How many PA sufferers have been vaccinated?

jennilee, interesting to hear this from you. I have three children and Christopher is my only one that was ever ill after shots. He ran basically the same symptoms as you tell about. It has been a long time so I can not remember every detail,but I do remember how sick and feverish and rashy he would be. My other two would run the achy body kind of normal reactions you would expect from shots. take care claire

Aren't allergies the result of a 'faulty' immune system - not the other way around?

I'm sorry your son has had a hard time with vaccinations. It is highly possible your son reacted to the vaccine in addition to having PA. My PA daughter (she's 6) has had all her vacccinations with no reactions. She is allergic to peanuts and all nuts. Maybe a child with multiple allergies is more susceptible to reactions from vaccinations due to the weakened immune system.

Out of my two kids it is the non-allergic child who reacted badly to his immunization shots, one time even requiring hospitalization afterwards. He came out of it fine however (the leg where he got his 18 month shot was temporarily paralysed) and even with this experience I still immunized my younger child later down the road. He never reacted to any of his shots at all, barely even a mark where he got them and he is the one with all the allergies, including PA.

There seems to be very little research on any possible connection between vaccines and allergies. My gut feeling is that some kids are predisposed to allergies, asthma, atopy, etc, and with these kids, vaccines may weaken the immune system to the point of bringing on some allergies or doing other damage. But, that's just my feeling. If I had it to do over again, I would delay some vaccines, and refulse others altogether. I basically believe in vaccination, but I would do it differently.

I have never heard of MMR containing peanut oil. I knew about it being grown in egg, but in all the reading I've done, which is a quite a bit (I've been recently studying the packet insert of the MMR vaccine, since my 5-yr-old PA son needs his second shot; I've also looked at anti-vaccine websites) I've never heard of peanut oil in a vaccine. Where did you get this information?

As for your son, you may want to consider finding an alternative medicine practitioner (homeopathic, nutriotinist, herbalist, etc.) There are things that can be done to counteract side-effects of vaccinations even after a long time has passed.

Regarding faulty immune system. I think it is more complicated than that. Allergic people have their immune systems sensitized so that the immune system is misdirected. It isn't necessarily "weaker". Why some people and families are more sensitive to misdirection probably has some genetic basis. Many other autoimmune diseases such as ms are theorized to have some tyoe of trigger- viral, toxins, immunizations, etc. in addition to some gentic predisposition.

My personal position on vaccinations is that too many are now approved and recommended for children under two and particularly for infants. I think families which have allergy histories and kids which have a history of reaction to the immunization should be extremely careful and do reasearch both pro and con.

As a child I had many of the diseases commonly immunized for now. Mumps, measeles, chickenpox are what I recall for certain. Some of these diseases have low complication rates for a healthy child.

RANT section-
I just have a hard time viewing a chicken pox vaccine (despite the hype) as the same priority as a polio vaccine for my child. It also kind of annoys me that the complication rate for chicken pox disease is so much lower that the rate of peanut allergy, which has really bad complications and risks. The only math that justifies this priority is the profits to be made on immunizing every kid in the U.S.
End rant section.

Anyway, my kid did show his first reaction at daycare on a day he had shots. However, it was also his first exposure. I do suggest that introduction of new foods not be done while a child's body is dealing with immunization shots. This is just a gut feel for me, I have zero evidence on the subject. It just seems like a bad idea to me.

"Some of these diseases have low complication rates for a healthy child."

This is true, but sometimes healthy children give these diseases to adults who have severe reactions. I was given mumps twice (before vaccines) and measles (before birth control pills)once when I was a teacher. I was in serious agony for a long long time twice from the pain of the mumps and once because of fear that I could be pregnant and have a damaged child. A friend of mine had an adult onset of shingles, brought on his doctor said, by chicken pox which he had as a child. My daughter had chicken pox at 18 and was out of school for weeks. My first husband had MS, and many doctors theorize that it may be caused by measles. Childhood diseases can have devastating effects on adults.

I find this thread particularly interesting because my daughter also had her first reaction the day she had her 18 month immunizations. This was her first exposure to actual peanut butter but she had already been exposed to foods containing peanut products a few times with no noticeable reaction. In fact, we had eaten at a Chinese Buffet (which I would assume would be fraught with cross contamination)just the day before! I have always wondered if there was any connection between the immunizations and the allergy, but both my pediatrician and allergist have assured me that there is not. I guess it really doesn't matter now because what's done is done.

