MMR

[LalyRawr]

I don't want to start an argument or be judges/seen as judging others, but I could really do with some advice.

My brother was Autistic. He had Fragile X syndrome and after being tested I also tested positive for it, but my 'symptoms' are much milder than his were due to the fact that I have a healthy X chromosome to balance out the 'bad' one.

Now my question is on the MMR. I know the study linking MMR to Autism has been discredited, but OH's Aunt is a Caffcas worker and has seen parents who swear blind their child was healthy and happy and literally changed over night after having the MMR.

I, like any parent, only want the best for my daughter. She is 10 months old so will need to have it in a couple of months and I am still unsure what would be best.

All NHS guidelines recommend the combined injection, but obviously they would do. But, once given, this isn't something that can be taken back if there is a problem.

But with the single vaccines, the NHS website states there is an ncteased risk of my daughter catching one of the diseases before she is immunised and they mentioned that all the clinics which offer the single vaccines are unlicensed, so obviously that has scared me!

I know this is long and I sound like a PFB mother (which I am!) but I just don't know what to do.

Help me please?

As a complete aside.

My DH has recently had Whooping Cough. He has had all his imms from birth and, as a soldier who has done a fair number of operational tours, has had more immunisations than most people do. He still got it, the symptoms were just as bad for him as they would have been if he had not been immunised. He still (6 months on) has periods when it is difficult for him to breathe due to coughing.

When he was diagnosed we were told that:
a) he was lucky that we live where we do, because there is a large community of people here who haven't been immunised against it, who bring it with them when they immigrate. Otherwise the doctor wouldn't have considered it as a dx. This has also been true of a friend of mine's DD who had been immunised against rubella, but caught it anyway and had some complications from it, GP refused to consider Rubella, hospital did blood tests to confirm that this was the actual dx.
and
b) the jab only gives immunity for an average of 10 years anyway, and often for only 6 months (can't provide evidence of this, but MO has done the research)

Not only should children be having imms, but adults should be offered boosters every 10 years in the same way as tetanus boosters used to be.

I post as a daughter of medic parents. No history of autism or any other SN in either my or DP family. Am educated to degree level and pro science ie not wacky theories...
And yet...
When it came to MMR jab on my DD I was really wary. I consider the usual MMR age too young to give 3 live vaccines.
So I waited til DD was 5 and she had initial and top up within 3 months as per NHS guidelines for her age.
I have to admit to holding my breath for 3 months...
Now I'm relieved that she has had the full jab as measles has had a surge locally. Not all children are immune after the first dose. That's why the top up is given.
It's up to you OP. I wouldn't blame you if you chose not to go ahead. But disease side effects can be severe and life altering for your DC.
Damned if you do etc etc

Go single vaccine, if, and that's a big IF your dc develops anything austic like you will always wonder......

Dd is due her MMR. I might have to hide this thread as it is making me even more panicked.

Did you not read it? Its full of sense, unlike most of these threads, detailing why you should do it and not worry.

I do not dispute that there is a risk of vaccine damage to some vulnerable children and that it is usually impossible to tell in advance whether or not your child will be vulnerable.

However, the risk of complications from measles as a % of cases is considerably higher than the risk of damage from a vaccine. Parents need to know this and make a judgement about which risk they would prefer.

In addition they also need to think about the risk that rubella presents to women in the first trimester of pregnancy, and ask whether they could live with the consequences of their decision not to vaccinate should the worst happen.

Apart from that it is totally everyone's individual choice.

There was an Agatha Christie book where someone committed murder because the victim had given her German measles (rubella) while she (the victim) was pregnant and she had lost the baby.

'However, the risk of complications from measles as a % of cases is considerably higher than the risk of damage from a vaccine. Parents need to know this and make a judgement about which risk they would prefer.'

At a population level, but not an individual level.

Vaccinations are not 100% effective. I would rather know i was not vaccinated and stay away from pg women, than assume i was and infect someone, and i also believe that it is the pg mothers own responsibility to ensure the conditions are right for falling pg/having a baby.

Starlight I would rather know i was not vaccinated and stay away from pg women

And how would you propose to do that since the danger period is the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, not only do a lot of women not know they are pregnant but dont tell anyone, and also they are no visible signs.

You can't expect people to base their decision on what they allow to be injected into their child on hypothetical pregnant women that they may not even come into contact with.

why not?

