In an Ideas and Opinions piece published in Annals of Internal Medicine, Danish pediatrician Lone Graff Stensballe DMSc, PhD reflects on a recent proposal to change the U.S. childhood vaccine schedule to mirror the more conservative childhood vaccine schedule of Denmark, focusing on a smaller set of universally recommended vaccines.
Dr. Stensballe warns that the U.S. should not replicate Denmark’s strategy due to major social and health disparities between the two countries. Denmark’s high equity and substantial taxpayer-funded investment in childcare, housing, education, and universal healthcare allows Denmark to maintain a limited vaccine schedule while also maintaining high uptake and low infection risk.
Factors that increase both infection risk and low vaccine uptake, including prematurity, chronic illness, low income, low health literacy, and limited access to care, are far more prevalent in the U.S.
Reducing the vaccination schedule may unintentionally increase confusion, deepen mistrust in healthcare institutions, and ultimately lower vaccination rates even more in the U.S., disproportionately affect disadvantaged children the most.
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