Our son is also allergic to eggs (and dairy and tree nuts) and after MUCH discussion with many physicians (and my husband and I are both physicians), the MMR is safe for egg-allergic people.

Two vaccines (flu shot and yellow fever vaccine) are definitely not safe for those with food allergies (can't remember exactly which food allergies but i just remember that our son had to avoid those).

He did fine with all of his vaccines. Some friends of ours live on a farm and decided that none of their 3 children would receive one vaccine and all 3 have been fine since----and the oldest is 7. The theory is to expose them to all the dirt and germs on a farm so their own immune system can be so busy fighting off those germs that it doesn't have time to fight food allergens (the so-called hygiene theory).

Interesting issues.

All I know is the information posted in my pediatrician's office & the info he gave me. According to that it is dangerous for your child & OTHERS to not vaccinate. None of us have memories of how horrible polio etc. was & maybe take vaccinations too lightly. They were a Godsend when these diseases were rampant. I would question the sources of information at your seminar to be sure they are unbiased.

It is up to each parent what they choose, but I would make sure you are basing your decisions on FACTS. My son never had any problems with his vaccinations. He is just PA, no other allergies. I actually thought about not vaccinating just out of fear of reactions. My pediatrician told me there is a LOT of wrong info being spread about vaccinations, especially via the internet.

My daughter is due for her 18 month vaccintations in July. I am nervous now. I know if I express my concerns to my doctors office they will dismiss them and say there are no risk. They are very relaxed about the whole allergy situation and seem to treat it as it is no big deal. It is a huge deal to me and I only want her to be safe. From what I read above it seems that a lot of children had bad reactions to their 18 month shots. Should I be nervous or just pray hard before taking her?

Benmadwood, if you don't feel comfortable, don't get the vaccines. Do your own research and then decide. I believe in vaccines, but I like to spread them out, and you don't have to get them at 18 months if you're not comfortable with it.

I held off on my son's 4 year old MMR because of autism concerns. More studies have now been done showing there is not a link. I have been reading the packet insert from the manufacturer for MMR (I asked the doctor for it.) It says not to give MMR with DTaP and Polio, yet that is routinely done at 18 months and 4-6 years. So, even though the manufacturer advises against it, doctors do this routinely. This is why you need to do your own research. Hold off until you are comfortable. A good website is the Institute for vaccine safety. They want vaccines to be safe, but aren't anti-vaccine. The website is [url="http://www.vaccinesafety.edu/."]http://www.vaccinesafety.edu/.[/url] They don't have info on everything, but it's a good place to start. Another one, though it is a somewhat radical, is the National Vaccine Information Center. The website is [url="http://www.909shot.com/."]http://www.909shot.com/.[/url] Good luck.

I agree. Do your own research from reputable sources (not just the vaccine manufactures who of course want you to vaccinate or pediatricians who get paid to administer them) nor just from well meaning parents of autistic children who believe that vaccines are what caused their child's autism.

Our son has received some vaccines on a schedule that we devised after doing our research. You do NOT need to go by your doctor/clinics schedule. They do what is most convenient for them, not necessarily what is safest for your child. We do not allow our son to get more than two vaccines at any one visit. This does require more visits to the clinic, but we feel limiting the shots to two gives his immune system a better chance of assimilating the vaccines instead of being overburdened by them.

If you have any concerns, do not vaccinate. Only do so if you are comfortable with it and feel you have enough answers.

I have a lot of concerns about the safety of the MMR vaccine (as well as its effectiveness) so our son will not be getting that until he is at least 5, if ever. I am hoping by that point there will be more conclusive research. [He is not in daycare so he is at minimal risk of coming in contact with any of the diseases anyway.]

Good Luck. It has definitely been the hardest decision I have ever made as a parent and I question if I am doing the right thing every time I bring him in for shots. I wish there was an easy answer.

I also wanted to clarify the above post that suggested that unvaccinated children pose a threat to others. How? If vaccines are so effective than people who have had their shots need not worry, right? Also, just because one is not vaccinated does not mean that person has the diseases!

