To Vaccinate or Not to Vaccinate

Once, a long time ago, I remember having a conversation with my dad about vaccinations. Now, you might think this was a strange topic of conversation for a dad and his little girl, but he was a GP, so it was not necessarily unusual for us to have conversations about things like this with each other. I have to say, though, I was rather young for a discussion about the MMR scare. I knew that MMR stood for measles, mumps and rubella but did not really understand much more than that they were something which made people sick. I was just old enough to take away two key points; that the man who caused the MMR scare was bad and that people who did not get the MMR vaccine were silly. That was the professional opinion of my dad in my younger self’s not so professional words. For years I never really thought much more of it; it didn’t affect me and as far as I was concerned, people nowadays just got their jabs and that was that, so when stories about the so called ‘anti-vaxxers’ in America came into the news, I could not quite believe that people were still talking about an argument which, in my mind, had been disproven so long ago - yet they were.

In recent years, there has been rising concern surrounding the implementation of immunisation programmes, prompting several countries to make changes to their legislation regarding vaccination requirements. Roughly eleven countries from the European Union now have mandatory vaccination requirements including France, Italy and Greece who have recently increased the number of vaccines required. Greece currently has the highest number of mandatory vaccines at 14 while France’s requirements increased in 2018 from three to 11. Most countries which impose obligatory vaccinations include immunisation against such diseases as diphtheria, tetanus, polio, pertussis (whooping cough), measles, mumps and rubella. With the number of cases of measles rising throughout Europe and the United States of America, other countries like Britain and Germany, where immunisation of any kind is voluntary though highly recommended, are considering making changes to their own laws.

As the situation stands, in countries where vaccinations are not mandatory, people (especially children) who are unable to be immunised, be it for medical or religious grounds, rely on herd immunity. This August, however, the UK lost its measles-free status from the World Health Organisation (WHO) after reaching the target three years ago and at the end of September the Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced that he had made enquiries into legal advice on the situation, saying that there was a very strong case for enforcing immunisation in some way or other. Meanwhile in America, the anti-vaxxers have been spreading and popularising their own views on the dangers of vaccinations through social media and celebrities who have come out in support of the anti-vaccination movements have only exacerbated the situation. Over the course of 2019 1,249 cases of measles were reported with 22 outbreaks occurring mainly in the state of New York. America too is now on the brink of losing its measles free status.

So why do people decide against having their child immunised? To many it would seem irresponsible and unkind. Why would you put your child at risk of catching a potentially life-threatening disease which, even if they are not in danger of death, is painful and scary? For the most part it stems from peer pressure coming from other misinformed parents and support groups. The pressure felt, both self-imposed and from outside sources, by new parents to do everything absolutely perfectly, is extreme. The onus is on you to make sure this tiny human being gets the best start in life so it is understandable that if you come across other parents vehemently arguing for their anti-vaccine views, a small seed of doubt can easily flourish into misgivings serious enough for you to decide against vaccinating your child at all. One of the most high-profile vaccine controversies was sparked by an article by Dr Andrew Wakefield published in The Lancet medical journal in 1998. The paper argued that there was proof of a correlation between the MMR vaccine (Measles, Mumps and Rubella) and the occurrence of autism in children. Although an investigation in 2004 by the Sunday Times showed that the original paper was actually invalid due to several serious conflicts of interest on the part of Dr Wakefield, there was a lot of damage done to the reputation of the MMR vaccine. Despite Wakefield’s paper being discredited, his licence being revoked by the General Medical Council in 2010, and an absence of any credible evidence whatsoever linking vaccines and autism, the myth that vaccines and autism are related has persisted.

Furthermore, the decrease in vaccination rates is actually a result of their own successes. Those who are opposed to vaccines have most probably never experienced these diseases due to the very procedures they refuse to get for their children. Having grown up in a world where vaccines are the norm, they have forgotten that, if one survives, diseases like measles can result in serious defects such as deafness, blindness and complications from encephalitis (swelling of the brain) for the rest of a person’s life. When faced with the apparent choice between autism and diseases which can mostly be cured, these parents are choosing the diseases, unfamiliar with the potential consequences of their actions.

It is easy for us to scoff at the anti-vaxxers if, like my father, you know the facts and the science behind the vaccines. For the majority, they are scared parents who are trying to do the best for their children but who are listening to the wrong advice. In our world of fake news and alternative fact, it is no wonder that they choose the wrong people to believe. Not only have they been fooled by the hearsay and conjecture which fills the internet, they are often very adamant about their views. The fact is that there are many people with anti-vaccine views whose opinions will not be changed and they are putting others at risk. The key to vaccine success on a huge scale is herd immunity and these people could potentially cause a serious public health crisis if they are allowed to continue to propagate their views and encourage other new parents to make decisions based on false information with no response from the government. As such, in order to protect the health of the general public, creating legislation to make immunisation mandatory is the best way forward and Britain should follow the lead of countries where vaccines are now a legal requirement. There are several ways to do this, such as implementing a fine or, for example, in some countries such as France, vaccinations are now a pre-requisite for school enrolment. Their message is clear – no vaccine, no school. These diseases can be too dangerous to allow the opinions of a minority to harm the health of the majority and schools are already a hotbed of germs and infection as it is. Some parents argue from a libertarian standpoint that a legal requirement for vaccinations is an infringement of one’s human rights, but one does not have the right to put another in harm’s way: in not vaccinating your child you are doing just that.