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AIBU?

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Original poster

Measles Outbreak?

1003 replies

MoaningLisa · 27/05/2011 13:56

I am sure you have all heard on the news that there has been an outbreak of measles.

Papers, Schools, Hv, Drs are saying if you or your child haven't had the vaccine(s) now would be a good time to get it done.

I cant help but think though that the parents who haven't and wont get their child vaccinated are putting their children at risk.

Aibu to think that its just bloody selfish and very daring to play with their own childs life?

OP posts:
exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 19:21

Latootle-parents tried to get you to have Rubella(especially girls), Mumps(especially boys) and Chickenpox young- but not Measles-there were too many complications, especially eyesight.

exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 19:22

I agree with you bigfatcath.

exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 19:23

They didn't try and get you to have whooping cough either.

Riveninside · 30/05/2011 19:34

I never had the mmr or the triple vaccine for whooping ocugh, diptheria and tetanus. Im to o old. But when i had a blood test to check immunity for immigration purposes i was immune to all of them. My mum recalls whooping cpugh and mumps when we were little but none of the others.

Riveninside · 30/05/2011 19:36

I read recently that neither whooping cough itself, nor the vaccines confers more than a few years immunity. WC does the rounds but in the majoity its an awful cough lastimg weeks but never gets a WC label.

bigfatcath · 30/05/2011 19:38

Where did you read that Riven???

Are you the fab Riven of old? If so hope you are well.

silverfrog · 30/05/2011 19:42

oh the whooping cough vaccine is hopeless - deosn't protect against the most common/virulent strains.

bigfatcath: your points are all true. all those factors may accoutn for a rise in ASD dx. but not from the 1 in 20,000 figure of 25 years ago to the 1 in 64 of today.

the stats do not add up.

as for yuor "it's not vaccines" remark - how do you explain sudden, regressive autism? at,maybe 18 moths old? or 2.6 years old? or 4 years old?

how do you explain sudden onset blindness post vaccination?

I suppose none of those things can be attributed to vaccination either...

alistron1 · 30/05/2011 19:44

'Some' older children and adults may get whooping cough. This is a very different situation to the epidemics of whooping cough before vaccine was developed where children under 1 were at risk of developing dangerous complications.

An epidemic of any illness leads to an increase in complications and fatality in some cases.

This is one of the reasons why we have vaccine programmes, to prevent epidemic levels of disease. Not just for disease eradication.

I still contend that if we had epidemic levels of measles, whooping cough, diphtheria, smallpox, polio etc that many people would rethink their position on vaccination and realise that a lot of their contentions are based on dangerous pseudoscience.

silverfrog · 30/05/2011 19:46

but you hve nothing to base that contention on, alistron.

and indeed, theposters on this thread who have un-vaccinated children have all (I htink) said that they would not change their position.

for many, it is not a position that can be changed all that easily.

alistron1 · 30/05/2011 19:50

Well, that is true because by and large people who 'choose' not to vaccinate their kids (as opposed to people who cannot because of existing health issues) are doing so with the luxury of knowing that these diseases are not at epidemic levels in the UK.

However, I bet if they spent some time in the refugee camps on the Afghanistan/Pakistan border, or in some african nation states they might come to see the benefits of mass vaccination programmes.

bigfatcath · 30/05/2011 19:53

*s for yuor "it's not vaccines" remark - how do you explain sudden, regressive autism? at,maybe 18 moths old? or 2.6 years old? or 4 years old?

how do you explain sudden onset blindness post vaccination?*

Well I have 12 years as an SEN teacher and I have seen some children regress without vaccines. One child after chickenpox. Several after diseases such as Battons. Some just without known reason.

How common is sudden onset blindness post vaccination? Is it so common that it could account for the supposed huge rise in autism?

Also I have worked with premmies and children with traumatic birth injuries who have severe autism and not asd.

alistron1 · 30/05/2011 19:56

Have we done the bit about there being no scientific link between autism/asd and vaccines? I missed a few pages.