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Amy

Sorry... I know everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and I haven't posted here because of that... BUT vaccines are not "So effective" and that is not really their intent at all. The intent is (as it has always been) to prevent epidemics. To successfully prevent epidemic outbreaks of polio and other common childhood diseases like it, an estimated 85-90% vaccination rate is needed, because most vaccines are only about 80% effective at preventing the illness completely. This is why there is a "flu season" every year (because vaccination rates are not high enough to prevent its spread) and it is why there used to be a "polio season" in this country as well. Vaccinating your child protects EVERYONE. For anyone who thinks this is unnecessary since their child is not in school or daycare, how often do you take your child to the library or to the grocery store? How many unvaccinated infants does your child see/touch/kiss each month?

What about your friends with compromised immune systems? This would include those suffering through chemotherapy as well as those with HIV. How would you feel if your child gave one of them measles or diptheria?

Many childhood diseases have hidden and very serious consequences, even in children. My first husband died at the age of 37 because of mumps. He had the illness at age 4 (in spite of vaccination!) and this set into motion a chain of events which led him to become diabetic which was not even discovered until many years later. His diabetes eventually caused retinopathy and kidney failure.
For whatever reason, I have never had chicken pox. Do I want it now? Not on your life. My daughter has been vaccinated to prevent this, since if I were hospitalized, her safety would be in jeopardy with another caregiver.

A dear friend of mine lost two pregancies through exposure to "childhood" illnesses- measles and fifth disease. She has been unable to concieve again.

Whooping cough outbreaks can be fatal to young infants, and this illness is incredibly contagious. Infants die every year from contracting it, and preventing outbreaks of it are the reason for the DTaP series being started so young. There is even some speculation that either RSV or pertussis infection may lead to asthma.

And another thing about the "hygeine theory" and vaccinations... if this is true, then our children develop allergies because their immune systems "don't have enough to do" otherwise. In that case, *more* vaccinations, not fewer, would be more effective at preventing this from happening. A vaccination activates the immune system in a controlled fashion, unlike the illnesses themselves.

Our generation is too young to recall the effects of a large percentage of the population going unvaccinated, but they are very real. Parents used to breathe a sigh of relief when their children reached the age of four, since mortality rates from epidemics dropped then. Ask your parents and aunts/uncles what they know about friends' siblings, cousins, etc. dying or being crippled from childhood illnesses. That has only gone away because of widespread vaccination, and it could easily return again.

Lest anyone here think that I say this because I think my own child breezed through her vaccinations- she didn't. We ended up in the emergency room because of a reaction to her 3 mo. DTP, and we were offered the option of omitting the pertussis component of the rest of the series as a result. We elected not to do this. Pertussis regularly makes the rounds at colleges and other institutions.

The decision you make does not just affect your family and your child- think very carefully before your decide to leave your child unvaccinated.

[This message has been edited by Corvallis Mom (edited June 28, 2001).]

Ugh!!!!

Why is it that people assume children who are not vaccinated are going to somehow spontaneously give the diseases to others???? Does this make any sense? The child would FIRST have to come in contact with the diseases, THEN they would need to contract them, then they could potentially pass them on to others. I have never gotten a lyme disease vaccine but I am not worried about getting the disease because I do not go anywhere near the woods. According to your logic, I must have lyme disease anyway simply because I have not been vaccinated!

You even stated that your husband got measles despite having been vaccinated, so you are well aware the effectiveness of MMR is in question. Statistically, more people annually get these diseases who HAVE been vaccinated than those who have not. [Now I am not suggesting the vaccines are causing the diseases, I am merely stating that a lot of people get the MMR shot and that of those who do, a fair percentage of them still get the diseases]

Plus, vaccines in no way 'help' the immune system, as you suggested. Where did you get that idea? Natural immunity is much more effective. Plus, there is now evidence that suggests that vaccines may be contributing to the increase in auto-immune disorders.

I'm sorry to rant but I just don't understand the fear people have of unvaccinated children. My sister chose not to vaccinate her son. He is extremely healthy, is never sick. Our mother just had a liver transplant and one of our sil did not think he should visit her in the hospital since he had not been vaccinated. No mention was made to exclude my brother's children whom I've never seen without a runny nose or cough. They pose a much more realistic threat to my mother, but because they had been vaccinated it was okay for them to visit. Unbelievable!

