Is the CDC being sued over 72 vaccines?

An old, unsettled lawsuit has everyone talking again about how many vaccines children receive. Is it 72 vaccines? Should the CDC be sued?

Former pediatrician Paul Thomas named former CDC director Susan Monarez in a lawsuit about the childhood vaccine schedule. They claim the schedule includes 72 vaccines.

That number is misleading. Even when you count boosters and combination vaccines, children get far fewer than 72 vaccinations from birth to age 18. For example, by age 2, a child usually gets about 27 vaccinations. Many of those vaccines protect against more than one disease at the same time.

Boosters are not totally new vaccines. They remind the immune system how to fight germs it has already learned about. Counting every booster as a new vaccine can make the schedule sound bigger than it really is.

The vaccine schedule has grown because science has helped us prevent more diseases. And i has not grown all at once. Since the 1980s, only about one or two vaccines have been added each decade. Some people say the vaccine schedule is exploding, but that is not accurate. The schedule has grown slowly and carefully as doctors and scientists have learned how to protect children from more illnesses.

A baby’s immune system handles many germs every day, starting at birth. The vaccine schedule gives only a small challenge compared with what babies face every day from eating, breathing, and living in the world. The ingredients in vaccines are also used in very tiny amounts.