Great posts from bigfatcath.

exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 19:56

Now that simply isn't true silverfrog. My siblings and I all had whooping cough at the same time, those of us who had been vaccinated had it not much worse than a bad cold, the baby was in a dreadful state-he wasn't old enough to have been vaccinated. I can give you the benefit of the doubt on some things-but not on the whooping cough vaccine-I know it worked. (I imagine it was a common strain)

silverfrog · 30/05/2011 19:58

the difference, bigfatcath, is that I am not claiming that regression post natural disease can happen.

I am not trying to deny that something which clearly does happen cannot possibly be the fault of vaccines.

I also never said that sudden onset blindness post vaccination was anythign to do with the rise in autism rates.

"Also I have worked with premmies and children with traumatic birth injuries who have severe autism and not asd." - I am no tentirely sure what you are meaning here. if you are trying to split hairs between "sevee autism" and "asd". I am not sure why you woudl do so - the terminology changes every few years, as I am sure you are aware. I believe there is a current move towards ASC rather than ASD. but other than that, I do not understand your point at all.

silverfrog · 30/05/2011 20:00

sorry, exoticfruits - it is true. do please look up the info for the whooping cough vaccination.

the current vaccination does not protect against the most common and most virulent strains of whooping cough. it has mutated.

exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 20:03

I don't know about now but I can assure you that it worked when I was young. It wasn't just my brother-I saw it elsewhere.

exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 20:03

I also think that bigfatcath has some of the most sensible posts on here.

Riveninside · 30/05/2011 20:04

Heh, dont think iwas ever fab riven of old. Just boring old me back again.
If we lived somewhere else dd still couldnt be vaccinated. I rely on a healthy immune system for her.

perfectstorm · 30/05/2011 20:04

Silverfrog - Heller's Syndrome (Childhood Disintegrative Disorder) was first identified in 1908, and there hasn't been a marked rise in incidence since the MMR, which you'd expect of there was a link. This study is interesting there.

silverfrog · 30/05/2011 20:14

exoticfruits, I would again just say -look up the stats. the vaccine was largely ineffective, and not long lasting.

even the new 5in1 job - estimatees are that immunity will last up to 10 years, oftne waning faster. the booster adds an extra 6 years, apparently. again immunity often waning faster than that.

that's a shed load of people with lapsed immunity.

and even with an uptake rate of 94%, whenever there is an outbreak, there are as many vaccinated people who come down with whooping cough as unvaccinated.

it really is not an effective vaccine.

perfectstorm - why would I expect a rise in CDD since MMR?

bubbleymummy · 30/05/2011 20:16

Exotic, not sure why you're insisting that the vaccine worked if you all caught whooping cough despite being vaccinated! If it had worked, you wouldn't have caught it. You may have had a mild case even if you hadn't been vaccinated. The baby may have had it worse because he was younger - you just don't know. It is quite well known that the whooping cough vaccine offered limited protection and there are currently large outbreaks of whooping cough in adults in the US who no longer have immunity.

exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 20:29

I'm not going to keep arguing about it! I will stick to my original -agree to differ. I can tell you things until I am blue in the face and you won't have it-and vice versa.
I don't really think that you can pick holes in bigfatcath's posts.
I really will give up.

MurphyWasAnOptimist · 30/05/2011 20:30

So there's an uptake rate of 94% which means 6% of the people are unvaccinated. Then when there's an outbreak, you get equal numbers of vaccinated and unvaccinated people getting whooping cough. I'm no maths whizz but wouldn't that say that you're better off being vaccinated! The unvaccinated 6% of the people contribute to 50% of the cases, right?

And from what exotic wrote, if you are immunised against whooping cough you're more likely to get a mild case if you do get it (makes sense to me, even if not perfect, your body's immune system has had a head start so you get less sick)

Sorry, nothing here has persuaded me that vaccines are 'a bad thing' and I still think those of you who don't vaccinate (excluding those who do it in accordance in medical advice) are completely totally and utterly bonkers.

MurphyWasAnOptimist · 30/05/2011 20:33

You've done a great job exotic. You were never going to be able to persuade the hard core of silver, gbb, bubbley etc on here. They've stated their position and that nothing will change their minds including an epidemic of whatever killer disease you wish to mention.

But I, for one, enjoyed reading your posts and I think you made a lot of sense.

exoticfruits · 30/05/2011 20:39

Blush people are not usually so kind! Thank you. I don't know why I started-it was a lost cause from the beginning!

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