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Vaccinations and professional examinations
Last reviewed: 15.05.2018
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The goal of preventive vaccinations is to make the child immune to certain infections, protect it from a contagious disease and its complications. Such vaccinations, for example, managed to defeat diphtheria, poliomyelitis, and although these diseases still occur, their number is not as catastrophic as before.
Immunity is passive and active.
Passive immunity is when antibodies against an infection are either transmitted from the mother's blood to a child still in utero (innate immunity) or when these antibodies are taken from an immunized animal (serum) and injected to the child so that his body is protected against infection.
Active immunity is produced by prophylactic vaccination. A weakened culture of the pathogen (a bacterium or a virus) is introduced, and in response to it, the body develops antibodies that neutralize the present causative agent of the disease, if it still enters the child's body. But such immunity is not at all easy: the introduction of a vaccine is a serious burden for the body and there is a risk of complications. The most dangerous of them is the inflammation of the membranes of the brain (meningitis or meningoencephalitis). Sometimes the vaccine does not completely protect against infection: the child still gets sick, but the disease runs in an erased form, atypical, so it can be difficult for a doctor to recognize it sometimes. In addition, a person vaccinated in childhood can become ill, for example, with measles or mumps while already an adult, and adults suffer so-called childhood infections much heavier than children, often with complications.
In the evaluation of vaccinations among specialists there is no unanimity. To say unequivocally - to do or not to do this or that inoculation, given possible complications, it is difficult. Unambiguous can only be considered that vaccinations against poliomyelitis, tetanus, rabies (if a dog is bitten) must be carried out, because these diseases are deadly. As for other vaccinations that prevent children's infections, some doctors believe that the child should be sick with them, and preferably in childhood. In addition, vaccinations increase allergic organism, sometimes weaken the immune system.
Vaccinations are contraindicated to a child suffering from eczema, bronchial asthma or prone to convulsions.