Why Childhood Vaccines are a Public Health Success Story
upstart writes:
Why childhood vaccines are a public health success story:
That vaccine was licensed in the US in 1955. By 1994, polio was considered eliminated in North and South America. Today, wild forms of the virus have been eradicated in all but two countries.
But the polio vaccine story is not straightforward. There are two types of polio vaccine: an injected type that includes a "dead" form of the virus, and an oral version that includes "live" virus. This virus can be shed in feces, and in places with poor sanitation, it can spread. It can also undergo genetic changes to create a form of the virus that can cause paralysis. Although this is rare, it does happen-and today there are more cases of vaccine-derived polio than wild-type polio.
It is worth noting that since 2000, more than 10 billion doses of the oral polio vaccine have been administered to almost 3 billion children. It is estimated that more than 13 million cases of polio have been prevented through these efforts. But there have been just under 760 cases of vaccine-derived polio.
We could prevent these cases by switching to the injected vaccine, which wealthy countries have already done. But that's not easy in countries with fewer resources and those trying to reach children in remote rural areas or war zones.
Even the MMR vaccine is not entirely risk-free. Some people will experience minor side effects, and severe allergic reactions, while rare, can occur. And neither vaccine offers 100% protection against disease. No vaccine does. "Even if you vaccinate 100% [of the population], I don't think we'll be able to attain herd immunity for polio," says Abbas. It's important to acknowledge these limitations.
While there are some small risks, though, they are far outweighed by the millions of lives being saved. "[People] often underestimate the risk of the disease and overestimate the risk of the vaccine," says Moss.
In some ways, vaccines have become a victim of their own success. "Most of today's parents fortunately have never seen the tragedy caused by vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles encephalitis, congenital rubella syndrome, and individuals crippled by polio," says Kimberly Thompson, president of Kid Risk, a nonprofit that conducts research on health risks to children. "With some individuals benefiting from the propagation of scary messages about vaccines and the proliferation of social media providing reinforcement, it's no surprise that fears may endure."
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