My wife and I decided against vaccination for both our boys after long and intense studies on the science and evidence behind the theory. We are currently in the process of adopting a little girl and since she is a ward of the court, we have to follow the court-appointed pediatricians’ recommendations. This has not been the best experience, but so far, she has had no severe reactions to any of the shots. It is interesting how the pediatrician seems to always comment on how healthy our boys look, even commenting on their “strong immune system”. May be not having vaccinated them has nothing to do with that, but the conversation is always a sore one when we talk about it with the pediatrician.

I stumbled across this article tonight just a couple minutes before seeing your blog post, I thought I would put it up for all interested parties here to look over. It talks about steps taken that will make vaccine manufactures immune from litigation if the vaccines harm anyone.

I did also want to bring up the fact that the US schedule is not universally comparable to that of other first-world countries with similar disease-exposure probabilities.

The fact that in the US, drug manufacturers contribute to the FDA/CDC recommended schedule is something I find deeply problematic. While the US has approximately 58-70 recommended/scheduled vaccines (for girls, including annual flu from 18 months, HPV and the disputed varicella vaccine – which means 55-67 for boys) in a child’s lifetime before they are 18, other countries (Finland*) have as few as 8 for a child under 18 (*pentavalent/tetravalent doses, but still…).

So (free math) that’s a possible 50-62 MORE vaccines in the US. I can’t be the only parent for whom this seems…well, troubling. And excessive.

I think that it’s best not to have a knee-jerk reaction to vaccinations one way or the other (really, that’s true about most things). Every parent should do the research and decide what’s best for their children. If other parents I talk to have a concern about vaccinations, I generally recommend following a delayed schedule (Dr. Sears has a good one). I am definitely an advocate of giving only one shot at a time (and for only one disease at a time, as e suggested), and waiting a few weeks in between shots. But this, too, is based on my own parental experience — my kids react to so many things, so now try to only introduce one new thing at a time and observe them carefully, so I can know how that particular thing is affecting them. If others feel comfortable with the current vaccination schedule, I certainly have no problem with them following it.

I feel the need to clarify my own practices, too. While I am an advocate for delayed and spaced out vaccinations, that’s not what I’m currently doing. I doubt my oldest will ever get another vaccination. My second has had one round of a couple of vaccinations, but he has enough undiagnosed problems at this point that he won’t be getting any vaccinations at least for the foreseeable future. The youngest will not get any vaccinations until he is at least 2 — we’ll see how healthy he is at that point. While I agree that herd immunity is a wonderful thing, I can’t justify putting my children at what I believe is serious risk (for them) just so others will have slightly less risk.

Miles, thanks so much for your comment. One of the arguments in the vaccination debates that makes me most upset is that we need our children to be vaccinated to keep from spreading the disease to all the adults whose vaccinations have probably worn off. In my opinion, adult bodies are much more equipped to handle these diseases (even in their more inert forms), and anyone who doesn’t want to catch them should go and update their own vaccinations rather than yelling about my children’s vaccinations (or lack of them). So thank you for being a responsible adult and doing what you can to protect the children around you (rather than the other way around). I urge any healthy adult to do the same. (I do know the reason it’s often the other way around is that vaccinations for children are free, and for adults, they aren’t. I think it’s sad.)

Thanks again for a great conversation!

I had a conversation with an opt-outer parent of a child in my oldest child’s kindergarten class, and they had chosen not to vaccinate not for any particular health-related or religious reason, but just to avoid the general (really really small, for most children) risk of vaccinations. She said they would get immunizations if they were going to travel to the developing world, but otherwise they would just rely on the herd immunity. The parents interviewed in the recent Oregonian article said basically the same thing. That’s what’s unethical–not participating in the risk, but reaping the benefits. If you have reason to believe that the risk to your children is considerably greater than normal (immune-compromised, etc.), that changes the calculus.