Essay about Benefits and Hazards of Immunizations

Throughout history, vaccinations have been used to help the prevention of infectious diseases; some of which can produce serious illnesses, crippling disabilities, and ultimately be the cause of death. There is evidence of ancient culture’s attempting to treat transmittable diseases with various forms of inoculations. Developments in the research of vaccinations increased during the mid-twentieth century because of the established of more advanced laboratories, improved equipment, and new innovations. The progression of medicine during history has helped further the development of research into vaccinations. Several cultural, ethical, and religious issues have resulted from the development and use of vaccinations in our society. The topic of vaccinations has caused a strong debate amongst our culture about the safety and danger of treating infectious diseases with such methods.

The controversy over the MMR vaccine started in the late 1990’s when Andrew Wakefield suggested that there was a connection between the MMR vaccine and autism in a scientific paper which he had published with several other co-authors. Although there has not been a proven fact that the MMR vaccine is the causation to autism it has brought concerns to parents and has caused a major drop in immunization rates. For example, Dannetun et al., 2005 states that, “Fear of side effects and beliefs

Imagine traveling to the “Happiest Place on Earth”, Disneyland, with your family. While you are there a person that has not been vaccinated is walking around with the measles virus in their system. While that person shows no signs or symptoms of the measles, they are infecting others that haven’t been vaccinated, due to young age or other purposes. Now what turned out to be many people’s family vacations is now a life-threatening situation for some. This type of outbreak actually occurred during December of 2014, where 40 Californians were exposed to the measles at Disneyland and 91 additional cases of the outbreak strain also occurred from the people exposed affecting others (Blumberg et al, 2015). Outbreaks likes this can potentially be

Controversy concerning the risks of vaccinations will always exist. As is the nature of a preventative intervention, it is difficult to rationalize giving a completely healthy child an injection that is known to have varying degrees of sides affects5. Additionally, these injections are to provide immunity to children for diseases that have an extremely low risk of circulating within a population. Since these vaccines have been able to protect so many individuals from experiencing these dangerous infections, most parents do not even have personal experiences regarding the impact of these diseases. As such, many parents do not see the vaccine-preventable disease as a threat to their child. This often causes parents to not fully understand the risk their child has for contracting a disease and the subsequent danger of a vaccine-preventable disease infection verses the potential side effect of a vaccine which is normally only mild to moderate discomfort for their child15.

In the 1998 article in the Lancet, Wakefield studied 12 children “who, after a period of apparent normality, lost acquired skills, including communication” (Wakefield, Murch, Anthony, Linnell, Casson, Malik, Berelowitz, Dhillon, Thomson, Harvey, Valentine, Davies, & Walker-Smith,1998). All 12 children were reported to show behavioral symptoms after receiving the vaccination. After receiving the vaccination, the features associated with exposure collectively included fever/delirium, rash, self-injury, repetitive behavior, loss of self-help, convulsion, gaze avoidance, diarrhea, disinterest, lack of play, vomiting, and recurrent viral pneumonia. In 8 of the 12 children, the beginning of behavioral problems was linked to the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccination by either the parents or by the child’s

The MMR vaccine was designed to make the individual it was given to have a immunity or resistance to the following diseases; mumps, measles, and rubella. Over the years however, the number of people who had measles skyrocketed after it reached near extinction in 2000.1 Similar to this, the cases of the mumps disease have also risen in the past five years. However, it is not as much due to lack of vaccination, but more to being less effective in specific situations.2 Unlike these two diseases, the rates of rubella has gone down in the U.S. to about ten people per year.3 For the most part, these diseases cause cough, sore throat, itchy eyes and more. However, they each cause specific complications that can result in death. Since these diseases are still common today and affect the health of not only themselves, but the rest of the population, people are debating if the MMR vaccine should be required. Though this has always been a debate, it has resurfaced after recent outbreaks of specifically mumps and measles throughout America.

