The Friday Five – National Immunization Awareness Month
Follow and join the conversation with #NIAM17.
Sponsored by the National Public Health Information Coalition (@nphic), National Immunization Awareness Month is an annual observance that strives to underline the importance of vaccination at all ages. This week’s Friday Five includes all you need to know about vaccines past, present and future and what you can do to support vaccine awareness.
10 Things You Can Do During NIAM & Toolkit
Feel the need to spread the word and support the NPHIC’s message about the importance of vaccines? There are many ways to get involved and the NPHIC makes it easy with their list of 10 Things You Can Do During NIAM. The list includes a variety of ideas and resources to choose from including logos, quizzes, social media messages and videos. The National Public Health Information Coalition also provides a toolkit each year to help promote the importance of immunizations. The 2017 edition of the toolkit contains key messages, vaccine information, sample news releases and articles, sample social media messages, links to web resources from CDC and other organizations and more. It also includes a media outreach toolkit and a place for you to share your NIAM activities and view what other are doing for NIAM.
The History of Vaccines
Want to know anything and everything about vaccines? Look no further than The History of Vaccines (@historyvaccines), an award-winning informational, educational website created by The College of Physicians of Philadelphia, one of the oldest medical societies in the United States. “The College has created The History of Vaccines to provide a living, changing chronicle of the compelling history of vaccination. The site aims to increase public knowledge and understanding of the ways in which vaccines, toxoids, and passive immunization work, how they have been developed, and the role they have played in the improvement of human health.” Take our word for it, even if you don’t think vaccination is interesting, you will be fascinated once you give this site a visit. Do yourself a favor and make your first stop the interactive timeline.
Cartoon, 1924, showing antivaccinationist leading Ignorance, Bigotry, Carelessness, Innocence off a cliff to smallpox @CPPHistMedLib pic.twitter.com/Mmk0qDmdPr
— History of Vaccines (@historyvaccines) September 27, 2016
WHO on Vaccination
The World Health Organization (@WHO) states, “Our goal is to build a better, healthier future for people all over the world. One of the ways the organization supports this goal is by supporting safe vaccines, availability of vaccines and vaccine education. For reliable facts and information regarding vaccines check out 10 facts on immunization. For a list of commonly asked questions about vaccine safety or a chance to submit you own question online, view Questions and answers on immunization and vaccine safety.
Just a Few Vaccine Refusers Could Endanger Many
There is much controversy these days among parents about whether or not to vaccinate their children. WebMd (@WebMD recently reported that, based on data collected by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, with just a 5 percent drop in the MMR vaccine coverage would triple the number of American kids aged 2 to 11 who would catch the highly contagious virus. Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia notes, “Measles is really the canary in the coal mine. It’s that contagious. Much more so than influenza or chickenpox or polio.”
Just a 5% drop in vaccinations could lead to triple the measles cases in kids aged 2-11, a new study finds. https://t.co/1a3O1NVzZH pic.twitter.com/L2rMXKOk5x
— WebMD (@WebMD) July 24, 2017
Our Best Shot: The Importance of Vaccines for Older Adults
Maybe you didn’t get certain vaccines as a child. Maybe vaccines that you did receive as a child have now worn off. Maybe the type of job you do, your lifestyle, your health status or travel require additional vaccinations. Whatever the reason may be it is important for adults to be aware and receive the vaccines they may need later in life. In this short animated film, the Alliance for Aging Research (@Aging_Research) reminds older adults of their role in increasing the immunity of their families and social circles.
True or false: Vaccine-preventable illnesses aren’t that serious. The answer is in our film! https://t.co/4yGyBTxfeL #NIAM17
— Aging Research (@Aging_Research) August 2, 2017
ICYMI – Our other Friday Fives
