A lot of people have misconceptions about vaccinating their child
Some believe the vaccine itself will do more harm than good. But by trusting the medical professions and the statistics on the outcomes of the vaccine, you will see that the good outweighs the bad.
Most of these concerns come from misinformation spread through social media or word-of-mouth.
Anyone with a child in his/her care should do some research before trusting a Facebook post and likely putting their child or others around them at risk for life-threatening diseases.
So here are the top five reasons why you should vaccinate your child.
Immunizations can save a child’s life
Due to advances in medical science diseases that have onced killed thousands of children, have been eradicated and/or close to extinction.
This is primarily due to safe and effective vaccines.
For example, Americans’ most feared disease, polio, caused death and paralysis across the country, but thanks to vaccinations, there are no reports of polio in the United States today.
Vaccine refusals put our communities at risk
By vaccinating your child, you’re not only helping your child, you’re also helping the community not spread infections.
If all children were vaccinated, outbreaks could be prevented.
Once a disease, such as smallpox, becomes medical history vaccination against that disease is no longer necessary.
Vaccination is very safe and effective
Vaccines have worked for over 50 years and have saved over millions of lives.
For example, infectious diseases like smallpox and polio have been eliminated because of vaccines.
Most childhood vaccines are 90 percent to 99 percent effective in preventing diseases, in which if a vaccinated child does get the disease the symptoms are far less worse than if a child who was not vaccinated got the disease.
Diseases like diphtheria are still a threat today, even though the disease is now rare it is important to vaccinate your child incase of a return.
Immunizations can save your family time and money
Not only will you be saving a trip to the doctor’s office or hospital, you’ll be saving money on the cost it’ll take to treat the disease you get from not being vaccinated.
According to the CDC, vaccinations will prevent more than 21 million hospitalizations and 732,000 deaths among children born in the last 20 years.
Not only are vaccines saving lives, but saving money as well. This reduction in disease also means a reduction in the cost of treating the illnesses.
Immunizations protects future generations
Vaccines have reduced and in some cases eliminated many deadly diseases, in which have affected thousands of children just a few generations ago.
The smallpox vaccine has eradicated the disease worldwide and now the vaccine is no longer needed.
If we continue vaccinating now, and vaccinating completely, parents in the future may be able to trust that some diseases of today will no longer be around to harm their children in the future.
by Kerri Grana
CougarBuzz 