Global Policy Issue: Childhood Vaccinations
Summary
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has listed immunizations as the number one greatest public health achievement in the 20th century. This attainment towards the goal of health and safety is a huge success for not only our country but from the global perspective as well. Immunizations help to prevent illness and death from vaccine-preventable diseases. The World Health Organization states that global vaccination coverage has remained consistent for the past few years; for example, the percentage of infants fully vaccinated against diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis has held secure at 83%. Programs for population-wide vaccinations have helped with the annihilation of polio in America since the late 1970’s, the eradication of smallpox, and the control of numerous other infectious diseases in the United States and other parts of the world.
Problem
Despite such documented success we are still witnessing the deadly impact of vaccine preventable diseases. Millions of preventable cases of disease and death are still occurring in low and middle-income countries where disease burdens are often the highest. The time lag in the introduction of new vaccines between high-income and low-income countries has been a major issue. Some vaccines are introduced in high-income countries a full year before they are introduced to low-income countries where disease burdens are rapidly growing.
Solution
The Global Vaccine Action Plan is a framework approved by the World Health Assembly. This action plan is the product of the Decade of Vaccines Collaboration. The main focus of this framework is to deliver universal access to immunization by the year 2020 regardless of where the person is born, w...
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...eeds and constraints. Research and development is underway to provide non-syringe delivery mechanisms and thermostable vaccines that will make the vaccines less expensive, more effective and much easier for the manufacturer to deliver. Research will help in achieving the understanding of the adverse effects from vaccines and the ways to avoid them without compromising the product. Safety concerns have shown to cause hesitancy in the use of vaccination. It is important to ensure that everyone receives the safest vaccines. In view of this the Global Vaccine Safety Blueprint “represents an attempt to leverage international commitment and to set out a framework for coordinated action that will raise the level and accuracy of vaccine safety monitoring globally” (Global Vaccine Safety Blueprint, 2012). This blueprint will help monitor and assure the safe use of vaccines.
Health care policies are put into place regarding childhood immunization requirements for schools, along with information on obtaining religious exemptions. Each state and/or country develops their own individualized guidelines through interactions with federal and state government agencies. One in five babies around the world are missing out on basic vaccines and may die from weak health systems and insufficient funding. UNICEF and its partners are working to change these numbers and ensure that all children are successfully protected with vaccines.
Atkinson, William. Epidemiology and Prevention of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases. Washington: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1996.
The article’s information is presented with the goal of informing a reader on vaccines. The evidence is statistical and unbiased, showing data on both side effects and disease prevention, providing rates of death and serious illness from both sides. This evidence is sourced from a variety of medical organizations and seems reliable, logical, and easily understood, no language that would inspire an emotional response is used. The validity of studies is not mentioned in the article, but it does encourage readers to investigate further to help make a decision. The article allows a reader to analyze the presented evidence and come to their own
“Vaccinations are causing a major upsurge in childhood diseases, adult maladies, and even deadly ailments such as Gulf War Syndrome and Lou Gehrig’s disease” (Blaylock). Every now and then an individual’s doctor calls telling them about the latest vaccine they should receive. The person immediately schedules a time to come in and get it done. But do they even give a second thought about it? Have they ever thought that maybe they do not need another vaccination? Many people have not taken the time to seriously think about the process of immunization. The truth is, there are many dangers that the average person should be unaware of. Rarely do vaccines actually accomplish what the public has been told. In fact, a lot of vaccines contain harmful substances that have been linked to disorders such as autism. The lack of education and dishonesty from doctors are putting people in danger of health problems without even realizing. Many parents feel obligated for their children to get vaccinated because of school, not knowing they have the alternative option of refusing immunization.
Vaccines have been used to prevent diseases for centuries, and have saved countless lives of children and adults. The smallpox vaccine was invented as early as 1796, and since then the use of vaccines has continued to protect us from countless life threatening diseases such as polio, measles, and pertussis. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (2010) assures that vaccines are extensively tested by scientist to make sure they are effective and safe, and must receive the approval of the Food and Drug Administration before being used. “Perhaps the greatest success story in public health is the reduction of infectious diseases due to the use of vaccines” (CDC, 2010). Routine immunization has eliminated smallpox from the globe and led to the near removal of wild polio virus. Vaccines have reduced some preventable infectious diseases to an all-time low, and now few people experience the devastating effects of measles, pertussis, and other illnesses.
