Argument Essay

Should Vaccination be made Compulsory for all Children? Name Institution Should Vaccination be made Compulsory for all Children? The recent decline in the rate of children's vaccination in the United States has been a cause of major concern in the country, especially in the public health sphere. As a result, there has been a heated debate on whether children vaccination should be made a legal requirement in the interest of protecting the health of children and future generations. Opponents of vaccination claim that vaccines are dangerous and can put children at more health risks, while proponents claim that vaccines are safe and effective (Grzysbowski, Patryn, Sak, &Zagaja, 2017). However, given the increased refusal to vaccinate children for non-medical reasons, children's vaccination should be made compulsory not only to save the life of a child but also to enhance herd immunity. Vaccination protects children from contracting and dying from diseases that are otherwise preventable. That is why the government encourages parents to vaccinate their children. Through vaccination, children are not exposed to diseases, such as polio, that were once a threat to the survival of children. According to Carrion (2018), the recent rise in the number of measles cases in the United States involved unvaccinated children. This is attributable to the fact that more parents are refusing to have their children vaccinated, thus endangering their lives. To avoid more cases of preventable diseases attacking children, the government should make vaccination a legal requirement. Pierik (2016) suggests that while parents have the primary responsibility of protecting their children and making decisions for them, the society is obliged to intervene when the parents fail to protect the interests of the children. In this case, the society exerts its authority through the laws provided by the government. Given the benefits associated with children vaccination, parents who oppose vaccination are failing to protect their children and the only way society can protect them is by making children vaccinati...