Dr Miriam Stoppard

Dr Miriam Stoppard

New research, conducted on behalf of AstraZeneca, shows that 48% of mums worry about taking their child for routine immunisations, while a significant 43% believe immunisations affect the parents more than their child.

In recent research on attitudes towards immunisation, mums commented: “My two year old has just had it done and I’m going ‘you’re making my baby poorly, I don’t like it” while another added “They don’t realise until thirty seconds later … they look at you … what have you done.”

Younger mums are particularly susceptible to immunisation anxiety. Over half of younger mums worry about child immunisations, compared to just a third of mums aged over 45.

Even more worryingly, 16% of younger mums have delayed vital immunisations due to concerns about pain, compared to just 6.7% of mums overall.

Dr Miriam Stoppard, commenting on the research, says “As a doctor I feel immunisation to be vital but as a mother and grandmother I understand the distress and anxiety mums can experience during the immunisation process.

“I am concerned that younger mums in particular seem to experience more anxiety around the health of their child and immunisations in particular, and call for more support and information to be made available to mums on ways to help deal with this potentially difficult situation.”

In this video Dr Miriam addresses whether parents should immunise their children, what fears parents have, whether they should worry about the pain of the prick and how parents can make the process less stressful for their child.