The Argumentative Essay: The Anti-Vaccine Debate

While going about your day, you may have overheard others conversing about vaccines. Perhaps you have been involved in such a conversation, as the vaccine debate is presently a prominent topic of discussion. Ever since the late 1700s, when vaccines were first invented and used by Edward Jenner (Levine, Miller 1020), there have been copious amounts of pro-vaccine advocates. However, overtime anti-vaccine campaigners have accumulated as well, thus creating the ever-present vaccine debate. Not solely in our modern times, but throughout history, pro-vaccine supporters have been disputing with anti-vaccine supporters, constantly presenting new reasons to either love or despise vaccines. Foremost, vaccines consist of killed or weakened forms of

Anti-vaccine supporters strongly protest against vaccines primarily because they contain harmful ingredients. Indeed, this is true, but many pro-vaccine supporters urge that these ingredients are found in such minuscule quantities that they are deemed harmless. In fact, they claim that “Children are exposed to more aluminum in breast milk and infant formula than they are exposed to in vaccines.” Not to mention, the CDC and the FDA insist that vaccines are thoroughly tested and made safe. Although countless anti-vaccine protesters believe that vaccines are the origin of many autism cases, there is no definite evidence proving a link between vaccinations and autism. In 1998, scientist Andrew Wakefield published an article stating that his experiment has proven that vaccines cause autism. Eventually, it was uncovered that lawyers paid Wakefield hundreds of thousands of dollars to forge the results of his experiment, reinforcing the fact that there is no proof that vaccines cause autism. Furthermore, anaphylaxis occurs in only “one per several hundred to one per million vaccinations” ("Should Any Vaccines Be Required for Children?"). On the other hand, “Studies have shown that influenza vaccine is 70 percent to 90 percent effective in healthy adults younger than 65” (Bren). Due to vaccines, millions of children are