to think it's not terribly helpful to keep referring to parents who haven't MMR'd as "whack jobs"...

[MsGillis]

..or morons, or unfit parents, or up there with people who drink and drive?

I appreciate that people have very strong feelings around the subject, but I think that we need to understand that there are a significant number of parents who didn't/haven't vaccinated, not because they are crystal waving nutjobs, but because they are actually scared shitless and paralysed into indecision?

Surely there are ways and means to communicate information, and arrogantly shouting about how one person is right and anyone who disagrees is all kinds of nobhead is not going to be conducive in opening up reasonable dialogue?

lottie ok then there isn't any evidence that mmr causes any condition on the autistic spectrum. I'm not arguing about what autism is just that mmr doesn't cause it (it = the wide range of conditions that encompass autism).

Pagwatch - I'm sorry to hear about your sister Pag.

I think there is evidence because I choose to believe parents who know their own child. (shrugs)

That is not to say that I think MMR generally causes autism - I don't.

I am sorry to hear about your sister, particularly to go through chemo with no positive outcome.

I think the problem for the 'nice' anti vaxxers is that you travel under same umbrella as waynetta and her ilk.

I don't want to make anyone genuinely wrestling with a dilemma feel like shit. But you have to understand the consequences of your decision. I would like to spend some time with waynetta face to face while she justifies her view to me that I am acceptable collateral damage to the consequences of her decisions.

Who cares what the Blairs did or didn't do?

The evidence for the safety and efficacy of the MMR vaccine is now established.

A mother who rang R5Live yesterday exclaimed "But I refuse to play Russian Roulette with my child's health" and would not accept that she was doing just that by refusing the vaccination.

I imagine when this epidemic spreads and more young people start dying people might start feeling differently. It's a shame that it has to get to that stage though.

YANBU OP.

This whole debate is making me furious. Life really isn't black and white - family history, previous reactions, allergies all make the decision much more difficult.

It is just not the case to suggest that those who do not vaccinate are negligent or stupid. And nor can the debate blithely exclude those who 'cannot vaccinate for a medical reason'. Because it has become a medical blasphemy to debate vaccines (and I say this as a qualified doctor) you will rarely get a definitive opinion not to vaccinate from a mainstream medic.

However there are children for whom I believe single vaccines are more appropriate and those for whom not vaccinating is safer for them , if not for the herd.

I felt differently before I had my anaphylactic daughter and was a medic dealing with other children. The herd came first. Now I feel that DD2 who has a clear allergic predisposition that multiple vaccines are not appropriate, particularly multiple vaccines that contain egg.

And the media just repeating the same stuff with no variation is making any alternative view sound ignorant. Whereas it may well be the result of more investigation and questioning of the official line.

Some of the facts are deliberately being simplified to reduce this questioning. Eg info about the MMR booster which suggests that you have 95% immunity after the first vaccine. This is not true - 5% will have no immunity, 95% will have had a definitive response to the vaccine. Obviously it would cost a fortune to do antibody tests on all after the first vaccine, so we vaccinate everybody again. 95% of those did not need a second vaccine - it is not actually a booster it just mops up the non-responders.

But this isn't being explained because the official line is to spout the same, simple information to ensure herd immunity (important though that is).

There is far more grey area in all this than people are suggesting....

Well said tempnameswap

Tempnameswap - very eloquently put.

pag really sorry about your sister.

temp just wondering what your opinion is re mmr and autism.

some people who refuse to vaccinate clearly are negligent and stupid. And they are spoiling the debate for those who aren't.

I appreciate life is rarely black and white. But from all that I have read over the years about the MMR/autism debate, it tends much more to the monochrome for me.

"(and I say this as a qualified doctor)"

Good for you, but I'm glad you're not my and my DC's doctor.

Pag - sorry x-posted, I am so sorry about your sister.

WhenSheWas - I suppose my honest opinion is I don't know enough about it. It is not my area of expertise and I have never had significant experience in a working environment. Plus thankfully it doesn't affect my children so I have never had to delve any deeper.

My view though is that if you believe have personal experience of regression you have every right not to go ahead with further vaccines. In general, it is not for those who have an easier ride to judge. These decisions are hard as a parent.

In the area I do have particular experience of - allergies - it is clear that there is so much we do not know. It is just as wrong IMHO to give a blanket assurance that multiple vaccines are 'perfectly safe' than to say they are not. Much of the anti- vaccine stuff is bonkers I reckon but some of the blindly pro-vaccine stuff is arrogant and ignorant.

