By Shaidathul Suhana Ros
MELAKA: Aida (not her real name) seemed nervous and fidgety as she held her eight-month-old baby close to her chest, clutching an immunisation brochure in her hand as she waited for the government clinic in Ayer Keroh here, to open.
She was obviously there to get her daughter immunised but still had doubts if she was doing the right thing. Apparently, she had read an article on social media stating that vaccines could cause death as they contained substances that were not only harmful but forbidden in Islam.
Out of fear, Aida did not take her baby to the clinic for the first round of immunisation when she was two months old.
“Now my baby is eight months old but I’m still worried and scared about the effects of the vaccines,” the young mother told Bernama.
Influenced by fake reports
Aida is not the only one who has been influenced by anti-vaxxers, as those who are opposed to vaccination for babies and children are known as.
Hospital Pantai Ayer Keroh paediatric expert Dr Hayati Jaafar said the public was still not well informed on vaccines which was one of the factors why some people were easily misguided by propaganda disseminated through social media platforms.
She said it was worrying when professionals from the medical fraternity grouped together as anti-vaxxers. With their medical knowledge, they are expected to have a better understanding of vaccines but, unfortunately, they are lending credence to the anti-vaccine arguments.
“All the facts pertaining to safety, efficacy and religious context have been discussed and settled earlier through various mediums.
“Although the anti-vaccine groups are aware of these facts, they are too stubborn and arrogant to vouch for vaccines,” she said.
She believed that these groups had done their own research and studies but chose to be selective and biased towards their own beliefs.
Best protection
Explaining that vaccines were the best protection for babies and children against certain dangerous diseases, Dr Hayati said they help to boost the immune system to fight bacteria or viruses that attack the body.
“Vaccines are produced from dead or weakened pathogens. When a vaccine is injected into a person, it will cause a natural immune reaction that will create antibodies that are stored in the memory of the body’s defence system and will be used when disease strikes,” she said.
Vaccines are created for diseases that have no cure or are highly infectious and can lead to dangerous complications, especially in children.
Dr Hayati said HIV-infected children and those suffering from congenital immune deficiency or are being treated with steroids, cancer drugs or undergoing radiotherapy cannot be given vaccines.
In Malaysia, babies and children have been given free vaccinations since the 1950s under the Ministry of Health’s National Immunisation Programme to protect them against 12 types of contagious diseases caused by certain bacteria and viruses.
These diseases include tuberculosis or TB, hepatitis B, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, poliomyelitis, Haemophilus Influenza Type B, measles, mumps, rubella and Japanese encephalitis.
The government’s immunisation programme has proven to be highly effective as the nation’s child mortality rate has decreased by 85 per cent over the period from 1970 till 2017. The immunisation has also succeeded in wiping out smallpox and poliomyelitis.
Does not cause autism
On the argument pertaining to the link between the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism, Dr Hayati said it was one of the medical field’s biggest myths and worse still, anti-vaxxers were still propounding the inaccurate hypothesis.
She said the issue sparked in 1998 when a medical researcher from Britain Andrew Wakefield and 12 of his colleagues published the findings of their study that suggested that the MMR vaccine may increase the risk of autism in children.
“In 2010, this doctor’s findings were retracted after it was found that the data he used in his study was incorrect,” she said.
Other concerns put forward by anti-vaxxers were related to the presence of aluminium and mercury elements in some vaccines which, they claimed, could harm the children’s brain.
“Take for instance the mercury found in the influenza vaccine… observations showed that it did not cause any harm. Likewise, the aluminium. In fact, the aluminium content in the body is far higher when fed with breast or formula milk than the amount (of aluminium) found in the vaccine itself,” she pointed out.
Dr Hayati also said that to ensure herd or community immunity prevailed in this country, parents must make sure that their children are immunised.
Herd immunity refers to the resistance to the spread of a contagious disease within a population once enough people are immunised.
On Feb 21 this year, a two-year-old child from Johor Bahru who was not immunised was suspected to have died from diphtheria.
The Ministry of Health’s director-general of Health Datuk Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah had said that the boy had developed a fever and cough and had swollen tonsils on Feb 16 before he was taken to the hospital’s emergency unit on Feb 18. He passed away three days later.
In 2018, the ministry recorded six deaths related to measles, with all the cases having had no immunisation against the disease. It also recorded five cases of diphtheria, four of which did not have immunisation; and 22 cases of pertussis, in which 19 were not immunised.
Mohd Qayyum Ashraf Mohd Shukor, 29, who has a three-year-old son, told Bernama that Muslim parents need not have any doubts about immunisation as a fatwa has been issued stating that vaccines made in Malaysia were halal.
“Based on current conditions in the world, changes in weather and eating patterns and (existence of) infectious diseases, vaccines are necessary. We don’t know when a disease will strike, so vaccines are important to protect us before something bad happens,” he said.
Mother-of-three Norizah Atin, 45, said certain anti-vaccine groups have been feeding society with all kinds of false information, even to the extent of claiming that vaccines were not halal and that they were part of Israel’s agenda to destroy Muslims.
“The more naive parents believe what they read. They reject vaccines and use supplements instead, knowing very well that those products do not comply with the Health Ministry’s requirements and relying solely on the testimonials of users who are unaware of the truth.”
Norizah urged parents not to expose their children to the risk of contracting infectious diseases by refusing to immunise them.
“Learn a lesson from the children who have died as a result of not being immunised,” she added. – Bernama
