The Michigan Academy of Family Physicians sounded the alarm Monday about falling vaccination rates for preventable childhood diseases such as measles, polio and whooping cough, since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. .

Glenn Dregansky, president of the Michigan Academy of Family Physicians, said every case is important. .

"Without the protection of vaccines, illnesses such as measles, whooping cough, COVID-19, and even seasonal flu can easily spread," Dregansky said.

Measles is so contagious, for every person who has it, up to nine out of 10 people around them will get measles if not fully vaccinated, Pruitt said.

"The virus causing measles results in fever and rash and in most serious cases brain swelling, which can lead to permanent brain damage and death, she said.

Whooping cough, also known as pertussis, is equally contagious "and a significant threat to babies," Pruitt said.

People who don't have trusted relationships with a primary care physician may not have a dependable resource for vaccine information, he said, and too many parents today don't know about how devastating many of these diseases can be.

And so now it's been two generations and the parents don't have the fear of these diseases.

"If a child gets polio, there's nothing we can do to prevent paralysis," he said.

"Now, most people get polio don't get catastrophic illness, but we don't know why some people do.

We don't know why some people get catastrophic illness with COVID.

Dregansky, who was born in 1953, said he remembers his grandmother crying when he and his brother were immunized for polio.

"She was so afraid that her grandsons would be crippled like other children," he said. "She watched children crippled and die from polio.

"I don't know that we have, frankly, any herd immunity anymore because of this trend toward people not getting immunized," he said