Diseases our parents worried about when many of us were children, like measles, went away, but now they’re coming back. Why is that? They went away because nearly everyone got vaccinated against them, and the vaccines worked. They’re coming back because fewer people are getting the vaccines. The discovery of new viruses, and the development of vaccines against them, was made possible in large part by the Nobel Prize-winning discoveries of Dr. John Enders and his colleagues at Harvard Medical School. This laboratory began developing the polio vaccine in the late 1940s and the measles vaccine in the 1960s. In the 1940s virtually every kid got measles. Every year in the United States, several million children were infected, 50,000 required hospitalization, 1,000 suffered brain infection, and about 500 died. As a result, measles itself creates immunity that lasts for years thereafter. Then the vaccine arrived. Studies of many thousands of children showed that getting two doses of the measles vaccine was effective and safe, and protection also lasted a lifetime. The number of measles cases began dropping precipitously. By the year 2000, there were no more measles cases in the United States. From millions of cases a year to none, in just 40 years. But in recent years measles has returned; there are outbreaks in many states and, once again, people are being hospitalized and dying—almost all of them unvaccinated. Some parents thought the disease had been eliminated, so why bother? Or since measles is simply a mild and benign childhood disease, let them acquire it a then become immune. Also wrong! And some parents were worried by misinformation that the measles vaccine was unsafe. That is simply not true.
So, who should get the vaccine? If you were born before 1957, you don’t need it, for you almost surely were infected by the virus, and like the vaccine, that gives you lifelong immunity. If you were born later and have not had both doses of the vaccine, you should get them now. If you received only the vaccine given between 1963 and 1968, you should talk with your doctor about getting another shot; that vaccine was not as strong as the one in use since 1968. Obviously, this same advice also applies to your children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. We all have a right to decide whether or not to protect ourselves—if that’s the only issue. But vaccines protect not only you but also your family, friends, and colleagues. Measles is not only potentially dangerous, but extremely contagious: one infected person (including people who don’t know they’re infected) will infect 12 to 18 other people! Getting a vaccine is about protecting them, too. Protecting just ourselves may be at our own discretion, but protecting others is not!
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