Vaccines Save Lives

This post consists of resources that I used to gather this information as well as resources that are reliable and I recommended to individuals when looking for information about vaccines. They are all linked in this post: Center of Disease Control and Prevention : The CDC is a science and data driven organization that advocates for public health. They have great vaccine resources on their website.  Vaccines and Immunizations  (main vaccines page) Child Immunization Schedule  Diseases and the Vaccines that Prevent Them CDC Pink Book : Contains descriptions of all the vaccine preventable diseases as well as their vaccines. The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia has a great section on their website that they refer to as their  Vaccine Education Center  (main vaccines page). It is a very reliable source and keeps up to date with vaccine science and safety. Here are a couple examples of the pages they have on there: Vaccine Ingredients  Vaccines and the Immune ...

Community immunity, also known as herd immunity, is crucial in order to contain and prevent infectious disease from spreading in a community. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the a negative association was created with the term "herd immunity" so now it is more commonly referred to as community immunity.  This can be achieved by enough people in a population being vaccinated. The figure below represents this nicely: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/herd-immunity/ The choice to get vaccinated does not only affect you, it affects everyone around you. If you are not vaccinated you are not only at high risk for contracting the disease yourself, you are also contributing towards the spread of a disease. There are certain individuals that cannot get vaccinated. For example, an immunocompromised individual, someone who has cancer, and others typically cannot receive certain vaccines. If a majority of a community gets vaccinated we can protect those who are not able to get vaccinat...

For all students that attend Quinnipiac University, they are required to receive the following immunizations. They do allow medical exemptions.  Meningitis conjugate (A, C, Y, W) immunization is required of anyone living in university-owned housing and must be administered within five years of enrollment. Meningitis B vaccine is strongly recommended. Two MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) or positive titer, as indicated by lab report TB screening, per guidelines listed on the form Two Varicella (or proof of having the disease) or positive titer, as indicated by lab report Vaccination against Hepatitis B is strongly recommended and may be required by certain clinical programs. https://catalog.qu.edu/handbooks/undergraduate/student-affairs/student-health-services/   So what is concerning here? To start off, a lot of the vaccines and vaccine preventable diseases that I discussed before, are not present on this list. The biggest thing that sticks out to me specifically on this list ...

There are different ways we can gain immunity to certain diseases. The two big categories of how our immune systems can obtain immunity by having antibodies present against the specific disease. Antibodies are proteins that are produced by our immune system and are what destroy pathogens (disease causing agents). They are crucial in stimulating our immune system to produce memory. There are two types of immunity which are active  and passive  immunity. Before I go further in depth on the differences of these two types a chart might be helpful to reference.  https://www.healthline.com/health/acquired-immunity       This is all a part of our adaptive immune system that develops over an individual's lifespan. For this we are going to focus on active immunity as this is where vaccines come into play. There are two different types of active immunity: natural and artificial. Active natural immunity refers to the individual getting sick wi...

So now we know what the types of vaccines are and the vaccine preventable diseases so lets put them in their respective categories:     You may notice that Influenza has three different types of vaccines, live attenuated, killed, and subunit. This is because there are several different types of vaccines for influenza as it continues to mutate each year so each year a new vaccine specific to that strain needs to be developed.      Here are some pros and cons to each vaccine class: Live attenuated: Pros: Best immune response  Life long immunity  Minimal doses required Most similar to the actual pathogen without getting sick Cons: Can't give to immunocompromised individuals Need to stay refrigerated    Killed: Pros: Stable and very safe Easy storage and transport (specifically important in developing countries) Cons: Need boosters to maintain immunity  Weaker immune response than live vaccines    Toxoid: Pros: Safe and v...

Here is the CDC vaccine schedule for birth-18 years old. It is critical to follow this schedule and get the correct amount of doses for each vaccine preventable disease. There is no such thing as an "alternative vaccine schedule" as the CDC focuses and bases their schedule off of when children are at most risk for exposure and infection of the disease. Changing when these vaccines are administer puts the child and others around them at high risk for contraction disease. https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/hcp/imz/child-adolescent.html#print 

Vaccines are all about instructing your immune system how to effectively fight off several vaccine preventable diseases. Here are the different ways they do it:   Live attenuated:             Live attenuated vaccines are derived from whole living microbes which are then weakened in a laboratory setting. In a safe lab environment, they are passed through several generations and pick up weakened mutations over time. This way the immune system can build immunity to the virus or bacteria without the individual getting sick. The weakened microbe when introduced in the body will target the immune system directly in order to trigger the immune response to create antibodies against the disease without causing disease in the individual. These vaccines are extremely effective as well and typically do not need the support of an adjuvant as this type of vaccines represents the closest thing to the actually pathogen. When receiving the...

Listed here below are quick descriptions of the Vaccine Preventable Diseases. It is so crucial to follow the CDC schedule to ensure that these diseases are easily prevented.  Measles:  The measles virus is a serious respiratory disease that is especially dangerous for infants and young children. It is very contagious and can cause a rash and fever. After being infected with measles, that individual will be immunocompromised for 2-3 years. In severe cases it can results in death.   Mumps:  Mumps is a virus known to cause fever, head and muscle aches, swollen jaw, and puffy cheeks. It is important to note that there is no treatment for mumps and can be easily prevented with a vaccine. Mumps can results in long term health problems, for example before the vaccine mumps was known to cause deafness and meningitis.    Rubella:  Rubella is a virus known to cause a mild fever and rash and extremely dangerous for pregnant women. This is why herd immunity i...

    Antigens:             Antigens are what we know to be the active ingredient that triggers the immune response that is desired during vaccination in order to achieve immunity to a disease. Antigens in vaccines can be in many different forms. Whole microbes, either weakened or killed. Parts of the microbe, inactivated toxoids, proteins, etc. Antigens are responsible for the memory that our immune system creates after being vaccinated.  Adjuvants:             Adjuvants are responsible for enhancing the effectiveness of the vaccine by allowing them to create a better immune response. This is very beneficial as it may allow for the overall contents of the vaccine to decrease in amount of lessens the number of doses needed to achieve immunity. It is important to note that not all vaccines contain adjuvants. In particular, live attenuated vaccines do not ne...