How do parents decide whether to or not to immunize their children?

Maggie F: How do parents decide whether to or not to immunize their children?
There is a lot of information telling parents to immunize and not to immunize. How do parents decide who to listen to? I live in the East Bay and would love to hear from Oakland, CA-area parents who have dealt with or are dealing with this question.

Answers and Views:

Answer by Juicy SuperStar
I was hard for me to decide and Im still not sure. He is behind on his 12 months shots because of all the confusing information. Some say do it and some say dont. I dont know who to believe.

Answer by Miki
i think you should look into both options.

people should be careful of where they get their information from. i answered a question a few months ago where this lady found a website that stated not to vaccinate. she didn’t realize at the end of the website their was a notice stating that the website creators are NOT DOCTORS.

so people need to get the information from a creditable source.

Answer by Mozz, incognito
I sort out what I heard from what I know to be true. This is easier said than done. Then I weigh the risks of both sides and consult the pediatrician for his input and opinion.

Answer by I’m Me, Who Are U?
Easy.. The State of Florida will not allow kids in school without vaccinations. I’m abiding by the law.

Answer by lovelymummy
Vaccinations kill children. It’s irresponsible to poison into your child. Autism has increased in children with vaccinations. There was one lady on here early asking about her daughter developing a fever after being vaccinated. Because she irresponsibly vaccinated her daughter without knowing the risks, her daughter could die of a reaction. People who vaccinate are not educated.

It was an easy decision. I know that mercury is in vaccines and I will not subject my angels to such a deadly toxin. I did my research online. Even though my doctor doesn’t agree, I am refusing to vaccinate any of my kids. The have natural antibodies from my breast milk and we use holistic, natural medicines.

I will never vaccinate my kids. They don’t need it if all the other kids are vaccinated, right? I breast fed them all so they have natural antibodies.

Answer by Liz
Listen. Kids don’t come with instruction booklets. Any decision that we make as parents is hard. M

Answer by ☆ ♥Isabella B.♥ ☆
well i have four boys and they were all immunized and have no problems. but i have read and heard a lot of concerns that parents have about immunizations and how they can cause more harm than good! i am currently pregnant with my first girl and a little scared about what i have read but i also read that instead that it is best to immunized your child late instead of early like instead of (for example) immunizing them right away at 1,2,3 months wait until they are 6-8 months and that it is not necessary to immunize them so young so i think i will do that 🙂 if you google immunization there are a lot of interesting articles that will pop up

Answer by duckie
i agree with I’m me. in louisiana you can not send your children to school unless they have had all their shots.

Answer by celtic.piskie
lovely – immunities from breastmilk only last for 6 months, and they’re not complete either.

Mercury is found in many natural things, in much higher concentrations than in vaccines. Thermisol is only in the MMR, not in the single shot ones.

They don’t do it for crap and giggles people. If there is an outbreak, your children will die.

8, 16, 4,3. Those are the ages of the children in the UK that have died of measles.

20 years ago, it never happened, because people vaccinated.

Yes, they can have reactions to getting the vaccine. But the reaction to being dead is universal, and the likelihood of getting the disease is much higher.

My FIL is a pedi in the UK. and since he doesn’t get paid to do them, he makes no money out of them, and he wanted his Granddaughter to get them, i see no reason too disbelieve him.

I spaced my girls out a little, as i think them all at one time is a little harsh on her system. She was a premie, and delicate.

But she’ll be vaccinated against everything where the vaccination is better than the disease.

Answer by violet
It does seem more confusing now than it was even 15 years ago, when my kids and almost all the kids I knew were routinely immunized.. You would think the research would have cleared up some of these questions instead of making it worse!

But it seems that the scientific evidence is still heavily in favor of immunizations, and in a lot of cases in which children have been disabled or died, there is no proof that the shots actually caused it. If a lot of parents start skipping the immunizations, those diseases will come back – and they are bad! I had measles as a child, and my parents were very worried. More kids died or suffered damage from the disease in those days than from the immunizations they give now.

I know none of this is really any help in deciding what to do for your own child, but personally, I think I would probably get the immunizations. Most of the time there are no problems, and knowing your child will not get measles or whooping cough gives you one less thing to worry about.

Answer by Cheese Burger
My brother in law has progressive deafness because he was not vaccinated against whooping cough as a child, he caught it and is now completley deaf in one ear and will lose his hearing in the other by the time he is 45, he also had a baby sister who DIED from the same whooping cough that made him deaf.

So for me there was no question, both my children are vaccinated and if that makes me irresponsible^^ then so be it. I would rather them have a fever for a few days and be protected against a disease then unvaccinated and at risk of dying or being damaged from a preventable disease.

Answer by Heart’s in the 808
~~Hi Maggie…I Live in Central California about 90 minutes S.E. of you..I am Re-Posting my Answer from an earlier Question about Immunizations…

My choice not to vaccinate actually came from my upbringing. My parents, Both Highly Trained Physicians, My mother a PHD. in Pediatric Nutrition, My Father an Orthopedic Surgeon. They Each Practiced for over 40 years in their Individual Fields. They did their Research (which, BELIEVE me was EXTENSIVE) and decide that the CONS outweighed the PROS as far as Immunizations go. Their Choice involved being VERY Pro-Active in PREVENTATIVE NUTRITION. We were all kept on Highly Nutritious Foods as well as Immunity Building Supplementation, which included Liquid Multi-Vitamins,Liquid Calcium(with Phosphorus and Magnesium) as well as Liquid Cod Liver Oil (extremely good for the immune system) all of my Siblings have been VERY healthy all of our lives, So I made the decision to Raise my Children the Same way without regret as they have ALWAYS been EXCESSIVELY HEALTHY. This is MY Choice and I Force it on no one…Too Immunize or Not too Immunize..EACH Parent must make their own Choice.

