Baby boy in Perth (Aus) dies of whooping cough.

[WhereTheFuckIsMyFuckingCoat]

mobile.news.com.au/lifestyle/parenting/grieving-dads-message-for-anti-immunisation-parents-after-whooping-cough-death/story-fnet08xa-1227268866019?utm_content=SocialFlow&utm_campaign=EditorialSF&utm_source=News.com.au&utm_medium=Facebook

Hoping I've done the link properly, am not the most technically minded

A four week old boy, who was too young to have begun the vaccination schedule, has died here in Australia. His parents, obviously, are completely devastated and bereft, and have released a statement imploring parents to rethink not vaccinating, owing to the importance of herd immunity. It has also been suggested that antenatal vaccinations are introduced to both protect the mother, and allow her to transmit a certain level of immunity to the foetus to give protection before the vacc schedule begins. It is suggested in the news reports that this is already common in countries in Europe and the US. I left the uk four years ago, as far as I'm aware it wasn't a thing then?

It's just made me feel even more strongly that immunisation should be (excluding exceptional medical grounds) compulsory. Here in nsw, in most schools and preschools, you have to present your child's immunisation records before you can enrol them, which I feel, is a massive step in the right direction, but won't deter people who for eg homeschool from refusing vaccinations unnecessarily.

It's just made me so sad today. I can't even begin to imagine what his parents are going through.

[Providore]

Tragic. I've seen the photos and he was just a gorgeous little thing :(
The thing is, though, that the reason Perth has such high rates of pertussis is not due to low levels of vaccination (vaccination rates for the hexavalent pertussis-containing vaccine are NOT declining) but because WA has mutated variants of wid pertussis circulating. The current vaccine is just not effective, and there is a lot of work going into developing a more relevant and effective vaccine. It saddens me that the death of this lovely little boy will unleash outpourings of blame on people who are in no way responsible, rather than shining the light on the Australian givernment's systematic dismantling of science and research programmes, a move which has possibly contributed to there not being either an updated pertussis vaccine or a Western Australan specific vaccine.

[ChablisTyrant]

That's awful. Yes, we now have antenatal jabs here for whooping cough. Awful illness I had as a young child - being ill with it is one of my earliest memories.

I'm depressed how many anti-vax people there are on mumsnet. A few on my Facebook too. Nobody who has studied science and is capable of understanding the arguments properly, of course. I'd be in favour of tying pre-school funding to vaccinate schedules.

[WhereTheFuckIsMyFuckingCoat]

He was gorgeous.

Thank you for that information though providore - I honestly didn't know that. I hope cases like this will highlight it (although it goes without saying, that I hope that there aren't any other similar cases, fortunately it is the first death from pertussis (sp?) since 2011.

[WhereTheFuckIsMyFuckingCoat]

We are vaccinated here postnatally for whooping cough. Mother is free, father and grandparents/other close family pay $25 each.

[Jackieharris]

So this wasn't the fault of people who criticise the vax schedule but you are going to blame them anyway?

Maybe if people had listened to those people who warn of the failure rates of these vaccines then this boy wouldn't have died.

[WhereTheFuckIsMyFuckingCoat]

That argument doesn't stand up, as this baby was too young to be vaccinated. And no one can say whether this baby caught whooping cough from an anti-vax parent's child or not, but there is no denying the fact that herd immunity is needed for babies this baby's age, who are too young to be vaccinated.

Who said they had a problem with people who question the vaccination schedule?

[AuntieStella]

It is because of the death in 2012 of 14 babies too young to be vaccinated in UK that the late pregnancy booster was introduced.

Similar has happened in other countries.

[peggyundercrackers]

your pretty despicable - imagine using a tragic situation like that to score points about immunisations and people using their own judgement...

[WhereTheFuckIsMyFuckingCoat]

Is that directed at me Peggy?