Argument 2 paper

Running head: VACCINES ARE CRITICAL 1

Vaccines are Critical to the Eradication of Disease

Grand Valley State University

Kelsey E. Stevenson

VACCINES ARE CRITICAL 2

Vaccines are Critical to the Eradication of Disease

In February 2015, an outbreak of measles occurred at Disneyland in California. Many

measles cases were reported in California, even though the measles was considered to be

eradicated as of 2000. Outbreaks of previously eradicated diseases like the measles are

happening because there is a resistance to vaccines among parents throughout the country.

Doctor-recommended vaccines should be required for children to aid in the eradication of

disease. This paper will discuss the vitality of vaccines to the eradication of disease, how

vaccines are both safe and healthy for children, and the cost of treating disease compared to the

cost of vaccinations.

Vaccines and Their Vitality to the Eradication of Disease

Many diseases that at some point in time were very common in the United States can now

be controlled through the use of vaccinations. These diseases include but are not limited to:

measles, rubella, mumps, tetanus, and pertussis (whooping cough). Our bodies use our immune

systems to protect from disease, but when children are young they have weaker immune systems.

It takes time for the human body to build up immunity to certain things, and for babies and

children it takes even longer. Typically what happens is someone gets infected with a virus or

bacteria, their body tries to fight it, but because this takes so long for a human body to do the

child gets sick before their immune system can fight the virus off. Vaccines were created as a

way to give children automatic immunity to a disease before they even get sick. Vaccines contain

weakened or dead versions of the antigens that cause a certain disease, but they are just strong

enough to allow the human body to develop an immunity to that disease (“Vaccines and

immunization,” 2014).


Many parents today are making a conscious choice not to vaccinate their children.

Unfortunately, these unvaccinated children are in turn infecting other children or people at high

risk. A concept called “herd immunity” is one of the main factors in fully eradicating disease. If

a disease comes in contact with a group of people who are unvaccinated many of these people

will become infected because they do not have immunity against the disease. On the other hand,

if a large number of people in a certain area are vaccinated, the disease is less likely to spread.

The unvaccinated people are in a way “protected” by the vaccinated people. This is the simple

way that herd immunity works. If you are surrounded by a “herd” of people who are vaccinated

but you are not vaccinated, you are very unlikely to contract the disease. Vaccination rates,

however, need to be as high as 80%-95% for herd immunity to be effective (“Herd immunity,”

n.d.).

A study done by Alexander M. Capron (2015) asked students about their opinions on

vaccines and the results show that people are able to recognize the importance of herd immunity.

The specific question they were asked was, “To what extent should the state allow parents to

make choices about vaccinating their children against communicable diseases that can cause

injury or even death?” (p. 13). He gave the students a brief description of the pending bill in

California regarding vaccine mandates and some questions to consider. The students made some

very interesting points. They first said that many parents refuse vaccines because they feel that it

is in their child’s best interest, especially if they feel their community has a high level of herd

immunity. They also said that the problem with this is that if every parent thinks like this, then

herd immunity will drastically decrease. Then, in turn, the parents who choose not to vaccinate

are exposing other children to a disease (Capron, 2015). Parents need to be better informed about


the consequences of refusing to vaccinate not only for their children health and safety but for

other children as well.

Vaccines Are Safe and Healthy for Children

If parents and doctors in our country do not push vaccines and explain how a decrease in

herd immunity can bring back previously eradicated diseases, many children’s health and well-

being is being put at risk. In a study done over a four year time period (1998-2002) over 18,000

influenza vaccinations were administered to children from ages 18 months to 18 years. There

were many factors evaluated both before and after the immunizations were given such as asthma

rates and serious adverse events. Out of the over 18,000 vaccinations given over four years, only

42 had serious adverse events that occurred, but none of them were attributed to the influenza

vaccine. There were also 6 adolescent pregnancies that occurred amongst the vaccine recipients

all of which delivered perfectly healthy babies. They also found that, despite popular belief, the

children in the study who received annual doses of the vaccination did not have an increased risk

for asthma (Piedra et. al., 2005). This is just one study out of many proving that vaccinations are

safe and healthy for children

Another concern related to the safety of vaccines is that children get too many vaccines

and that their immune systems are not strong enough to handle that many vaccines and still stay

healthy. Children currently receive 11 doctor-recommended vaccines and up to 20 shots by the

age of two. That being said, the increasing number of vaccines has reduced the number of

vaccine-preventable diseases. Despite what many parents believe, infants actually have a

stronger immune system from birth than most people think regardless of how small or fragile

they may seem. Infants are actually protected from birth by maternal immunoglobulins. These


are transported through the placenta and breast milk. The mother passes on antibodies to her

child in order to help their immune system fight disease from day one (Offit et. al., 2002).

