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Add immunization record checks to your back-to-school routine
AUGUSTA - As parents and children cruise through their back-to-school lists, the state director of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention is urging parents to remember to complete one other important task: checking to see that their children's immunization records are up to date.Maine CDC Director Dora Anne Mills said that immunizations are one of the top public health successes of the last 100 years, being one of the biggest contributors to the expansions in life expectancy.
For example, smallpox, which killed more people in the 20th century than all that century's wars combined, was eliminated by 1980 because of the vaccine.
Polio, with epidemics that instilled fear in millions of children in the first half of the last century, is now on the verge of elimination worldwide, thanks to vaccines.
More recently, Mills said, types of bacterial meningitis that once stole children from their families are now virtually eliminated because of a vaccine.
It's important to remember that vaccines are safe, Mills said. The proteins that make up the main ingredient of many of them are now more purified than ever before.
The vast majority of vaccines, including almost all childhood vaccines, are now available in preservative-free formulations. Thimerosal, a once-common preservative in vaccines, is now rarely found in more than trace amounts in childhood vaccines.
Immunizations required for school entry, starting in elementary school include Diptheria/Pertussis/Tetanus, Measles/Mumps/Rubella, Poliomyelitis and Varicella.
Immunizations required for postsecondary school entry include Diptheria/Pertussis/Tetanus and Measles/Mumps/Rubella.
Additional immunizations that are recommended for children, but not required for school entry, include Influenza vaccine on a yearly basis, Hepatitis B, Hib (Hemophilus Influenza B), Meningococcal vaccine, Pneumococcal vaccine, and Hepatitis A and Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) vaccine, once it is available.
More information on childhood vaccines can be found at www.mainepublichealth.gov.
