Editor, Gazette-Journal:
In 1900, one in five children in the U.S. died before their 5th birthday (20 percent). That number is very grim by any standard. Certainly, the grief associated with the death of a child knows no bounds and may continue for years.
Now, over a century later, thanks to antibiotics and vaccines developed by scientists in the medical field, that fatality rate is well below one percent and that level of grief is now found only in the history books. The decrease in that early death rate was due mainly to the mandatory use of vaccinations.
This mandate was accepted by people in the early 20th century because, with those early deaths still fresh in their minds, they knew that sometimes a personal freedom must be given up for the good of the community. We now have an entire generation without a memory of the devastation of those diseases and that feeling of community appears to be lost.
Now we are well into the 21st century and the Trump administration has fired thousan...