Middlesex-London Health Unit, Ontario Medical Association stress importance of vaccinations

The Middlesex-London Health Unit (MLHU) is joining forces with the Ontario Medical Association (OMA) to remind the public of the importance of vaccines.

This comes in the wake of the World Health Organization classifying vaccine hesitancy as one of the top threats to global health.

At Banting House in London Wednesday, Dr. Sohail Gandhi, president of the Ontario Medical Association, addressed the safety concerns around vaccines.

“Vaccines in Canada are safe,” Gandhi explained. “They go through a rigorous multi-phase trial process and what that means is for a vaccine to get approved in Canada, it’s not just one clinical trial, but its multiple clinical trials and multiple stages that the vaccine has to go through before it can be used on humans.”

Banting House is a national historic site and is known as the birthplace of insulin. Dr. Chris Mackie, medical officer of health for the MLHU, said the site — just like vaccines — is an example of how Canadians have adopted medical innovation.

Gandhi also spoke about how easy it is for parents to access false information.

“Sixty-three per cent of parents actually look to the internet for advice on medical treatments and on vaccines,” Gandhi said, “but some of the information on the internet is wrong and does not tell the truth.”

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The OMA has launched a new campaign to try to counteract some of the misinformation that exists around vaccines.

The Ask Ontario Docs campaign is trying to provide those who are unsure about vaccinations with accurate information and help connect them with doctors to answer their questions.

The numbers for vaccine hesitancy in London are fairly low, with the health unit estimating only three percent of parents in the region object to vaccines for no medical reasons.

According to the MLHU, London schools are doing extremely well when it comes to numbers on vaccinated children.

“Only a handful of schools have vaccinated less than 80 percent of their students for measles, mumps, rubella, and for the polio vaccine it’s less than half a dozen schools where the rate is below 70 per cent,” said Mackie.

“I would argue vaccinations are second only to clean water in terms of the health benefits it created.”

Although numbers for kids in London are relatively high, Gandhi said when it comes to common vaccines like the flu shot, only 60 to 65 per cent of the population in Canada gets vaccinated.

Despite last year being what he called a mild flu season, there were still 12,000 people hospitalized due to flu complications. Of that number, 3,600 people died.

“What is most important is that our population wholeheartedly embraces vaccinations,” said Mackie.