To vaccinate newborn or not

[confusedaboutclothes]

I know this is a very sensitive subject, but i’m asking please for FACTS only - I don’t want answers like ‘because the NHS recommends you to vaccinate your baby etc’

Id like to point out i’m not ‘anti vax’ as such, but covid really opened my eyes to researching vaccines etc i’ve done my own research on whether i should be vaccinating my newborn but it’s hard to find unbiased facts.

What I don’t like, is the pressure that is put on us to do as we’re told with our babies. I don’t like the constant reminders, the phone calls and the pressure to vaccinate - it all feels like a box ticking exercise not because the NHS are actually worried about my baby.

Please be kind, I really am confused about this and would love some different perspectives

Thank you for that - i agree that the amount of
professionals that have posted has really been such an eye opener for me and really so helpful

@Nanny0gg

I actually didn’t - only because my midwife didn’t mention it until what seemed to be too late - she said once passed the 34 mark it was almost
pointless.
I unfortunately got caught up in midwives leaving
and new ones coming in and i slipped through the net

One of the mum’s in my baby group was struggling with the same decision, OP, but ultimately did vaccinate her little boy and is glad that she did now he’s starting to lick park slides and eat soil in the garden!

I think the reason you’re not finding ‘unbiased’ sources of research as you say is because the research is correct - vaccines ARE proven to be effective and DO help stave off any super nasty bugs that might not be much to an adult, but can wreak havoc on a tiny immune system. I know you must have hormones flying about all over the place and this overwhelming feeling of needing to protect baby from anything ‘other’ or that maybe you don’t quite understand, but this is a really easy way of protecting them from things you can’t control.

When we got DD vaccinated she screamed like a banshee, but I’m so glad we did. It’s a moment they won’t even remember, but if it keeps them healthy it’s worth it in gold. I’d vaccinate DD against the common cold if I could! 😅

@Nanny0gg there is a chicken pox vaccine in UK, but it's not in included on the nhs. You have to find a provider and pay for it yourself. I did pay for ds1 to have the meningitis vaccine, as he was too old to get it on nhs and that can cause total devastation. I assumed that CP was mild, so didn't. I had it as a child, but at too young to remember, so I have no idea how badly I got it.

I worked as a nanny for a very well real scientist. Who worked in research and development of vaccines for a very high profile company.

His children are all vaccinated, he is the reason we have cervical cancer vaccines. The reason we have malaria pills etc when did we turn against our amazing scientists? Please vaccinate your child, you are so privileged to live in a time when we can protect our children against horrendous diseases.

like I said further up the thread it’s not up to me to to anyone how to parent but a good parent vaccinates.

There’s no vaccine for cervical cancer. There’s a vaccine for HPV though.

Sometimes I feel very low about the state of the NHS. I think we all know that healthcare could be better in some areas.

BUT the UK does well with vaccination. Vaccinations were developed to save lives and prevent disability and ill health. Childhood vaccination is an easy way to protect children.
And we live in a country where this is free and available for every child. This is an amazing part of NHS care in my opinion.
When my oldest child was born the MMR controversy was at its peak. I felt real doubt , but after doing my research and seeking advice from my Gp he had the MMR. As have my other children. So pleased I made this decision.

Thank you so much, this is a really lovely reply.

All I can say is, hooray for Mumsnet!
What an amazing bunch of women we are!
The advertising line should be 'better than google'

You have the luxury of being comfortable with your son’s unvaccinated status because you know he is protected from these diseases by herd immunity as a result of many thousands of people making more informed and conscientious decisions than you have.

If you lived in a country where these diseases were still prevalent and living through the trauma of watching babies suffer and die around you, you would crawl through broken glass for the opportunity to vaccinate your son and save him from the same fate.

Furthermore - your ‘explanation’ is patently stupid and not borne out by fact. If healthy food and clean water were the reason people abruptly stopped dying of measles, there would have to have been a substantial and sudden increase in people’s access to healthy food and clean water at the same time that the measles vaccine was rolled out in western nations for your explanation to be even remotely worthy of consideration, and yet we know that simply wasn’t the case.

