In the early 20th century, parents refused to allow their children to enter swimming pools or partake in typical summer activities. Childhoods were robbed and parents lived in fear of a crippling disease: polio. Little did they know, this disease was preventable. Luckily, Jonas Salk, a researcher and inventor, or better yet, a hero, developed a vaccine in 1955 that prevented the contraction of polio. Millions of children worldwide were spared from a crippling life, thanks to him. Once this vaccine was licensed for use, people worldwide demanded to be vaccinated – a small or nonexistent price to pay for the reward of a long, healthy life.
Since then, doctors have quite literally saved the world from epidemics of diseases such as hepatitis, mumps, rubella and measles, to name a few. Unfortunately, easily preventable yet deadly diseases such as these are making a comeback, thanks to parents who do not understand the importance of vaccines. The parents who have opted to not vaccinate their children are too young to remember the days when their friends one day woke up and could no longer walk due to polio, or contracted mumps as a child and discovered at a young age they would probably never be able to have their own children. These parents are still alive today, able to even be parents, because, you guessed it, their parents vaccinated them.
The fervor surrounding the anti-vaccination movement stems from a journal article written decades ago claiming vaccines can lead to an autism spectrum disorder that has since been disproven.The author of this article lost his medical license. However, some parents are still convinced that ingredients in vaccines, such as thimerosal, which is present only in trace amounts and has been proven safe by the CDC time and again, are harmful to children. Heads up: If the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that something is safe, it’s safe. If a parent is more concerned about the possibility of their child having autism, which is false, than they are about whether or not their child will contract a deadly disease, then they should not be a parent at all.
Do we really want to witness a time when polio makes a comeback and our kids live in fear of losing the ability to walk? Do we want our toddlers to get lockjaw because they never received their tetanus shot, or for them to get covered in red, itchy splotches from measles?
You can snort as many essential oils as you want or eat all the elderberries in the world but you’re still going to die of measles if you don’t get yourself a shot. Modern medicine has eradicated and limited the spread of contagious diseases, but some parents have decided that modern medicine is too scary and that they’d rather risk bringing back an eradicated disease than expose their child to something that they have been repeatedly told works.
This is not to shame parents for their choices, but rather to educate against the misinformation spread by anti-vaccine activist groups. No one really cares how you parent, as long as you do your best to love your child. However, preventing a child from receiving potentially life-saving vaccines is not doing your best, as you are willingly exposing them to diseases. Show your child you love them. Rock them to sleep with lavender essential oils, and sleep soundly knowing they will never die from a 19th-century disease that causes paralysis and infertility because you care about them and vaccinated them.
Hannah Whitaker is a UF English sophomore. Her column appears on Mondays.
