To not give my children the swine flu vaccine?

[wintersnow]

I decided not to last year as I wanted to wait and see how safe it was but am reconsidering this year after several people have died. Did you give it to your children and what were your reasons to give/not give it?

exactly right LeonieDelt, the US really is the land of freedom. People do ask questions there and the Constitution enshrines free speech. I didn't realise that all states mandated it, but I was aware that many religious groups are against it.

they have so many radio stations that diverse opinions can be found. It is not a monopoly type control as we have here.

When I googled 'Measles outbreak in vaccinated population' this article was one of the first to be found.

pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/peds.2009-1653v1

It's in Pediatrics which is one of the top medical journals iirc. And the conclusions were:

"Despite high community vaccination coverage, measles outbreaks can occur among clusters of intentionally undervaccinated children, at major cost to public health agencies, medical systems, and families. Rising rates of intentional undervaccination can undermine measles elimination."

What do you think?

leonie

Someone suggested I google something and this is what came up as one of the first links.

What do you think is wrong with the study? Is there anything fishy about it? Do the authors have some conflict of interest that you know about it? Do you have problems with the methods used?

Which parmco sponsors Pediatrics?

I have hypothyroidism by the way. I've found that the latest thinking is to look at the patient as a whole rather than just TSH - although TSH levels generally work very well for me as an indicator for the level of medication that I need. My Mum's the same (she has it as well).

Im not sure what you're asking me stata. That wasn't the outbreak I was talking about - there have been a few in schools with very high vaccination coverage (vaccination is compulsory in the US for school (unless exempt)). I am not saying that are not outbreaks among unvaccinated people - As was the case in San Diego - just that herd immunity from vaccines isn't a reliable guarantee of protection.

Here's one link for now stata. 70% of the cases had been vaccinated so were considered 'vaccine failures'. Not great really...

Anecdotally, my son and nephew are at university and there have been outbreaks of mumps at both their campuses. These are most likely fully vaccinated students because at 19 they had MMR before the Wakefield furore.

bubbleymummy

So, 70% of measles cases were vaccinated people. If 98% of the population were vaccinated, then the 2% of the population who weren't accounted for 30% of the cases.

So, basically, immunisations don't protect 100% (OK, no argument there, we all know that) but if you are immunised then (a) you're far less likely to get the disease if there is an outbreak, and (b) it's likely to be a weaker case, and (c) vaccine failures may play some role in transmission but that such transmission is not usually sustained.

Would you agree with that conclusion? I don't understand why that would support an argument not to vaccinate.

I'm still wondering if there's any example of a community (of sufficient numbers) or country that has refused mass vaccinations for a disease like measles, mumps or polio where infant and child mortality has then gone down.

I'd find that a pretty compelling argument. All I can see though is the opposite. Why would that be?

i'm not philosophically wedded to the idea of immunising or medical interventions for the sake of intervening - mass immunisation really does seem to save lives as far as I can see. I'd really like to know if there are any examples to the contrary.

claig and leonie and others as well
Would anything actually change your minds? Or is this a view point you're wedded to come what may? What would you need to know to change your mind about vaccines?

Yes I am open to changing my mind. I would need to be convinced that it was safe and that it was efficacious.

I am open to changing my mind that aspartame is dangerous, but so far I haven't been convinced.

Are you open to changing your mind?

The Amish are not vaccinated. 1 in 15000 Amish has autism. 1 in 75 non-Amish Americans have autism.

The Amish are not vaccinated and have similar infant mortality to the rest of the population

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8296784

Yoy are right Statalover. It's not a 70% failure rate is it. If everyone in the school were exposed to measles and 70% of those vaccinated caught it measles then it would be a 70% failure rate. Only 19 cases in the whole school were vaccinated and the outbreak was self limiting because so many were vaccinated.

Also it doesn't say the size of the school and it doesn't say whether they were given boosters and also that report was from 1987 so probably prior to booster.

But what would convince you? I already said I have an open mind. The only reason I think vaccines save lives is that nearly everything I have come across points to that fact. I haven't found the arguments against convincing in the slightest, other than there possibly being a small sub-group of children for whom the risk is higher. Even that's not for sure but just a possibility.

Every country in the world has a mass immunisation programme. If it led to a decrease in child well-being why would they spend precious resources on it? Do you really think you know better than the medical authorities of every single country in the world? Do you have a medical background at all (I sure don't)?

There might be questions over which diseases to vaccinate (eg chicken pox), which age to vaccinate etc, but do you really doubt the basic principle that vaccinating against diseases with relatively high mortality and/or morbidity such as measles and polio saves lives? And if you do, why?????

And how do you explain the eradication of smallpox? Do you think we're healthier now that we don't have smallpox? Or are our immune systems able to deal with it since most people did survive it?

I really really don't get the logic behind all of this.

That amish claim is a myth

re smallpox: I think that diseases sometimes just run their course, the species they like best just overcomes them. I know that the plague still exists and can be caught from cute ground squirrels in the US, but how many epidemics of the plague are there nowadays? It used to kill tens of thousands of people. So what happened to it?

neither DS has had it nor will they. I am against the majority of vaccinations.

I have my reasons.

I live next door to a peadiatric nurse who has a toddler - she is dead against the swine flu jab.

I'm not an expert. I believe what I believe. Some children die shortly after receiving certain vaccines. Some parents report that their children have been damaged after taking certain vaccines. Some people were paralysed after taking swine flu jabs in 1976 in teh States. The Daily Mail reported the leaked memos about the possible side-effects of the swine flu vaccine. If none of that occurred, then I would be convinced that it was safer.

I don't believe everything doctors say. They have in the past approved medicines which turned out to be dangerous and later had to be withdrawn.

I don't know all the answers to every question. You can find many answers to the questions that you ask if you research it for yourself.

So smallpox just ran its course and the WHO's global vaccination campaign had nothing to do with it? Is that your claim?

Or that we should have just let smallpox run its natural course, because some diseases may do that.

IIRC, there have been outbreaks of plague in India and other countries.

claig

'I believe what my believe'

This is what I've been feeling on this thread. I feel like I'm arguing with someone about the existence of God. You can argue till you're blue in the face that we don't know but if someone believes, then they believe. This anti-vax stuff seems more like a religion than anything else.

duchesse

Comparing bubonic plague ( I assume that's what you mean) and smallpox is apples and pears.

Bubonic plague is not a viral disease, but a bacterial one, so for a start, it can be treated with antibiotics. Additionally, many of the causes of bubonic plague were "lifestyle" related- it was carried by fleas and spread by rats/ other feral animals who lived in close proximity to the population at that time, who themselves lived in filth and squalor and in very close proximity to one another, assisting the spread. Therefore the reasons for why BP doesnt keep ravaging the populaton these days are fairly obvious.