Have you benefitted from vaccines?
Why would you deny that same benefit to your baby?

Well you are lucky most other people had their kids vaccinated so yours stayed safe. Aren't you.

I went for the full programme of vaccines for both my children. I'm pretty mainstream pro-science. I used to say that people who didn't vaccine were idiots or freeloaders.

Then I got whooping cough at the age of 42 (a while ago now sadly), posted in a very bad-tempered way here about "anti-vax idiots" and - much to my surprise - ended up with a far better appreciation of where people who don't vaccinate are coming from as a result. I still don't agree with them, but I'm not rude to them or about them nowadays.

As part of this process I read lots stuff from both sides: by pro-vax (Paul Offit etc) and anti-vax (Andrew Wakefield etc). It was all very interesting. I didn't end up agreeing with Wakefield, but I ended up sympathising with him more than I expected.

I ended up reckoning that it's mostly a question of trust: how much do you trust the medical authorities etc? I trust them myself, but not everyone does, for a whole bunch of reasons. That's not something you fix by calling people stupid or other names.

I don't know how best to advocate my point of view to the OP or anyone else for that matter. I think it's the right one - but there's no point in my being heavy-handed about it.

I suppose the best advice I can give is this: try to put things together in your head so there aren't any conspiracy theories or lots of people being bad generally - that everyone is trying to do the right thing. It doesn't leave much room for Big Pharma being an evil conspiracy, but it also doesn't leave much room for anti-vax people being dishonest or bad or whatever. I'm cool with all of that.

"COVID-19 vaccination is effective and the safest way to protect yourself from COVID-19." Right at the top of the NHS page about Covid vaccination.

"The coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccines are safe and effective."

"All of the approved vaccines are shown to be safe." British Heart Foundation

Just a few of dozens of claims you can find with a quick Google.

totally agree!!

This is really well written thank you and the way you’ve put it, along with others, really has got
the point about vaccinations across.

I do agree that comments like ‘do you want your baby to die’ are completely unnecessary and ridiculous, but the strength of these comments did make me realise how important it is to get vaccinated.

I am not an anti-vaxxer, nor a ‘tin foil hat wearing’ conspiracy theorist as others have mentioned, but what I am is somewhat easily lead. I have this annoying personality trait where no matter how strong my opinion is on something, I will always get swayed by the opposite opinion too. I have always seen it as ‘well where did that information come from’ or ‘why would they possibly lie about that’ and I think I got caught in the anti-vaxx arguments and did wonder to myself why it
would all be made up.

Of course i realise that it can be fictitious and now i’ve seen the facts speak for themselves, but that
coupled with heavy media coverage on let downs from the government and the NHS in turmoil, it was very difficult to make sense of.

If you feel up to it, you should go back and make a complaint about that MW. Not to cause her trouble, but to prevent that mistake happening to any other women - this MW appears to need some retraining

Although the jab is most effective before 32 weeks (to allow time for the antibodies you produce to pass to your baby), it remains effective beyond that, and NHS recommends it up to the onset of labour.

Midwives should not be giving out incorrect information, nor denying pregnant women the jabs they are recommended to have

and the research is very tightly regulated

With respect, I think this sort of statement shows exactly what a terrible state of affairs we are now in (the idiotic refusal to trust experts stems from a lack of understanding of what an 'expert' actually is, and what makes someone reliable/trustable), and indicates that many people don't know what 'science' actually is.

'Scientific method' is being able to prove a hypothesis by testing (and re-testing) to see if the same conditions yield the same results. Scientists will test a hypothesis to see if they can disprove it. The scientific method includes making observations at various stages of an experiment which provides data that can prove or disprove a hypothesis (or theory if you'd rather).

