Vaccines: Don't put them off

My son is 2 and my wife and I are considering skipping some of his immunisations as 11 jabs before the age of 5 seems excessive. Which, if any, are the most crucial? - DL.
The decision to skip immunisations is ill-advised. The injections may be unpleasant, the diseases may seem archaic, but the consequences if your child gets measles, encephalitis or pneumococcal meningitis can be devastating.
As parents we worry vaccination might trigger some dreadful syndrome (autism, lupus, obesity or whatever is in vogue this year). These links generally end up disproved years later but by then the damage is done. Parents avoid theoretical risks of vaccine complications and replace them with proven risks of infection. It's human nature. "Vaccines cause disease X" is a headline that draws crowds, even if it's not true, while "Vaccines save millions" draws yawns, even though it is true.
Let's look at the specific example of diphtheria. I am a doctor and I have never seen a case of it. You would be hard pressed to find a layperson who could even describe what it is. Yet, in the years before vaccines, it killed 200 New Zealanders a year. It's a forgotten disease now because people are immunised against it and even unimmunised people are protected because so many others around them are immunised.
Diphtheria starts off with a sore throat and fever. But it can make you sick to the point where your heart, kidneys or breathing muscles fail. About one in 20 who get it will die. Yet we don't give it a thought because the vaccine works so well. So it goes for polio, tetanus and mumps as well. They are gone and forgotten, until vaccination levels drop below a certain level and cases arise.
Europe is in the throes of one such epidemic. In the past decade, measles immunisation rates have dropped because of complacency and misplaced fear. A tipping point has been reached and measles cases are now exploding. In the past few months, England has had 300 cases. France, where immunisation rates are even lower, has suffered more than 5000 cases. I'm not sure what vaccines the French would recommend to skip but I daresay it wouldn't be the measles jab.

Gary Payinda MD is an emergency medicine consultant in Whangarei.

Do you have a science, health topic or question you'd like addressed? Email: drpayinda@gmail.com

(This column provides general information and is not a substitute for the medical advice of your doctor.)