Vaccines save lives, period

The title used to be a self-evident, fact-based truth that many of us (including pediatricians like me) assumed most everybody believed and understood.  Unfortunately, we are now living in an increasingly “post-truth” society where other self-evident and easily verifiable facts are being questioned.  It is generally a good idea to question one’s beliefs and conventional wisdom—especially when new information becomes available.  However, casting doubt on the safety and efficacy of vaccines can and has had deadly consequences.

Just outside our pediatric clinic, we have a statue honoring a child who died from the flu—an illness to which at least one of his parents refused to vaccinate him against.  It is a silent, yet powerful reminder that even common illnesses can be lethal when people aren’t vaccinated.  And while getting a flu shot won’t prevent you from getting the flu, it will significantly reduce the likelihood that you will be hospitalized and/or die from the flu.  

The COVID-19 vaccine has a similar risk-benefit profile to the flu vaccine.  Getting a COVID-19 vaccine won’t prevent you from getting COVID-19, but it will significantly reduce your being hospitalized from serious COVID-19 complications and/or die from this illness.

Because of the use of evidence-based vaccines along with near-unanimous bipartisan political support, measles (a vaccine-preventable illness) was eliminated in the United States in 2000, and we earned a corresponding international designation to that effect.  Because of declining measles vaccination rates and the increase spread and death from measles, the United States may lose that designation just as Canada recently has.  The sad irony is that the measles vaccine, like many others, were discovered in the United States thanks to decades of public investment in research institutes like the National Institutes of Health (NIH).  Even sadder is that NIH staff have been significantly cut over the past several months in an effort to reduce the overall size of the federal workforce.

If you’re reading this, you are likely part of the “choir” to whom I am preaching.  Given that diseases spread regardless of political affiliation or what one believes, we must find ways to engage with those who don’t believe accordingly.  

If you have a medical background and are a person of faith, consider making yourself available (e.g., giving a talk, meeting individually, etc.) with your congregation at your place of worship.  Keeping in mind that most vaccines are given to kids who spend many of their waking hours in school, teachers and administrators can provide evidence-based vaccine information.  This is even more important at private schools as some don’t always follow public school vaccination guidelines.  Parents (who have a medical background) of kids involved in extracurricular activities can be a trusted resource of scientific information to other parents in a non-threatening environment.  Outreach to people who are skeptical about vaccines can come from anybody—regardless of whether they have a professional medical background.  People generally are more likely to listen to someone with whom they have a personal connection regardless of their professional expertise.  

In the end, we all have a role to play to counter the misinformation about vaccinations.  Our collective failure to act can have deadly consequences for us all.