Mumps, Measles, Whooping Cough, Smallpox, Polio and, Diphtheria are all deadly diseases that were once a death sentence to children and adults around the world, but there is something that can help combat these fatal diseases. Vaccinations can change the course of these lethal diseases, but some families are still refusing to vaccinate the future of the world. Vaccinations can not only be beneficial to the child itself but to rest of humanity as well. There is evidence that goes against false claims bashing vaccination and the positive effects of vaccination overrule all of the negative. Vaccination can have a positive effect on the world due to its life-saving properties, effects on humanity and the extensive amount of safety and care that
Immunisation is the safest and most effective way of protecting against disease. The first program of immunisation in Australia was proposed in 1924 with the mass immunisation of diphtheria antitoxin in Victoria (Australian Government Department of Health – Immunisation Australia Program, 2014). Since then, vaccinations have protected residents of Australia from life-threatening infections and diseases, increased life expectancy, and their vital role of immunity maintains health and wellbeing in our global society, as vaccines are estimated to prevent over 6 million deaths worldwide annually (J Enreth, 2013).
Diseases such as the flu, meningitis, hepatitis B and tetanus are rather serious, and have become common. For this reason, the common corresponding vaccinations for each illness along with a possible few others should now become mandatory, as doing so will be effective not only personally, but to an entire society. By receiving vaccinations one can easily improve and preserve his or her health as well as children and those around them.
Vaccinations have significantly reduced the disease rate throughout the world. Usually, vaccines prove to be between 90 and 99 percent effective. This reduces disease and mortality rate by thousands every year (Jolley and Douglas 1). On average, vaccines save the lives of 33,000 innocent children every year (“Vaccines” 1). In addition, if a vaccinated child did contract the vaccine’s targeted illness, that child would, in general, have more mild symptoms than an unvaccinated child that contracts the same illness. These vaccinated children will have less serious complications if they do contract the disease; they will be much more treatable, and have a lower risk of death (Jolley and Douglas 2). The risks of not vaccinating greatly outweigh the small risks of vaccination. Diseases like measles and mumps can cause permanent disability. While there i...
The federal government should require children to be vaccinated because it saves lives, time and money and protect others. Childhood vaccinations save lives in the interest of it protects against diseases and it eliminates dangerous diseases, also prevents future diseases. Getting childhood vaccinations as kids can save time and money, considering it will prevent high medical mills and it won’t delay their schooling. Childhood vaccinations protect others from getting a disease and their families and protects the teacher from also catching a disease.
In recent years, the correlation between vaccines and autism has become the subject of much debate. On one side, there are the anti-vaccinators, or anti-vaccers. On the other, there’s pretty much everyone else. Despite the fact that the anti-vaccination movement has little base in scientific fact, their campaign to end early infanthood vaccinations rages on. While doctors and scientists try desperately to make parents look at the research studies, vaccination rates continue to fall. But, even in these dark times, there is still hope that scientific fact will prevail and defeat the anti-vaccination fear mongers who have caused many children to fall ill and even die because their parents did not properly vaccinate them. This is one of the most saddening scientific failures of the twenty-first century. A failure to educate the public properly has resulted in child, even infant, fatalities. The anti-vaccination movement was started based on falsified data and continues only because of a lack of knowledge and proper education of the general public.
With the advancement of technology lies mishaps and slip-ups emerging from continuous experimental factors that are being force manipulated. These stem from non-stable results of automation. Even though many doctorate mechanics have molded the path for medical amelioration, unsteady ground remains prevalent. Through these understandings, one can ask, have vaccines proven to provide beneficial aspects, improving the lives of people, or are they unknowingly harming us with questionable material and reasoning? Vaccinations affects adults and children regarding their safety and health, such as, the process of developing, that includes psychological and behavioral adaptations, through the study of past experiments.
The CDC works closely with public health agencies and private partners in order to improve and sustain immunization coverage and to monitor the safety of vaccines so that public ...
“Vaccines have contributed to a significant reduction in many childhood infectious diseases, such as diphtheria, measles, and Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib). Some infectious diseases, such as polio and smallpox, have been eliminated in the United States due to effective vaccines. It is now rare for children in the United States to experience the devastating and often deadly effects of these diseases that were once common in the United States and other countries with high vaccination coverage” (U.S. Food & Drug).
Vaccines are safe because of the high safety standards and protocols they must pass through before being administered to the public. Today, new vaccines must first go through numerous tests by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) which usually takes several years, and then the FDA decides if the vaccine is safe for human trials (“Vaccine Safety”). After the FDA approves the new vaccine for human testing, clinical trials take place, usually involving thousands of volunteers (“Vaccine Safety”). Once the vaccine proves to be potent, pure and sterile, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) must recommend it for public use. There are multiple monitoring systems in place that track the vaccine when released to the public, and these