Let’s not be lax about vaccinations, says Dr Zahid Chauhan

GP Dr Zahid Chauhan

A sharp drop in the number of children who have had their measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) jabs has left me deeply worried.

The number of immunisations has in fact fallen to its lowest ebb since 2011/12. This at a time where we have already had three times as many cases of measles in 2018, than we had in the whole of 2017!

The rot set in for MMR way back in 1998, when fraudulent research attached a link between the jab and autism spectrum disorder. “Rot” was the right word – because subsequent studies have shown there is no such link and its author has been struck-off from practising medicine here in the UK.

The MMR vaccination is the safest way to protect your child from highly infectious diseases that can have serious, potentially fatal complications, including meningitis, encephalitis and deafness.

Babies are routinely immunised within a month of their first birthday. A second injection is administered shortly before starting school, when they are three years and four months old.

One of the reasons cited by experts in the wake of the report is that parents simply didn’t have time to take their child for vaccination. There was also a feeling that particularly in the case of mumps, that these were dormant diseases from the past.

Mumps is a painful condition with similar symptoms to more serious infections such as glandular fever and tonsillitis. Provisional data shows cases have risen from 831 in 2015 to 1840 in 2017.

Thanks to vaccination programmes, the number of deaths from measles globally has gone from 2.6 million people in 1980 to 73,000 in 2014. If that doesn’t make a case for the MMR jab, I don’t know what does. 

Your surgery will automatically send you an appointment when your baby is due for the MMR vaccinations. All childhood jabs are free. If you are in any doubt about MMR, contact your surgery and a medic will talk you through it.

Measles, mumps and rubella remain the world’s most preventable diseases. Two injections is all that it should take to stop your child from contagion, misery and suffering. Make sure they receive their MMR jabs.