Measles … I don’t understand!

I got measles as a child and it affected my sight. Please don't assume it's a "mild" disease.

I think you are muddling this with ''German measles'' which is NOTHING like Measles.
Years ago they allegedly had German measles parties for girls.

Measles Proper can be a serious illness.

I had it as a child, and remember the doctor calling at the house daily, and the headache and scary rash that frightened me.

Measles is not something to be taken lightly, its also extremely contagious.

Thanks for the detective work @DogInATent. I was a 50s child and had measles aged 5, certainly was no picnic, I remember the dark room and horrible rash. Was off school for nearly 3 weeks with it.

Don't recall 'measles parties' at all, definitely did hear about chicken pox parties though. My mother (trained as a nurse) would never have sent me to one anyway!

Measles is certainly not a disease you'd want to have with the added complication of immune 'amnesia' afterwards. Probably explains why so many of us kids were constantly off school with illness!

my mum definitely remembers the 'parties' being done for German Measles/Rubella but not for Measles itself. (she's' 72 and grew up in Birmingham if its relevant)

I have a friend (mid 70's now) who tells me that there were 'measles parties'.
Also even Polio Parties (!). Her parents did not get her the jab as they were concerned about it at that time she said. She did not get Polio & was lucky. My other mid 70's friend also didn't get the jab back then but was not so lucky and ended up in an iron lung aged 7. For a year. Parents not encouraged to visit in those days. Just awful. I have given my two (now 17 & 19) every jab recommended & been grateful for the opportunity to do so.
I remember the fuss about the MMR 'causing ASD'. My two had the MMR.
They are both Austistic. It's genetic (very clearly in our case!).
We all had the Covid vaccines too. I judged the risk to be lower than the risk of a bad dose of the disease. Unlikly but I considered it an insurance.

I had measles when I was 2. It affected my eyes. I have little clarity of vision in one eye and will eventually go blind. The other eye’s not too clever either.

Vaccinate your kids, it’s not just a few spots.

@bruffin

I think I would have been part of the post 1968 mass rollout as it was offered to all children over the age of 1. My older sisters would have been part of the school catch up programme.

Measles took my dads hearing and left him deaf for life from being a perfectly normal toddler. He nearly died. My grandmother carried huge guilt her whole life for having gone to work and put him in the childcare facility where he'd caught it- (vaccinations weren't available then until a few years later). It was (and is) a terrifying disease for the unvaccinated, my Grandmother told me she waa scared and worried about it before my dad caught it, I don't think anyone wished it on their kid.

I know I posted the Guardian link, but this morning I've been trying to track back the possible origins and sources for multiple journalistic articles that make the same claim, and a similar claim that's made on a wiki article on the topic.

The best origin seems to be an unreferenced throwaway line in a Associated Press article, as this uses the phrase that's been re-used largely verbatim by most subsequent articles (probably quoting each other). And it's likely that this origin may be from a lazy journalist not understanding the difference between German Measles (Rubella) and Measles, and skimming the title whilst overlooking the detail of period articles like this.

Mor didn’t come in til late 80s I think? ….you could get a single measles jab from earlier though

Tell that to my uncle, who was perfectly healthy and went blind from measles, or Roald Dahl's family after he lost his young daughter to measles.

I remember chicken pox parties ….I was born mid 60s …..I got measles at age 17….I was proper poorly for a couple of weeks

This is anecdata but this news article from this year references measles parties. Not sure how reliable it is. I guess we rely on people who were alive then to report back.

Anyway, these parties are a bad idea!

Measles parties were reportedly popular in the 50s and 60s, before the MMR vaccine was introduced. More recently, parents have reportedly hosted chickenpox parties so toddlers catch the illness early.

inews.co.uk/news/measles-parties-risk-children-life-2873278?srsltid=AfmBOoqbxcCxJ-WPsEBtAZm6cNCncwmkF29CuR1seRQH-SbPsCi4p7qz

Who advised this? Certainly wouldn’t have been an nhs professional as they promote the U.K. childhood immunisations schedule

Vaccine or not she can still catch it! It just won't be as bad.
Why don't people understand this about Vaccines.

