Vaccines : A More Influential Achievement Than The Development Of The Last Century

The debate about vaccines has been going on since the development of the first vaccine. By understanding how Dr. Jenner developed the first vaccine and how vaccines have impacted society as a whole, one can gain insight into their importance. Vaccine safety concerns are on the rise, but researchers are attempting to ease worries by providing facts and clarity on the subject of vaccines. Knowing the facts about vaccines is important for one to recognize misinformation and poor logic as well as the misinterpretation of existing information about health concerns associated with vaccines. Because of these health and safety concerns, many parents question the benefits of vaccines.

In the book, “Survival of the Sickest”, Sharon Moalem forms the basis of how vaccine originated to become a way of combatting the most dangerous diseases in the world. It began with a discovery from a man named Edward Jenner, a doctor from Gloucestershire county in England, where he began to understand a strange pattern when people who were immune to cowpox were struggling with smallpox and vice-versa. He started to test his findings through a small experiment where he injected cow pox into a group of young children and he was surprised to see that their bodies built immunity towards smallpox and supported his findings on the bizarre immunity of people towards either the smallpox or the cowpox but not to both. The rest of the chapter explains complex concepts

First, in 1796, a doctor named Edward Jenner performed the very first vaccination. “Taking pus from a cowpox lesion on a milkmaid’s hand, Jenner inoculated an eight-year-old boy, James Phipps. Six weeks later Jenner variolated two sites on Phipps ' arm with smallpox, yet the boy was unaffected by this as well as subsequent exposures” (Minna & Markel, 2005)& (Cave, 2008). The first vaccination allowed people to recognize that it was beneficial for their health. It provided the base for the rest of the variations of vaccinations to come. Vaccinations began with the notion that it is rooted in the science of immunology. Throughout history, there have been many variations of this first vaccine for things such as small pox, mumps, malaria and guinea worm. (The College of Physicians of Philadelphia, n.d.)

The history of vaccinations begin with Edward Jenner, the country doctor from Gloucestershire who found, growing on cows, a nearly harmless virus the protected people from smallpox. Jenner’s vaccine was safer, more reliable, and more durable than variolation, and it is still the only vaccine to have eliminated its reason for being-in 1980, when the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the disease extinct. For nearly a century and a half, smallpox was the only vaccine routinely administered, and it saved millions of lives . But the controversy that marked the return of the vaccine, amid bioterrorism hysteria in 2002, was only the latest twist in the remarkable, mysterious life of vaccines.

In the recent years, vaccines have been in the center of many heated debates. The main one seems to be, are they causing other illnesses in the process of eliminating others? Many parents in the last four years have started opting their children out of the required vaccines right from birth. This has lead to a rise in infectious and contagious disease outbreaks all over the United States and the rest of the world.

Mandatory vaccination continues to be a contentious subject in the United States, even though extensive evidence proves inoculation prevents certain diseases. According to A. Plotkin & L. Plotkin (2011), the evolution of the first vaccine commenced in the 1700’s when a physician named Edwards Jenner discovered that cowpox protected individuals from one of the deadliest diseases termed smallpox. The precise virus Jenner used is unclear; however, it was espoused in the extermination of smallpox worldwide. The researchers further explained, the unearthing of the subsequent vaccine known as chicken cholera occurred approximately 80 years later by Louise Pasteur. Ever since, copious vaccines such as rabies, yellow fever, varicella, pneumococcal, mumps and recently HPV have been introduced.

When one is given a vaccine, the body’s immune system fights the disease or virus causing the body to become immune to the disease. Before vaccines, the only way to become immune to a disease was too simply contract the disease and hopefully live with no serious side effects or passing on the potentially deadly illness or dangers in a wide-spread epidemic. Vaccinations have been saving lives for over 200 years now. Below is a chart showing the successful impact vaccinations have had in the United States.

