to be upset at a mum bringing her contagious child to an meeting to a

[mamaloco]

Here is the story: Yesterday, a coffee morning for infos, chat and charity sales. Some toddlers and babies, a few pregnant woman, may be 100 person with wide spread ages. More "me time" kind of thing that a "I have to be there" thing.
One little girl school age, no worries, untill somebody told "Oh you are the little one with chicken-pox".
It is very contagious, and you can't be sure that all the adults here had it, even less the baby.
It think mums who takes their contagious and unwell children to playgroup, party, meetings are plain selfish and don't think about the consequences of their action.
BTH I might be angrier because I caught chicken pox from someone's kid at a diner party because they couldn't find a babysitter. They didn't warn anybody beforehand . I was sick for a month with it had to be on antiviral, very weak, some of my friends even ended up in hospital with it. (all 25+)
I know it is hard to stay at home and you crave human adult contact (my DD was sick a lot for 2 years, so I cancel a lot of things because she was contagious, and I was going slighty insane). But it is unfair the the child who should be resting, and to the people who will catch the disease.
Surely you should contact all the people present first and ask if it OK, no?

I think so especially if there are pregnant women present as well

Oh, you'll get lots of YANBU on this one, though I wouldn't be in the last bit cross, personally.

I suggest that you campaign vigorously for routine innoculation against CP, though, that would be a productive way to vent your frustration. Most people are not going to take CP seriously as a contagious illness until it becomes a routine childhood vaccination.

She had no crusts at all, some very small spots on her face, no blisters visible yet, which is the most contagious phase...

I'm not sure if you are still contagious once the spots are out.
Does anyone else know?

I would stay home with a child who had any kind of infectious disease of that nature.

Sorry X post

CP is really dangerous to unborn babies IIR, so your are definitly not being unreasonable. The girl shuld not have been there.

yes she should not have brought the child, very selfish - adults who have not had this can be extremely ill and in late pregnancy it can be fatal to both mother and child.

And this is not about CP only, but any kind of flu type (feverish), or rashy type contagious diseases which I have seen children being taken at playgroups with. Quite new to mumsnet so sorry if it has been done to death before, I just needed to rant )

CP is infectious before the spots come out until the spots scab over I always thought. Poor little things still look awful when they go back to school but not infectious anymore. I would be cross too.

Is CP dangerous to pregnant women? I have some vague idea about it possibly causing birth deformities, but is that just rubella?

but YANBU

Chicken pox is contagious until either 5 days after the spots have come out, of once they have crusted over, whichever occurs first. If the child was still infectious enough to be off school, imo she shouldn't have been out and about.

YANBU. Even at an event where there are no "known" pg women (which wasn't the case here anyway) lots of us choose not to make the pg common knowledge until after 12 weeks or even longer.

I caught cp myself a few days before I got married, again due to a mother thinking it wasn't a problem taking a contagious child to an activity

I don't think the mum would have brought her in the early stages as any idiot knows that is not on..
Do you know how long she had had them? You say there were spots, but do you know what end they were at? They can linger a very long time. One of my friends DCs still had the red spots several months down the line.

Stars yes it is dangerous for pg women. I don't have the exact statistics, but pg women should try and avoid it especially at the early and late stages of the pg. Baby can be born with complications.

I had to have my immunity checked whilst pg (blood test) due to have had confirmed cp twice in the past they weren't sure of my immunity status.

Afaik it is not generally as serious as rubella, but there are definite risks.

CP can cause birth defects -- but it is extremely rare for it to do so, usually only in PG women who get very bad cases of CP, and obviously most PG women are immune before the pregnancy starts, anyway.
Still, it's not really fair to knowingly impose that risk on other people.

YANBU I have a friend who will bring her children to the park after school, even though they have been off that day with vomiting bugs (one child was sick into the drain FFS). It drives me insane as my middle son has had some issues with his immune system. We've all been there going quietly mad stuck inside with the children but it's all part of the fun world of parenting. It's very selfish to put other peoples heath at risk because you want to do something, especialy in the enviroment you were in.

Another woman I know sent her daughter into school after she had been up all night vomiting because she (the mother) was tired and didn't want her daughter annoying her by whingeing all day about her sore tummy

I think it is horrible - my dad got shingles and bell's palsey - nerve in side of face infected with virus and facial paralysis (probably chick pox virus), even tho he'd had chicken pox as a child, because a contaminated child was on a bus with him - If a child's too ill / contagious to be at school WTF are they doing out and about in the general population? I think it's really selfish - I know life goes on but it can have an awful affect on other people's long term health and well being.

Even now, 3 years on, his face is still partially paralysed and he can't play his saxaphone much anymore. Really unfair!

Irratedme they were definitely spots coming out not scars, and she was still obviously off school.

I'd be annoyed too. I know when I used to work at a camera shop and we took babies passport photos, one woman came in with her baby which was then laid on a cushion to have their picture taken.

It wasn't till she was paying that she said "oh by the way, my child has chicken pox".

All of a sudden every member of staff who'd helped (which would be all of us) were on the phone to their mums checking they'd previously had CP

YANBU. My dd has had a squirty bum for the last four days. I am going stir crazy, but wouldn't take her out to infect other people (although she did come to the hospital with me and DH and waited while we had our swine flu vaccinations yesterday

Again - what stage was it at?

I happily wandered around with my dd once the crusts formed but even then had someone tell me off for being around other children even thought that is the medical advice.

Ah -X post then!!

YANBU

When my dad was receiving treatment for his cancer, one of the things he was told to avoid was exposure to chickenpox as it would have been really dangerous to his weakened immune system.

FWIW I had CP when I was 23 and it was absolutely horrendous! I've never been so ill. Trying to breastfeed 5 month old DD, who also caught it - nightmare!

YANBU very selfish