Many forget the damage done by diseases like whooping cough, measles and rubella. Not these families

In the time before widespread vaccination, young children often lost their lives to devastating infectious diseases that ran rampant in America. Over the next century, vaccines virtually wiped out long-feared scourges like polio and measles and drastically reduced the toll of many others. Vaccine hesitancy grew as memories of these diseases faded. But some Americans know the reality of vaccine-preventable diseases all too well. Their lives were forever changed by rubella, measles, polio and whooping cough, and they clearly see the value of vaccines. Now, as preventable diseases begin to make a comeback, they long to spare others from similar pain.