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

One could say a total nightmare for one’s new born child would be having the baby infected with a harmful disease. Today, children and adults of different races and generations are becoming victims of communicable diseases. Fortunately, an English doctor named Edward Jenner developed the first ever vaccine in 1796 that could stop the infection of a disease. A vaccine is a biological product that is made from insignificant extents of dead or weak microorganisms that can cause a disease, which helps humans or other animals develop immunities that protect them from one or more diseases (“Vaccines”). Countless children across the globe are given these vaccinations to stay clear and safe of any infectious virus. However, there are people who are concerned and question the safety of vaccinations. Due to some people being against

Throughout history, it has been shown that vaccines make a significant impact on the health of our communities and “administration of these vaccines led to dramatic reduction in the number of cases of, as well as deaths from smallpox, polio, diphtheria, pertussis, measles, mumps and preventable diseases” (Jacobson, 2012, p.36). Generally, those involved in campaigns for and research in these preventable diseases attribute vaccines for children as the main contributing factor to the overall decline in diseases such as measles, mumps, smallpox and pertussis (Jacobson, 2012). In the public health setting, there are many issues that threaten the health and safety of the public, not just in the local community but the nation and world-wide. One such issue, surfacing in public health, is the issue of vaccinations; those who choose to vaccinate, those who choose not to vaccinate and those who do not

Measles. Polio. Smallpox. The flu. Imagine the world when vaccines were yet to be created. There was a time when people lived in fear of dreadful diseases. Thanks to the introduction of vaccines, many of those devastating diseases have been nearly or completely wiped out. Despite these results, for some people, the question remains: should we vaccinate? Today, I will be discussing the development of the first vaccine, global benefits, and the anti-vaccine movement.

Despite significant progress in the fight against preventable disease, millions still die needlessly each year. According to UNICEF, originally known as the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund, a vaccine preventable disease is responsible for 2 million fatal infections worldwide each year. About 75% of these deaths occur in children under five years of age. (N) In more vivid terms, UNICEF notes that vaccine-preventable diseases kill a child every 20 seconds. (D) Due to high rates of childhood vaccination, the United States has experienced a dramatic reduction in such deaths. A comparison of the years 1950 and 2010 clearly illustrates the benefits of vaccinations. During this 60-year period, deaths from diphtheria reduced from 410 to 0, tetanus from 336 to 3, pertussis from 1,118 to 26, and polio from 1,904 to 0. Measles deaths dropped from 468 in 1950 to 0 in 2008, the last year a United States death rate was recorded. It’s not surprising that vaccinations have been touted as one of the top ten health achievements of the 20th century by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Millions of people around the world die because of diseases that have cures, but this can all be changed if there was a better way of administering these cures and vaccines. There are many non-profit organizations, such as, Project C.U,R,E., that go to developing countries and give vaccines or cures to the natives. But there are still millions of people around the world dying because of curable diseases, such as, malaria, tuberculosis, and acute lower respiratory infections. If I was to invent one thing that could change the world for the better it would be genetically engineered mosquitoes that would used to administer cures in developing countries. Imagine a swarm of mosquitoes that could cure malaria by biting a person, the number of lives

Before vaccines were invented, whenever an individual contracted a disease, it would easily spread to the people who were in contact with the individual. Many became carriers of the disease, resulting in an outbreak. No one was immune from the disease, thus making the vast majority a suitable host for the pathogen. In 1796, British physician Edward Jenner created the first vaccination for smallpox by applying matters of fresh cowpox lesions on an infected eight years old’s hand (Riedel 2005). The fundamental principle behind vaccine is by injecting an antigen (usually a killed or weakened bacteria cell) into a host body; the antigen will imitate an infection and attack the host body. However, since the antigen is weakened or dead before being administered, it will not make the body sick. The antigen triggers the immune system to produce T-lymphocytes1, B-lymphocytes2 and antibodies to attack the affected cells, as though the body was infected with a disease. In the future, when the vaccinated individual encounters the disease, his or her immune system will recognize the pathogen and immediately produce the needed antibodies to fight it, preventing the individual from infected (“Understanding How Vaccines Work” 2013).

Vaccines have been considered one of the greatest medical achievements, and are instrumental in health promotion. Vaccines play a major role in lowering the risk of exposure to diseases. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) recommends 29 doses of 9 vaccines plus an annual flu vaccine for children ages 0 to six (CDC, 2017). There are twelve diseases that have been considered potentially dangerous that children are routinely vaccinated against. They include: Measles, Mumps, Rubella, Diptheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Polio, Hepatitis A and B, Pneumococcal disease, Varicella (Chicken Pox), and Haemophilus Influenza Type B (HIB disease). There is much debate about the safety of vaccinations. Those who oppose vaccinations believe that a child can