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Should I Vaccinate My Children?
A science-mom reviews the risks and benefits of vaccines
It’s an opportune time to dig into the risks and benefits of vaccines. Many parents have nagging concerns about vaccines and are skeptical about the prospects of a safe, accelerted COVID-19 vaccine.
This topic hits close to home, as my twin girls are about to enter Kindergarten and I just received an email asking me to get the controversial MMR-V (Measles, Mumps, Rubella and Varicella) vaccine.
In order to make an informed choice, I donned my scientist hat (I completed my PhD in genetics) and dug into the latest data on vaccine risks and benefits.
This simple article shares my key takeaways, along with resources to learn more, so that others can benefit from my research.
Five Things You Need to Know About Vaccines
1) Vaccines work.
Taking my home turf (Canada) as an example, case numbers dropped remarkably across the board before and after vaccines — by 87% (Whooping Cough) to 99–100% (Measles, Mumps, Rubella. Diptheria, Polio). Around the…
