Parents’ guide to kid’s vaccines is very vital as it helps the parents and the caregivers to learn about the importance and role that vaccinations play in keeping the child healthy. Knowing which shot kid needs and when could be confusing and hence the guide helps.
A simple prick of the syringe in the skin could provide the kid with lifetime protection against deadly diseases like meningitis, chickenpox or hepatitis and others. Thus scheduling these kids’ vaccines at birth and lasting into childhood, millions of children in the United States get vaccinations each year. Vaccines indeed contribute to a significant decrease in much childhood infectious dangerous diseases. Due to the effective vaccines for years, infectious diseases like polio and smallpox have been eradicated in the United States. It is very rare now in the US to experience the devastating and deadly diseases that were once common and also in other countries with high vaccination awareness and coverage.
What is a Vaccine?
The vaccine is a biological preparation that provides the immunity to a person to a particular disease. A vaccine typically consists of the agent that is similar to the disease-causing microorganism and is made from a weaker form of the microbe or killed form, its toxins or the surface protein. These agents stimulate within the body to make immune systems such that they recognize the agent as a threat and work on destroying it and further terminate any of the microbes associated with the agent that might cause in the future. Child vaccination helps in preventing the effects of a future infection by wild pathogens or by nature. This is the most effective method of preventing any deadly infectious disease.
How do Vaccines Work?
Vaccines are like the training course for the body’s immune system. Vaccines prepare the body to fight any of the diseases without exposing it to any disease or symptoms. Immunization vaccine fights the bacteria or viruses or any foreign invaders when they enter the body via the lymphocytes in the body that produces antibodies to keep safe. Antibodies are protein molecules which creates a natural defense to safely develop immunity. Vaccination for babies reduces the risk of them being infected by working with the body’s natural existing defense mechanism to help them develop immunity to diseases safely.
Antibodies that work with other defensive molecules also circulate in the blood called as the complement proteins that destroy microbes. The work of these cells is called humoral immune response or simply the antibody response. The ultimate goal of the vaccine is to stimulate this very response.
How are Vaccines Given?
Vaccines are given to generate immunity around the whole body. And they provoke a specific immune response in particular body areas. There are varying methods of vaccine delivery and different age.
Oral polio vaccines, for example, are ingested in order to arouse the creation of antibodies in the intestinal lining. This is where the poliovirus ends up thereafter multiplying when they enter via contaminated food or water. The oral cholera vaccine creates a localized set of antibodies that curb the Vibrio cholera bacteria from fixing themselves to the walls of the intestine.
On the other hand, intranasal (up-the-nose) vaccines are for the same purpose and have the same effect but the mucous membrane of the nasal cavity is where they act. This is a method to combat diseases that overcome the barrier of nasal mucous to infect the body like influenza etc.
The particular delivery routes of vaccines are sometimes necessary to minimize the chances of vaccines having a negative or adverse effect on the body. Vaccines for kids contain aluminum-based adjuvants causing inflammation unless they are injected via the muscle tissue. The vaccine for tuberculosis – BCG Bacille Calmette-Guerin, is injected into the topmost layer of the skin and termed as an intradermal injection. This is to avoid any damage caused to the blood vessels and nerves.
There are few other vaccines for yellow fever or MMR (Measles, mumps or rubella) which work best when they are released into the body slowly. This is the reason they are injected into the body right between the layers of the fat between the skin and the muscle. The blood flow is limited in this area preventing the vaccine being distributed throughout the body quickly. This is also called as a subcutaneous injection.
Immunization Vaccine Happens at Different Ages:
The vaccines are given to people when they are at risk of contracting a particular disease. Many of these vaccines are given at a younger age when the kid’s body might not be strong enough to fight the naturally occurring diseases due to the developing immunity which much put them at risk. Thus kids are given vaccinations at an early age.
Some vaccines work less effectively in adults and hence they are given to the kids. For instance, the risk of contracting tuberculosis is also given BCG but before the age of 16 and they can never be given post 35 years of age. At this age, the vaccine holds ineffective in stimulating the required immune response.
Some diseases, however, have become risky only at a later stage in life and hence childhood vaccination is not mandatory for them. Likewise, before the age of 65 years in most adults, there are serious risks of being ill from influenza. At this age, the body does not have the ability to fight flu and decreases as the body ages.
Types of Vaccination
There are numerous different types of vaccines. Each of this is designed for your immune to be taught to fight off certain kinds of germs and viruses causing serious diseases. There are many considerations that scientists have before creating vaccines like:
- How well your immune system responds to the germs
- Who all need vaccination against the germs
- The best approach for creating the vaccines.
Based on these various factors, scientists decide which vaccine they have to make and the types of it.
- Live-attenuated vaccines: These are usually weakened or attenuated form of the germ that has the ability to cause the disease.
- Inactivated vaccines: These vaccines are used to kill the version of germs that cause the diseases.
- Subunit, recombinant, conjugate, and polysaccharide vaccines: These are a specific piece of germs like protein, capsid or sugar which make a casing around the germ
- Toxoid vaccines: The toxoid vaccines are made by germs that cause disease.
Childhood Vaccines Risks vs Benefits:
There are more benefits of child immunization as compared to the risk of vaccines kids get. Vaccination like any other medicine could have serious reactions but the risk of serious harm to the body or death is extremely meager.
Benefits of Vaccination:
- Vaccination saves lives
- Vaccination protects the community as a whole and prevents the disease from spreading.
- Vaccinations are cost effective
- Vaccinations are safe
Risks of natural infection: Any vaccine can cause side effects but mostly those are minor and do not last for long.
There are no major risks of vaccination which are common. The report says 1 out of every 100 might have the below problems:
- Blood in the urine or stool
- Pneumonia
- Inflammation of the stomach or intestines
- Headache, upper respiratory tract infection
- Stuffy nose, joint pain or sore throat
- Diarrhea
- Abdominal pain, nausea, cough
- fever
Vaccinated kids have been observed for many years for any long-term health conditions. Scientists are working to identify any risks associated with the vaccines that could lead to conditions like cancer, heart disease, stroke or any autoimmune disease such as lupus or rheumatoid arthritis. There are thousands of studies already being done to check the potential risk factors. So far the studies have not identified any as a huge risk factor from the experiments.
We have learned that vaccines undergo clinical trials before being licensed. They are monitored continuously since millions of dosages are administered after it is licensed. There could be no real biological reason to believe there would be long-term effects, however, the experiments are still ongoing for years. Hope this parents’ guide to kid’s vaccines helps you and write to us about your thoughts via the comments section below.