After 1 dose of mmr, it is over 90% effective, the 2nd dose helps provide immunity to another few %. They are planning to bring the 2nd MMR forward to 18 months nationally. If a child has the 1st dose between 6 and 12 months, they should have another dose at 12 months and then another dose, so 3 doses total (so if you have a missing dose on your record, you can have a 3rd).

You can still get breakthrough measles, if you have had 2 doses, but it is considered to be very low risk of being transmitted to others with healthy immune systems.

Measles is diagnosed in high amounts by gp's currently, all cases should recieve an oral fluid kit in the post which should be completed and returned to confirm or not.

You only need to isolate for 5 days from onset of rash for measles even if rash remains - if exposed and not immune, it can take 21 days for infection to start.

Rubella is no longer tested for antenatal now as there is very very low levels of rubella in the uk (norimported from travel to other countries with circulating rubella), so with no natural exposure immunity levels difficult to check (doesn't mean no immunity if you were exposed)

I think there are some ‘recollections may vary’ going on here. I’m in my mid 70’s, and the only disease parties I am aware of for myself as a child, and my children, was for mumps! It was important for boys to contract it as it can cause issues as an adult.

Obviously, this was well before the development of the MMR vaccine. Incidentally, one of my DC’s was refused the measles vaccine due to childhood eczema, and was extremely ill when they contracted it.

We are fortunate now as a society to have access to many vaccines.

Roald Dhals healthy eldest daughter died from measles. She was neither immunocompromised nor malnourished. She was seven when she died.

we vaccinate against measles for a reason,

I'm also that generation. I got measles aged 5 in 1960, as did my little sister, we were both fine.

I remember chicken pox parties, but not anyone trying to get measles as parents were very aware of the sight complications that it could cause. I knew at least one other person my age with sight loss because of it - and a slightly older student at my uni who had the lasting effects of having had polio as a child. It was not unknown to see children in callipers in the 60's.

measles is the single largest cause of blindness among children who are impoverished. If we can eradicate it worldwide by vaccination, we should.

23 years ago DS got measles. He was only 6 months so hadn’t even had the first jab.
DD had had the first jab, but not the second. She did not catch it from him.
Thankfully DS was fine.

DHs father caught measles as a child, before vaccines, and lost the sight in one eye.

@KreedKafer

Msybe my eyesight was worsened by measles, I’ll never know!

@BillieJ

Scarlet fever was only viewed as a ‘mild illness’ after antibiotics were available to treat it. Pre antibiotics, it was very serious - my DM was put in an isolation hospital as a toddler for several weeks and was only allowed to see her mother through the window.

@SabrinaThwaite
The vaccine was only introduced in 1968 so there was a catch up programme in schools for children born prior to that and had not had measles, so it could be you may not have had the vaccine by then.

I promise you they didn’t. Measles was greatly feared because so many children died or were left disabled by it. There’s a tiny possibility they did have these sort of parties for rubella, which used to be known as German measles, because women who didn’t get natural immunity from the disease in childhood faced damaging an unborn child if they later caught it while pregnant (this was before the rubella vaccine was available), but nobody was trying to catch measles. I was born in the 70s when we had the vaccine as a matter of course. Measles had almost died out in this country until Andrew Wakefield came along.

DM had measles when she was three. She subsequently got pneumonia, and was left with permanently damaged lungs, a condition called bronchiectasis. She was not unwell, or immuno-compromised, when she got measles. Please don’t take the risk of not vaccinating.

This also happened to my aunt. She needed glasses because of measles. Although other members of the family also got measles, it didn't affect their eyesight.

It's interesting what you say about headaches as well as my aunt had terrible migraines. My mum and I get migraines as well but nothing like as badly as she had them. So maybe the measles had something to do with that as well.