The Anti-Vaccine movement has been making a comeback in the news lately, and it’s not just because of unenlightened parents refusing to vaccinate their children, it’s because of the effect that is has caused.
Recently, some diseases that had not been seen in decades now have a second life. Measles and pertussis have been coming back, and even causing death.
So why are there parents refusing to vaccinate their children? Celebrities like Kristin Cavallari and Jenny McCarthy have hyped up the movement with claims that Thimerosal, a substance used in vaccines to prevent the growth of bacteria while in storage, causes autism, yet there is ample proof that Thimerosal does not cause autism. On the contrary, there is little to no scientific evidence supporting the claim that this bacterial growth inhibitor causes autism.
How could this claim come about? McCarthy and Cavallari are not qualified or licensed medical doctors. It all started with a now retracted article published in 1998 by Dr. AJ Wakefield. He observed 12 children and nine of them had shown signs of autism, according to their parents, while eight had shown symptoms after receiving vaccines.
This article caused quite a stir and scared many parents. However; evidence quickly revealed that many of the findings had been falsified, and Wakefield lost his medical license…and people still believe the hype.
Because of how careless some of these anti-vaxxers are, so many vaccine-preventable disease outbreaks have occurred. In 2010, the biggest whooping cough outbreak in fifty years occurred and infected over 9100 people and left ten dead.
The fact that there are people who do not care about this is absolutely shocking, because it is such a scary thing.
There are of course risks associated with getting vaccinated, some of the most common would be:
(MMR Vaccines)
- Fever (1 out of every 6 people)
- Stiffness
- Temporary pain in joints (1 out of every four people, mostly in teenage or adult women)
But these minimal risks are vastly outweighed by the tremendous benefits one receives when getting vaccinated.
