The decision to vaccinate yourself or your family can be viewed as a social contract whereby the majority of individuals take an action in the interest of protecting the entire community.

According to Angus Thomson, Director of Vaccination Advocacy at Sanofi Pasteur, who was the special guest at a TEDxBrussels event on April 5, the success of polio and smallpox vaccination gave birth to a new unwritten contract to cooperate in the name of public health.

“People understood that although there were risks associated with vaccination – albeit very very small – they were willing to accept this,” said Thomson.

He said that the minority of people who refuse vaccination “are willingly rejecting this contract because they no longer see the need for vaccines, because they no longer see the diseases”.

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