Vaccines save millions of lives

Forms of immunisation have  been practised for hundreds of years in the East, but Dr Edward Jenner is considered the father of vaccinology in the West.^[5] Having noticed that milkmaids who were exposed to cowpox in their work did not catch smallpox, he inoculated his gardener’s son with cow pox. A hundred years later, Louis Pasteur developed vaccines against cholera and anthrax.  Most countries with effective primary health systems such as the UK, Australia, New Zealand and Canada offer free childhood immunisations.  Vaccines stimulate the body’s immune system to protect the person against subsequent infection or disease. Immunisation is a proven tool for controlling and eliminating life-threatening infectious diseases (such as polio and smallpox) and is estimated to avert between 2 and 3 million deaths each year.^[1] The number of childhood deaths have been decimated worldwide due to immunisation and several diseases have been declared eradicated by the World Health Organization. An individual’s immune system can protect them from infectious diseases through either experiencing the disease or through vaccination. Immunisation uses the body’s natural defence mechanism, the immune response, to build resistance to specific infections. When an immunised person comes in contact with that disease in the future, their immune system will respond to prevent them developing the disease.^[6] Immunisation gives the same protection as having experienced the disease without the dangers of the disease itself. Vaccinations induce active immunity and the ‘immunological memory’ allows the body to respond to the infection if exposed at a later date.^[7]

[P1] Immunisation is the most cost-effective health measure. [P2] Millions of lives have been saved and many infectious diseases largely eradicated. [P3] Information presented as evidence of widespread harmful effects has been comprehensively disproved.