Children’s vaccination has always been a subject to many doubts and discussions, and even now, it remains an actual topic. A large number of concerns associated with this matter is quite natural because all parents want to be confident in the safety and health of their children. But why are there so many? In this post, we will take a look at the main pros and cons to figure out whether it is worthwhile to vaccinate kids at an early age or not.
Why Is Vaccination Important?
Every qualified doctor would tell you that vaccination is one of the most effective methods of preventing infectious diseases, and that is why vaccines for children are so important. Besides, today, with the fast progress, it became possible to avoid more than 30 infectious diseases with the help of injections, which sounds quite impressive. What else to keep in mind? Regardless of your position regarding this question, we all should admit that thanks to the injections, we were able to eliminate smallpox (in 1980) entirely and significantly reduce the incidence of polio over the past 200 years!
How does it work? When the virus hits the baby’s body for the first time, the immune system produces the necessary antibodies to fight it, and an injection is a weak form of the virus, which “teaches” the body to recognize the danger. Thus, if you do vaccines for kids at a young age, later when the virus attacks, the body is already prepared and will protect itself more actively.
What else should you be aware of? It is also important to understand that the injection protects not only the individual but also the surrounding community. If the majority of people (about 75-94% of the population) are engrafted, then there is nothing to worry about because the collective immunity will take care of the rest. What does it mean? This means that it would not be necessary to vaccinate little kids if all adults were more attentive to make injections themselves when it is needed.
What Are The Main Arguments Against Vaccination?
The number of parents who refuse to do vaccinations for their children swiftly grows with every year, and each time we can observe more and more new arguments.
Why are so many people against it? The movement against this method has begun with the fact that in 1998 Andrew Wakefield linked it with autism by publishing a study in which he cited 12 examples of autism after vaccinations against measles, rubella, and mumps. Nevertheless, the experts could not find any confirmation of this theory.
Many parents believe that most infectious diseases can play a vital role in the growth of a strong and healthy immune system. This is one of their main arguments. However, this statement is meaningless because the injections aim to strengthen children’s immunity by helping to fight dangerous and deadly viruses.
What are the other reasons? Also, parents refuse from vaccinations because they are afraid of certain health implication and/or allergic reactions. Adverse reactions could occur 1-2 days after vaccination. As a rule, they pass without treatment within 2-3 days. Unfortunately, there are recorded facts that confirm a presence of such reactions as convulsions, high fever, polyneuritis, impaired sensation, paralysis, abscess or ulcer at the injection site, anemia, neuritis, etc. However, you should understand that such pathology is quite rare. The most dangerous complication that can appear after an injection is an anaphylactic shock, which can occur even after using cough drops or some other common medicine.
However, even taking into account all of the advantages, there is still no exact answer to the question of whether all parents have to engraft their kids at a young age or not. There are just too many controversial opinions.
Most of the children’s health problems we talked about above are caused by a wrong injection or poor qualifications of a doctor who does it; for example, college vaccinations are usually done without the parents’ control, which is often a problem.
Another problem is peoples’ unawareness of the problem. Both kids and adults should know vaccine requirements to minimize health risks:
- The child and all members of the family should be healthy;
- One day before, limit the volume and concentration of food; the child shouldn’t eat at least one hour before;
- The doctor should be aware of the individual characteristics of the child’s body (for this purpose it is better to have a family doctor);
- A child can be engrafted only in a specially equipped inoculation room;
- The rules for storage and transport of the vaccine must be observed;
- After the graft, the child cannot leave the hospital within 10-15 minutes;
- After the graft, the child should avoid too crowded places, but needs some fresh air and walking;
- If you notice a child’s reaction, you need to visit a doctor immediately.
As you see, vaccination at a young age is a very ambiguous topic. No one can give an exact answer, whether it is worthwhile to vaccinate children and what age is the best to do it, but you should avoid any bits of advice from friends or non-competent medics!