Mandatory Vaccination Research Paper

Words: 441
Pages: 2

Mandatory Vaccinations Mandatory vaccinations have become quite a controversial topic in the past decade. Originally, they were invented in 1796 by a man named Edward Jenner in order to stop the spread of the smallpox virus. Today, this revolutionary invention saves the lives of over 4 million children each year. The debate over this topic mainly comes from people who don’t want to be forced to get vaccinations through mandatory vaccination laws. Though the argument against mandatory vaccinations has some merit, it does not outweigh the fact that mandatory vaccinations can prevent pandemics, as well as, reduce the number of deaths from common childhood diseases. First off, children are the most susceptible to infectious diseases as their immune systems are much weaker …show more content…
On top of this, vaccines are really effective because it is quite hard to quarantine children due to their rambunctious nature. “In the United States, vaccinations have decreased most vaccine-preventable childhood diseases by more than 95 percent.”(Source 2). Before vaccines, common childhood diseases infected and killed a lot of people that could have been spared most of their suffering if they had gotten a vaccination. For example, before the vaccine, “whooping cough” saw around 200,000 cases, and 4,000 deaths annually. In 2006, there were nearly 16,000 cases and 27 deaths.”(Source 3) The vaccines have drastically decreased the danger of childhood diseases and possible outbreaks. Due to their curious nature, children from the ages of 0-5 often explore the world around them through their hands, feet and mouth. They also do not understand most sanitary habits that help prevent disease. Because of this, just one child infected with the disease could go on to infect many others. Herd immunity means that when you get enough people in a group immunized to a certain virus, it makes it very difficult for the virus to