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| |    Myth: Vaccines Don't Work by Lynn Cates, M.D., F.A.A.P. reviewed by Laura Jana, M.D., F.A.A.P. Myth: Vaccines don't work. It is just a coincidence that the incidence of specific diseases dropped after their immunization programs were begun. Fact: Vaccines do work. It has been well documented that the real, permanent drop in cases of vaccine-preventable diseases in the United States occurred only after vaccines were used routinely throughout the country. Even without vaccination programs in place, the number of cases of most infectious diseases naturally varies from year to year. So if there was a dip in the rate of infection following the introduction of a vaccine, some people just wrote it off as a normal fluctuation, not the result of an effective immunization program. It's easy to see how people might think this. However, if the decrease were just a coincidence, it would be temporary--it wouldn't persist like it does following immunization programs. Immunization programs keep disease rates low Examples of the dramatic and lasting impact of successful immunization programs include smallpox, polio, measles, rubella (German measles), pertussis (whooping cough), tetanus, and diphtheria vaccines. The most recent success story in the United States is the lasting drop in cases of life-threatening disease caused by Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib). Before 1985, Hib caused serious infections in about 20,000 children each year. This included 12,000 cases of meningitis and over 400 deaths. Since routine immunizations began, the incidence of Hib disease has fallen 99 percent, and it has remained low for more than a decade. Decreased immunization rates lead to increased rates of disease Other evidence that vaccines, and not other factors, are responsible for helping reduce disease is when immunization programs are cut back, there are rapid increases in cases of disease. For example, when Great Britain, Sweden, and Japan cut back on the use of pertussis vaccine, the effect was dramatic and immediate. In Great Britain, pertussis vaccination rates fell in 1974, and by 1978 there was an epidemic of more than 100,000 cases of pertussis and 36 deaths. Sweden and Japan had similar experiences. Also, in the former Soviet Union, when the immunization rate for diphtheria fell, the number of cases rose from 839 in 1989 to nearly 50,000 in 1994-including 1,700 deaths. Furthermore, it led to some cases of diphtheria being imported into Europe and the United States. Adapted from National Network for Immunization Information (NNii) Copyright 2000, and the National Immunization Program of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
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