Preventable Diseases

We've had vaccines against measles since the 1960s. They are surprisingly effective; many doctors today, including me, have never even seen a real live case of measles. We learn from textbooks, and sometimes, we relegate it to the category of diseases like polio and smallpox - things we'll never see. Alas, this is not the case. Despite safe and effective measles vaccines, parents who decide not to vaccinate their children against this put their kids at risk. In recent news, an outbreak of measles occurred in Disneyland, presumably because of close proximity of many unvaccinated kids. As more parents opt their children out of the vaccine, herd immunity - the principle that many immune people can keep vulnerable people safe by limiting spread of a disease - wanes.

Although mortality for measles in the current health care environment is quite low, it's a serious disease with many potential complications. Most importantly, it's preventable. There is no evidence that routine vaccinations have any serious risk, and its benefits are substantial. I hope that outbreaks like this encourage more parents and physicians to vaccinate.

First image shown under Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike License, second image is in the public domain, and both are from Wikipedia.