The two vaccines that are most refused by parents are the MMR, and the Dtap vaccine. The Center of Disease Control and Prevention has all vaccine risks posted online to the public. The mild effects of MMR (fever, mild rash, and swelling glands) are worth having rather the actual disease. The severe risks of MMR seizure, temporary pain or stiffness in joints, and temporary low platelet count affect less than 4%. The Dtap vaccine was accused of causing Barbara Fisher’s son to develop autism. The most common conspiracy it is known for is causing autism in children. This however isn’t true according to the British Medical Journal Lancet children vaccinated or unvaccinated have the same risk of developing

Helpless and unaware, a young girl had her life ripped away in an instance. Holly, a five year old received her second dose of the MMR vaccine; a school required vaccine for kindergarteners, a week after her fifth birthday. Prior, Holly received the MMR vaccine and others when she 16 months old and reacted to them for seven straight weeks after. Her pediatrician told Holly’s mother it was normal and to continue vaccinating. In addition, her mother claims she was given no information to recognize side effects. Resulting from her second dose of the mandatory MMR vaccine, the little one’s brain subjected to irreversible damage and her body went through convulsions. Doctors told Holly’s parents that Holly’s vegetative state could not be reversed. With only five years of life with their beloved daughter, Holly’s parents had to make the decision to take their daughter off life support (naturalblaze.com). It was confirmed Holly died from acute encephalitis caused by the MMR vaccine.

A wise Welsh man once said, “An apple a day, keeps the doctor away.” But, can that also be said about immunizations? According to the Medilexicon medical dictionary, “an immunization is the action of making a person or animal immune to infection, typically by inoculation.” The Merriam-Webster Dictionary provides a more technical definition of immunizations by defining them as “the creation of immunity usually against a particular disease, treatment (as by vaccination) of an organism for the purpose of making it immune to a particular pathogen.” Most people feel that immunizations are a very important part of a health care regimen and should be mandatory for the majority of individuals. But over the past several years, questions have

The main concerns parents have are about the reactions to vaccinations. There is credible evidence that some vaccines may cause adverse events (Maglione, Das, Raaen, Smith, Chari, Newberry, Shanman, Perry, Bidwell & Gidengil 2014). The type of adverse event depends on the vaccine. The measles, mumps and rubella vaccine has been associated with febrile seizures as well as body encephalitis, both which are serious conditions. Trivalent inactivated vaccines were

Introduction: Public health achievements in the areas of vaccinations to prevent disease, disease prevention and control, laws to limit the consumption of tobacco, maternal and infant health, and cardiovascular disease are achievements on their own. With public health, improvements in one area often have an effect on a different area of public health. Improvements in vaccinations, for example, will improve maternal and infant health as a reduced number of mothers and infants will fall ill from diseases preventable by vaccination. In addition, vaccinations control the spread of infectious disease, and reduce the incidence rate of the disease in a population.

In today’s day and age, many health concerns that were not common years back, are increasingly rising. It is known that 20 million people are diagnosed with measles a year. But what if we could mostly prevent measles? We can, it’s called vaccinations. Doctors today offer vaccinations to their patients, to prevent diseases like measles. But why do so many people refuse them? The answer isn’t totally clear, however if children did get those vaccinations, they would be so much safer. The government should require all children to be vaccinated because kids do not get to live their normal lives with a disease, there are too many risks without it, and the disease could be contagious to other students.

The Human papillomavirus (HPV) is the virus responsible for cervical cancer. It is one the most common viral sexually transmitted infections. A vaccine was approved in 2006 that is effective in preventing the types of HPV responsible for 70% of cervical cancers and 90% of genital warts. Proposals for routine and mandatory HPV vaccination of girls have become sources of controversy for parents of school-aged youth, legislators, members of the medical community, and the public at large (Cooper et al. 2010).

Children that given MMR vaccines are more likely to be protected against common symptoms of these infections which include rash, high fever, painful eyes, swollen glands and joint pains.

Furthermore, they believe that these illnesses are not serious. Not only parents, but also advocates for anti-vaccination are a huge voice in this heated debate. Whether the public understands and accepts important information in the debate will depend on both the communication skills, and the credibility, of the source. Vaccines are as safe as humans can presently make them. Yet as in any health intervention, some level of uncertainty will always remain (Clements). It is now the responsibility of the parents of these young children to make the pivotal decision in their young child’s life. To vaccinate or not to vaccinate is a question that many parents find extremely difficult to answer. However, once faced with the research and safety statistics surrounding the MMR vaccine, the answer may be clearer than once believed. Starting with the controversy of the presence of thimerosal, once further research is done the speculation over its presence and lack of safety can be dismissed entirely.