4 Vaccine Myths Debunked, Once And For All

In a world as vast and varied as the one we live in, there are always going to be a variety of opinions and beliefs. 

But there’s a difference between belief and fact, especially when it comes to vaccines.

There has been so much misinformation and vilification flying around about vaccines of late, that we wanted to set things a little straight(er). Here are a few vaccine ‘myths’ that have been widely discredited by experts, medical professionals, and researchers the world over.

1. Toxic Chemicals Are Present In Vaccines

The idea that vaccines contain toxic chemicals like mercury or aluminium has been circulating online and in anti-vaxxer communities for some time now. Now, it is true that aluminum salts are present in some vaccines. They are added in some cases to improve the immune system’s response to the vaccine. However, the same aluminium, and similar quantities, is also found in formula, breast milk, some foods and drinking water.

Another chemical that is often brought up in the ‘toxic chemicals’ claim is thimerosal, a vaccine preservative that contains a form of mercury. However, this is not the same kind of mercury that you would find in tuna from Woolworths (which is known as methyl mercury), it’s a different variety that our bodies can process and excrete. Additionally to that, thimerosal has been purposely excluded from many childhood vaccines.

Formaldehyde is another chemical that tends to illicit a worried response from people, who probably recognise the name of the chemical as that used in the preservation of cadavers. Very small amounts of formaldehyde are used to inactivate the toxins from bacteria and viruses. However, formaldehyde also occurs naturally in quite high concentrations in pears, shiitake mushrooms, apples, spring onions and more.

In the interest of full transparency, the full list of ingredients in vaccines was published by health experts in the Medical Journal of Australia, which you can read here.

2. The HPV Vaccine Is Not Safe

The belief that the HPV vaccine, routinely given to both boys and girls when they are teenagers, is not safe is based on a number of unfortunate instances of selective reporting. The vaccine protects against two high-risk HPV types (type 16 and 18), which are responsible for 70% of cervical cancers in women and 90% of HPV-related cancers in men. It also protects against two low-risk HPV types, which are responsible for 90% of genital warts.

Now, the selective reporting comes into play through VAERS, the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, a system in place since 1990 to record the issues with vaccines. On the system, some 30,000 adverse events have been recorded, along with 200 deaths. These seem like big numbers, but they need to be taken in the larger context of the vaccine. The fact is that although some people had a reaction, some very adversely, there have been almost 200 million doses administered.

However, there’s something that you need to know about VAERS: it’s not perfect. It’s a well documented phenomenon that when a vaccine gets any bad press, more negative adverse reactions are submitted to the system. In the same thread, there’s no way to account for whether the deaths are directly linked to the patient getting the vaccine. Deaths are simply reported to the system, and unfortunately people die in all kinds of circumstances, from all kinds of illnesses, everyday. That’s why it’s important not to jump to conclusions, especially when faced with a vaccine like HPV that by the wide majority is perfectly safe.

More vaccine myths next page