Pros And Cons Of Vaccines

In less than fifteen weeks, I am going to be an aunt of a beautiful baby girl. I have many dreams for her, none of which include her becoming ill from a deadly disease just because she or others around her are not properly vaccinated. According to the Center for Disease Control (CDC), a vaccine is “a product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease” (“Immunization: The Basics”). Vaccination has been a controversial issue for many decades in the United States. Some people support mandatory vaccination of children because they believe that it is necessary to keep the entire population safe from preventable diseases, while others oppose it because they think it should be the parents’ choice whether or not to vaccinate their children. Although certain religious groups may have objections to vaccinations, requiring parents to vaccinate their children is in the best interest of the lives of the American civic society because vaccines are safe, economic benefits would accrue to society, and they save the lives of many people both in present and future generations.

Over the last couple decades the debate over vaccines has been heated. In the last week there seems to have been a renewed interest. This is likely to the recent occurrence of measles around this country. I feel compelled to share some basic information that will hopefully address concerns regarding vaccines. At the very least, my friends and family can know where I stand.

Vaccines have saved many lives the last couple of decades by the support and advancements in Vaccinology. The effectiveness of vaccines has expanded, leaving 99% of people getting vaccinated to help the epidemic of immunity in Louisiana. The sensitive discussion of whether it should be voluntary or involuntary for parents to have children vaccinated is still controversial today. The parents that refuse to vaccinate their children has started a vaccine war due to opting out of vaccinations for their children. When they decide to opt out of their children receiving vaccination, the children become unprotected and gain ability to spread diseases efficiently. There are many vaccines provided for children to help prevent various diseases throughout their life including Varicella, Tetanus, HepA, FLi and MMR. When parents can protest vaccinations, they are setting up the public to be a disease transmitting environment which could contribute to further problems. Utilitarianism can help us prevent the further problems of disease spreading by making the children get the vaccines because it is best for the greater good. As of today, there are a variety of vaccinations required of children before attending school, Varicella being one of them. Varicella is a vaccine for the chicken pox, which is easily spread among children not vaccinated. When parents withhold their children from vaccines such as Varicella they are at risk for disease exposure, prevent them from attending school and

Diphtheria, whooping cough, measles, yellow fever, small pox, and mumps are several diseases that have become unfamiliar to many nowadays. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, these illnesses struck and killed thousands of people worldwide, targeting mostly children. Today, these diseases remain forgotten due to vaccines. A vaccine is a biological preparation that provides active acquired immunity against a type of disease. Vaccinations are beneficial because they train the immune system to resist a new pathogenic without exposing us to the disease by producing antibodies to fight it. Whereas before vaccinations, in order to be fully immune from an illness you had to catch the disease, and hopefully survive it. However, despite the positivity that comes out of being vaccinated, their are still certain individuals who do not believe vaccines are as beneficial as they are said to be. This indeed is a false accusation because vaccines can save a child’s life, the ingredients in the vaccine are proven to be safe in the amount used, vaccines saves time and money , and they are proven to protect future generations.

vaccines than by the diseases themselves” (Wisconsin for Vaccine choice). The first example of this, in Vaccines a Reappraisal, Dr. Richard Moskowitz points out an example of a parent who left the exam room for a moment and never had the opportunity to give or refuse permission for the doctor to give their child a flu shot. A few days later the child was found blue in his crib and rushed to the hospital. Regrettably, this child suffered severe brain damage, and the doctors encouraged the parents to remove the child from life support (110). Furthermore, he recognizes there are the parents who have to live with the guilt, like this example, “My son died 40 hours after his 2-month shots. I’d never heard of vaccine injury before. I feel guilty every day because it was the one thing I didn’t look into and wish I did” (Moskowitz 51). The current trend to choose not vaccinating children causes legitimate concerns about the spread of disease and receives a great deal of news coverage; while the mainstream media under-reports the numerous stories of children injured and dying from vaccinations.

We live in a country where not only adults, but children are being forced to take different vaccines for the “safety” of other children. Some vaccines of course are necessary; however, there is one vaccine on the market that children are being forced to take. This vaccine is known as the MMR vaccine also known as, the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine. This vaccine used to be three separate vaccines until the 1970’s when they decided to combine them to make them more convenient for parents. Ever since these vaccines were combined, the rate of autism has gone up exponentially. Parents do not have a choice to have their child receive three separate shots and are being forced to give their child the combines MMR shot. Vaccines are also not tested as thoroughly as pharmaceutical drugs. So how do you know if this vaccine is safe to give your children? You don’t. People should have the choice to give their children the MMR vaccine all at once or as separate shots for precautionary measures. This vaccine should also be vigorously tested the same way as pharmaceutical drugs for the safety of all children.

