A Medical Boon, Or A Religious Sin?
- The Youth's Lens
- Jan 23, 2019
- 2 min read
Immunization prevents 2 to 3 million deaths each year. Yet, the percentage of 2-year-olds who have never received a single vaccination has quadrupled since 2001, reaching 1.3 percent of children born in 2015 according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
It is true that a small fraction of the world’s population are advised against receiving vaccinations because of their severe allergies or damaged immune system, but the number of people that fall under this category have been steadily decreasing over the years. However, the excuse of religious exemption has increased instead.
The worry of having ‘chemicals’ injected into their child’s body has been proven to be one of the major reasons why most parents decide to not vaccinate their children, as they claim that the human body is ‘sacred’, and should only be healed by ‘God’ or through natural means.
Most parents who are anti-vaccinations often brag about how their children are 100% healthy even without having had a single vaccination in their life. However, they forget that the only reason why their child hasn’t been a victim of a life threatening disease so far, is not because they haven’t been vaccinated, but because they are leeching off the benefits of herd immunity from the vaccinated society around them. They also often disregard the fact that by remaining unvaccinated, not only are their kids vulnerable to diseases that have been close to eradicated thanks to vaccinations, like measles and influenza, they are also dangerous to the health of those who don’t have an immune system strong enough to receive vaccinations.
Contrary to popular belief, homeopathy is not and cannot be an alternative to vaccination, and there hasn’t been any evidence, as stated by the NHS, to prove that it can protect one from illnesses and diseases. Moreover, it is a myth and a false rumour that vaccination can cause autism, as there hasn’t ever been scientific evidence supporting the link between the MMR vaccine and autism, as said by the World Health Organization. Although there was a study published in 1988 which started this rumour, it was quickly taken down by the journal that published it as it was found to be immensely flawed.
So tell me, is it more important for you to increase your daughter’s risks of having cervical cancer because you thought that she wouldn’t need the HPV vaccine? Is it more important for your son to never be able to walk again because he has polio, a disease that could have been easily avoided by receiving the polio vaccine? Would you really rather your child die from a completely preventable disease, and pose as a threat to other children and people who had no choice, but to remain unvaccinated because of valid medical reasons? Let’s stop clouding our judgement with unscientific information and rumours from unreliable websites, and get ourselves, and our children vaccinated from the diseases of the past.
Written by Nandini SInha
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