On top of already having a pretty tough immune system when born, infants also have the

capacity to respond to a large number of antigens. An infant, in a perfect circumstance, actually

has the capability to respond to almost 10,000 vaccines at one time. With that prediction, if 11

vaccines are given to a child at one time, they are only having to use less than 1% of their

immune system. While it also seems that there are far more vaccines than there were in the past,

vaccines now contain fewer antigens than they did back then. The fewer amount of vaccines

combined contained more antigens than the 11 vaccines being administered do today. So the

assumption that too many vaccines “weaken” a child’s immune system is actually not true at all

(Offit et. al., 2002).

Cost of Vaccines versus Cost of Disease Treatment

Not only are vaccines both safe and healthy for children, they are also cost-effective. If a

parent chooses not to vaccinate their child, they also must be aware that if their child gets

infected they will have to pay for treatment of whatever disease they contract. As mentioned

previously, in early 2015 there was a measles outbreak that started at Disneyland. There were

121 cases in 17 states at the time and unfortunately measles is a disease that was eradicated in the

United States in 2000. Measles is an extremely contagious disease—it can stay airborne for

almost two hours and once an outbreak begins, it never ends. A similarly sized outbreak in 2011

cost health departments anywhere from $2.7 million to $5.3 million. This kind of outbreak can

cost taxpayers around $10,000 per case and families almost $800 per sick child. Fortunately, the

Affordable Care Act requires that the vaccine for this disease be covered for every patient. The

problem is that people just aren’t getting vaccinated (Haelle, 2015).


Costs are obviously high for taxpayers and health departments, but they are also high for

the infected patient themselves. If the infected person is working, they have to miss work and

take on the loss of income. Adam Powell, president of Payer+Provider Syndicate Healthcare

Consulting said, “…the median wage for people without sick days is $10 per hour. Assuming the

person works five days a week, missing a week of work would cause a loss of $400” (as cited in

Haelle, 2015). An infected person would not only have to take a loss in income, but they would

also have to pay hospitalization costs if they have to be hospitalized. The costs upon costs of

treating a disease versus getting vaccinated are so significant, that it is a wonder why so many

people choose not to vaccinate.

Not only are vaccines far less expensive than treating disease, but many children have

access to free vaccines. For example, there is a program called the “Vaccines for Children

Program” (VFC) that is federally funded and gives children access to vaccines at no cost if they

are otherwise unable to pay. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention buys the needed

vaccines at a discount and gives them to health departments, public health agencies, etc. Then the

vaccines are given to children at no cost. This program was created to help in eradicating

contagious diseases in our country after a measles outbreak from 1989-1991 in which more than

50% of the children infected had not been vaccinated (“Vaccines for children,” 2014). Parents

have the resources available to get vaccinated and having the funds to do it is not an issue. With

the overwhelming amount of evidence that vaccines are in fact safe and healthy for children,

parents should be getting their children vaccinated.

Refutation

According to those who oppose vaccines, vaccinating your child can have serious side

effects. Some of these points were addressed previously, such as the argument that there are too


many vaccines or that vaccines can cause a higher risk for asthma, but one of the biggest

arguments against vaccines in recent years is that vaccines can lead to autism. This belief started

due to Dr. Andrew Wakefield making a claim that the MMR vaccine could lead to autism. He

claimed that the three vaccines, if taken together, could alter a child’s immune system and

damage the brain. Shortly after he release his study, he was rejected by the medical community.

The British Medical Journal actually called his research a fraud. He was stripped of his license

and ended up in jail for some time (Haberman, 2015). If a doctor that was prominent in the

medical community was put in jail and stripped of his license for making that link between

autism and vaccines, it is clear that his research was flawed at the least.

