A shot to survive or a shot to live?

Shot! A shot so painful I could not begin to understand the complexity of its content. A shot I have to take to survive; how do I understand such a shot? Then there is a cacophony of sounds echoing in my head. You have been shot! You need to get a shot! Why must I be shot? I asked. It seems the shots are never ending? A shot to survive or a shot to live? That is the question in all your minds, I know. Let’s find out together whether you need a shot to survive or a shot to live: vaccinations or nature’s fight?

Immunity before modern medicine

It is an acceptable fact that before shots from vaccination, there were “inoculations or variolation.” In simple terms, “inoculation” is exposing an individual to some infections, and as the body was designed, it fights against this infection and thus the body gains immunity from this infection. In later years, it recognizes this infection and stops it from any further attack (Sabin 2025). This method was practiced for centuries in the Ottoman Empire, in Africa, and in Arabia before it spread to Europe and the Americas (Bolyston, 2015).

However, an English physician, Dr. Edward Jenner, is credited with the first vaccination in 1796 when he experimented with the vaccine for smallpox on James Phipps (Sabin 2025). There are other virologists, microbiologists, and others who have worked on vaccines for other infections. With the acquisition of new knowledge and the explosion of the human population come new diseases and new vaccines to treat them.

But the recent bout of COVID-19 has raised questions about the safety of receiving the shot. Is the current fear of vaccines valid?

Recent rise of vaccinations

Aside from the rise and appearance of modern diseases and infections, the 1918 Influenza Pandemic commonly known as the Spanish flu, might have influenced the research and work on vaccines: “While the 1918 H1N1 virus has been synthesized and evaluated, the properties that made it so devastating are not well understood. With no vaccine to protect against influenza infection and no antibiotics to treat secondary bacterial infections that can be associated with influenza infections, control efforts worldwide were limited to non-pharmaceutical interventions” (CDC 2018).

Ergo, it is not surprising that efforts have been made to curb the fear, millions of deaths, and unpreparedness experienced during the Influenza Pandemic. Therefore, according to the World Health Organization, “the efforts of virologists, microbiologists and other researchers has produced significant numbers of … vaccines to prevent more than 30 life-threatening diseases and infections, helping people of all ages live longer, healthier lives. Immunization currently prevents 3.5 million to 5 million deaths every year from diseases like diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis (whooping cough), influenza, and measles.”

Vaccine phobia: valid or not?

According to the United Nations News of November 2025, although there was an 88% decrease in death from measles in 2000 as a result of immunization, currently “millions of children remain under-immunized following years of COVID-19 pandemic-related disruption.”

So why is the COVID-19 pandemic stirring up a hornet’s nest?

With every philosophy there are sceptics; so it is with medicine. There have been vaccine sceptics since its inception. However, the UN News’ findings should be of worry to everyone. On the other hand, it should not be taken for granted that the COVID-19 pandemic has had a hand in the shunning of vaccines, including the measles vaccine. This fear of vaccines might have been caused by three factors: the controversies surrounding the gain-of-function research, the stories told by some recipients of the Covid-19 vaccines and capitalists/businesses/philanthropists being the main advocates for the Covid-19 vaccine.

Gain-of-function research

Brownstein (2025) describes “gain-of-function” (GoF) research as “… experiments that alter and test a pathogen’s transmissibility, adaptability, virulence, and longevity—could provide valuable information about what the virus might do next.”

Dr. Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin-Madison (NLM 2015) has classified GoF into three. In layman’s comprehension, the first is “gain-of-function” on viruses that do not have natural properties and are airborne and transmissible among ferrets; this he classified as gain-of-function of concern. The second GoF is transmissible and pathogenic (spreads and causes diseases) but is not as severe as those that are found in nature or are natural. The third and final one is transmissible and pathogenic among animals only.

The vaccine phobia among the layman is that new knowledge has been gained on making all these viruses (those without natural properties, those not as severe as the natural ones and those transmissible among animals only) airborne and transmissible among humans. The words of Marc Lipsitch, professor of epidemiology at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, “… the risks of this research are not worth the potential gains—which aren’t as significant as advocates suggest” can only confirm this vaccine phobia.

Who is pushing the vaccine agenda?

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the world witnessed a number of capitalists/businessmen/philanthropists, one in particular, Mr. B. Gates, explaining how the Covid-19 virus spreads and advocating for the vaccines. With all due respect, Mr. Gates has no known medical credentials. Thus the ordinary man on the street questioned his fervent advocacy; did he have any monetary interest in his advocacy?

The new media and the evidence for vaccine phobia

The vaccine rollout seemed quick upon the spread of the Covid-19 virus, which, to vaccine phobic, was at the speed of lightning. It is a little worrying that mosquitoes have spread malaria for centuries, yet the vaccines for malaria were recently rolled out. It would be more comforting if all vaccines, not excluding Covid-19 vaccines, went through “… trials … including preclinical testing on animals to assess safety and effectiveness, followed by clinical trials involving human participants” (Yaamika et al., 2023).

This did not seem so; thus, the adverse effects from Covid-19 vaccines, such as “… anaphylaxis, blood clots, myocarditis, pericarditis, hearing changes, and tinnitus” (Yaamika et al., 2023), went viral on social media. The rippling effect is the current vaccine phobia still being experienced a couple of years after the Covid-19 pandemic.

Conclusion

Recent findings reported in the Washington Post state, “… vaccines can reduce the risk of developing dementia and heart conditions. … can also prevent common chronic illnesses, including some cancers, according to public health experts (Chiu 2025). And “We now have an understanding of how these vaccines go beyond just protecting us against the disease that they helped prevent,” are the words of Richard Martinello, chief medical officer and infectious diseases physician at Yale School of Medicine.

Thus, it takes time to roll out effective vaccines and treatment and explanations about medicine should be left in the hands of medical personnel.