Fears, Myths & Misconceptions

If vaccines cause side effects, wouldn’t it be “safer” to just avoid them? Unfortunately, choosing to avoid vaccines is not a risk-free choice - it is a choice to take a different and much more serious risk.

“Vaccines don’t work.”

A dramatic reduction in the incidence of diseases such as measles, mumps, German measles, polio, diphtheria, tetanus, Hib and pertussis occurred within several years of the introduction of vaccines against them. Vaccines not only work, but they work phenomenally well.”

“The majority of people who get diseases have been vaccinated.”

No vaccine is 100% effective. Most childhood vaccines are effective for 85% to 95% of recipients. For reasons related to the individual, some people will not develop immunity.

“Vaccines are not safe.”
Yes.Before vaccinesare licensed they are tested and monitored for mafety. The FDA requires testing to ensure safety. This process can take 10 years or longer. Once a vaccine is in use, the CDC and FDA monitor its adverse events through the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS). Any hint of a problem with a vaccine prompts further investigations by the CDC and FDA.
“Infants are too young to get vaccinated.”

Children are immunized in the first few months of life because several vaccine-preventable diseases infect them when they are very young. Fortunately, young infants are surprisingly good at building immunity to viruses and bacteria. About 95 percent of children given DTaP, Hib, and hepatitis B virus vaccines will be fully protected by two years of age.

“Children get too many shots.”

Infants and young children commonly encounter and manage many challenges to their immune system at the same time. But vaccines are just a small part of what babies encounter every day. The 11 or 12 vaccines that children receive in the first two years of life are just a drop in the ocean when compared to the tens of thousands of environmental challenges that babies successfully manage every day


“Vaccines contain harmful additives.”

Some parents are concerned that thimerosal, a mercury-containing preservative contained in the influenza vaccine, causes autism .During the past few years, a series of biological and epidemiological studies have shown this concern to be unfounded, and it has never been demonstrated that mercury at the level contained in vaccines causes neurological problems.

Today, with the exception of some flu vaccines, none of the vaccines used in the U.S. to protect children against 12 infectious diseases contain thimerosal.