Many others have also encouraged this link, such as former television host Jenny

McCarthy. She has spoken out many times linking her son’s autism to his vaccinations. She

claims he got vaccinated and then he was not okay. The problem with this argument that she

makes as well as the one Dr. Wakefield made is that it is actually a post hoc logical fallacy. A

post hoc fallacy is when people link two events together illogically by saying event one follows

event two, so event two must be the direct result of event one (Haberman, 2015). There are

children who have been vaccinated and later developed autism, but there is no sound evidence or

studies that have been done proving that the autism is linked to the vaccinations.

After Dr. Wakefield’s claim was made and rejected, many doctors, scientists, and

researchers began doing studies on the subject. A study done by DeStefano, Price, and

Weintraub (2013) has also stated that there is in fact no link between vaccines and autism. They

studied over 250 autistic children to determine whether the vaccinations they had received

throughout their lives had a direct link with their illness. They confirmed that there is no link, at

any age, from a child’s vaccinations to autism. In their discussion it says, “These results indicate


that parental concerns that their children are receiving too many vaccines in the first 2 years of

life…are not supported in terms of an increased risk of autism” (p. 563). This is just one of many

studies done that further proves that there is not clear link between the two things. Many people

have their doubts about vaccines, but they are mostly due to the media and popular belief rather

than to facts, studies, and science.

Conclusion

This paper discussed the cost of treating disease compared to the cost of vaccinations,

how vaccines are both safe and healthy for children, and the vitality of vaccines to the

eradication of disease. Doctor-recommended vaccines should be required for children to aid

in the eradication of disease. Dr. Scott Goldstein, a pediatrician at Northwestern Children’s

Practice in Chicago said, “If parents have the right information, and they understand the

overwhelming evidence that supports vaccination, we feel they will come to understand why we,

as doctors, feel so strongly in favor of vaccination” (as cited in Vara, 2011).


References

Capron, A. M. (2015). Personal beliefs exemption from mandatory immunization of children for

school entry. Journal of Law, Medicine, & Ethics, 12-21.

DeStefano, F., Price, C. S., Weintraub, E. S. (2013). Increasing exposure to antibody-stimulating

proteins and polysaccharides in vaccines is not associated with risk of autism. The

Journal of Pediatrics, 163, 561-567.

Haberman, C. (2015). A discredited vaccine study’s continuing impact on public health. The

New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/02/us/a-discredited-

vaccine-studys-continuing-impact-on-public-health.html?_r=0.

Haelle, T. (2015). Measles outbreak in dollars and cents: It costs taxpayers bigtime. Forbes.

Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/tarahaelle/2015/02/11/measles-outbreak-in-

dollars-and-cents-it-costs-taxpayers-bigtime/.

Herd immunity. (n.d.). The History of Vaccines. Retrieved on November 13, 2015 from

http://www.historyofvaccines.org/content/herd-immunity-0.

Offit, P. A., Quarles, J., Gerber, M. A., Hacket, C. J., Marcuse, E. K., Kollman, T. R., Gellin, B.

G., Landry, S. (2002). Addressing parents’ concerns: Do multiple vaccines overwhelm or

weaken the infant’s immune system. Pediatrics, 109, 124-129.

Peidra, P. A., Gaglani, M. J., Riggs, M., Herschler, G., Fewlass, C., Watts, M. (2005). Live

attenuated influenza vaccine, trivalent, is safe in healthy children 18 months to 4 years, 5

to 9 years, and 10 to 18 years of age in a community-based, nonrandomized, open-label

trial. Pediatrics, 116, 745.

Vaccines and immunizations. (2014). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.. Retrieved

November 12, 2015 from http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/howvpd.htm.


Vaccines for children program (VFC). (2014). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Retrieved on November 13, 2015 from

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/programs/vfc/index.html.

Vara, C. (2011). Doctors take a stand for immunizations. Shot of Prevention. Retrieved from

http://shotofprevention.com/2011/09/02/doctors-take-a-stand-for-immunizations/.

Argument 2 paper

Health & Medicine

Transcript of Argument 2 paper