Remember, I chose to vaccinate my son, so I do see some benefit to it. I would NOT, however, have let him get any other shots if he had reacted to them in any way. The literature they hand out with the shots even advises against having the vaccine if anyone in the family ever had a severe reaction. I just can't imagine willingly letting my child go through something like that once, let alone twice.

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Amy

Thank you Corvallis Mom for saying so eloquently what I was trying to say, but failed!

I must stand up for my pediatrician-he is an absolutely wonderful, caring man, who has treated my son like his own. If you feel your pediatrician would administer any drug or vaccine to get "paid" or on a schedule convenient for them (regardless of the effects on your child) I would definately choose another pediatrician!

Now I am sick to my stomach over this whole thing. I am for getting my child vaccintated because I believe it is the right thing to do but am now even more nervous about the risk. I have never known anyone with any reactions other than fever and of course my doctor's office downplays any risk so I guess I am to trusting in my thinking. I am however, checking into the exact shots she will be given at this visit and will do research on them and make my decision on how I think they should be administered. I will have them done eventually but maybe not all at once.

I forgot to say thanks for the information and for the website links. I will check those out right now.
Brooke

Brooke,

Good luck with your research. I didn't mean to scare you, but it is good to know full well what you are getting involved in with vaccines.

I would ask around your family to see if anyone has had a severe or moderate reaction to shots. If not - I wouldn't stress too much about the shots. Especially if your child has already had some vaccines without problems, then you should be okay. If anyone in your family has had a severe reaction to any vaccine, I would really think twice before your child received any new vaccines.

The site mentioned above [vaccinesafety.edu] is really good. I use it to make sure our son gets the best vaccines. Some manufactures add mercury or other harmful additives to vaccines which can be unsafe. That site helps you know which brands are the safest so you can request the specific ones from your doctor.

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Amy

Many children in Africa die from childhood diseases that can be prevented with vaccinations. Their "natural immunities" are not enough to save them. And they don't spontaneously get these diseases. There is a high rate of unvaccinted children.

We do vaccinated our kids. My daughter just got her 6 mos. round of immunizations. Of course I was a bit nervous since she got a fever 102 degrees at her 4 mos. immunizations probably due to pertussis element. However, I have done some research and that is considered a mild/moderate reaction. The consequences of catching one of these diseases is much worse. We will be travelling by plane to visit relatives soon and I wanted her to be protected from serious illness since she will be exposed to more people than ever before in her life.
Also, I could not quite follow the Lyme disease argument. Is it not spread by the bite of a tick? I didn't think it could be spread from person to person by coughing, sneezing, sharing toys, close contact, kissing, (whatever) etc. like the diseases that are being discussed here. I guess by the same token you can travel to Africa without taking preventive malaria medications but I would not. I guess it depends on your risk threshold. The difference is that a decision like that would just affect you. You cannot transmit a disease like that to someone else.
For the posters who do not believe in vaccinations, I will give up one point, that is the Hepatitis B vaccine. I don't really understand why it is routinely given to children. Granted it is a terrible disease to catch, however, it is spread by sharing needles, unprotected sex with an infected partner, etc. not behavior that a child would be involved with. I understand if the mother is infected or at high risk and the child can catch it during child birth, but after that? or if the mother does not have it? Anyone can enlighten me on this one?
-Cindia

[This message has been edited by Cindia (edited June 29, 2001).]

Hi Jennilee: I have triplet 4.5 yr old boys, all have been vaccinated on schedule. Only 1 is PA. His PA was "discovered" at around 2.5 yrs, although now that we know what it is...we believe his first reaction (non-anaphylactic) was at 20 months. Take care!

I also have two vaccinated children - one with allergies, one without. My son's allergies showed up before his first round of vaccinations. (He had HiB at birth I think.)

I feel very strongly about vaccines because I had a friend whose child died from meningitis. Only parents who live without the fear of these diseases have the luxury to debate this topic.

One more thought and I'll get off my soap box... This seems to be a "touchstone" issue for many parents. By that I mean that parents are looking for some way to deal with the anxiety of keeping their children safe and well in a complicated world, and they fixate on one issue (vaccines, food, pesticides, electric lines, whatever). However, at the same time, they ignore the risks that really kill children such as not using car seats or preventable accidents.

