Children are one of God's best gifts to people, as watching their children grow is one of
the best pleasures people enjoy during their life course. For this reason, parents must
take good care of their children during their early years, as they are vulnerable to many
diseases due to their weak immunity. There are many diseases, infecting children, that
may lead to death such as the polio disease. Scientists found a solution to this problem,
by injecting a tiny sample of the virus into the child's blood, in order to stimulate the
immune system to fight the disease if the child catches it, which is known as
vaccination. However, McTaggart contradicts this by pointing out that vaccination
problems far outweigh those of going unvaccinated (1). Therefore, there are many
questions concerning the safety and effectiveness of vaccines as opposed to those of
going unvaccinated.
Vaccines can cause complications that are more harmful than those of going unvaccinated
or even the disease itself. Professor of epidemiology at the university of Washington,
Dr Russell Alexander, points out that the panel set up to determine the risks of
vaccination did not compare it to those of being unvaccinated (qtd in Miller 9). This
means that the research done by the panel, which proved vaccination risks to be 'too
small to count', contains many weaknesses. McTaggart links the appearance of learning
disabilities, autism, and hyperactivity to the beginning of the mass vaccination programs
(1). Thus, vaccination is directly related to many diseases, in which some are still
unknown. McTaggart adds that the mumps vaccine has proved to be a direct cause of
seizures, meningitis, deafness, and encephalitis. (6). These are extremely dangerous and
unrecoverable diseases. Dr J Anthony Morris, an immunization specialist formerly of
America's 'National Institutes of Health' and 'Food and Drug Administration' says that
"In several of the studies, the measles vaccine strain has been recovered from the spines
of the victims, showing conclusively that the vaccine caused the encephalitis" (qtd in
McTaggart. 5). Thus, this doctor as a medical authority relates the measles vaccine to a
deadly disease such as the encephalitis. On the other hand, the risks of catching the
disease for unvaccinated children are similar, if not less, to the risks of developing
harmful complications due to the vaccine. Therefore, vaccination is more risky to your
child than going unvaccinated.
In addition to the safety problems, vaccines have also proven to be ineffective among
many children. McTaggart reasons the current debate about vaccination to the fact that
measles portion of the triple shot is not working (2). This means that children who
receive the triple shot, called MMR, which is a short hand for measles, mumps, and
rubella, are not completely immune against these diseases. McTaggart adds that the cases
of measles are increasing exponentially during the last decade (2). Similar to measles,
McTaggart states that rubella's portion of the vaccine showed failure in preventing this
fatal disease (3). Therefore, the fact that vaccination is not effective is common in
many diseases. According to the 'Centers for Disease Control Morbidity and Mortality' in
1985, about 80 percent of measles cases occurring to children in America were in
vaccinated ones who were vaccinated in an appropriate age (McTaggart 3). Therefore,
generally vaccination is ineffective against most diseases.
Vaccine supporters defend vaccines claiming that it caused a reduction in the number of
disease cases among children upon its invention. However, this claim is wrong, as it
lacks an important side, which is was the number of disease among children increasing or
decreasing before the vaccine invention. By reviewing the child disease history before
vaccine's invention, we see that the number of child-disease cases was already decreasing
before the invention of vaccines. Nowadays, the number of child-disease cases are
beginning to grow again due to the increasing use of vaccines. Vaccines are not the
reason for the decreasing number of child-disease cases, as it is steadily increasing
nowadays.
Therefore, vaccinated children face more problems than the unvaccinated ones. Vaccination
is hazardous to the child's health and could cause even greater complications than those
of the disease itself. In addition to safety problems, vaccination has proved to be
ineffective against many diseases such as measles and rubella to name some of them.
Besides, Castro infers in "House and Home" magazine, that childhood illness gives the
child's immunity a chance to develop stronger and more resistant to diseases (24). Thus,
it is a kind of training for the immune system of the child against diseases. Therefore,
vaccination should be abolished, for it is not safe nor it is effective against many
diseases.
Bibliography
Castro, Miranda. "Measles, Mumps, Chickenpox, The natural way to nurse them.". House and
Home Apr. 1994:
24-25.
McTaggart, Lynne. The WDDTY vaccination handbook.
Miller, Susan Katz. "Vaccination risks are 'too small to count'. ". New Scientist 25
Sept. 1993: 9.
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