Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Sara Harbin
UWRT 1103
November 7, 2019
We all know someone who refuses to get the flu shot every year. Either because they’re
afraid they’ll get sick, or they’re just afraid of needles. This phenomenon isn’t something out of
the ordinary but what about the people who aren’t vaccinated for diseases such as measles.
Although it may seem like only children in third world countries are not getting the medical care
they need, there are children in the United States who have parents that are refusing to get them
vaccinated. This new “trend” that parents are partaking in is called the Anti-Vaccination
movement.
These parents who are choosing to not vaccinate their kids believe that they are doing
what is best for them, even though countless medical articles prove them wrong. Not vaccinating
your children does more harm than good and the research goes to show that. And yet the trend of
toddlers not getting vaccinated is going up. We are bringing back to life diseases that we have
already fought off, for no apparent reason. There are some people who choose not to vaccinate
for religious reasons, which is understandable, but what is hard to understand are the people who
choose not vaccinate because they are afraid for the child’s safety. This issue needs to be put to
No, they do not. And yet many people including college-educated individuals still believe
that vaccines will give your child Autism. Why is this? Andrew Wakefield’s 1998 study that
claimed that the combined measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine (MMR), caused autism.
Wakefield conducted a study of 12 children who received the MMR vaccine 10 of which were
later diagnosed with Autism. This statistic put together by Wakefield shocked parents
worldwide, who now thought that the reason that their kid has a neurological disease is because
of a vaccine. And even though Wakefield’s study never claims a relationship between Autism
and the MMR vaccine, as soon as he put those two in the same chart, there was no going back.
Parents started to try to find ways to avoid the MMR vaccine: taking the measles,
mumps, and rubella vaccines separately, avoiding any combined vaccinations or just stopping
you know anything about conducting research or creating an experiment, you can already tell
there are some major issues with Wakefield’s study. With only 12 kids and no control group,
there is no way to tell if the results he is getting are accurate. Once this “study” was analyzed by
other medical professionals, it was quickly disproven and Wakefield eventually lost all
credibility and his medical license. But the effects of this study are still going on today, with
You can’t get autism from getting vaccinated, but you can die from not getting
vaccinated. Since diseases like Measles have been so far removed from the present society, we
have all forgotten how brutal of a disease it can be. Measles can lead to pneumonia, encephalitis,
neurological problems, and more, especially when it occurs in young children. A parent should
be doing anything to protect their child and keep them from getting sick, not avoiding what they
think is harmful to their child, with their zero medical experience. This thought that risking
getting measles or mumps or rubella is better than autism is also a dangerous thought process.
Thinking that you would rather risk your child being hospitalized than having a mental disorder
It may seem like common sense to just vaccinate your kids, the people telling you to get
vaccinated are doctors. You would think that everyone would just automatically give their baby
all the shots they need, but there is an actual thought process behind those parents who aren’t
vaccinating. As Jennifer Reich says in her interview with David Green, “What I find is that
parents see each and every vaccine as a different kind of choice … they want to be able to tailor
what they see as what's most important to their own child,” which basically means that parents
aren’t completely avoiding vaccines, just the ones they perceive as not necessary. Parents
obviously want to feel in control of their kid’s life, especially their young kids, and not
The information from Andrew Wakefield’s study is still running through society today
and parents still chose to believe it. This especially rings true for parents who know someone
with autism or who already have a child with autism. Parents are afraid to face the reality that
autism is a challenge to live with but it is not a preventable disease. And as a parent, you want to
be able to do anything to prevent your child from being harmed so even though you may be
causing more harm for your child by not vaccinating, the intentions behind it are pure. It should
be common knowledge that there will be no harm from getting your child vaccinated in order to
You might be thinking right now, “So what, who cares if their kids aren’t vaccinated, it’s
none of my business,” but I’m here to tell you everyone should care about this issue. Even if you
are vaccinated, there is still a risk that you may get something like measles, if others around you
are not vaccinated and are spreading the disease. According to the Center for Disease Control
(CDC), in 2016 less than 90% of kids were being vaccinated, a statistic that should concern you.
The more children who are not being vaccinated the higher the likelihood of a disease break-out,
even if the majority of people are vaccinated. You as an individual should be pushing for
everyone to be vaccinated, from children and adults in third-world countries to the children who
may live across the street from you. Everyone deserves the best medical care and by allowing
this Anti-Vaccination movement to continue, we are causing harm for future generations. In this
day and age, the least of our worries should be vaccines that have been proven time and again to
have worked.
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from getting the disease before they even come into contact with the disease is amazing when
you think about it, so you could see why vaccinations could seem too good to be true. But the
truth is that the benefits of vaccines far outweigh the drawbacks. Even if you still believe that
getting vaccinated causes autism, which is better a dead child or an autistic child? Not to be
harsh but that is the reality you are choosing if you do not vaccinate your kid. Not vaccinating
can either lead to serious illness and a long stay in the hospital or death. There is no perceived
benefit of not vaccinating your kid, other than maybe making you feel more in control of your
child’s medical care. You should go and vaccinate your child, today, because it does not only
Works Cited
Bhandari, Smitha. “Are Vaccinations Linked To Autism? The Latest Science Explained.”
2019.
Godlee, Fiona, et al. “Wakefield's Article Linking MMR Vaccine and Autism Was Fraudulent.”
Green, David. “Why Aren't Parents Getting Their Children Vaccinated?” Weekend Edition.
https://www.npr.org/2019/04/29/718165015/why-arent-parents-getting-their-kids-vaccina
Hussain, Azhar, Syed Ali, Madiha Ahmed, and Sheharyar Hussain. “The Anti-vaccination
https://www.aappublications.org/news/2018/10/11/vaccinationrates101118, Accessed 7
Nov. 2019.
“Measles Complications.” Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease
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Rao, T S Sathyanarayana, and Chittaranjan Andrade. “The MMR Vaccine and Autism:
“Vaccination Coverage Among Children Aged 19–35 Months - United States, 2016.” Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2 Nov.