Why Vaccinate?

I saw a post on social media recently about the “dangers” of vaccinations. The post included the word “shocking” in the title, and contained unattributed “facts,” and major errors, including misidentifying the FDA as the “Federal Drug Administration.”

I am a vaccine proponent, and here’s why…

  • I am old enough to know polio and smallpox victims. Polio and smallpox have been eradicated by vaccines. Young people are inclined to forget just how terrifying and destructive many of these diseases were. Read about smallpox here (link), then tell me we didn’t need to vaccinate it out of existence.
  • Mumps and measles are making a resurgence, thanks to the anti-vax crowd. These are very dangerous diseases that were unheard of for much of my life because my generation came right after the period in which they made a lot of people sick, so we understood the risks.
  • Even if the illness-to-prevention ratio was 1000:1, it would still be worth the cost to protect a huge majority from serious illness. It is colossally selfish to abstain from risk at vastly increased risk for everyone else.
  • Vaccines increase herd immunity, slowing or stopping the progress of serious illness in society overall.
  • Diseases for which there is yet to be a completely successful vaccine like HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, or malaria are responsible for millions of deaths every year.
  • Vaccines are one of the seminal breakthroughs of the 20th century, and they have saved literally millions of lives and prevented untold suffering.

Before you start cackling about the “flu shot” “giving you the flu,” maybe you need to try to understand that “flu” in vaccination terms is influenza, a dangerous and very specific viral upper respiratory infection. The “flu” is not that snotty, miserable cough most of us get in November, nor is the “flu” a gastric or intestinal malady.

Finally, it is difficult to reconcile a society that is often eager to blame an outside cause, frequently the government or “big business,” for their problems: My child is disrespectful, distracted, and not very bright because of an unseen, unreported, unverified chemical from the doctor (insert chemtrail reference here if you like), not because of extensive sugar consumption, extensive inactivity, extensive electronic entertainment, and extensively indulgent, lazy, gullible parents.

An influenza vaccination might save your life and prevent the spread of a very dangerous disease, and there is little chance it will make you seriously ill. I got mine today.
An influenza vaccination might save your life and prevent the spread of a very dangerous disease, and there is little chance it will make you seriously ill. I got mine today.

2 Comments

  1. The simple fact is that you can’t prove that you didn’t get the flu because you got a flu shot. They can’t prove that their child is autistic because he got a vaccine. No one will ever know if President Trump was the result of Russian meddling. Why? Because we can’t go back in time and prove it. It’s a temporal conspiracy.

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