My entire idea about it was child-centered. You may wonder why. Well, in this region, it is children who often get vaccinated. While I was growing up, I received a number of them.
Back then, some people were selected and trained by the health centers and given the vaccines to administer to children within a certain age range in different communities.
Hardly would you see such programs for adults, and being lazy, I didn't even take the time to do research on vaccinations; I just concluded it was a children's thing.
But when COVID-19 struck the world around 2020, a mandate was made for everyone to get vaccinated in order to be immune against the virus.
It was then that it occurred to me that vaccines are not just for children but for everyone. Sadly, that year, there was a lot of controversy about the COVID-19 vaccines.
Those who were able to partake in it complained that the effects were harsh on them. There was different evidence given by people concerning the side effects.
I made a post about vaccines some months ago on Hive, and in one of my comments, a fellow hivian said that some of the things said about the bad side of the vaccines were true.
The person made it clear that COVID vaccine made her distrust vaccines, and she gave her reasons. You can find the comment in this post here
This was something that was created to protect us. Unfortunately, it did the opposite.
Well, in my place, there was no record of death; however, some people complained bitterly about the effects.
As a result, I refused to get vaccinated for COVID 19. The truth is, I know taking that decision was risky, but I had to.
I was in a dilemma. Some people said the government brought the vaccines to reduce our population, and some said the opposite. I got frustrated and decided to just follow my heart. Well, thank God nothing bad happened to me, but that was risky.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and in my opinion, I think there is nothing wrong with getting vaccinated. We live in a world full of germs.
Getting infected by diseases is as easy as blinking our eyes. Those vaccines were created to give our bodies a chance to survive and function properly even in the midst of such threats.
There was a physically challenged boy in my community who had issues with both of his legs. Out of curiosity, one day I summoned courage and asked my mother why he was that way, and she said, It was polio that affected his legs.
She went further to tell me that some parents refused to get their children vaccinated against polio, because they were told it would either kill their children or weaken their immune systems.
I was surprised to hear that he was not born that way. All thanks to vaccines, now polio is not something common; some people don't even know it exists and how dangerous it can be.
Since I grew up, I haven't gotten any vaccines yet, but I am open to vaccination. If I see any around that I can trust, I won't take a second thought before going for it.
The reason why most people dread getting vaccinated is because of the things they have heard about vaccines. Sadly, some of those things are true.
But I think our government and medical centers can do well by ensuring that only vaccines that have undergone proper examination and have been proven to be safe for everyone are given to people.
This way, people would be open to vaccines. It's bad to see people running from what is meant to protect them. If only people had a practical assurance that it won't harm them, I am sure most of them wouldn't hesitate to go for it.