Anna Kirkland
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781479876938
- eISBN:
- 9781479844272
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479876938.003.0002
- Subject:
- Law, Medical Law
This chapter presents a social scientific perspective on vaccines, showing how to think of vaccines as thoroughly social and political, that is, created through law, regulation, political will, and ...
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This chapter presents a social scientific perspective on vaccines, showing how to think of vaccines as thoroughly social and political, that is, created through law, regulation, political will, and ideologies as well as through scientific development. This chapter explains how vaccines are approved and recommended, what the current recommended vaccine schedule for children in the United States looks like, and how it has changed over time and examines the state-level politics of school entry immunization requirements. It also describes the structure of our federal vaccine safety monitoring system, underscoring how federalism and our lack of a comprehensive national health care system create difficulties in detecting vaccine injuries.Less
This chapter presents a social scientific perspective on vaccines, showing how to think of vaccines as thoroughly social and political, that is, created through law, regulation, political will, and ideologies as well as through scientific development. This chapter explains how vaccines are approved and recommended, what the current recommended vaccine schedule for children in the United States looks like, and how it has changed over time and examines the state-level politics of school entry immunization requirements. It also describes the structure of our federal vaccine safety monitoring system, underscoring how federalism and our lack of a comprehensive national health care system create difficulties in detecting vaccine injuries.
Paul Offit and Charlotte Moser
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231153072
- eISBN:
- 9780231526715
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231153072.001.0001
- Subject:
- Public Health and Epidemiology, Public Health
This book answers questions about the science and safety of modern vaccines. In straightforward prose, it explains how vaccines work, how they are made, and how they are tested. Most important, it ...
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This book answers questions about the science and safety of modern vaccines. In straightforward prose, it explains how vaccines work, how they are made, and how they are tested. Most important, it separates the real risks of vaccines from feared but unfounded risks. The book addresses parental fears that children may receive too many vaccines too early, that the HPV vaccine may cause chronic fatigue or other dangerous side effects, that additives and preservatives in vaccines cause autism, and that vaccines might do more harm than good. This book offers honesty—instead of hype—in the quest to protect children's health.Less
This book answers questions about the science and safety of modern vaccines. In straightforward prose, it explains how vaccines work, how they are made, and how they are tested. Most important, it separates the real risks of vaccines from feared but unfounded risks. The book addresses parental fears that children may receive too many vaccines too early, that the HPV vaccine may cause chronic fatigue or other dangerous side effects, that additives and preservatives in vaccines cause autism, and that vaccines might do more harm than good. This book offers honesty—instead of hype—in the quest to protect children's health.
Paul A. Offit and Charlotte A. Moser
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231153072
- eISBN:
- 9780231526715
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231153072.003.0002
- Subject:
- Public Health and Epidemiology, Public Health
This chapter addresses questions regarding the safety of vaccines. Any medical product that has a positive effect can have a negative effect; hence, no vaccine is absolutely safe. Before they are ...
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This chapter addresses questions regarding the safety of vaccines. Any medical product that has a positive effect can have a negative effect; hence, no vaccine is absolutely safe. Before they are licensed, vaccines are tested in tens of thousands of children. These studies are extensive enough to determine whether vaccines cause common or even uncommon side effects, but they are not sufficient to determine whether a vaccine causes a very rare side effect. To test for this, two postlicensure systems were put in place in the late 1980s and early 1990s: the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) and the Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD). VAERS is a surveillance system codirected by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which can raise the question of whether a vaccine caused a particular problem. These questions can then be answered by the VSD, a group of large health maintenance organizations (HMOs).Less
This chapter addresses questions regarding the safety of vaccines. Any medical product that has a positive effect can have a negative effect; hence, no vaccine is absolutely safe. Before they are licensed, vaccines are tested in tens of thousands of children. These studies are extensive enough to determine whether vaccines cause common or even uncommon side effects, but they are not sufficient to determine whether a vaccine causes a very rare side effect. To test for this, two postlicensure systems were put in place in the late 1980s and early 1990s: the Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) and the Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD). VAERS is a surveillance system codirected by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which can raise the question of whether a vaccine caused a particular problem. These questions can then be answered by the VSD, a group of large health maintenance organizations (HMOs).