Good science (eg, science that is done correctly, transparently, peer-reviewed (that means, hauled over the critical coals by a panel of 'peers' - other highly regarded scientists who will try to find flaws - and if necessary, run through a series of trials) is GOOD. At the point at which it's done, we can trust it. One hundred years into the future, I hope people will still be able to trust good science, even if it comes to different conclusions, because good science uses the best methodology at the time.

With medicine, we do our best to make decisions based on what we know at the time. 'What we know' comes (or should come from) up to date scientific research. This may be a bit different in the future - that's a good thing, it shows our methods are progressing, 'science' is able to utilise better methods, materials, etc. Surely you're in favour of scientific progress - or perhaps you'd like to get cancer 70 years ago and see what your outcome would be?

If you don't agree with this rationale, then you may as well go back to sucking toad stones and applying magic poultices.

I know of a woman at 25 who has cervical cancer at her first smear. Mum didn't consent for her to be vaccinated at 15 as it was 'too early'. Too late now.

Nothing to do with the original thread, also incredibly sad. However, I do think it's worth mentioning that the biggest and most important thing you can do to protect yourself is not to be having sex early. So many girls having sex at age 15/16 (you only have to read through the threads on here) and then first smear is TEN YEARS later. If you're going to have early sex, you need to take yourself off for a private smear. It's just simple common sense. Amazes me how many young girls are happy to risk sex but don't want to go for smears or any of the other tests to check they're not contracting anything.

You simply can't say it's 100% to do with missing the HPV vaccine. You can minimise your own chances. We shouldn't just presume we are 'safe' becuase we've had the vaccine.

Going back to the original thread, as I have already said, my son was vaccinated and contracted whooping cough. The vaccine simply didn't work on him at all (consultant confirmed this)

For every story I'm reading on here of 'this child didn't have the vaccine and died/lost a leg/became deaf' etc, there is a story of a baby having an MMR and dying days later, or a young girl having the HPV vaccine and developing major problems. Re the HPV one, have a read of this poor girl's story.

https://www.facebook.com/ChloesVaccineInjuryJourney

Can we all just agreed on one thing? Having a vaccine IS a risk. Not being vaccinated is ALSO a risk. You pick your risk and you have to be comfortable with that.

It's a fact that someone getting the vaccine will have an awful reaction to it, possibly life changing. Saying they're 100% safe is simply untrue. Tell that to poor Chloe above.

All drugs / medicine can cause reactions. As I have said, even paracetamol. My own son nearly died due to breastmilk! But, when comparing to complications from the illnesses vaccinations are there to prevent, the risk is very low.

And not all vaccines work for all people. That is why we rely on herd immunity.

And no one says vaccines are 100% safe. NOTHING is 100% safe.

You don't understand data, screening, public health, vaccines or smears.

Nothing to do with the original thread, also incredibly sad. However, I do think it's worth mentioning that the biggest and most important thing you can do to protect yourself is not to be having sex early. So many girls having sex at age 15/16 (you only have to read through the threads on here) and then first smear is TEN YEARS later. If you're going to have early sex, you need to take yourself off for a private smear. It's just simple common sense. Amazes me how many young girls are happy to risk sex but don't want to go for smears or any of the other tests to check they're not contracting anything.

@stillmissmyboy - this is such a stigmatising and uninformed post

Firstly, any sexual contact can allow transmission of HPV, so touching, rubbing, sex with condoms. Boys are also at risk - of becoming carriers who will pass it on to other girls and also other types of cancer.

Shaming girls into having no sexual contact whatsoever until they are 25 is a completely useless public health policy given these facts ESPECIALLY when we have a vaccine which is amazingly protective against infection.

Random patronising comment about "young girls" avoiding smear tests but having sex regardless - there's many many reasons people don't want to have them, and again shaming isn't a good public health policy.

FWIW, I paid £££ of my own money to have the HPV vaccine as an adult (just missed it when I was growing up due to age) because replicated data shows just how effective and safe it is.