The risk of vaccine damage is extremely slight, akin to dying in a plane crash. Yet most of us still fly (and those who are afraid usually acknowledge that their fear is irrational).

Actually, this is applicable to PA as well. 100 kids a year die from food allergies. 500 die from bee stings. 5000 from asthma. 50,000 from accidents. You can't live all your life in fear, and it's important to put risk in perspective and make sure that your fears are not out of proportion to risk.

*SIGH*... I certainly wasn't trying to "inflame" anyone with my post, but clearly it did. To defend myself and to clarify a few points:

1. My first husband was exposed to mumps as a child on a military base in a part of the world where... (surprise, surprise) vaccination rates were low. This is a prime example of what can happen during an epidemic, since *most* vaccinations are far from 100% effective protection!!

2. How would you know if your child were in the incubation phase of one of these illnesses? (The answer is that you would not.) There is generally a contagious period in a viral illness before the victim shows any overt symptoms. THIS is the point I was making- not that anyone who is unvaccinated necessarily "carries" the illness. Carriers of illnesses are very rare... and usually this involves agents which are not viral anyway (like typhoid).

3. Check out published work on immunology if you don't understand how sensitization works in the immune system. It is quite simply a fact that catching the illness itself is playing roulette, whereas the vaccinations have much much lower rates of complications (your child is at greater risk of being struck by lightning, pretty much- certainly if you live in FLA! [img]http://uumor.pair.com/nutalle2/peanutallergy/smile.gif[/img] ). Your body cannot fight an intruder it does not recognize. THAT is what vaccinations are for- a little "social introduction," if you will. As far as risk-benefit analysis goes, be aware (though I don't mean to offend anyone by saying this) that we human beings generally are disproportionately afraid of what we don't fully understand. (Again, another post mentioned this too!)

4. Diseases which are transmitted person-to-person, and do not have a standing "pool" in nature, (measles and the like), cannot be compared to those which survive independently in a natural resevoir (like Lyme disease or Hanta virus). Smallpox, killer scourge of generations, has only been eliminated through widespread vaccination. With the increase in global travel, each of us is at risk of exposure every time we contact someone who has been travelling anywhere in the previous two to four weeks.

5. General practitioners aren't getting rich, and they didn't go into medicine to make money. They went into it to help families, and most are appalled by the behavior of pharmaceutical companies and HMOs alike.

6. We would have considered omitting pertussis after our daughter's moderate reaction to DTP, but we were both college professors at the time. Therefore our daughter was at relatively high risk for exposure.

7. Leaving a child unvaccinated affects more than your family, and in fact each unvaccinated individual ever so slightly increases the probability of an epidemic. What if everyone decided to exercise this "right?" Pertussis outbreaks now regularly occur in Northern Idaho each winter- many parents have elected to omit it. This is simple epidemiology; check out what the Centers for Disease Control has to say about vaccinations.

8. I am certainly not suggesting that there are never reasons for delaying/omitting vaccinations. In the event of a family history of serious reactions to one or more of them, OF COURSE you should ask some very hard questions of your practitioner.

I questioned the "newborn" vaccination too, and was told this by several friends who are doctors. The reason for the newborn vaccination for hepititis (which is not automatic in many states) is that very few of the women who engage in high risk activities are likely to be honest about it when asked, (even if it places their infants at high risk of contracting the illness). Many of the high risk behaviors are illegal.

Again, I am not necessarily trying to promote "my own agenda" here. I am offended by misinformation which is meant to scare parents who have the best interests of their children at heart. It seems that most of the "anti-vaccination" groups are also anti- medical research and anti- western medicine in general, if you look closely. Consider the source of any information you see- especially on the internet, where anonymous misinformation abounds.

I'm another mom who strongly believes in vaccination.

A point I wanted to bring up is something that happened to us recently.

We had been waiting to have Wade vaccinated against chickenpox, waiting till he was healthy enough. Wade has asthma, rather uncontrolled in spite of medication which has required the frequent use of oral steroids such as Pediapred and Decadron. At same time as an ER admission for a severe asthma attack for which he was prescribed oral steroids (and yes we had told the triage nurse that he had been exposed) Wade had been directly exposed to chickenpox at his pre-school that same week.

