Baby dies of whooping cough. Concerns about vaccine hesitancy.

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Article on the the BBC website today. It’s so sad.
Vaccines are probably the most important public health measure ever introduced. But they’ve been so successful that people forget how awful things were before we had them and how deadly the diseases were.

Baby dies of whooping cough after mother not vaccinated while pregnant https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2xe5l4mn5o

I don’t disagree that there has been a cultural shift away from vaccines which needs to be addressed. But I didn’t get the whooping cough vaccine in pregnancy because the nurse who was meant to administer them was never in the hospital when I was there for scans. You couldn’t book an appointment, it was a drop in service but fell apart if no one was available for drop ins. I suspect a small proportion of the fall in take up is similar tales of the NHS not working for users.

Could you not ‘drop in’ on a day she was in? Maybe they just needed a clear time table of when she was available

Which they didn’t have.

Was there literally no way of finding out when she would be in? Asking at reception etc?

There's definitely disorganisation in the nhs, but you could have been more persistent about it probably and/or complained or found a private vaccine failing all that.

This is a really sad story but its mostly a story about stupidity in refusing vaccines- play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

armed with news of this dead baby it might be worth going in and asking loudly when the nurse will be available so you can have some small reassurance that your baby won't die?

I remember so many people disabled by polio when I was young and I myself almost died from measles complications as a small child. I had my children vaccinated for everything. That now debunked study on MMR and autism did untold damage.

I agree, first poster is an example of part of them
problem here. NHS need to do better but women also need to take responsibility to keep their babies safe, I’d have kept dropping in different days.

That must be quite an unusual situation though. Vaccines are easy to administer and most midwives do it on the spot in one of your second trimester appointments.

You can also get the vaccine from your GP practice, even before a vaccination service was established in hospitals
It's tragic that babies die- when they needn't
I agree that so many people forget- or are unaware - of how bad these diseases are.

I had whooping cough as a child and can still remember the feeling of not being able to breathe properly. Scared my mum too

Very sad but I'm not sure it's necessary to remember how awful the disease was - I'm not old enough to remember any incidences of whooping cough and I'll confess I don't know much about it. Just accepted the vax on the nhs as it was recommended and my midwife just did it at one of my regular appointments. But I also have no one trying to influence any anti-vax opinions in my life (and don't have much sm) so the default for me has always been to just do whatever the NHS recommends.

Well he’s three now so I think we’re in the clear.

My point is you can’t run a service that relies on people being highly motivated and persistent. I was told stuff like “oh there was meant to be someone there today” or “pop in some time next week”.

I would never have thought of myself as someone to skip a vaccine, but I did.

And perhaps tellingly, I know because of these media reports that my son will now be due various boosters since turning three. But there has been zero communication from the NHS about it. I really do feel they are missing the basics of how you improve take up.

I got mine from a pharmacy, was extremely easy

It’s so scary how many people take it as fact that the MMR vaccine causes autism. My eyebrow lady told me she didn’t vaccinate her children due to this reason. I bit my tongue from pointing out all three of her dcs were on the spectrum (diagnosed not just my opinion!) .

Hopefully now he is 3 you will make the effort to make sure he gets any boosters though? NHS inefficiency wouldn’t make you feel better if he fell ill because you didn’t vaccinate him fully. We all know the NHS is struggling, it’s important to put the effort in yourself even if we shouldn’t have to.

We should have to put the effort in though, you were lucky once - hopefully you're not going to rely on luck again and actually get the vaccines done @Sleepygrumpyandnothappy

You will get a letter or text from your GP as he approaches 3yr4m as the 3 year old vaccines are given then. Same as your 12 month vaccinations which presumably you managed not to miss.

I had to work really hard to get my vaccine for similar reasons - after I'd got it, I found the "drop in" nurse always seemed to be hanging around other clinics bullying women in public into getting their vaccine. Which was pointless and rude. Let's say a woman wanted to go against her community/culture around vaccines - surely better for her to discretely pop in?

(And I was on high risk so in hospital every two weeks trying to find her)

It always boggles my mind how useless midwives are in this respect. If I can be expected to take home daily injections with one demo post-birth, then surely a trained midwife can administer a bloody vaccine at routine appointments!

As I've said in support of that poster - I was high risk and dropped in repeatedly.

It's absolutely stupid that a midwife can't do it.

Indeed. That bloody Andrew Wakefield bloke should have gone on trial for genocide.

He and the pharma company he was in cahoots with are responsible for thousands of babies and children dying or ending up disabled in some way. All for money and prestige.

The mother in this case acted stupidly and foolishly and her own baby has paid the highest price. It’s unutterably tragic. The poor baby had no choice in the matter.

Vaccine hesitancy is a euphemism for foolish and selfish refusal to be vaccinated against potentially fatal illnesses.

I wish our government would do what some countries do - not allow parents to register at nurseries and schools unless they’re fully vaccinated.

Bullying?

Couldn't agree more.
It's not just protecting your own children, but there children who cannot receive some vaccines for medical reasons and the herd immunity theory is all that's between them and serious illness.

Agreed, or course they should be able to do it. Doesn’t change the fact that sometimes they won’t and we have to make additional effort to protect our children.

Try harder FgoodnessS