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Article: Today's Vaccine Paradox.(eradication of most childhood diseases causes reduction in immunization utilization)
- Article from:
- Pediatrics for Parents
- Article date:
- July 1, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1999 Pediatrics for Parents, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Our very success with infant and childhood vaccines during the past 40 years has paradoxically proven to be one of our major liabilities in maintaining high levels of immunization for today's infants and children.
In the 1950s, parents and grandparents were personally familiar with the annual summer-autumn devastations of polio with 25,000 or more victims ending up with braces, crutches, wheelchairs, or in iron lungs. Similarly, the vision of a child choking and strangling from obstruction to breathing caused by diphtheria was well recognized by families in that same era.
Most recently the millions of cases of measles that occurred every year have ...