More than any other review excerpt thus far, this quote best summarizes what makes Vaccinated such a compelling read:

“Maurice Hilleman may be the most important person you’ve never heard of. World over, millions of lives have been saved by this man, and the living, breathing people he saved, going about business as usual, don’t even know it.”

Vaccinated covers not only the vaccines created by Hilleman himself - measles, mumps, rubella, chicken pox, Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, pneumococcus, meningococcus, and Hib - but also “the history of all vaccines, including the work of other scientists. It describes how vaccines were invented and what methods were used to make each of them,” which makes it all the more interesting “since all manner of history, science, and sociology were thrown in as well.”

Hilleman won neither fame nor fortune for his work (nor were those his goals), and vaccinology remains much the same today.  “Vaccines are manufactured by very few pharmaceutical companies at the present time because their production is not a high income venture. They use extreme caution and care in creation of these serums which protect our lives and those of our families. Many of the vaccinologists put in long hours of dedicated work for little recognition and no intention of gaining anything except the greater good for mankind.”

Vaccines are still a relatively new phenomena.  “In the 1950s there were only four vaccines at a cost of about $4. We now have sixteen vaccines, some requiring multiple shots, at the cost of over $1000.”  That’s a lot of new discoveries in only fifty years (and don’t forget to take inflation into account when comparing those dollar figures).  As another blogger commented, “The thing that was incredibly eye opening while reading this book is just how recent many of the medical advancements (vaccines, antibiotics, etc.) that we take for granted are.”

While Hilleman was not the inventor of the polio vaccine, two of our bloggers - interestingly, two who have deviated somewhat from the standard course of vaccinations due to their own children’s reactions - recalled family friends who had been struck by polio.  One wrote: “My mother recalls when her best friend came down with polio. They had to gesture to each other from several backyards away since they couldn’t play together anymore. Parents used to fear many of the diseases that are now part of the routine immunization schedule.”

The other knew the polio victim herself, and this woman comes to mind whenever others ask her about her stance on immunization:  “That visual confirmation of the horror that vaccines prevent looms large in my mind. Most people don’t have this sort of reference to draw from. They have never lived in an age of a pandemic, never experienced in anyway the true horrors that vaccines prevent.”

The final three chapters of Vaccinated deal with the controversies of vaccination, and according to one blogger, they “should be mandatory reading for anyone who questions whether or not vaccinations are necessary.”  She goes on to say that “one of the reasons why I feel safe to take my young children out into society, allowing them to play with other children, is that I assume that those children have been vaccinated…What about the parents who are essentially counting on everyone else to immunize their children so that their own non-immunized kid won’t get sick?”  Another blogger chimes in with essentially the same sentiment: “After reading this book, I’m even more convinced of the necessity of vaccinating all children, especially my own.”

While the book is undeniably pro-vaccine, its basis is science, not editorial:  ”The explanations of the history of vaccines, and the scientific data [are] pretty unemotional. Even when showing that vaccinating is preferable after analyzing data, the author still completely articulated the opposing argument and then rebutted it.”  Another blogger agrees, noting that: “Even though this is a touchy subject for some, I feel that Offit does a nice job of compiling the facts and presenting them in a way that few would find offensive.”

One blogger - a former neuroscience researcher whose son is on the autistic spectrum - is still not sure about how well the associated risks have been refuted.  “Without taking up a huge debate over the issue, I’ll say that neither side has me convinced.”  She goes on to theorize - quite sensibly - that: “I do think that for sensitive kids, the sheer number of vaccines may be problematic. This isn’t that the vaccine causes autism, but rather that too much too soon combined with other factors may serve as an environmental trigger (more likely a catalyst for other environmental triggers) to show the various symptoms that are now classified as being on the autistic spectrum.”

But the most striking anecdote came from a mother of preemie twins, who had recently passed up the first MMR vaccine for her boys:

“With all the hoopla surrounding the MMR vaccine we decided to be safe rather than sorry with the boys. Even though I was 90% certain there was no substantiated link to autism, I didn’t have the time to research the issue enough to erase all doubt. So at their 15 month well-baby visit, I asked their pediatrician if he had each of the three components available in separate injections.

He made it clear that the science behind the alleged link to autism was faulty – and he had given both his sons the MMR. But he understood our caution. Yes, that meant an additional two shots/visits per boy, but we figured that was a small price to pay.

Just a few days later I was reading Vaccinated by Paul Offit and came to the part about the alleged link of autism to the MMR vaccine. After a few pages (and having read in the rest of the book about vaccine methodology), I changed my mind. The boys had their MMR injections the next week.”

Regardless of whether parents choose to follow the standard course of vaccinations or not, it only makes sense to gather information - from reliable, diverse sources - and be clear about the path you take and its possible repercussions.

We’ve got more reviews of Vaccinated in progress - please see the schedule below and return for our Round-Up Review on Wednesday, June 27!

6/21 - Slouching Mom
6/22 - Chaos Theory, Hello Pushkin
6/25 - Gingajoy, Sarah’s Dandelions
6/26 - Midwestern Mommy, Quarter Rest
6/27 - Round-Up Review on PBN