In recent years, the vaccine and anti-vaccine issue has hit major headlines. As of July 2016, California law states “Public elementary schools and secondary schools cannot admit children unless they are immunized against 10 diseases: diphtheria, Haemophilus influenzae type b (bacterial meningitis), measles, mumps, pertussis (whooping cough), polio, rubella, tetanus, hepatitis B and chicken pox.” Children with medical conditions such as immune-system deficiencies and allergies, confirmed by a physician, can be excused from immunization. (Perkins) California does not stand alone, all 50 states have some variation of this law. Despite the law, should these vaccines be a requirement to enroll in public school? Vaccines build your body's immune system so that, in the future, it's able to fight against a specific disease. Having children vaccinated early on in their academic careers is beneficial to all of society.

Vaccines are safe to the human body although there are dangerous and concerning ingredients. the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) carefully monitors and tests the ingredients to ensure the safest vaccine.The ingredients in vaccines are tested to be safe in the quantities used. As reported by the CDC, vaccine ingredients such as thimerosal, formaldehyde, and aluminum can harm one only in large amounts of doses (Vaccines and Immunizations). The CDC notes that, “people are exposed to more bacteria, viruses, toxins, and other harmful substances in one day of normal activity than are in vaccines” (Vaccines and Immunizations). Discussing the concerns of the public about the ingredients, the CDC commented, “[t]he FDA requires up to 10 or more years of testing for all vaccines before they are licensed, and then they are monitored by the CDC and the FDA to make sure the vaccines and the ingredients used in the vaccines are safe” (Should Vaccines Be Required). Vaccines are tested to the highest standard of safety. They are carefully evaluated with the help of many programs to reassure safety.

Vaccines have been engineered to help prevent infectious diseases some specifically for children. Not every parent want to let their children get vaccines and other people believe that these vaccines are vital. This forms the debate on whether or not vaccines should be required for every child.

Why wouldn’t people want to be vaccinated when there is diseases out there that can cause them to be in pain and sometimes it can be fatal?

One of the greatest products that humans have ever created are vaccines. Vaccines are created to protect us from infectious and life threaten diseases. In today’s world, vaccines play a major role in enhancing our immunity and expanding our life span. The use of vaccines can be found in Chinese ancient medicine, where early Chinese doctor used an early version of smallpox vaccine to inoculate their citizens. This method of early vaccination moved from Asia through European and Africa continent. It wasn’t until in the late 1700’s when Edward Jenner discovered how to manipulate small pox and turn it into a vaccine and thus creating an immunity for millions of people. Jenner’s early use of the small pox vaccination lead to many more vaccines such as Hep B, MMR and the all-important polio which has completed wipe the disease from many develop countries. Although vaccines have played a crucial role in our human growth and development, there are people who still refuse to give vaccines to their children. Many debates and controversies have popped up in recent concerning vaccines and how much and how often they are received.

. Most children today in the United States receive multiple post-natal vaccinations. As such, some parents are concerned about their children being overly vaccinated. Staunch vaccination opponents believe that vaccinations can cause physiological impairment, mental disorders, and even birth defects. This is largely attributed to a broad misunderstanding of two intrinsic properties of vaccines. Vaccines are generally weakened versions of a viral strain. Once the vaccine is exposed to a patient, the patient’s own immune system recognizes so called markers called antigens on the surface of the virus. The immune system promptly initiates a cascade of cellular actions that both result in the virus being destroyed and a prompt increase in the number of immune cells that are engineered to attack that specific virus strain. Opponents to vaccination are likely to oppose vaccines once educated on how vaccines work and how much vaccines have contributed to modern society. In extreme cases, vaccinations can cause severe illnesses, however they are credited with preventing numerous diseases on a global scale. Vaccination should be mandatory because they prevent malignant illnesses from occurring and have been shown eradicate certain diseases.

Diseases have been around since the beginning of time. In response of disease, vaccinations were developed. Since the 1800’s, vaccines have been protecting adults and children from fatal diseases by building up immunity within the human body against such communicable diseases like smallpox, measles, and tuberculosis. Throughout history, vaccines have been widely accepted as mandatory for life events such as travel and school. While most of the world population welcomed vaccines enthusiastically, there are groups of people that believe the vaccines are more harmful than helpful.

Vaccine-preventable diseases cause important health, societal, and economic burdens worldwide. Morbidity and mortality from vaccine preventable diseases occur primarily in poor countries. It has been estimated that out of the approximately 162 million disability adjusted life years (DALYs) that have been lost around the world from vaccine-preventable diseases, over 90% occurred in low income countries(2). Additionally, it was estimated that 87% of the 2.5 million deaths of children under 5 years of age worldwide have occurred in poor areas of the world(2).

Vaccinations or immunizations should not be required to attend school or to have a job. I think it should be the guardians or individual’s choice on what they want to be vaccinated with. I do think that some vaccines can be a benefit to an individual’s lifestyle, but not all vaccines. Vaccinations and immunizations are supposed to help create permanent immunity by injecting small amounts of the live or weakened microorganism that causes the illness into the muscle tissue. The body’s immune system is then supposed to fight the virus or bacteria and create antibodies that remember the pathogen should it reenter the body at a later time.