Who's calling the shots?
More parents are refusing to have their children immunised against diseases, but doctors insist vaccinations are essential, writes Elaine Yau
When a baby first comes to the world, painful vaccine shots are among the first things that befall the crying infant. Right after he is born in the hospital, he will get Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine against tuberculosis and another one against hepatitis B.
Many more vaccine shots will follow right until the child completes primary school to give him comprehensive protection against a host of diseases. But a growing number of parents have spurned the government immunisation programme, citing health concerns, setting off alarm bells among paediatricians and infectious disease experts.
Although the government says they have not observed any decrease in the immunisation coverage rate among children over the years, paediatricians say there are more parents, especially those returning from overseas, who refuse to get their children immunised.
In 2009, parents set up the Hong Kong Vaccine Awareness League, which now boasts 200 members dedicated to the education of parents and concerned citizens regarding vaccination.
The childhood immunisation programme, launched in the 1960s by the Health Department, targets children from newborns to primary six students. The current schedule covers 10 diseases: diphtheria, hepatitis B, measles, mumps, pertussis, pneumococcal disease, poliomyelitis, rubella, tetanus and tuberculosis.
Disease cases decreased as related vaccines were added to the programme. For example, the hepatitis B vaccine was introduced in 1988; cases decreased from 100 in 1997 to 70 in 2011. Rubella cases dropped from 4,958 in 1997 to 85 in 2011, and measles cases fell from 316 to 12 in the same period. No cases of diphtheria and polio have been reported since 1982 and 1995 respectively.