There is a trope among anti-vaccine activists that immunity from contracting and surviving a disease is superior to vaccine immunity. In a nutshell, the anti-vaxxers are wrong.

Vaccine immunity is essentially equivalent to disease-caused immunity. The only difference is that contracting a vaccine-preventable disease is dangerous. And that danger from the disease is considerably greater than the minimal risks from a vaccine.

Vaccine immunity is absolutely “natural” immunity derived from disease. The immune system reacts to a vaccine in the same way as it does to a vaccine-preventable disease. The only difference is that getting immunity from a vaccine is safer than the consequences of an actual infection.

Contracting a vaccine-preventable disease and surviving it does not make your body or your immune system stronger. It might actually make you more likely to be permanently weaker. And this post is going to show why that’s a scientific fact.

Vaccine immunity vs “natural immunity”

First up, let’s look at polio. The polio vaccine is incredibly safe and incredibly effective at preventing polio.

According to the CDC, most people who contract polio will not exhibit any symptoms. About one in four people who contract polio will develop mild, flu-like symptoms that resolve within a few days.

However, a proportion of people with poliovirus infection will develop more serious consequences that affect the brain and spinal cord:

• Meningitis (infection of the covering of the spinal cord and/or brain)—occurs in about 1 to 5 out of 100 people with poliovirus infection, depending on virus type.
• Paralysis (unable to move parts of the body) or weakness in the arms, legs, or both. This occurs in about 1 in 200 people to 1 in 2000 people, depending on virus type.

Next up, measles. Once again, the MMR vaccine (against measles, mumps, and rubella) naturally boosts the immune system to prevent measles.

The anti-vaccine world has long insisted that measles is an innocuous disease, and contracting the disease is the best way to build the immune system.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

According to the CDC, some of the many measles complications are:

• About 30% of measles cases develop one or more complications.
• Pneumonia is the complication that is most often the cause of death in young children. As many as 1 out of every 20 children with measles gets pneumonia.
• Ear infections occur in about 1 in 10 measles cases, and permanent hearing loss can result.
• Diarrhea is reported in about 8% of cases.
• About 1 child in every 1,000 who gets measles will develop encephalitis, an inflammation of the brain that can lead to convulsions, deafness, and other long-term neurological deficits.
• For every 1,000 children who get measles, 1-2 will die from it.
• About 1-2 children out of 1000 who contract measles may develop subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE), a rare chronic, progressive encephalitis that affects primarily children and young adults. SSPE is caused by a persistent measles virus infection. SSPE starts with a measles infection, usually before the age of 2 years, followed by approximately 6-15 asymptomatic years. Some researchers think the asymptomatic period is around 5-8 years after the initial disease. The disease gradually progresses with psychological and neurological deterioration, including personality changes, seizures, and coma. It is always ultimately fatal.
• A measles infection can result in short- and long-term immune system dysfunction, sometimes called immune amnesia, which can leave the child susceptible to other diseases early in life (which is in direct opposition to claims by anti-vaccine activists that it helps “boost” the immune system). Even if a child developed immunity to a disease before the measles infection, their immune system will “forget” that immunity, and the child will be susceptible to that infection again.

Measles is not just a rash; it is so much more. Getting immunity to measles from a vaccine is infinitely safer than “natural” immunity from the disease. Getting measles is dangerous.

And speaking of immunity, as I wrote above, measles can actually ravage the immune system, making the child susceptible to other diseases. This alone destroys the anti-vaccine myth that a “natural” infection is better for the immune system than the vaccine.

It’s incomprehensible to me to understand how anyone would want to put their children at risk of measles just to avoid the simple measles vaccine.

Summary

I do not understand people in the anti-vaccine echo chamber who somehow think they know more than scientists and physicians with years of education and experience in disease prevention. They put their children at risk of deadly diseases because some “influencer” on YouTube says that “natural” immunity plus supplements they’re selling is enough to make any vaccine-preventable disease go away easily.

The “do your research” crowd that predominates among anti-vaxxers doesn’t know how to research. They generally use their confirmation bias to find “research” that confirms their pre-ordained bias rather than looking at all of the evidence and giving more weight to high-quality vaccine research.

I do think that people should be more interested in their medical care. But it’s the epitome of arrogance to think studying for 15 minutes or 15 hours on the internet to conclude vaccine immunity is somehow better than the years of education, experience, and research of vaccine experts.

I have been studying pharmaceutical safety and effectiveness for over 30 years, and I would never presume to know more than my physician. I communicate with them using my knowledge, but I also assume they know more than I do about just about everything.

Anti-vaxxers like to believe that they are smarter and more informed than doctors. That is patently wrong.

So, I hope I have convinced you that vaccine immunity is safer and better than “natural” immunity. Well, vaccine immunity = natural immunity.

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