To have doubts about giving Ds chicken pox vaccine

[Bells3032]

Let me preface this by saying I am probably one of the most pro vaccine people I've ever met..I volunteered with the COVID rollout and got vacicnated early. I booked ds for her vaccines as soon as slots became available.

I've booked my ds in for a private chicken pox vaccine on Saturday. As I know chicken pox, whilst generally more annoying than dangerous can have really dangerous complications. But I've heard from various people (including medical people I trust) that it may not give life long immunity. And surely that's more dangerous if she then catches it when she's older (or worse yet when pregnant). I know there's no way to know as it hasn't been out long but what are people's thought.

Please no anti Vax comments.its just because chicken pox itself is more dangerous when you're older .

Older adults should be getting the shingles vaccine - there is some interesting evidence suggesting that it may prevent some cases of dementia later on.

By the way, the real reason why the CP never became a thing in the UK was because the timing of the introduction coincided with the Wakefield thing. The UK was all set to roll out MMRV (V for varicella, the other name for CP). Then the Wakefield scandal hit, and MMR uptake rates plummeted. The Powers That Be, panicking, decided it was better not to add any extra elements to the MMR while people were so nervous about the vaccine, and doing CP separately was considered too expensive.

The ostensible reason given - "To waft the CP virus about so that old people's immune systems get stimulated and keep shingles at bay" - was always bollocks, seriously. If that were actually the case, the official advice for CP would be "When your child gets CP, get out in public and spread it as much as possible." In fact, the NHS tells people to isolate, which makes no sense if the point and purpose is to spread the virus about in the population!

Ooh interesting, I wondered if that might be the case but thought it couldn't possibly be 😂

I’m in Australia and it’s given free to all children as part of the standard immunisation schedule. One dose means that if you get chicken pox it’s likely to be mild without serious complications. You can choose to pay for a second dose (second dose is recommended by health professionals) which means you are very unlikely to get chicken pox at all. Generally the only people in Australia against the vaccine are also against other standard vaccines.

But chicken pox doesn’t give lifelong immunity either so surely better to have the vaccine?