Herd Immunity
Herd immunity is an interesting concept in which by having the majority of a population vaccinated against a disease, the majority is able to protect the minority. Because of this, when the majority of children are vaccinated, they are able to protect the minority from falling ill. This shows that herd immunity is an excellent benefit for the community when they receive vaccinations (Stephens, D., 2008.) That said, most of the children would need to be vaccinated in order to have herd immunity be effective. To reiterate P. Pannarj’s et.al article “School-Located Influenza Vaccination Decreases Laboratory-Confirmed Influenza and Improves School Attendance,” nearly 50% of the school’s population needed to have received a flu shot in order to protect the rest of the school from influenza illness through herd immunity (2014.)
This can be a problem, as some parents want their children to enjoy herd immunity without having to deal with potential side effects the vaccine may have on them (i.e. slight fever) and instead decide not to vaccinate their children and simply rely on the herd immunity of those…show more content… Implementation of such an education course may be plausible for the United States government after conducting more vaccination education research such as by analyzing what vaccination information is currently available to new parents online and through mass media, as well as by surveying more individuals about how they decided whether to vaccinate their children. When parents, medical professionals, and the United States government come together, we may be able to provide a safe, educated, and vaccinated future for our