Because to most parents, their child take priority over other people's. of course, many parents will think of the risk to pregnant women and unborn babies of they are planning a pregnancy, or if they have close family members who are pregnant.

But at the end of the day, each parent has to make the decision that they think is best for their own child. I don't think it's fair to guilt parents into making a parental decision they are not comfortable with because of possible pregnant women that they might never see.

Because hypothetical pregnant women are rarely going to be worth risking your own child for.

I am quite surprised that posters have mentioned measles and hearing loss. I have had measles, so has DH, so did our siblings, our parents and nearly all our friends as children. My children have also had measles and are fine. I know of no-one personally who has suffered hearing loss. I wonder how common it is?

My DS had the singles....he did not have the booster. The local GP surgery tried to make me agree for DS to have it but I checked with my specialist and he confirmed the booster was not needed.

The same thing happened to us when we had singles Betty, although our paediatrician offered the blood test to check immunity. We took him up on that, and it turned out that the rubella one hadn't worked with one of our ds's. We gave him a second rubella, but didn't test again after that thinking that if it hadn't worked, he either had some natural immunity, and there was no guarantee that a third one would work if we had been prepared to inject him again anyway.

If the second rubella injection did work, ds was immune much earlier than he would have been if he'd had MMR.

It also annoyed me greatly that despite my GP surgery being sent records to show that my ds's had been immunised, and the records to prove that they were (mostly) immune, they still questioned me at every appointment and sent countless letters telling me that I had to give MMR.

Thanks for all the advice and opinions (sorry for taking so long, my daughter appears to have decided that sleep is now optional).

Just to make clear, never once was I considering not vaccinating her. I was deciding between the MMR and the Single jabs. But seeing as you are now unable to get the Mumps as a single vaccine I think I will probably go for the MMR.

My sister is severely myopic due to measles. My brother has some hearing loss. This was back in the sixties and seventies when it was common to lose a child to measles.

The study has been discredited, the fear is irrational, get the MMR and protect your baby as the NHS recommends.

The thing that worries me about it all is what if the MMR doesn't "cause autism" (as there's obviously a lot of people who didn't have it who are diagnosed with autism) but what if it causes some autism. That's the part I can't let go of and weighs on my mind a lot. What if some people are genetically predisposed (is tht the right word?) to having it and it takes a trigger to set it in motion? Maybe in some kids the trigger is the high temperature after the MMR or in some kids its something else that happens earlier in life. That's the part that worries me a lot. What if its dormant in my dd and the MMR is enough to trigger it?

I know that could be a load of rubbish but I still can't stop worrying about it :(

It is not possible for anyone to make vaccination decisions without taking the welfare of other people into account.

Yes, for my child it would be best not to be vaccinated for anything AS LONG AS everyone else was vaccinated, some of those people were exposed to the side-effects of the vaccines but the diseases were eradicated. So my child would benefit 100% with no risk, others would take 100% of the risk and the benefit of the vaccines and a minority would suffer the harm of side-effects for all our benefit.

However, that only works on a purely individualistic level. As soon as everyone reasons this way, not enough people vaccinate and herd immunity is lost, the diseases re-emerge and unvaccinated people stand to lose the most (they avoid the risk of side-effects but take on the risk of the diseases).

Therefore vaccination reasoning has to take the welfare of others into account.

I am sure someone more familiar with game theory would make the point better.

Amy there are lots of conditions where a genetic predisposition is triggered by an event or life circumstance. However, autism really is very heritable. More than lots of other conditions. I firmly believe that people are born with it and that is all. People have had plenty of ideas about autism in the past (Google Refrigerator Mother) and they have been discredited.

I have been partially deaf as a result of having measles when I was 6,[1950]
My ds had febrile convulsions after his first MMR jab so our GP recommended that dd had reduced amounts of the vaccine-if she had no reaction to the first shot she could have the second.This was in 1975.Both my dc were fine eventually and both have had their dc vaccinated on schedule.

I was so worried about my ds having the mmr, although it has been disproven that there is a link to autism I don't believe a word the government say, and it really pisses me off that I'm unable to chose to singularly vaccinate my child.

I ummed and erred until I saw a video link on you tube by Penn and teller, and made me feel more comfortable getting the mmr. Ds 2 is due his soon and he will get the mmr but at 13 months rather than 12onths as five injections in one go us too much

Please watch this vid it might help . Sorry phone won't link

But go on YouTube search penn and teller vaccinations, it's the 1min 31s