Chickenpox can be a very serious and sometimes fatal illness for people who have compromised immune systems, such as people taking oral steroids, people with cancer, on chemo, etc. In our case, the doctor opted to vaccinate Wade immediately when we found out about the exposure. He ended up having a "mild" case of chickenpox and no it was not because of the vaccine, it was because he had already been exposed to the virus prior to the vaccine. We were lucky, but there have been many other similar cases where the child was not so lucky.

For anyone with an asthmatic child wanting information on this subject, here are some links:

[url="http://www.healthsquare.com/ana/cknpx.html"]http://www.healthsquare.com/ana/cknpx.html[/url]

[url="http://www.aafa.org/asthmaandallergyinformation/aboutasthmaandallergies/asthmaandallergyanswers/Corticosteroids.cfm"]http://www.aafa.org/asthmaandallergyinfo...icosteroids.cfm[/url]

Also, on another note, my mother (age 81, but you did not hear this from me LOL) had smallpox when she was 6 years old, she was exposed through a classmate who had a cousin visiting (he was a sailor) who had been exposed at sea, the classmate came down with it but was hardly ill at all. My mother on the other hand, spent 44 days in isolation at an english only hospital, she spoke only french. I can't imagine how hard this must have been for her. Had there been a vaccine readily available, she would never have been ill, she almost died.

Now, this is only my opinion, but if I had known how dangerous the oral steroid/chickenpox combination was, I would have insisted Wade be vaccinated much sooner than he was. In our case, vaccination was the way to go.

Regards,

Katiee (Wade's mom)

Okay, I promise this will be my last post on this topic [img]http://uumor.pair.com/nutalle2/peanutallergy/smile.gif[/img]

I just need to make a few points:

1)The people you are referring to in Africa do not have a 'natural immunity'. That occurs when one gets and survives a disease. Ask any doctor and they will confirm that a person who had chicken pox as a child is EXTREMELY unlikely to get it as an adult. However, a child who had the chicken pox vaccine, and not actual chicken pox, still stands a risk of contracting chicken pox as an adult (but still less so than one who neither had chicken pox nor the vaccine). This is what I am referring to when I say "natural immunity'. I am NOT saying (nor did I ever imply) that people in third world countries should not be vaccinated. I am talking about suburban U.S. and a parent's right to question the routine use of potentially harmful vaccines for diseases that are no longer a local threat.

2. I hope you are not discrediting vaccinesafety.edu as one of those internet sites that is spreading misinformation about vaccines. It is a site sponsored by Johns Hopkins and uses actual medical research in its recommendations about vaccines. Just because a site dares question the safety of certain brands of vaccines does not automatically make it run by lunatics! Open dialogue is how we all stay safe.

3. I am so frustrated and angered by the assumptions people are making about people who choose to not vaccinate their children. In my experience, the majority of parents of unvaccinated children do so based on medical research, not whimsy. In fact, many DOCTORS refuse to give their own children the same vaccines they inject into countless patients a day (JAMA, Feb. 20, 1981). I doubt that doctors would fall into the category of those anti-medicine.

Also, it is unfair to discredit people who are anti-vaccine as being irrational about 'real' threats and suggesting they would worry about a vaccine reaction but not, say, use a seat belt. These people are highly concerned about their children's safety in every aspect. It takes a lot of love and courage to be able to question a doctor's or governments authority to be able to refuse a routine vaccine. There is tremendous pressure to vaccinate. How dare you judge them like that? I could easily make an argument that a parent who blindly vaccinates their children because they trust their doctor is the most negligent. Vaccines ARE a real threat (just read the disclosures that come along with them) and to minimize a parent's (legitimate) concern about them is disrespectful.

Lastly, in defense of those people, like myself, who are (at least moderately) suspicious of the medical profession, we are so not because of something we read about on the internet. The medical profession caused us to be this way. I previously had a naive respect for Medicine. Events surrounding my son's birth have left me never able to completely trust anyone in the medical profession again. I will always second guess everything I am told and do my own research from now on. If you have been lucky to find a doctor who truly cares, and is unaffected by the demands of the institution s/he is affiliated with, good for you. I have not been so lucky. In the clinic I go to, everything revolves around insurance and big-money contributions from drug companies - not about current medical research or patient safety. How many of you had episiotomies long after they were proven to be not only unnecessary but even dangerous?

