A new opinion piece at American Thinker is raising a question that, on its face, seems straightforward: If children in other developed countries get far fewer vaccine shots than American kids do, why isn’t anyone in the media asking why?
The column, written by Jack Hellner, lays out a series of international comparisons that highlight a significant gap in routine childhood vaccination schedules. According to the piece, a child in the United States can receive anywhere from roughly 30 to 75 total vaccine doses by age 18, depending on whether they follow standard schedules and get annual flu shots. The wide range reflects the fact that some vaccines are combined into single shots, but the total exposure is still strikingly higher than in several peer nations.
In Germany, Hellner writes, the Robert Koch Institute—through its Standing Committee on Vaccination, known as STIKO—recommends routine protection against about 12 to 15 infectious diseases for children. Because Germany relies heavily on multi-component combination shots, such as the 6-in-1 hexavalent vaccine, children there receive roughly 11 to 14 actual physical injections.
England’s schedule is similarly lean: children receive around 20 to 25 individual vaccine doses from birth to age 14, delivered via roughly 14 to 16 actual needle injections. Japan’s routine immunization program calls for about 20 to 22 individual injection shots. And in Spain, children receive around 15 to 18 individual injection shots from birth through adolescence under the official public health system.
The contrast is stark. If the U.S. schedule indeed tops out at 75 doses—or even at the lower end of the range, around 30—American children are receiving substantially more shots than their counterparts in these other advanced democracies. Hellner’s piece poses the obvious follow-ups: Doesn’t it look like children in the United States get more shots today, and would there be a valid reason to recommend fewer? And do children in countries with fewer shots have worse health results?
These are empirical questions, and they’re answerable. But the column argues that the mainstream media isn’t interested in asking them, at least not in a way that might complicate the current political narrative. Hellner writes that the media seem content to repeat talking points aimed at trashing President Donald Trump, rather than engage in genuine curiosity about whether the U.S. schedule is optimally calibrated.
It’s worth noting that the piece is explicitly an opinion column, not a scientific study. It doesn’t cite peer-reviewed research comparing health outcomes across countries. But that’s precisely the point it’s making: the absence of such public discussion is itself notable. If other countries recommend fewer shots and their children aren’t suffering visibly worse outcomes, shouldn’t that at least prompt a conversation about whether the U.S. is over-vaccinating?
The broader health-care critique
The column doesn’t stop at vaccines. It uses the same lens to critique the Affordable Care Act, which Hellner calls “one of the worst and most costly bills ever passed.” He argues that the media and Democrats still falsely claim the law makes health care more affordable, when in reality it has driven up costs for many Americans.
Hellner contends that if Democrats truly wanted to cover the poor and those at high risk, they would have simply expanded Medicaid and high-risk pools, rather than “destroying the whole system.” In his view, the goal was never affordable care but government-controlled care.
These are strong claims, and they’re clearly partisan. But the underlying question—whether the U.S. health-care system is delivering value commensurate with its costs—is one that cuts across party lines. The U.S. spends far more per capita on health care than any other developed nation, yet ranks poorly on many health metrics. The vaccine schedule disparity is one more data point in that broader pattern.
Why the silence?
The most provocative part of the column is its accusation that the media are suppressing or ignoring these comparisons. Hellner writes, “Wouldn’t it be nice if the media were curious instead of just repeating talking points to trash President Donald Trump?”
Whether or not one agrees with that characterization, it’s true that the vaccine schedule debate has become heavily politicized. During the Trump administration, vaccine policy was a flashpoint, with some of Trump’s allies questioning the CDC’s recommendations. The media have often responded by framing any such questioning as anti-science, which can have a chilling effect on legitimate inquiry.
But the international comparisons in this column aren’t fringe theories; they’re public health data. The World Health Organization and various national health agencies publish their immunization schedules, and the differences are easy to verify. If U.S. children are receiving more doses than children in Germany, England, Japan, and Spain, that’s a factual pattern worth examining on its merits, not dismissing out of hand.
Of course, there are reasonable explanations for the disparity. The U.S. schedule includes some vaccines that other countries don’t routinely recommend, such as hepatitis A and varicella. The U.S. also recommends annual flu shots for all children, which adds up over 18 years. And some U.S. vaccines are given in multiple doses. But those explanations don’t fully resolve the question of whether the extra shots are necessary or beneficial—or whether they might be causing harm.
The column argues that the inability to even ask these questions is a threat to the republic. “Now more than ever,” Hellner writes, “the ability to speak our minds is crucial to the republic we cherish.”
That’s a grandiose framing, but it speaks to a real concern: when scientific questions become political litmus tests, the public loses the ability to make informed choices about their own health and their children’s health. The fact that a major online publication can publish this column and get attention suggests that, at least in some corners, the conversation is still open.
Whether the mainstream media will pick it up is another matter. But the question it raises—why do American children get so many more shots than children in comparable countries, and what are the health implications?—deserves an answer that goes beyond talking points.
Source: www.americanthinker.com — https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2026/08/if-other-countries-give-fewer-shots-why-can-t-we-ask-why/