BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts Hello, this is Marnie Chesterton bringing

you Thursday's edition of the Woman's Hour podcast. I normally live down in

NERD corner of the BBC, the Radio Science Unit, and from there I usually present

crowd science and sometimes present inside science. Both also can I say very

good podcasts. Now today I've climbed the stairs to the Woman's Hour studio

because this edition, the entire show, is devoted to the subject of vaccinations.

It's a topic that hits the headlines regularly, whether it's today's news of a shortage of

flu vaccines in Scotland or health secretary Mack Hancock saying that he's looking very

seriously at making vaccines compulsory. And news reports tell us that vaccination uptake

is on the slide. This is from September. The number of preschool children in England

receiving routine vaccinations has fallen for the fifth year in a row. You figures suggest

uptake for the first measles mumps and rebeller jab at 24 months was 90.3%. Northern Ireland

and Scotland are hitting the 95% target. Wales was just below that.

Now as you just heard, at least nine out of 10 parents are still following the advice

and vaccinating their children. But even if you've vaccinated, you may still have

reservations or queries. And there's nothing wrong with having questions.

In fact, it's crucial to our programme because for the next 45 minutes, we'll be answering

your concerns. Please do get in touch on Twitter, email or Instagram. I'll be monitoring them

throughout the show. We put out calls earlier this week and listener Joe was one who responded,

emailing Woman's Hour at BBC.co.uk to say, I am so tired of how inflammatory and polarising

this topic has become. She goes on to say, the accusatory, judgemental attitudes of people

on both sides make it very difficult for parents to get to the truth about risks.

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