The President’s campaign on vaccination

The Department of Health most recently declared a measles outbreak in Metro Manila after an alarming increase in patients contracting the virus from the beginning of this year. The department also expressed that there was a 60 percent drop in vaccinations following the Dengvaxia controversy which resulted to parents refusing to have their children vaccinated for fear of harmful side effects.

With the recent deaths caused by the outbreak, the President took it upon himself to urge our countrymen, particularly parents, to have their children vaccinated reiterating his administration’s commitment in providing the nation with adequate health care.

Let’s go back therefore to the basic understanding of why vaccinations are important, so that we can further respond to the call of our President, most especially In bringing back public trust on effective vaccines.

Measles, as many of us know, is one of the most contagious diseases there is. It is so contagious that, if one person contracts it, nine out of ten people closest to that person will surely be infected if they are not protected or immune to the disease.

In very serious cases, measles can lead to severe brain damage or even death. Measles is a virus and it is spread through the air when a person infected with the disease coughs or sneezes. The disease begins with fever which soon after leads to a cough and a runny nose, and eventually tiny red spots develop and spread throughout the entire body.

The upside however in all this is that measles can be prevented by a vaccine which infants usually receive in their first year after birth. I am a mother of two boys who have both received the MMR vaccine and from experience I can say that it is both safe and effective.

We must look back therefore into history prior to the vaccination program which registered in the United States an estimated three to four million people who acquired the disease every year causing around 500 deaths.

Since the vaccination program however which began in 1963, the widespread use of the measles vaccine led to a greater than 99 percent reduction rate in cases of measles. Measles therefore is readily preventable through vaccination.

We must therefore heed the call of our President and do our part to bring back public trust most especially for the very young children whose immune system can be dangerously compromised.

Just like what the President said in his speech, we are not lacking in vaccines and we should not be complacent in providing most especially our children the protection they deserve.