‘Law & Order: SVU’ season 16, episode 19 preview: Benson and the vaccination debate

While we know that there will be a more traditional case at the center of Wednesday night’s “Law & Order: SVU” episode, there are also going to be many detours that tackle what has become a hot-button issue of the past several months: Namely, the debate over whether or not parents should vaccinating their children. There are some out there who believe that the health risks are not worth the benefits, even if a measles outbreak is causing it to be nearly impossible for Benson’s unit to do their job properly.

We’re not going to take a stance one way or another on the debate, mostly because we’re not qualified to and this is not really the purpose of this article. Instead, we just want to give you a few teases of what to expect within the span of the episode.

1. The case hits home – Benson faces a real problem when she learns that Noah could be in danger of falling ill thanks to the disease, and while he has been vaccinated, it takes time for that to take hold. She is told to quarantine him and keep him away from other children for a lengthy stretch of time. Given her job, this is going to be a not-so-easy challenge.

2. The questioning – Is there a way to properly ensure that responsible parties are brought to justice? In this sneak peek, a mother admits to not following rules and getting a father to falsify records in order to ensure that she could continue to protect her child from what she believed to be a wrongful vaccination. However, the problem here is that she also recommended many other mothers to this doctor, and is not so willing to pass over the names. This is what makes this case so complicated, and therefore fascinating as a viewer.

(Photo: NBC.)