Being a Non-Vaccinator Works for my Family

What I am saying is Building my Childrens NATURAL Immunities is my Goal, so even if they DO catch something, their body is strong enough to Fight it. They all have had Chicken Pox,Measles and Mumps without ANY complications what-so-ever…I Have Chosen to be Pro-Active in their Health-Care.

Answer by Brass Monkey
Well, I read all the info I could find, talked to the pediatrician and then made an executive decision as it were =P When I first started my research I was very anti-vaccination. After months and months of research, I decided to do some vaccines and not others that the pediatrician and I deemed unnecessary, and to slow down the ones I did decide to get.

I have only made decisions for the following: My daughter did not have a hep b shot at birth as I was tested while pregnant and negative – this is the only way a newborn can get hep B. We are doing DTaP, hib and prevnar at 2, 4 and 6 months because Pertussis and meningitis are common in the area I live in. We are not doing Rotavirus at all as my daughter is not going to daycare and the doctor recommended against it altogether. I am also uncomfortable with Rotavirus because it is a live virus vaccine, and they have the potential to cause what they are vaccinating against unlike the killed virus vaccines. We are holding off on Polio because we are not planning on leaving the country with our baby until next year at the earliest, and there hasn’t been a case of Polio in the US in 20 years. My doctor also supports that decision. We are also holding off on Hep B until she is at least 10. We will be postponing the MMR until 30 months as my doctor feels it is safe since again, she’s not in daycare, and most cases of Autism can be diagnosed by 2 years of age. I am not really that concerned about the MMR causing autism, but it also is a live virus vaccine and I would prefer her immune system be built up a bit more before she is exposed to something she might contract from the vaccine. We will not be vaccinating against Chicken Pox as it is also a live virus vaccine and very rarely has complications. Even children that receive that vaccine can get chicken pox and are likely to get shingles if they don’t also receive the shingles vaccine.

So basically, our plan is to minimize the amount of vaccines received in the first year and to limit live virus exposure while still vaccinating on time for things that have a high prevalence in our area.

Answer by Twilight Princess
Well, in most places, vaccinations are required for school attendance unless they go against your religious beliefs.

I and my siblings were all vaccintated for standard stuff as kids, I’ve gotten more than my fair share of tetanus shots as a result of being laughably accident-prone, we got the required shots like meningitis and hepatitis B before going to college, and we’re all still more or less perfectly healthy.

What you need to do is weigh the risks of not vaccinating against the risks of vaccinating – there’s no proven link that vaccines cause anything, but there’s plenty of proof that if your kid does catch one of the diseases, they can get very sick or die. Vaccinations generally are not intended to protect against trivial things.

However, the one exception to all this is the chicken pox vaccine. Granted, chicken pox can have negative effects that stay with the children for the rest of their life, but these negative effects almost exclusively occur when an infant under a year or so old contracts it (like I got it when I was only a few months old, and still have scars and other issues, over 20 years later). However, as the vaccine isn’t given to children until they’re 5 or 6, well after the point at which there are serious risks associated with it, there’s not much of a point. My siblings, and most of the people I know, had chicken pox at that age, and none of them have had any problematic long-term effects that I’m aware of.

Answer by *smile*
You have to take the risk ,at first. Watch the reaction of your baby during any shots they get. My first daughter had maybe some soreness and a little fever, typical stuff. She recovered wonderfully each time.
My youngest daughter, different story. At her 15 month shots she cried a lot, of course, daddy and I took her for an ice cream. She came home tired. Well, she stayed like that for 16 days. She didn’t lift her head up, she barely made a noise, didn’t crawl or walk anymore. I was terrified. I called the doc constantly and took her in, only to be reassured it was normal. Uhm… not normal for MY daughter.She recovered slowly after that 16 days and somehow by chance, she pulled herself out of that. I don’t know how. Lucky.
Needless to say, we held off on her shots until she was older and INSISTED on one shot at a time. Not 2 or 3 or whatever. Just one.
she took the rest of the shots Okay. If I had to do it over, and I knew what would happen to her, I wouldn’t.
I’m so torn on this subject because I have seen both sides. You have to make that choice, but insist on 1 shot per visit. Never, please, never let them do more than that.

Answer by arial39
ok first off, dont listen to judgmental idiots like lovely. find the facts, immunizations have been around a LOT longer then autism has. its ” on the rise in most vaccinated children” because most children are immunized. and shes just stupid to think educated people dont immunize, 90% of people in the u.s. are immunized, its these new age “parents” that arent immunizing now. and the fact that “everyone elses kids are immunized so mine doesnt need to be”? what if everybody thought that way? people would start dying from polio, measles, and a whole list of other “wiped out” diseases. they have been wiped out BECAUSE of vaccinations, not in spite of them. if these shots were as dangerous as some (non-doctors) are claiming, there would be a LOT more people having problems because of them, with the percentage of people who have had them.As you have probably already figured out im for immunizations, but im not going to ram it down your throat. my kids have theirs and my son will finish getting his, so if you want to take a chance its up to you, but im glad mine are protected. :0)

and in the schools here you cant do the waiver, you have to vaccinate, home school, or move…theres alot of things they dont do here yet though, were like 20 years in the past lol.but my point is, there will be other schools like this as well, you have to check your area.