Childhood Vaccines Controversy

Childhood vaccinations were given routinely to children in the past, but more and more parents today are refusing to vaccinate their kids. The result: childhood diseases are making a comeback.

In an outbreak of measles in San Diego in January and February of 2008, twelve children became ill.

Nine of them were not vaccinated against the virus because their parents objected, and the other three were too young to receive vaccines.

The parents who objected to their children receiving vaccinations are among a small but growing number of parents who take advantage of exemptions to laws requiring vaccinations for school-age children.

Measles is a significant infectious disease because, while the rate of complications is not high, the disease itself is so infectious that the sheer number of people who would suffer complications in an outbreak amongst non-immune people would quickly overwhelm available hospital resources.

Most children recover from measles without any complications, but the disease causes death in one out of every 1,000 cases, and serious complications such as retardation in others. According to the World Health Organization, measles is a leading cause of vaccine-preventable childhood mortality.

Few deny the vast improvements vaccination has made to public health. Childhood vaccines protect children from a range of serious diseases. A more common concern is their safety. Controversies in this area revolve around the question of whether the risks of adverse events following immunization outweigh the benefits of saving children from tragic outcomes of common diseases.

Paradoxically, the very success of vaccinations in eradicating common childhood diseases may cause a generation, that never saw the possible tragic outcome of these diseases, to object to vaccines. Public health officials say they are concerned about the growing number of school-age children being exempt from being vaccinated and insist that there’s no solid evidence linking vaccines to autism or other neurological disorders. Critics say that lack of evidence of harm is not the same as evidence of safety.

The problem: incomplete vaccine coverage increases the risk of disease for the entire population, including those who have been vaccinated. One study found that doubling the number of non-vaccinated individuals would increase the risk of measles in vaccinated children anywhere from 5–30%. In several countries since 1960, reductions in the use of some vaccines were followed by increases in the diseases’ morbidity and mortality. Some parents who refuse to vaccinate their kids say that they are aware of putting other children at risk.

The vaccine debate has reached mainstream TV in 2001, when NBC’s television drama ER contained a highly controversial story line about a family that chose not to vaccinate their children. One of the children contracted measles and died from complications. The episode portrayed the parents’ decision not to vaccinate as irresponsible and negligent.

My own kids are vaccinated. I completely understand parents’ fears: the possibility, even if remote, even if unproven, that choosing to vaccinate your children would cause irreversible damage to them and ruin their life is devastating. But my husband and I felt that in a situation where the benefits of vaccinating are proven but the risks are not, we simply cannot take the risk of NOT vaccinating. We also felt that it would be unfair to choose not to vaccinate and rely on the fact that the majority of parents still vaccinate.

Currently, 20 states allow personal-belief-type exemptions from vaccinations. My guess is that if the number of non-vaccinated children will continue to grow, and if, as a result, common childhood diseases will start making a comeback, more and more states will stop allowing these exemptions.

Sources:
Health risk rises as parents reject shots
More Parents Refuse to Vaccinate Kids
Kids’ skipping vaccines worries health officials
Autism – Still Not Vaccines
Measles, Vaccine Contoversy