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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To not want my baby to have the BCG?

204 replies

lill72 · 30/03/2015 12:16

Hi,
I went to give my 21 week old DD the BCG the other day, but then chickened out at the last moment, due to the scar. Hear me out - this is not the only reason. We live in London in what is considered a high risk area, but we are not considered high risk, according to the GP. He said he would feel comfortable not giving it. We are from Australia where it is not given, and we will most likely return within 5-7 years, ie before DD goes to sschool. As you need repeated contact with a person who has it, I just consider our risk so low, that I don't feel out individual circumstances warrant it.
Thoughts?

The GP said many parents with simialr backgrounds or are going to move out of London when their children go to school dont get it either. Thoughts?

OP posts:
Original poster
lill72 · 30/03/2015 13:09

Ton - trying to get others thoughts and knoledge. I have up until one to give to my dd so am still considering...

OP posts:
Original poster
lill72 · 30/03/2015 13:09

knowledge even...

OP posts:
queenofthepirates · 30/03/2015 13:10

I just don't get it, who wouldn't want to protect their child from diseases that would seriously impair them? Seems a no brainer to me.

Mistlewoeandwhine · 30/03/2015 13:11

My kids had it at 6 weeks and the scar is now tiny on their much bigger arms. You are foolish not to protect your children. I worked with a Romanian lady who turned out to have TB (and had had it for 6 months before seeing a doctor). A group of us had worked daily with her, shared drinks out of the same bottles etc and none of us got it because... TADAAAH! we had all had the BCG. She on the other hand was v ill for a long time.

OverTheHandlebars · 30/03/2015 13:13

My sister caught TB as a child, we were very low risk and to this day nowhere knows where it came from. It affected the lymph nodes in her neck and she had to have a neck dissection to remove them. She now has to live with a significant scar on her neck that she cannot hide and that strangers frequently comment on. It is very distressing for her. A tiny mark on your arm is nothing in comparison.

Operations to remove lymph nodes affected by TB are well known by doctors to cause significant cosmetic issues. If that is your concern then you would be much better getting the BCG. Please don't take the risk.

GraysAnalogy · 30/03/2015 13:15

It's 'low risk' now because we have immunity. If people stop getting it because of this 'low risk' reason surely it'll make a return?

WhereIsMyFurryHat · 30/03/2015 13:15

I declined it for my third child having accepted it because I had to for my first two.

They give it at birth here. The two who got it both have scars.

BarbarianMum · 30/03/2015 13:20

I'd also like to hear more about this assertion as I am planning to pay privately to get my kids vaccinated this year. Lived in Nigeria and seen TB up close - v nasty to have, v difficult to treat. A small scar (I have one) seems a small price to pay.

EveBoswell · 30/03/2015 13:27

I cannot believe that, if a vaccination / immunisation is offered to you, you don't accept it. People like you, OP, have no idea of the terrible lives people with TB and other illnesses (that we rarely see now) had to bear in this country or have to bear in less developed countries. There are so many diseases - measles, German measles, mumps, polio and TB that are seldom seen now because of the wonderful vaccinations that are available. When measles was commonly seen, people often died and, after all these years, people don't know as much about it because they weren't around then so never saw it. The same applies to TB.

Children's scars usually disappear as they grow so don't use that as a feeble excuse not to have the TB vaccination.

Read Mistlewoeand Whine's, QueenofthePirates' and OvertheHandlebars' posts. I support them wholeheartedly.

SophieandHerSnail · 30/03/2015 13:29

The cases of TB most on the rise in UK are multi drug resistant TB, although there is also an increase in general TB. My concern would be more over multi drug resistant TB, because it is much harder to treat effectively. The BCG is not particularly effective at preventing transmission of pulmonary TB, it is most effective at preventing miliary TB and TB meningitis, efficacy against pulmonary TB has inconsistent data. Some studies have shown 60-80% effectiveness, one recent meta analysis/review showed that the BCG reduced infections by 20-30%.

Happy to be corrected as I am not a medic, this is from research done a year or two ago as a medical anthropologist Grin The meta analysis/review was in the BMJ.

Personally all of mine have had the BCG (we don't live in a high risk area, we are offered it as we have relatives from high risk countries), I figure why not...

maplebaconchips · 30/03/2015 13:32

I wouldn't give it to mine either.

KatieKaye · 30/03/2015 13:35

I had my BCG at 6 weeks because my DM had TB in her late teens. She had no risk factors but got TB all the same. 15 plus years later it was seen as medically necessary for me to have the BCG at a time when there was routine immunisation for teens.

Yes, I have a scar about an inch long. It has never bothered me at all. I'd much rather have that than TB.

GladysTheGolem · 30/03/2015 13:36

My 3 month old had it about 3 weeks ago, it's somewhere there but can't see it.

London has the highest rate of TB in any European city (obv UK highest rate out of all the countries), and they didn't offer it when my elder two were newborns (2012 & 2013) so it's enough to convince me.

Will you be giving them the men b vaccine?

IAmACuboid · 30/03/2015 13:38

Both my DCs had the BCG on the day they were born due to FIL being from a high-risk country. We found out he had latent TB while I was preg with DC2.
DC1 had a small reaction, no scar. DC2 is still reacting to his and has a large red scar and recurring hard scab still a year later.
I'm v glad both were vaccinated, one of my great grandparents died of TB and we live in a medium/high-risk area so it's not implausible that they could pick it up at preschool/school.

OP your decision sounds equally reasonable, apart from the scar comment - really the scar is irrelevant.

BumblingBoris · 30/03/2015 13:38

Where I work.(south east) We only give them to babies with parents from countries with high incidence of TB...Uk and aus are not on the list. I wouldn't have even suggested your baby needed one.

FireCanal · 30/03/2015 13:39

Please would whichever numptey posted that comment about BCG not protecting against MDR TB report their own post and get it removed. It is nonsense.
The ignorance people spout on here at times is astonishing Sad

Plarail123 · 30/03/2015 14:06

My son was born in Central London and had it at 7 days old. He has a tiny bump on his arm. We now live in Asia and I am so pleased he had it as a baby. I would go for it, you may decide to travel with your child before they get older.

Lonecatwithkitten · 30/03/2015 14:22

I think it has to be considered that a lot of what we thought we knew about TB is being turned on it's head. The BCG vaccination gives good protection against the bacteria and with new transmission methods being discovered it is our most effective protection.
We now know that cats who are symptomatic, but infected with TB can transmit it to humans.

Lonecatwithkitten · 30/03/2015 14:23

Stupid autocorrect that is supposed to be asymptomatic cats.

Totality22 · 30/03/2015 14:25

God I feel terrible but my dd had it when she was just a weeny 3 weeks old!!!!

MissMooMoo · 30/03/2015 14:27

I live in an area of London that is high risk but I grew up in a country that doesn't routinely give this vaccine anymore. Should I get it done?
I would 100% have it done for any dc's I have.

SunnyBaudelaire · 30/03/2015 14:27

it only takes one person with TB to cough over you on the bus or somewhere....
and London has been a high risk area for years. I was happy to take the offer when we lived in Lambeth tbh.

JohnCusacksWife · 30/03/2015 14:28

I don't understand why you would say no given that you live in a high risk area. What are your reasons?

madreloco · 30/03/2015 14:30

My last child had it at 5 days old. No scar, no problems, and we regularly travel to a high risk area.
I think vaccines are the single greatest medical advance of all time and find some of the reasons people turn them down to be bizarre.

worserevived · 30/03/2015 14:31

A relative caught TB when living in London, as did her DH and her very young dd. It was awful for all of them.