Risk Versus Reward: The Continuing Vaccination Question As young Americans living in the twenty first century, vaccines have always had a place in our lives. It is taught to us at a young age that vaccines are not only beneficial but necessary to the pursuit of healthy and long lives. For decades, we have been giving vaccines to ourselves and our children without question because the doctors say we should and they have the education, not us. The number of vaccines that children are mandated to receive continues to rise at an alarming rate. Currently, children receive approximately fourteen different vaccinations before the age of two Many of these vaccinations require multiple inoculations, which often have a child receiving four more shots in a single visit (Akinsanya-Beysolow). Every year, more vaccines are added to the list. With the speed of vaccine approval, it is time to step back and reevaluate who is making these recommendations and for what reasons. The cost to vaccinate a child from birth to eighteen has risen from one hundred dollars in1986 to $2,192 (Rosenthal). Vaccine manufacturing is a huge business with a vested interest in mandating vaccines. The decision to vaccinate should be left to the patient and parents, not the government or vaccine manufacturers. Data shows that even before vaccines most of the diseases we vaccinate for were on the decline (Obomsawin). Childhood illness rates have been on a steady increase over the last few decades. As the childhood vaccination list grows, so does the steady increase in asthma, diabetes, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, and autism (Fisher “In the Wake of”). In a retrospective study of children under the age of one, who had the DPT shot delayed by four months showed to have reduced the incidence of asthma by six percent on average (McDonald et al. 628). Parents and health care providers need to ask how much