The argument on whether or not you should vaccinate your kids has been around for a very long time. As soon as last year, it seemed as if the argument had finally dissipated and been removed from public website forums. However, Facebook and other sites are once again stirring the pot. So, I would like to tell you that you SHOULD vaccinate your children.

First, I want to make clear to you that vaccines do NOT cause autism. Research over the years has continually shown that vaccines are not responsible for autism, and the fact people still adopt this theory is crazy. There are few situations in which vaccines have been linked to disease or mental illness, but in many of the cases the condition was actually pre-existing and the specific vaccine just acted as an ignitor, or trigger for the condition. Even then, these odds for contracting these conditions are slim and the vaccines themselves are not actually causing the disease.

One argument I hear a lot is that there is no need to vaccinate your kids for something that has been eradicated from the U.S. for many years (ex: Polio). However, there is never such a thing as being too safe. Many diseases, including yellow fever, have been known to appear and disappear in waves. It is better to vaccinate than have your kids randomly contract polio.

A lot of the other vaccines people are presented with are very helpful. TDAP prevents three things, the two important ones being Tetanus and Pertussis (whooping cough), two diseases still somewhat prevalent in the population. Both are fatal in the right situations, and young children die from Pertussis every year because they cannot catch their breath. HPV is another common vaccine, one that is present for teenagers. Many men carry HPV unknowingly and many women contract a strain of it upon their first sexual encounter. If a certain strain of HPV is contracted, women can suffer from cervical cancer and other complications. The point of all this random information is that the diseases, viruses, and conditions that are we have vaccines against are still prevalent and relevant.

One thing that really worries people about vaccines is the fact that they can carry live versions of the virus. Some people are concerned that the virus being prevented is in the vaccine at all. Basically, the way the immune system works is that certain immune cells are responsible for marking foreign substances and signaling them for destruction. Other cells then hunt out these foreign substances and swallow them whole. One important part of the immune response, which is the reason we do not usually present the body with symptoms of the same disease twice, is memory cells. Memory cells remember the foreign substance so that when it enters the body again, the immune response can initiate quicker. By presenting virus in vaccines, the vaccines are allowing the immune system to essentially memorize what the virus is like. Because of this, post-vaccination, the virus may enter your body but you will not have any symptoms or actually contract the virus because the immune response will kick in before it can actually attack your body. This is why you are considered “vaccinated” or “immune” to a disease.

Lastly, vaccinating your children protects everyone else’s children. If you have not heard of it, “Herd Immunity” is a term you need to learn. Herd immunity relates to vaccines and says that as more people in a population or area are vaccinated, you are increasing the protection from said virus for those that are not vaccinated. If you are interested, watch this video:

The basics of the video say that the higher number of people in a population that are vaccinated, the more you prevent the spread of disease in a population. This idea is very important for children and people that do not have the ability to be vaccinated or have not been vaccinated for any of a myriad of reasons. I know what I’m about to say seems pretty tough to think about, and I promise it is not fully measurable: but, there is a chance that if you or your children are not vaccinated, you could be responsible for giving someone an infection that leads to their deaths. So, PLEASE vaccinate yourself and your children, not to only protect yourself and your children, but also your fellow community members.

As far as my thinking goes, and many fellow scientists and citizens are concerned, there is absolutely no reason to not vaccinate your children. All vaccines are tested repeatedly and all trial stages are presided over by ethical boards. Just vaccinate your children so that you children and your friends’ children are protected, please. And please, when you read scientific articles, remember that correlation and causation are not the same things. Vaccines can be positively correlated with autism without causing them. If you don't believe me, remember that the number of people that drown by falling into a pool is positively correlated with films Nicholas Cage appears in. Here is a bunch of other faulty correlations you can't trust to prove to you that vaccines and autism can be correlated without having one being the cause of the other:

http://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations