Vaccine Pros And Cons Research Paper

Research Paper: The Vaccine Controversy Since the very first vaccine, there have been proponents and opponents, both arguing the effects of inoculation. For many, the idea of injecting a healthy child with any derivative of a disease is counterintuitive. In America’s reality today, with few major disease outbreaks and extremely effective health care, more and more people are shying away from this idea. But just because the devastating diseases of past years are out of sight doesn 't mean they are gone. Though opponents of vaccines might call on under-researched potential side effects, or isolated cases of adverse reactions to common vaccines, to argue their cause, the benefits that vaccines serve to the individual, the surrounding community, …show more content…
Though many vaccination opponents claim that vaccines contain dangerous levels of mercury, the flu vaccine is the only inoculation made with mercury that is used in the United States. The purpose for the mercury contradicts the fears of anti-vaxxers in and of itself; a mercury compound is used to prevent cross contamination that comes from using a single container of vaccine to prepare multiple injections. Most vaccines come in single doses, so mercury was removed. Even so, “. . . there has not been a single case of proven mercury toxicity from vaccines . . .” (Link). The vaccine is still flawed, though. Each year, scientists use probability to predict the different types of flu virus that might be most common during that season, but there is always a chance of a different strain emerging. And because this vaccine is created over the course of months, not the decades in which other vaccines are perfected and made as harmless as possible, the flu immunization is more toxic than most. The nature of the virus parts used in the vaccine is toxic, as well as some of the chemicals it is preserved in. In spite of this, the vaccine still rarely causes worse than swelling and irritation at the injection site. Rarely does one go to the hospital or die from this, opposed to the effects of the flu virus. Any new side effects observed from the vaccine are closely monitored and contained, like in the case of a temporarily paralyzing disease which was seen to occur in every few million flu vaccines. For every vaccine there are side effects, but the use of vaccines like the flu vaccine not only reduce the chances of infection, but they lower the chances of having to visit the hospital if infection does