A lot of people will be happy about this (NHS roll-out of chicken pox vaccine)

[enchantedsquirrelwood]

NHS to roll out chickenpox vaccine for children (thetimes.co.uk)

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), which advises the government, said the vaccine should be given to youngsters in two doses when they are aged 12 months and 18 months.
They said the vaccine, known as the varicella jab, would dramatically reduce circulating chickenpox and prevent most severe cases and deaths in children.
The JCVI has also recommended a temporary catch-up programme for older children, warning that pandemic restrictions suppressed chickenpox so there is currently a larger than usual pool without immunity.
The chickenpox vaccine has been given in other countries, including the US and Australia, for many years but the NHS has always said there is a worry that introducing it in the UK could increase the risk of chickenpox and shingles in adults.

They had feared that a childhood chickenpox vaccination programme might mean that unvaccinated children would go on to get chickenpox as adults, when cases can be more severe.
However, latest scientific evidence suggests that the benefits of the vaccine outweigh the risks, and the Department of Health and Social Care will now look at the best ways to implement the JCVI recommendation. It means the chickenpox vaccine is likely to be added to other routine childhood vaccinations, such as MMR.

DH and I were talking about this yesterday. Rubella is bad for unborn babies and so well before MMR girls were vaccinated against it (i was at 12) so we were wondering why chicken pox was treated differently (and indeed slapped cheek disease, which I had not even heard of before I caught it from my three year old ds, and discovered that that is something you don't want when you are pregnant either).

I had terrible chickenpox. Would like to spare it to my son if I can. Does anyone know if you can buy vaccine as an adult? My husband thought of having one.

As this BBC report says, the JCVI has advised that this roll-out happens, but it's up to the Govt (i.e. the Dept for Health / Health Secretary) to make the final decision. That seems to be where we're at?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-67414983

Yes, you can get vaccinated as adult etc but have to pay. I didn’t have it as a child and DC reached 3 with multiple nursery exposure to it without catching it. When we spent a sabbatical in the US he had to be vaccinated in order to attend any educational setting in the state of New York

Yes, we paid for my partner (in his 40s) and both my kids to have it earlier this year.

That was meant for xogossipgirlxo, not sure why replying didn’t work!

Yes, my local Boots pharmacy advertises it. I think Superdrug does it too. Have a google for your area.

I think boots do them privately for people aged 1-65.

Good. We paid for dd to be vaccinated when she was a teenager as she'd not had CP and definitely didn't want it!

Hopefully this is fully rolled out soon! We paid for my son to have it privately, and the reasons why it isn't available en masse at present never seemed very reasonable to me. I had severe chickenpox as a child and have scars from it, I was very keen to avoid that for my son.

I hope they do adopt it. So many countries have had it as routine for years with good results.
I had chickenpox as an adult and was very ill. Vaccination could have avoided that misery.

I have lots of parents asking me if it’s worth getting the cp vaccine done I feel absolutely if they want it as my youngest was quite poorly with it, however my other 3 were absolutely fine so stupidly assumed my youngest would be too. I’m not sure where they would slot it in, 1 year Imms is already 4 vaccines so maybe 16/18 months.

I hope this gets approved. It's senseless to subject kids to a viral illness if it's preventable. The UK is 28 years behind the US on this. Not to mention CP is bound to strike at the most inconvenient time like the day before your holiday!

I have heard from various people to get it for boys not girls. As it doesn't necessarily have lifelong immunity and which can cause issues for girls once pregnant. I wonder what truth there is in this and what people's thoughts on it are. I am genuinely asking. i have a 2 year old and TTC no 2 so i don't know

We had our daughter vaccinated as £150 is two days of nursery for us. She’d be off for minimum a week if she had chicken pox as they have a 5 day exclusion policy.

When we had it done, we had to wait six weeks after his 12 month jabs due to the CP vaccine being live. We then had the follow up jab about six weeks after that. So all vaccinated by 15 months.

So you're saying it might be better for girls to actually get chickenpox? Rather than be vaccinated?

I don't know how true that is, but if you vaccinate all boys, the level of chickenpox would fall presumably. So girls would be less likely to catch it. So then they wouldn't be vaccinated and also might be less likely to catch it. Which would potentially cause more problems for them.

It will be given as a combination vaccine with the MMR so the MMRV vaccine. 1st dose at 12 months and 2nd dose at 18months (2nd MMR had already been announced as moving to 18months from 3years 4months)

Therefore no issue with spacing with other live vaccine.

Good. I paid for ds to get it done and a few
months later after getting it done, chickenpox was doing rounds at ds's nursery and we were able to go to my sisters wedding abroad chickenpox free. I didn't just to do it for the wedding but I had terrible chickenpox and remember all the horrors and I just didn't want ds to experience it and me having to deal with it.

My kids 31, 29 and 26 all had this vaccine as kids. We’re in the US. Never hear much about CP here.

Good. Hopefully it will be approved by the government.

DS turns 1 next month and is getting his done privately but it absolutely should be available for all toddlers.

Thank you everyone for replies. My husband didn’t have CP and apparently there is connection between having cold sores and catching CP that increases your chances of alzheimers? It scares the shit out of him so he wanted to get vaccinated in the same time with our son.

You can and can also get the Shingles vaccine. NHS only offer Shingles vaccine to those over 65, as I presume that's when they regard it being more serious, unsure if that can also be got privately though.

Got ds vaccinated when he was 2, it was worth every penny. I was seriously ill with chickenpox when I was a child, and Dh had encephalitis with it when he was 13. We weren’t taking any chances.

The vaccine hasn’t been around long enough to know whether it gives life long immunity. There’s no reason to think it wouldn’t in most cases but they don’t know.

I had my dc vaccinated as it’s standard where they grew up. Honestly I was happy to avoid weeks stuck in the house with one itchy kid followed by the next.

Good. It's part of the normal vaccination programme in most countries anyway.

I got myself vaccinated after being strongly advised to by my GP and got my daughter done at the same time.

I think its a great idea.

Already had mine vaccinated when kids.

Hope if it is offered people get it for their kids.