From measles to HPV, the financial cost of vaccine avoidance could bankrupt the entire health care system

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s efforts to undermine vaccines in America are not just scientifically absurd. They’re also financially ruinous. The costs of medical care in the United States have been skyrocketing for years, forcing health insurers to raise their premiums faster than overall inflation and pushing Medicare’s trust fund ever deeper into trouble.

Along with the lives they protect, vaccines save money. Spending a little on vaccination avoids spending a lot on treatment.

… Paying a pharmacy $100 or so to give a 70-year-old a flu shot makes far more sense than shelling out tens of thousands of dollars for that senior to spend a week in intensive care with pneumonia.

Most vaccines are more cost-effective than the flu shot. The one that prevents measles, for example, is dirt cheap, because it was invented in the 1960s and has never needed reformulation or retesting. Just two shots confer lifetime immunity. 

Related on the SLP

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If Kennedy succeeds in pushing even one vaccine off the market, the financial repercussions will be severe. And the physical pain of illness will be borne by the first generation of children denied proper protection.

This is an excerpt. Read the original post here