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Vaccines - Victims of Their Own Success

cpheapublichealthm
Aug 31
3 min read

In the early 1900’s, infectious diseases were the leading causes of death in the United States. Roughly 40% of these deaths occurred in children under 5 years old. By 1997, less than 5% of all U.S. deaths were attributed to infectious diseases. Three major public health advancements made this dramatic shift possible – improvements in sanitation and hygiene practices, the development and widespread use of antibiotics, and the development and implementation of mass vaccination programs for diseases such as tetanus, diphtheria, pertussis, polio, smallpox, measles, mumps, rubella, and several others. We now live in a world where vaccines have become a victim of their own success. The incidence of these diseases in the United States is so low that most Americans (including physicians) have never seen these diseases outside of pictures in a textbook. And, because most of today’s parents did not suffer from these diseases and have never seen the effects of these diseases firsthand, it is far too easy for them to believe that vaccinations may no longer be necessary, especially when that misinformation is spoken by people in authority. The truth is the exact opposite. The pathogens that these vaccines protect against are still in the environment. These pathogens don’t result in outbreaks of disease because of mass vaccination. Stop getting vaccinated, and the diseases come back. The increasing number and size of measles outbreaks in recent years, both in the United States and around the world, are a good case in point. Measles was declared eliminated in the United States in the year 2000 due to high vaccination rates. We are now seeing a higher measles disease burden in our communities and are on track to lose that elimination status as a result of falling vaccination rates.


Unfortunately, members of my family have experienced the realities of some of these diseases firsthand. My mother is a polio survivor. While other children in her community ended up paralyzed or even dead, my mother survived with only a slight limp, a reminder of her bout with polio that persists to this day. I contracted mumps when I was 11 years old. I still remember the intense discomfort that I experienced from every single lymph node in my body swelling, making it not only impossible to chew food but making the short walk from my bedroom to the bathroom difficult. I was sick for almost two weeks. In more severe cases of mumps, a person can be left with permanent hearing loss or even suffer infertility. Vaccines work and are among the safest and most well-studied medical interventions available. None of the anti-vaccine rhetoric and official acts of the current HHS Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., to undermine people’s trust in those vaccines changes that fact. However, the words and actions of the HHS Secretary matter and, at the very least, sow uncertainty and confusion in the minds of parents who only want to protect their children. Delays in vaccination increases the risk that a child will be exposed to a potentially deadly disease without vaccine-induced protection. The fact remains that adverse events and devastating outcomes are far more likely from contracting one of these diseases, rather than from the vaccines meant to protect us from these diseases. As National Immunization Awareness Month comes to an end, consult your children’s pediatrician or other healthcare provider to ensure that every member of your family is up to date on all recommended vaccinations. All of us play a role in maintaining the health of our communities, and one of the best ways to do that is to get vaccinated.


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