What if some sort of intervention could have prevented 322 million illnesses, 21 million hospitalizations, and 732,000 deaths of United States children since 1994? What if in addition it could save $295 billion in direct costs and $1.38 trillion in total societal costs? How many of us would jump at the chance to make this great of a difference in the lives of our kids? The good news is that according to a recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention such a program does exist and it has done all those great things mentioned in the first sentence above. The bad news is that so many parents are opting out of this intervention.
I am talking, of course, of the Vaccines for Children (VFC) program implemented in 1994, and funded by the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993. This act ensures that children do not contract vaccine-preventable diseases because of inability to pay for vaccine. It has been a remarkable success!
But, in spite of such proven success, many children still go unvaccinated, whether because of caregivers’ religious beliefs, fears of adverse effects or an association with autism, or other personal beliefs. Even full-scale epidemics don’t seem to change vaccination rates. The act was created in response to a measles resurgence in the United States that resulted in approximately 55,000 cases reported during 1989–1991.
Unless you practiced pediatrics before the Hib vaccine was developed you can not estimate how it changed the lives of kids, families, and pediatrics. The first vaccine to protect against Hib diseases was introduced in the United States in 1985; an improved vaccine was licensed two years later. The vaccines against Hib disease are inactivated vaccines and contain only a part of the Hib bacterium and can not give you the disease!
Hib is a bacteria that causes most all of the cases of bacterial meningitis in pre-school kids. In 1980 there were and estimated 20,000 cases in the US every
year. Ten years later the rate had fallen my more than 99%! Pediatricians in training today are unlikely to see a case in all their years of practice. It is, or now I should say, “was”, a very serious disease with a high mortality and lots of very serious complications and after effects. It was a pediatricians nightmare which kept many of us awake long after a parent called about a child with fever.
When I started practice the vaccine had not been developed and we had many cases of Hib meningitis in our little town every year. A few years after the vaccine was introduced Hib meningitis all but disappeared! Most medical doctors, including me, call this vaccine the biggest medical break through in the 20th century!
Of course there still are cases of bacterial meningitis caused by the Meningococcal bacterial, but these cases are not common and are decreasing because of the use of a new, effective vaccine which prevents this dreaded disease.
I had not intended this to be a treatise on meningitis, I just want to stress the miracle of disease prevention by use of vaccines. Polio, measles, rubella, and mumps are just some of the diseases we can prevent. I have never seen a case of diphtheria, tetanus, or small pox. All these, often fatal diseases, are all but non existent in our country and small pox has been eradicated from the world by immunizations.
I know that I am sentized by the importance of vaccines because when I was a grade school kid my aunt had polio at the age of 25. She spent time in an “Iron lung”, and the next 50 years in a wheel chair. Thanks God for her saint of a husband who loved her enough to care for her all those years. At her funeral he filled everyone’s eyes with tears when he said. “Today she is walking in heaven!”
I know there are people who do not support immunizations; they simply do not know how vaccines work. I am not going to go in to all the details just trust me like you would your hair dresser. Vaccines saves thousands of lives every year. Flu vaccine won’t give you the flu, Measles vaccine won’t make your child autistic, no vaccines cause leukemia, the HPV vaccine to prevent cervical cancer will not make your daughter or son sexually promiscuous, and when a vaccine for AIDS is developed it will not make your son or daughter gay.
Thanks for getting your kids immunized, and if someone tells you vaccines are unsafe, don’t argue, just walk away like you would if they told you not to keep your kid in a car seat. People like that are not capable of changing their minds, just move along and continue to be the best parent you can be! Your kids will thank you, your community will thank you, the world will thank you, and so will I! Thanks parents for doing a great job!