Saad B. Omer and Sam F. Halabi
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- October 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780190604882
- eISBN:
- 9780190604912
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190604882.003.0013
- Subject:
- Public Health and Epidemiology, Epidemiology, Public Health
In chapter 13, Saad B. Omer and Sam F. Halabi examine the evidence, strategies, and challenges surrounding vaccine safety as novel technologies and expanding coverage introduce new factors to ...
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In chapter 13, Saad B. Omer and Sam F. Halabi examine the evidence, strategies, and challenges surrounding vaccine safety as novel technologies and expanding coverage introduce new factors to consider in maintaining the safety profile of current and new vaccines. While the fundamental principle behind vaccination remains the same, the technologies behind antigenic components have evolved. The chapter provides concrete recommendations on how the regulatory process that assures vaccine safety and efficacy may be adapted to respond to these technologies. The chapter also reviews postlicensure vaccine safety and adverse event reporting systems at both the national and the international level. It assesses weaknesses in the global system for adverse event monitoring, especially in light of advances in immunization coverage programs in low-income countries, and propose potential solutions to address those weaknesses.Less
In chapter 13, Saad B. Omer and Sam F. Halabi examine the evidence, strategies, and challenges surrounding vaccine safety as novel technologies and expanding coverage introduce new factors to consider in maintaining the safety profile of current and new vaccines. While the fundamental principle behind vaccination remains the same, the technologies behind antigenic components have evolved. The chapter provides concrete recommendations on how the regulatory process that assures vaccine safety and efficacy may be adapted to respond to these technologies. The chapter also reviews postlicensure vaccine safety and adverse event reporting systems at both the national and the international level. It assesses weaknesses in the global system for adverse event monitoring, especially in light of advances in immunization coverage programs in low-income countries, and propose potential solutions to address those weaknesses.
Elisha P. Renne
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781526110886
- eISBN:
- 9781526124272
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526110886.003.0012
- Subject:
- History, History of Science, Technology, and Medicine
Vaccination campaigns rely on the political authority of the state to carry out public health programs for the benefit of its citizens. In sub-Saharan Africa where vaccination programs were ...
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Vaccination campaigns rely on the political authority of the state to carry out public health programs for the benefit of its citizens. In sub-Saharan Africa where vaccination programs were introduced by health officials during colonial rule, subsequent postcolonial programs, such as interventions which focus on a single disease and are supported mainly by western international NGOs, may be viewed with suspicion by some. Rather than strengthening state control of its citizens, vaccination campaigns such as the Global Polio Eradication Initiative as implemented in northern Nigeria, may undermine state authority and control. With its initial focus on polio vaccination rather than on childhood diseases which parents considered more life-threatening, the initiative highlighted the federal government’s failure to provide basic primary health care. That the GPEI was funded by western international NGOs also led some Muslim parents, religious leaders, and medical professionals to question the safety of the oral polio vaccine and to refuse vaccination for their children. However, in 2013 their actions have been tempered by programs providing monetary awards to state governments and foodstuffs to cooperating mothers and in September 2015, WHO announced the interruption of wild poliovirus in Nigeria.Less
Vaccination campaigns rely on the political authority of the state to carry out public health programs for the benefit of its citizens. In sub-Saharan Africa where vaccination programs were introduced by health officials during colonial rule, subsequent postcolonial programs, such as interventions which focus on a single disease and are supported mainly by western international NGOs, may be viewed with suspicion by some. Rather than strengthening state control of its citizens, vaccination campaigns such as the Global Polio Eradication Initiative as implemented in northern Nigeria, may undermine state authority and control. With its initial focus on polio vaccination rather than on childhood diseases which parents considered more life-threatening, the initiative highlighted the federal government’s failure to provide basic primary health care. That the GPEI was funded by western international NGOs also led some Muslim parents, religious leaders, and medical professionals to question the safety of the oral polio vaccine and to refuse vaccination for their children. However, in 2013 their actions have been tempered by programs providing monetary awards to state governments and foodstuffs to cooperating mothers and in September 2015, WHO announced the interruption of wild poliovirus in Nigeria.
