the 2016 film "Vaxxed," a controversial documentary that questions the safety of vaccines.
In March 2019, Amazon removed the film from its streaming service following public criticism.
One of the anti-vax organizations the Selzes support is the Informed Consent Action Network (ICAN), which was founded by Del Bigtree.
According to its website, the network aims to "[expose] shortcomings with our vaccine program."
The Selzes' gift of $1 million accounted for three-quarters of the group's $1.4 million budget, 2017 tax returns obtained by The Washington Post show. Lisa Selz also serves as ICAN's president.
Because of the Selz Foundation's support, ICAN founder Del Bigtree was able to travel the country hosting events and lobbying lawmakers to further the group's agenda.
Bigtree has hosted numerous events in Williamsburg, ground zero of New York City's measles outbreak.
In April, Business Insider reported that 285 cases of measles had been reported in Brooklyn. The outbreak began with the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn's Williamsburg neighborhood, many of whom rejected the vaccine for religious reasons.
The outbreak is so severe that New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio declared the outbreak a public health crisis.
The city now requires all un-vaccinated persons to get a vaccine or pay a fine.
More cases of the measles have been reported in the United States in 2019 so far than in any other year in the past three decades. According to The New York Times, there have also been outbreaks in Isreal and Ukraine.
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