Vaccines are man-made biological creations that are used today in society in order to build one’s immune system up to fight against a particular disease. Once one’s immune system is exposed to a disease, the immune system will retain knowledge to kill that disease. Vaccines are simply weaker forms of diseases, which physicians inject into humans in order to stimulate the immune system to create cells which can kill the disease.
Vaccines seem mostly beneficial to society and overall health because they prevent illnesses. However, there are many problems with vaccines such as harmful or even fatal side-effects. There is also a noticeable disparity in who gets treated in the U.S. based upon one’s race.
Politicians are debating whether or not laws that mandate vaccinations are Constitutional.
Barbara Low Fisher, the Co-founder of National Vaccine Information Center, responded to these debates by saying, “If the State can tag, track down and force citizens against their will to be injected with biological products of known and unknown toxicity today, there will be no limit on which individual freedoms the State can take away in the name of the greater good tomorrow.”
“Intimately personal medical decisions should not be made by the government,” said Ron Paul, MD and former US Representative. “Freedom over one’s physical person is the most basic freedom of all.”
Many other people like Fisher and Paul are enraged by the attempt to mandate vaccines.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) produced research on vaccines that some found troubling. Although the CDC has produced an extensive amount of research on vaccinations, they cannot exactly pinpoint the long and short-term side effects of every vaccine.
Research from the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) shows that many vaccines contain harmful ingredients to humans. According to the Vaccine: Pros and Cons webpage, some vaccines contain aluminum, which in large quantities can cause neurological problems.
Other harmful ingredients include but are not limited to formaldehyde, a cancer causing agent associated with causing heart, mental, and nervous system diseases; CTMP, an antiseptic which can irritate the eyes, skin, or respiratory system; and MSG, a compound that can cause diabetes and other chronic illnesses in humans.
The CDC is aware of these side-effects and also that there are more unknown side-effects yet to be discovered. However, the rate of occurrences in which side-effects resulting from a vaccine happens is almost insignificant. According to Walter W. Williams, MD of the CDC, the most common side-effect of the flu vaccine only occurs about once for every twenty thousand vaccinations.
On June 9, 2005, the Catholic Church issued a report that urged its followers to boycott the use of certain vaccinations that were created from cultivated cells of two aborted fetuses in the 1960s named MRC-5 and WI-38. The church declared these methods of gaining vaccinations as immoral. Today MRC-5 and WI-38 are still used to produce vaccinations for the U.S. despite the church’s complaints.
From a social standpoint, Dr. Williams at the CDC wrote in his article about recent research done on vaccinations in the U.S. that there is an unequal percentage of whites and blacks getting vaccines and Hispanics and Asians getting vaccines. According to statistical data gathered in the 2013 NHIS, 22% of whites and blacks get vaccinated but only 17% Hispanics and 11% Asians get vaccinated. This disparity could be a result of culture and or religious beliefs.
Vaccinations are not universally accepted amongst U.S. residents. Whether it is because of political and social unfairness, because of race or spirituality, or because of fear of unknown and known side-effects, vaccines are not quite fully trusted, despite their tremendous positive impact on society.
