Don’t Hesitate. Vaccinate.

Elena Montanye, Copy Editor

College students have a lot going through their minds every day. When is my next assignment due? Have I paid rent yet? Should I go out or stay in? Do I have time to buy groceries tonight? With all of the immediate concerns we have to think about, most of us don’t spend much time considering one increasingly relevant question: Should I vaccinate my future children?

The vaccine debate has swept the nation, and it’s not going away any time soon. The media is constantly feeding us testimonials from doctors, parents, children, teachers and anyone else with vocal chords and an opinion. At the unripe ages of 18 to 22, most of us aren’t yet troubled with the daunting task of choosing whether or not to vaccinate our kids. To a lot of us, it probably doesn’t even seem like that big of a deal. We’re all relatively confident that little Khaleesi and Abel won’t get smallpox, polio, diphtheria, tetanus or yellow fever. After all, we’ve lived a great two decades and managed to remain life-threatening disease free. Why wouldn’t our kids?

Because we were vaccinated. Or, at the very least, roughly 92% of our classmates and people we interacted with were. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) stated that between 1994 and 2014, vaccinations saved an estimated 732,000 lives. That means that 1,464,000 parents would have lost a child had they not chosen to vaccinate them. That parent could be you. Of course, as in any case, there is a flip side to that statistic. About 4,500 children had seriously adverse reactions to vaccines. These could have been allergic reactions, seizures, comas, autism or a variety of other disorders. And yes, those cases are travesties. Of course no one wants to find themselves in that situation, but is refusing to vaccinate your child the best way to face that fear?

The answer is in the numbers. Just a tiny fraction of vaccinated children experience long-term trauma compared to those whose lives are saved. Believing that your child’s life was saved because you chose not to have them vaccinated is, frankly, a little preposterous. Vaccines obviously exist for the individual, but above that, they exist for the herd. For the common good of everyone, including parents who didn’t vaccinate their kids. Those children are still indirectly protected by vaccinations because they’re surrounded by people who have been vaccinated and therefore won’t be spreading around diseases for unvaccinated kids to catch.

There are clearly folks on Team No Vaccine that are extremely persuasive in their arguments, but we need to start being careful who we’re listening to and why. The most persuasive isn’t always the most knowledgeable; they’re just the best at playing the convincing game. In a lot of ways, our species has gotten to where we are today because of vaccines, and it strikes me as careless and a bit naïve to walk away from scientific, historical and statistical proof.

However, there will always be people who feel otherwise. There will always be someone who knew someone who knew someone whose child developed autism after a vaccination. I could throw numbers around all day (literally, because there are that many stats in my favor. But I digress), but someone will still make the call to not vaccinate their child. Which is why it might be worth college students’ time to put some thought into this now.

I’m not a doctor, so I can’t spew ethos all over campus and convince everyone to vaccinate their kids. But I am a college student, and I know a bit about what comes of procrastination. When we avoid problems, problems don’t get solved. When we’re unsure, we hesitate and hesitate and hesitate until we’ve waited too long to take action and our indecisiveness has made the decision for us. I urge people to take a good hard look at this issue and really take a stance. It’s not too early. Your conscious, purposeful decision, whatever it may be, could be the difference between attending your future child’s graduation and attending their funeral.