>>5684910 (lb)

Anon, much depends on where you live and what pathogens are circulating that your youngster could encounter. You can follow reports from your state and local departments of health to stay abreast.

But certainly organisms like the one that causes tetanus are ubiquitous (soil). The consequences of contracting that illness are very severe.

Hepatitis is another potentially sever disease but it emerges from the human population.

Mumps can cause sterility in males.

Polio, while unlikely to be encountered in the US where it has been eradicated and where there is adequate water and waste water treatment, is still active in Africa. If Ebola can get here from there, so can polio.

Meningococcal meningitis can be lethal and can progress from first symptoms - which often can be mistaken for "24 hour flu" - to hospitalization and death within 12 hours. The organism that causes it lives in our throats and cases of the illness often arise from contact with a symptom-free carrier, some from self-infection.

Rubella - German measles - can have severe consequences for the unborn child if the mother contracts it.

Etc.

Personally, I never rolled the dice with my four offspring. I got them vaccinated on schedule and all are healthy. Only one contracted a vaccine preventable disease - chickenpox - but that is because they contracted it a month before old enough for the vaccine. That little one suffered a lot but sibling who had been vaccinated never missed a beat. No did I b/c of immunity from contracting it as a kid.

Follow authentic science and get informed as much as possible. The anti-vax movement has very little if any hard science to support it. And that's the scientific truth of the matter.