Why Wears? If you had concerns I would discuss them with you, if not I would strongly recommend you vaccinate.

Eg info about the MMR booster which suggests that you have 95% immunity after the first vaccine. This is not true - 5% will have no immunity, 95% will have had a definitive response to the vaccine. ...... 95% of those did not need a second vaccine - it is not actually a booster it just mops up the non-responders.

Just thinking aloud about this: a good way forward might be to develop a cheap inexpensive and easily administered test to find out who needed the second jab?

Much is made of the numbers who were 'incompletely vaccinated'. Unless we can say for certainty that it's only that category which are getting measles it might suggest that the vaccine has begun to lose its efficacy? In which case, what is being done to address the issue? Or is the question even being asked?

Spero - there are very few on these threads who refuse to vaccinate, but as tempnamechange says, those who want to question the timings or use single vaccines are lumped in with them, and told that they are knaves and fools. If those who don't vaccinate have children with the disease and go round spreading it yes, it's a bit selfish. But, a genuine question here, are you going to get the disease from someone who hasn't caught it themselves? You get the impression from some of these threads that those who don't vaccinate have children who are walking cauldrons of disease!

If you had concerns I would discuss them with you, if not I would strongly recommend you vaccinate.

We need more doctors like you temp!

Those who don't vaccinate are contributing to such situations that have arisen in Swansea when infections may proliferate widely across an unprotected community. My chances (in Bristol) of being exposed to an infected person is thus much greater.

However there are children for whom I believe single vaccines are more appropriate and those for whom not vaccinating is safer for them , if not for the herd.

Are you allowed to recommend single vaccines to your patients?

" some people who refuse to vaccinate clearly are negligent and stupid. And they are spoiling the debate for those who aren't"

It is interesting that the number of those in the UK who absolutely cannot vaccinate their children post 1999, owing to unique special factors, is so very high, higher in fact even than the number needed for herd immunity, when in the rest of the world it is a fraction of a %

And the high incidence of MMR caused autism in the UK is a puzzle, as globally no correlation has been found.

Ditto, these same people also seem to experience measles as a mild inconvenience, whereas it is a global killer everywhere else.

There is clearly something very unique about British post 1999 child physiology.

"However there are children for whom I believe single vaccines are more appropriate"

Which children do you mean?

I am sure that tempnamechange can speak for herself, but her speciality was allergies, of which she said that there was still a lot we didn't know, so I presume she was speaking of these.

BTW tempnamechange - I'd be quite happy to have a Dr who was happy to use their clinical judgement.

"Some of the facts are deliberately being simplified to reduce this questioning. Eg info about the MMR booster which suggests that you have 95% immunity after the first vaccine. This is not true - 5% will have no immunity, 95% will have had a definitive response to the vaccine. Obviously it would cost a fortune to do antibody tests on all after the first vaccine, so we vaccinate everybody again. 95% of those did not need a second vaccine - it is not actually a booster it just mops up the non-responders."

Even if the purpose of the secondary jab is misunderstood (which is doubtful in my view), why does this matter? And, particularly, why would it matter to a doctor who will understand the importance of coverage for the individual and the benefit of assuring the extent of herd immunity?

I don't see why this is any sort of argument at all. Would you not give 'boosters' without evidence of need? And what do you fear would happen if you do?

I don't need to recommend vaccines/deal with them in any way in my area LaVolcan but no, single vaccines are not officially recommended.

And the point is Lazeyjaney that the number who cannot vaccinate through special factors is probably incredibly low but there are higher numbers of people who believe they have an issue that affects vaccination.

And because life is not black and white, and decisions that affect a child's health are hard, we need a health service and a media that discusses these issues rather than categorises all these people as stupid and negligent.

Some of these people will have worries that are easily dispelled, others will not be convinced by any argument however evidence-based. But some will have genuine worries that could have some justification. More and more is being discovered about the genetics of immunity - nobody has all the answers.

Haven't read the whole thread but (im going to say this really quickly and run away as I'm sure I'm going to be flamed...) but YABU as, although I'd never say it to someone's face, nut job thinking is along the right lines! Oooh, I'll just give little johnny some homeopathic vaccinations. That'll do the job, right?! Um no it won't nutjob you poor uninformed and illadvised parent.*

Suspect I'm in not in the minority. Sorry OP.

• I am NOT talking about children who have a genuine medically advised reason for delaying/omitting vaccines eg immunocompromised kids etc.