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How Do Vaccines Work?

How Do Vaccines Work?
Reading Level
     edHelper's suggested reading level:   high interest, readability grades 4 to 6
     Flesch-Kincaid grade level:   4.45

Vocabulary
     challenging words:    additional, lifetime, injection, tricky, virus, booster, mumps, polio, destruction, shots, actually, smallpox, series, chickenpox, attack, schools

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How Do Vaccines Work?
By Patti Hutchison 		  
1     "Ouch!" Joe exclaimed. "That hurt!" Joe's doctor just gave him a flu shot.
 
2     "I know it hurts," Dr. Smith said. "But that few seconds of pain is worth it. Now, you won't have to put up with a week or so of being sick with the flu."
 
3     You have been getting shots since you were a tiny baby. Shots are also called vaccinations. They help keep you healthy. Vaccines help your body fight disease.
 
4     Doctors have developed many vaccines. Before they were developed, millions of people died or were crippled by some diseases. Smallpox and polio have been almost completely wiped out. Most young children never get measles, mumps, or chickenpox. Maybe you have never even heard of these diseases!
 
5     How do vaccines help your body fight off these diseases? The vaccines are actually made from small doses of the bacteria or virus that causes the disease. Most of the time, they are put into your body by injection (a shot). There's not enough of the germ in the vaccine to make you sick. But there is enough to make your immune system spring into action.

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