CHICAGO — By age 6, children should have vaccinations against 14 diseases, in at least two dozen separate doses, the U.S. government advises. More than 1 in 10 parents reject that, refusing some shots or delaying others mainly because of safety concerns, a national survey found.
Worries about vaccine safety were common even among parents whose kids were fully vaccinated: 1 in 5 among that group said they think delaying shots is safer than the recommended schedule. The results suggest that more than 2 million infants and young children may not be fully protected against preventable diseases, including some that can be deadly or disabling.
The online survey of roughly 750 parents with kids ages 6 and younger was done last year, and results were released online today in the journal Pediatrics. They are in line with a federal survey released last month showing that at least 1 in 10 toddlers and preschoolers lagged on vaccines such as those for chickenpox and the measles- mumps-rubella combination shots. That 2010 survey included more than 17,000 households.
The Pediatrics survey follows other recent news raising concerns among infectious-disease specialists, including a study showing the whooping-cough vaccine seems to lose much of its effectiveness after three years — faster than doctors have thought — perhaps contributing to recent major outbreaks, most notably in California.
“I have to make sure that my child is healthy, and I do not want to put medications in my child that I think are going to harm them,” said Kandace O’Neill of Lakeville, Minn., who has shunned vaccine guidelines but was not involved in the latest survey.
O’Neill said parents — not doctors or schools — should make medical decisions for children.
Study author Dr. Amanda Dempsey, a pediatrician and researcher at the University of Michigan, said vaccine skepticism is fueled by erroneous information online and media reports that sensationalize misconceptions. These include the persistent belief among some parents about an autism-vaccine link despite scientific evidence to the contrary.
And some parents dismiss the severity of vaccine-preventable diseases because they’ve never seen a child seriously ill with those illnesses.
“From being someone in the trenches seeing children die every year from influenza and its complications . . . I would not do a single thing to risk the health of my kids,” said Dr. Buddy Creech, associate director of Vanderbilt University’s Vaccine Research Program. Creech has served on advisory boards for vaccine makers and has accepted their research money.
Dempsey, the survey’s lead author, has been a paid adviser to Merck on issues regarding a vaccine for older children but said that company made no contributions to the survey research.
Dr. Larry Pickering of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the new survey is important and well done, and that it indicates that doctors need to do a better job of communicating vaccine information to patients.