The original point I wanted to make is that fear of unvaccinated children in the United States is largely unwarranted. The reasons they are feared is due mainly to propoganda from the government and pharmacuetical companies. The government, in their praise of vaccines, never admits that the same diseases they credit vaccines with eradicating in the US also disappeared simultaneously in Europe where mass immunizations did not take place. (Polio, for example).

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Amy

You're right (if you directed the "How dare you judge them like that") thing at me that I should not have implied that all parents who choose not to vaccinate ignore seatbelts, and I did not mean to imply that any parent would knowingly ignore safety concerns. However, I do believe that all parents have difficulty evaluating risk in a rational way and that this comes out in irrational actions like avoiding vaccines where the benefit clearly outweighs the risk.

The car seat analogy was meant to illustrate the difficulty many people have evaluating the continuum of risk and responding appropriately. In other words, ensuring that your child is in a car seat (or a booster seat until 80 lbs) is a much more important safety action than avoiding vaccination. Far more children die from car accidents than vaccine damage. However, statistics indicate that very few people put their children in car/booster seats, so it's simple math to conclude that most of the parents who choose not to vaccinate are not doing something that's a much more important action for preventing injury.

The JAMA article on physician compliance with their own children is interesting...can you please provide the Medline link or any other information you may have? (I was unable to find it by searching on Medline or the JAMA site.)

Also, can I ask why you vaccinated your child when you seem to be so anti-vax?

Corvallis mom, can I ask why you haven't gotten the chicken pox vaccine yourself? Is it only recommended for children?

I basically have to agree with Milkmom on this. Informed consent is the way to go. Do your own research, make your own decisions. Sure, most kids breeze through vaccination with little or no problems (that we can see immediately anyway--who knows about the chronic stuff.) But take a kid (like most of ours) born into a family with a history of allergy and atopy, and I think it warrants a second look. I'm not anti-vaccine, but I'm also not for pummeling my child with 5-7 diseases at once at a young age. I'm not for giving my kids every new vaccine that comes on the market. Look at the rotavirus vaccine. They pulled it not long after it came out. Mistakes are made.

Yes, there is the concept of "herd immunity." If everyone is vaccinated, then those for whom the vaccine didn't work, there's no on to catch the disease from. Herd immunity is what give the non-vaccinaters the luxury of not vaccinating. I do wonder what might happen if more and more people don't vaccinate. I have friends who don't vaccinate, and I wonder if they will get measles or mumps when they are adults, or catch them from their own kids. I don't want my kids to get these diseases later in life, which is why I vaccinate.

People are skeptical of vaccines, the medical establishment and the government for good reason. I've learned from this site that the chicken pox vaccine is a good idea for asthmatic kids who may be on oral steroids. But the literature for the vaccine that they give out in the doctor's office states that the the vaccine is good because then parents won't have to miss a week or more of work staying home with a sick child. I kid you not, this is the main advantage given in the literature. So the government is going to force me to vaccinate (for my child to enter public school) so that I don't have to miss work??? Taking care of my kids IS my full time work! This is why people don't trust the vaccine requirements. (In addition to what I mentioned above already about MMR being given with other vaccines.) What about when they went from live polio back to inactive? I decided on my own that I wanted my child to have the inactive rather then the live. What do you know, a year later, the AAP agrees with me and stops using the live vaccine!

So, yes I believe in the good of vaccination, but I think a healthy dose of skepticism is a good thing.

I'm breaking my promise! Sorry, but some questions were asked and I thought I had better respond.

The JAMA article is rather old (1981), so I don't think it is stored anywhere on the internet, but I will look into it and see if I can find it. (I think both JAMA and the doctors surveyed in the study took a lot of heat for that so I don't think they have published anything similar since then!). I orginally came across it as reference in a book by pediatrician Robert S. Mendeslsohn, M.D. ("How to raise a Healthy Child In Spite of Your Doctor") in the chapter on immunizations.

