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Parents who may have concerns about childhood vaccinations can get answers Saturday when doctors from the University of Arizona address questions about the benefits and safety of immunizations.

Thanks to

Posted Nov 10, 2011, 8:23 am

Ryan Kelly TucsonSentinel.com

Parents who may have concerns about childhood vaccinations can get answers Saturday when doctors from the University of Arizona address questions about the benefits and safety of immunizations.

Doctors from the College of Public Health will answer commonly asked questions about infant immunizations, HPV vaccines, vaccine safety and misconceptions during a forum at the university beginning at 9:30 a.m.

In the last 10 years, the percentage of unvaccinated Arizonans has risen from 1 percent to 3 percent, said Elizabeth Jacobs, a UA associate professor at the College of Public Health.

“This doesn’t sound like a high number, but there are pockets of people in Arizona who aren’t vaccinating,” she said.

There also is a growing number of parents who are not vaccinating their children because they hear myths that vaccines cause autism or don’t work, Jacobs said.

The forum will address topics such as vaccine preventable diseases, how vaccines work, what every parent should know about the HPV vaccination, autism risk factors and the trends and risks of vaccine exemptions.

This affects everybody, Jacobs said.