Vaccine Safety Concerns Parents

Many parents are concerned about the safety of vaccines and elect not to vaccinate their children from potentially fatal diseases, according to a new study completed by researchers at the University of Michigan and published online by Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, on March 1, 2010. 

“The study found that 12 percent of parents have refused at least one vaccine that their children's doctor recommended. Parents' hesitation about vaccines has, in some cases, led them to postpone vaccinations for their children,” said Dr. Gary L. Freed, lead researcher of the study and the director of the Child Health Evaluation and Research Unit at the University of Michigan Health System.

The study examined data from more than 1,500 parents regarding attitudes about vaccines and revealed that 53 percent of parents are worried about side effects of vaccines.

The vaccines typically avoided include newer vaccinations such as the chickenpox and meningococcal conjugate vaccine, which 32 percent of parents refused for their children. Nearly 57 percent of parents chose not to have their children receive the HPV vaccine, a vaccine which is recommended for females to prevent certain strands of HPV that can lead to the development of cervical cancer.

Dr. Paul Offit, chief of infectious diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and director of the Vaccine Education Center said that the concern about vaccine safety is predictable. Since disease rates were high before vaccines, when the vaccinations first became available, people made it a point to receive the vaccines and fatalities due to preventable illnesses decreased.

But nowadays, according to Dr. Offit, parents do not have the fear of deadly diseases that was once prevalent in parents who experienced the illnesses first hand.

“If you believe, as I do, that people are compelled by their fears, as diseases rates diminish, the fear of disease decreases and the concern about vaccine side effects, real or imagined, increases,” Dr. Offit explained.

Dr. Marc Siegel, associate professor of medicine at New York University, said a possible contributor to the problem is the vast amount of vaccines children are now receiving. Dr. Siegel says the solution may lie in evaluating which vaccines are most important and pushing for parents to be sure their children receive those vaccinations, adding, “We need to justify every vaccine.”

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