Last Sunday KRAE News 13 posted an article with the following headline, “Measles outbreak casts spotlight on anti-vaccine movement.” We all heard about the supposedly scientific report that showed a link between vaccines and autism. We also heard later that the research was fraudulent and there was no link. Generally speaking, I think I would vaccinate my children, which is what I did, but not everyone makes that choice. Because of the outbreak of measles that began in Disney World, there has been a focus on those parents who have not vaccinated their children–as if they were responsible for the outbreak of measles. Admittedly, they may not be helping the situation, but before we attack those parents who have refused vaccinations for their children, let’s look at some facts.

A website called stason.org posted statistics on the number of children worldwide who receive vaccinations. These are statistics from the early 1990’s, but they are interesting. In America, parents opt out of vaccines because they fear the consequences of the vaccine more than they fear their child contracting the disease in question. In many other countries, the vaccines are simply not available or not affordable.

According to stason.org (1992 figures):

 About 80% of the world’s children aged less than 1 were
reported to have received measles vaccine

The CDC Website cites a measles vaccination rate for Americans of about 91 percent.

So what am I getting out here? Most American children are protected against measles.

The article at KRAE News 13 reports:

Health authorities believe the outbreak was triggered by a measles-stricken visitor to one of the Disney parks who brought the virus from abroad last month.

As one of the world’s biggest tourist destinations, Disney was a perfect spot for the virus to spread, with large numbers of babies too young to be vaccinated and lots of visitors from countries that do not require measles shots. The disease has since spread beyond Disneyland.

Last summer there were a number of children from South American countries who crossed the Mexican border into America. What percentage of those children was vaccinated? It seems to me that rather than focus anger on parents in America who have refused the measles vaccine, we should be looking to the number of illegal aliens in this country (both children and adults) who because of poverty have never been vaccinated. One of the unintended consequences of President Obama’s policy of not enforcing our southern border may be a much more serious measles epidemic than might have otherwise occurred.