There is no doubt that vaccination is essential for a child’s health; unless a child is exposed to a certain vaccination at a specific age for his/her organism to develop the antibodies which will be necessary to decrease the chances to contract the disease in question in the future, the outcomes can be rather drastic. It must be admitted, though, that in Sweden, the issue of vaccination is taken extremely seriously. According to the existing research and pieces of evidence concerning the issue of children’s vaccination and immunization, the aim of the above-mentioned procedures is to ensure that the child will not contract a specific disease in the future. According to Barklay et al., “The aim of vaccination programs is to increase the number of immune people in a population, and if that is achieved, a greater proportion of the parasite population will be evolving in immune hosts” (Barklay et al.). Therefore, it can be considered that vaccination and immunization of children in Sweden are aimed not only at making the vaccinated children healthier but also at making the people of next-generation resistant to certain types of diseases.
As has been mentioned above, there are strong reasons to believe that vaccination is essential for children’s health. Since vaccination prevents people from contracting diseases in the future, it seems crucial to make sure that children are vaccinated properly. The issue of vaccination and immunization of children in Sweden has become especially important in light of the recent statistics provided by the Swedish Health Department. As the recent report says, “The National Board has recently initiated a revision of the schedule of the national vaccination program, especially with the reference to pertussis and diphtheria immunity” (Carlsson). Since diphtheria has become a serious threat to Swedish children, immunization and vaccination are crucial at present.
According to the recently established schedule for vaccination and immunization approved by the Swedish Health Department, the vaccination schedule for children in Sweden includes vaccination against DTaP, IPV, PCV, MMR, HPV, BCG, HepB and dTAP. It is essential to mention that vaccinations against BCG and HepB are conducted on the day the child is born. As for the rest of the vaccinations, children are vaccinated against DTaP, IPV and PCV several times, namely, at the age of three months, 5 months, and a year. At the age of 18 months, children are vaccinated against MMR. When the Swedish children reach 5–6 years, they get only the DTaP and IPV vaccines; occasionally, at 6, a Swedish child can also have an MMR vaccine, but the MMR vaccination age stretches from 6 to 8; MMR vaccination is also injected at 12. When Swedish children reach 10, they have the DTaP vaccine again, and will also be vaccinated against HPV at 10-12. The final MMR vaccination comes when a child reaches 12. Last, but definitely not least, dTap vaccination must be provided at 14-16 (Childhood Vaccination Schedule).
Despite the fact that the question of necessity in vaccination and immunization has been raised quite a lot, there is still no doubt that without vaccination and immunization, there would have been a number of problems concerning children’s health. According to the existing evidence, the Swedish children who were not vaccinated against measles were caught in a sweeping epidemic of measles registered in 2007 (Kulane, Johansson, Robleh and Bågenholm 2).
There is no secret that the reasonability of vaccination has been debated for quite a long (Reid). However, it is still clear that at present, there is no alternative way to protect children from developing diseases in the future other than offering vaccination. Hence, in every case of vaccination, the individual specifics of a child’s organism must be taken into account to prevent negative vaccination effects.
References
Barklay, Victoria C. et al. The Evolutionary Consequences of Blood-Stage Vaccination on the Rodent Malaria Plasmodium chabaudi. n. d. Web.
Carlsson, Maria. Sweden. n. d. Web.
Childhood Vaccination Schedule n. d. Web.
Kulane, Asli, Annika Johansson, Idill Robleh and Gunnel Bågenholm. Somali Parents’ Acceptance of MPR Vaccination for Their Children: An Exploratory Study. 2007. Web.
Reid, Sue. MMR: A Mother’s Victory. The Vast Majority of Doctors Say There Is No Link Between the Triple Jab and Autism, but Could an Italian Court Case Reignite this Controversial Debate? 2012. Web.