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Value of Health or Value of Convenience?
To All Concerned Mothers:
The moment your child was born it experienced the painful pricking of a needle. As their
little lives progress they regularly encounter this same experience as they are pumped full of
preventative immunizations and medications. Have you found yourself keeping your children away
from another child with the slightest sniffle, or quarantining them from siblings that happen to be
ill? Do you clean their hands immediately after they touch a dirty surface or prevent them from
playing in the mud and touching bugs? Have you kept them up to date on all of the available
immunizations because you relish in the idea of a childhood without illness? If so, I ask you, why?
As a Rehabilitation and Human Services major as well as a future member of the children’s
healthcare field, I feel that all parents should address the issues surrounding unnecessary childhood
vaccines. In our country’s current economic situation, where many families are finding themselves
strapped in the financial department, why are families continuing to vaccinate their children for
nonfatal illnesses rather than allowing their immune systems to boost themselves through exposure?
Parents continue spending hundreds upon thousands of dollars a year immunizing their children
against non-life threatening sicknesses when the money could be spent on much more pressing
preventative measures for a child.
So, I ask you, with money being so tight in our country and so many families being
uninsured, what is it worth to vaccinate children for non-life threatening illnesses? There are about
300 million Americans at this exact point in time. Let’s say the average American lives for 75
years. This means at any given point in time there are about 4 million people in a given year of life,
for example, there would be 4 million 1-year-olds. Children receive the Hepatitis A vaccine at ages
1 year and 18 months as well as they Chicken Pox vaccine at 1 year and 4 years old. This means
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regardless of any other illnesses or vaccinations, 8 million vaccines will be given to 1 year olds in a
given year. The outcome of these vaccines is like rolling dice, you never really know what to
expect. There are side effects associated with these vaccines that included symptoms similar to the
illness being vaccinated for, so I fail to see the dire need to vaccinate children for these sicknesses.
Certain vaccines are even being associated with causing developmental disabilities like Autism.
Maybe the idea of protecting a child from an uncomfortable illness such as Chicken Pox drives
parents decisions, but all aspects of a vaccine must be addressed be administering it.
When it comes to the issue of childhood health, we all agree that vaccinations are a good
idea. Our views deviate in the small area of vaccinations that are given to children for non-life
threatening illnesses. We as Americans have entered a new age of technology and medicine that is
unprecedented. Clearly the convenience associated with the prevention of illnesses like the Chicken
Pox is obvious, no sick days from school, no time taken off of work, but how beneficial and cost
effective are these vaccines? Of course all mothers desire a healthy, happy childhood for their
offspring, but where should the line be drawn when it comes to a beneficial vaccine or convenience
for parents? Has this country’s increased sense of laziness gravitated as far as our ability to care for
our sick children? If parents continue believing that vaccinating their children will provide them
with a good immune system, they are sadly mistaken.
Vaccinating children for all preventable illnesses is like continuing to eat after you’re
already full. While it may seem like a good idea at the time, are there truly any positive outcomes
in the end? If you are so concerned with your child’s health, maybe the money you’re spending on
needless vaccines could be spent on educating yourself and your child on something more life
threatening, like obesity. While children in this country die everyday from obesity, parents ignore
this disease and spend time and money attempting to avoid everyday illnesses like the Chicken Pox
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and Hepatitis A. The vaccines for these sicknesses are given twice to children while they are young
and cost around $100 a piece without physician and administration costs. Those 400 dollars could
be spent on getting your children involved in athletics or other activities to keep them active, or
purchasing healthier food at the grocery store, lowering their risk for a truly deadly illness like
obesity. We spend so much time trying to prevent the non-life threatening illnesses while we
completely neglect to address the pressing, deadly issue of childhood obesity. For thousands of
years children have endured the chicken pox and other non-life threatening illnesses; why do
parents now feel the need to continuously vaccinate rather than allowing children to be exposed and
giving their immune systems the ability to fight the illness. Ultimately, the antibodies produced
through exposure are stronger than those produced from a vaccine; parents need to allow their
child’s immune system to do it’s job. Many vaccines, like Zostrix, and vaccine for Shingles, are
proven to be 50% effective at most and others like the Chicken Pox vaccine do not guarantee a child
will not contract the illness. If parents continue to remain oblivious to the other aspects of their
child’s health and continue to rely on vaccines, our children will soon reign as the unhealthiest
group of Americans to date. Obesity does not resolve itself over the course of a week like the
Chicken Pox, rather it plagues children for their entire lives. The value we place on our children’s
health must re-evaluated, and parents must begin altering their view points and addressing the
deadly, life threatening illness we ignore on a regular basis rather than placing such great value in
ultimately needless vaccines.