This story appeared in the Cheboygan Daily Tribune and was written by Pino Colone, president of the Michigan State Medical Society. Read more here.
For two years now, COVID-19 has dominated the public consciousness in a way that’s unlike anything I can ever remember. How to treat it, how to protect against it, how to avoid exposure in the first place — concern for these kinds of questions have dominated nearly all facets of our daily lives. Considering that, you may think there’s no need to spill more ink on the topic of vaccinations.
However, I can quickly point to over 50,000 reasons why that isn’t true.
Right now. Today. There are nearly 51,000 Michigan toddlers who are less protected than they should be against deadly, vaccine-preventable diseases.
That’s nearly 51,000 chances for needless — and completely avoidable — tragedy. And that’s the only way to look at it.
With COVID-19 and the vaccines that protect against it dominating headlines and our collective attention over the past two years, remaining diligent in protecting against diseases we have already conquered has fallen by the wayside. Michigan child immunization rates have fallen to their lowest levels in nearly a decade. In 2019, just prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, 74.6 percent of Michigan children ages 19 to 35 months completed a core series of vaccines. In just two years’ time, that rate has dropped to 69.9 percent.
While at first glance, that rate of decline might not seem like much, one must remember these aren’t just numbers on a sheet of paper. We are talking about young, vulnerable human lives, and a lot of them for that matter — approximately 164,000 here in Michigan. And that’s just our toddlers. Slumping childhood vaccination rates is a trend that is observed across cohorts, from infants to adolescents.
All told, it’s a dip that has left tens of thousands of Michigan children susceptible to preventable diseases like diphtheria, pertussis, mumps, and measles — all dangerous and potentially deadly conditions.
But it goes beyond that. Not only do falling vaccination rates leave more vulnerable to deadly infections, but they threaten the delicate thresholds for herd immunity that must be maintained to keep disease outbreaks at bay in the first place. In short, a small dip in immunization rates is the only difference between a safe, stable situation and an infectious disease powder keg waiting to blow. Eventually it becomes not a question of if an outbreak will occur but when, and unfortunately, it’s safe to say Michigan is now firmly in that territory for a whole host of communicable — and completely preventable — diseases.
It’s something we’ve already seen to some extent in recent years. In 2019, measles roared back across the country, surging to the highest number of cases in a generation and infecting dozens right here in Michigan. Pertussis, also known as whooping cough, surged to dangerously high levels in 2010 and then again in 2014, afflicting thousands along the way.
These are diseases that too often come with tragic consequences. The onus is now on all of us to make sure these kinds of heartbreaking stories become a thing of the past, and the great news is that’s something that’s completely in our control. It starts with and ends with making sure you and your family are caught-up on your routine vaccinations.