I am really not anti-vaccine, or else I would not have vaccinated my son for anything. I just happen to respect those who chose not to do so and felt the overwhelming need to defend them. In my family there have been no moderate or severe reactions to vaccines plus we spend a lot of time with international students and faculty so I thought in our particular case vaccines were warranted.

Thank you Bensmom so very much! I was starting to worry I was going to get an email from Chris stating I had been kicked off PA.com for life! I also wanted to ask Corvallis Mom why SHE didn't get the chicken pox vaccine!

[This message has been edited by Milkmom (edited July 01, 2001).]

I'm sorry I picked on the chicken pox vaccine so much. But as mentioned you would never know about the steroid/athsma/chicken pox connection from the ad literature. This seems to be an absolutely valid reason to consider this immunization. For this population this could be vital.

I have an irrational grudge against this vaccine.

This chicken pox vaccine has received extensive, and I mean extensive advertisement in all the mainstream parent and baby magazines. It was all over the place in 1999. The numbers cited in the ads for complications of chicken pox disease are LESS than for nationwide food reactions cited by FAAN.

Cited might be the wrong word, I think the quote by the weeping ducky picture in the ad was "Sadly, a hundred children last year had complications from chicken pox...". In the fine print you get a percentage in the hundreths.

This vaccine is not highly effective and kids frequently still get a mild case if immunized (per my pediatrician). It seems the potential reactions from this vaccine are at the same order of magnitude as the people who have complications from the disease. The vaccine was sold more on the money argument- lost time from work and school, than it was on the health complications.

I would get angry every time I saw one of those stupid ads when they had their initial big campaign. If it was really a nationwide health problem they would not have had to push it so hard. In addition, I could not help visualizing those extensive ads everywhere instead publicizing food allergies as a health threat instead. Numerically, more people are affected each year by food allergy and it would have helped more people I know! (Selfish, selfish...and jealous of the big budget, too). This was when I was really assimilating the implications of my child's PA.

All that money spent on chicken pox, it just seemed out of proportion to the benefit. Of course, it's just an investment for the drug company that now has a big payoff for them.

I really do not put polio, etc. in the same catagory. I am not so young I don't remember when the polio vaccine came out. My parents faked an address in another county to get the oral polio vaccine for us a few months early. The gym was filled with people of all ages, with children prioritized to drink the stuff. People actually wept to see their children drink it and I am not kidding. This was due to a true fear of the disease and the bad complications that were the frequent outcome of catching polio. I can't see people doing this for chicken pox....

The public health argument on Hib for infants is insulting to mothers. This is just not an appropriate vaccine for a 1 hour old infant. Why expose your child to any thimerisol (mercury)so young? Why introduce this immunization to an exceedingly immature immune system. They are targeting a small at risk population when they are trapped in the hospital giving birth and using everyone else's kids as guinea pigs. This is politics, not health care.

Hib also happens very fast in the nursery after birth. My husband was instructed to refuse it for our child, but it happened right in front of him w/o even a moment to stop the nurse. You would think the second time we would have been able to face them down, but they ignored our written instructions and protest. I'm still ticked off about that.

Well thanks to all of you who have posted your thoughts on my topic.
I must first make it clear that I am not anti-immunization. I have a 3 year old daughter who has been vaccinated without any adverse effects. However,after seeing the reaction that my son had to the MMR, I am definitely not keen to consent to anything of the like.

I think the whole reason why I was so irate
after learning what was in this vaccine,
was, because I was not made aware beforehand!! The GP gave me a Parent Advice Sheet, which outlined common reactions to vaccination and what to do about them. It listed seven reactions, but did NOT mention anaphylactic reaction, but the manufacturer
did list this as a possible adverse effect.
Knowing that I consented to this, makes me sick to the core. My health nurse, and GP both now agree that Jedd will need to have
the MMR booster at the hospital when he's older.

I find it annoying to say the least, that this information has not been forthcoming or easily accessible.

I guess my whole point is that this vaccination is extremely dangerous to a lot of allergy kids, and I feel there should be a better system of screening the prone from the rest. Would it be too much for a small skin test, to be done prior. Not all 12 month old babies have tried eggs.

I'm sorry that it has turned into a debate
about the neccessity of vaccinations. It was not my intention to scare anybody, I am well aware of the importance of this system, however,now I am well aware of my precious son's inability to cope with such.

Take care,
Jenni