Coloradans showing more faith in immunization
If you’ve been avoiding the news because it’s making you hit the bottle, this will give you a couple reasons to return to the morning paper sober. Several encouraging news stories broke last week about vaccines and one pertains specifically to Colorado.
On Monday, Moderna, a biotech company in Massachusetts, announced preliminary data from a human trial of its COVID-19 vaccine. The vaccine triggered the production of antibodies in human test subjects. Prior to the human trial, the firm’s vaccine prototype was successful in helping mice produce antibodies that protected them from COVID-19 lung infections.
Developing antibodies is key to mounting an immune response to viral or bacterial infection. Vaccines teach the body’s immune system to recognize pathogens by introducing a bit of pathogen protein. The body responds by producing antibodies. When the virus later shows up, the presence of these antibodies enables the body to quickly mount an immune response and eliminate the pathogen.
Also this week, another group of scientists, this one from Harvard, announced that they had successfully inoculated monkeys against COVID-19. The Harvard scientists join two other biotech companies, one from Oxford University and another from China, that have successfully vaccinated monkeys. More trials are needed but the results are promising given physiological similarities between human and nonhuman primates.
Colorado also got good news on Wednesday on a related front; support for stronger vaccination standards for school children has increased since autumn 2019. A Keating Research poll found that 88% of Coloradans want children to be vaccinated against communicable diseases such as mumps, chickenpox, and measles prior to enrolling in school or daycare. That’s an increase of four percentage points since November of last year. Support for vaccination among unaffiliated voters and women who are 50 years old or older increased by even greater margins.
According to the poll, a greater percentage of Coloradans would support legislation to strengthen Colorado’s vaccine law than last year. Seventy-nine percent of those polled approved of the requirements in the 2020 Senate Bill 163. The bill would oblige parents who choose to exempt their children from vaccines for non-medical reasons to submit a form signed by an immunization provider or to take an online class on the efficacy of vaccines before they can enroll their children in school or daycare.
Current law merely requires parents who exempt their children to submit a statement to that effect. The state’s weak vaccination requirements likely contribute to Colorado’s lower kindergarten vaccination rates compared to other states. Less than 89% of kindergarteners were fully inoculated against common childhood diseases. The national average for this age group is 94% just shy of the percentage needed to achieve herd immunity. Herd immunity prevents an outbreak and protects those children who cannot be vaccinated for medical reasons.
Senate Bill 163 passed in the state senate prior to the pandemic. The bill awaits votes in the state House when legislators return. Hopefully the House will pass the bill and the governor will sign it.
Immunization advocates have worked hard to educate the public about the necessity of vaccines. They deserve credit for the rising support for stronger immunization laws. The pandemic has also likely helped sway public opinion by giving the public a glimpse of what life was like before vaccines were common.
Prior to the creation of vaccines for polio, measles, rubella, and other diseases, tens of thousands of people died from communicable diseases every year. In 1921, for example, 206,000 Americans caught diphtheria and 15,520 died. By comparison, there were two cases of diphtheria in the U.S. between the years 2004 and 2017. The fatality rate for this disease is about 20% among young children and adults over the age of 40. Without vaccines, tens of thousands of people would die from diphtheria every year.
The COVID-19 outbreak has been educational; most people understand that the only way to beat COVID-19 is to survive an infection or get vaccinated — the second option is far, far safer. This week’s news gives us reason to be optimistic both about the future availability of a lifesaving COVID19 vaccine and rising public support for vaccination more generally.