National Immunization Month
August is National Immunization Month, which means it’s time to raise awareness about vaccines and brainstorm ways to increase immunization rates within our communities. It’s also time to remind adults that vaccines aren’t just for children. Shots and immunizations can protect people of all ages from serious, fatal diseases. There are many reasons to be vaccinated. Here are the top four!
Vaccines Will Keep You Healthy
This one is obvious, but vaccines will keep you healthy. Despite the rumors surrounding this phenomenon, you cannot “catch” the disease from the vaccine. Additionally, vaccines play a vital role in keeping you healthy, just like regular check-ups, exercise, and eating healthy. As the most convenient mode of preventative care, it’s important to stay up to date. And when you skip vaccines, you’re leaving yourself vulnerable to shingles, pneumococcal disease, influence, and HPV and hepatitis B, which can both lead to cancer.
Vaccine-Preventable Disease Haven’t Gone Away
One of the most important reasons to stay vaccinated is because some of these preventable diseases have not gone away completely. Disease travels easily and can be passed around by those who remain unprotected. In fact, in the United States, most reported cases of measles are a result of international travel. And as of this year, there have been about 1,164 cases in 30 states. Most of these cases occur in communities where most people are unvaccinated!
Vaccine-Preventable Diseases Are Expensive
Vaccines are one of the safest and most cost-effective health interventions, yet time and time again, adult immunization rates are staggeringly low. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that only 42% of adults during the 2015 – 2016 flu season received an influenza vaccine. That same year, adults not getting vaccinated cost the US $7.1 billion dollars according to a study published by the journal Health Affairs. These common preventable diseases could have been avoided with a simple immunization.
Also, when people get sick, they miss work. On average, catching the flu costs you five to six days off of work. And adults who get hepatitis A lose up to one month of work. With a member of the team missing, your company begins to suffer, which means businesses are paying the price.
Vaccines Protect Your Family
If you get a preventable disease like the flu, measles, or pneumonia, odds are, your family is automatically at a greater risk of getting sick too, even if they are relatively healthy. Not only are you putting yourself at risk when you avoid getting vaccinated. You’re jeopardizing the health and safety of others too. And that goes even more so for people living with elders and infants, who are at a greater risk for serious life-threatening infections and complications. What might knock you out for a week or two might cost them their lives. “Adults are the most common source of pertussis (whooping cough) infection in infants. In 2010 alone, 25 US infants died from whooping cough.” It’s so important to keep up with your immunizations, and that’s especially true if you want to protect your family and loved ones.
Awareness about the importance of immunizations starts with reminding your friends and family to stay up to date with their shots. It’s as simple as promoting vaccines as a necessary measure to prevent dangerous diseases like the flu, measles, and pneumonia. Stay safe, stay protected, and stay prepared. Especially this month for National Immunization Month. If you’re looking to make an appointment with your doctor to get a vaccine or immunization, consider Abba Medical Transportation. We will suit all of your needs.