National Child Immunization Week April 21-28

Health

It is important for children to be fully immunized. Diseases that can be prevented with vaccines can be very serious – even deadly – especially for infants and young children. For example, children younger than 2 years old are at the highest risk for serious pneumococcal disease like pneumonia, blood infection (sepsis), and meningitis. Before the pneumococcal vaccine was used routinely, an estimated 17,000 cases of severe types of pneumococcal infection, like meningitis, occurred each year.

Immunizations have helped to greatly improve the health of children in the United States. Most parents today have never seen first-hand the devastating consequences that vaccine-preventable diseases have on a family or community. While most of these diseases are not common in the United States, they persist around the world. It is important that we continue to protect our children with vaccines because outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases can and do occasionally occur in this country.

For example, in 2010, there were 27,550 people reported to have “whooping cough” (pertussis) in the United States. Twenty-seven deaths were reported – 25 of these were in children younger than 1 year old. In 2011, 222 people were reported to have measles in the United States – that’s more than any year since 1996. Measles is brought into the United States by unvaccinated U.S. residents and foreign visitors who get infected when they are in other countries. Measles is still common in many parts of the world, including Europe, Asia, the Pacific, and Africa. In fact, in France alone, more than 15,000 people were reported to have measles in 2011. Measles spreads easily, and it can be serious, causing hospitalization and even death. Young children are at highest risk for serious complications from measles.

Vaccinating your baby according to the recommended immunization schedule gives him or her the best protection against 14 serious childhood illnesses – like measles and whooping cough – before he is two years old. The recommended schedule is designed to protect infants and children early in life, when they are most vulnerable and before they are exposed to potentially life-threatening diseases.

Even though the United States experiences outbreaks of some vaccine-preventable diseases, the spread of disease usually slows or stops because of immunization. If we stopped vaccinating, even the few cases we have in this country could very quickly become tens or hundreds of thousands of cases. Fortunately, most parents choose to vaccinate their children and immunization rates in this country are at or near record high levels. In fact, less than 1% of children do not receive any vaccines. However, some children have not received all of their vaccines and therefore are not fully immunized. It’s important that children receive all doses of the vaccines according to the recommended immunization schedule. Not receiving all doses of a vaccine leaves a child vulnerable to catching serious diseases.

Most health insurance plans cover the cost of vaccinations, but you should check with your insurance provider before going to the doctor. If you don’t have health insurance, or if your insurance does not cover vaccinations, the Vaccines for Children (VFC) program may be able to help with the cost.

The VFC program helps families of eligible children who might not otherwise have access to immunization. The program provides vaccinations at no cost. Children younger than 19 years of age are eligible for VFC vaccines if they are:

•Medicaid-eligible
•Uninsured
•American Indian or Alaska Native,
•Underinsured and vaccinated in Federally Qualified Health Centers or Rural Health Clinics.
Parents of uninsured or underinsured children who receive vaccines at no cost through the VFC Program should check with their health care providers about possible administration fees that might apply. These fees help providers cover the costs of giving the vaccines, including storing the vaccines and paying staff members to give vaccines to patients. However, VFC vaccines cannot be denied to an eligible child if a family can’t afford the fee.

For more information about vaccinations, visit www.cdc.gov.

Information obtained from www.cdc.gov

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