in thinking Measles can't be more dangerous now than it was 15 years ago ?

[Onajourney]

Hi

Wondering if there are any GP's out there that can tell me this ?

My eldest child is 15 and I still have his baby books and they say Measles is a mild disease and just to keep their temperature down etc, they liken it to chickenpox. I remember not being worried about it at all when he and his 11 year old brother were small.

Fast forward 14 years and we have a 1 year old who is at "huge risk from this killer disease" according our GP, but I can't understand how it can have changed so much.

Can anyone tell me, is Measles worse now than it was 15 years ago and if so why ?

Thanks

bearcrumble it is still very uncommon.

You could look at the take-up rate for vaccination in your area and see what it is like - outbreaks tend to occur in areas where take-up is low. It's mainly areas in London AFAIK.

Still it is pretty rare. You would have to be very unlucky for your baby to catch measles, but I understand your worry, I was the same. And even if your baby did catch measles, the most likely outcome would be that it would recover with no compications. Please try not to worry about it.

Re the underlying conditions thing - it could be anything - there are hardly any people who don't have underlying conditions TBH.

Sadly I think that some people when discussing immunisations will get into a "conspiracy theory" and become distrustful of any quoted figures as though we are trying to be misleading.
Debate all you like but death and morbidity rates are facts with each one affecting a family with tragedy.

Baloonslayer, chicken pox does not give people shingles. People with Shingles give people chicken pox but not I repeat NOT the other way round.

Most people with Shingles start off with 1 / 2 spots and are very contagious before they realise they have shingles... 3 guesses who gave you chickenpox

Somebody further down the thread asked how long the measles jab has been available. I was one of the "guinea pigs" for the new vaccine in 1964. They kept in touch with my mum (and then me) for 20 years to see if I'd ever had measles, and I never have.

I'm not sure if the M part of the MMR is the same vaccine, is it?

My aunt's best friend died of chicken pox aged 39, having never had it as a child.

Bearcrumble - my daughter caught measles before the MMR injection, she was 11 months old. She was one of 11 confirmed cases in Wandsworth that year - the next year I think there were about 5 times as many cases and I know there has been another recent outbreak. Most but not all of the cases are babies who haven't yet had their MMR. So if you live in London, where take-up of the MMR is low, the risk is a lot higher than in other places. I think if you google your council + measles, you should be able to find out if there were any recent cases near you. Hope that helps.

My daughter was really ill for about a week, but luckily didn't require hospital treatment. I do get really cross thinking that it could have been avoided if more people chose to give their children the MMR vaccine, but I guess everyone is entitled to make their own choices. But Bubblymummy - I think what you are trying to get at about children with underlying health conditions is beside the point. We should all vaccinate our kids to make sure that vulnerable children with underlying health conditions have as little risk of being exposed to them as possible.

novicemama and ImSoNotTelling thanks for the info.

Unfortunately I do live in London (Borough of Lewisham) so probably in a low take-up zone.

If there is a group of children susceptible to complications of a vaccination, are they also likely to be more susceptible to complications of the illness if they catch it?

But yes, I take on board that I do worry too much and that there are always going to be things outside my control and that I can't worry about all of them (and even if I did it would have no bearing on something being less or more likely to happen).

You just try to be sensible and do the things you can to reduce risks.

Thanks tinasan too.

Harpsichord. You must have missed my post where I clarified that I meant misleading in relation to The statement that 'all the children were previously healthy.' I did not mean that the figures were misleading.

Iirc at least one of the victims was malnourished. This does not make the death any less tragic but we do know that being malnourished increases the risk of complications from measles.

so, what?
why do you need to clarify that the child was malnourished or had an underlying condition?
in every population there will be a proportion of children that are malnourished or have an underlying condition, and therefore at greater risk of dying from measles. So the death rates are not in the least misleading.
I am asking, genuinely, why it matters and why you feel the need to point it out?

Jaffacake, again. I said it was misleading in relation to your comment that all the children were previously healthy. I am not disputing the figures. I know that one of the children who died was malnourished - that does make a difference to susceptibility to complications from measles. Once again, I am NOT disputing the figures or crying conspiracy theory.

What do people think of the vaccination rates in eg westminster (11.7%)?

From vaccination rates 2006

Are these low take-up rates a good thing as they show that people care about their children?

Or are the a consequence of scare-mongering in the press combined with other variables to produce a low take-up rate and this is a bad thing?

For the "Non MMR" people, do they approve of the take-up rates of boroughs like westminster, or not?

Given the turn in the conversation, it is a relief to know one will now not be accused of scaremongering when one posts links such as this about deaths following vaccinations.

It does not cover the period when George Fisher and Anna Duncan died, both of them ten days after MMR, with them becoming poorly after MMR.

I would hope no one will now mention the possibility of underlying health conditions as a reason for dismissing the effects of vaccinations. For example, in the Hannah Poling vaccine autism case, with her mitochondrial disorder.

"why the need to point out that one of them had an underlying condition? I don't really understand WHY the need to point that out AT ALL tbh, other than to in some way point out that the death is less serious, less bad, not really as worrying." I would sincerely hope that if you believe this, then you also believe it applies to children with underlying conditions who suffer vaccine damage.

I had no hesitation in letting my son have the MMR. I had the old measles jab back in the 70's, but I still caught measles and was so ill I was hospitalised. The same outbreak when I was a child saw 2 children die locally. I was not going to take any risks with my son. But, obviously each parent will make their own decision.

"why the need to point out that one of them had an underlying condition? I don't really understand WHY the need to point that out AT ALL tbh, other than to in some way point out that the death is less serious, less bad, not really as worrying." I would sincerely hope that if you believe this, then you also believe it applies to children with underlying conditions who suffer vaccine damage.

Er, why would I NOT believe this, exactly? Have I given any indication on this thread that I consider that those with underlying health conditions are in a different or less important category?
I don't really understand what you are getting at, tbh, so best you come right out with it

For the last time I did NOT say the death rates are misleading! Jaffacake said 'all the children were healthy' THAT is misleading because they were not. Fair enough if you don't think that is relevant but when I see higher than usual death figures for a disease I want to know why and if there were any additional risk factors that may have contributed.

Do I have to keep writing this or are you actually going to realise that I am not in any way disputing the figures. They are what they are. I would just want to know why they were higher than usual - fair enough if you(or anyone else) don't find that interesting.

I simply do not believe that 89% of children are unvaccinated in Westminster. That study does not include those who are vaccinated with singles privately, and it would be interesting and far more balanced to do a study which includes children vaccinated with single jabs privately, rather than judging them as unvaccinated if not vaccinated with MMR. If 89% of children in Westminster were not vaccinated at all, there would have been a massive epidemic in London by now - there is plenty of wild measles circulating to trigger an epidemic if such a large number were not immune.

Yes that;s true,

When you look at the stats and see that the lowest MMR uptakes are in the poorest areas of London, it makes perfect sense to assume that they are all paying privately for singles vacs.

And that in the more affluent areas (like my borough, which has seen outbreaks in recent years) the people are much less inclined to pay for private jabs.

I know that when there was a measles outbreak at my nursery (before I was using it, but in recent years), when the nursery manager called around to notify, about half of the children were unvaccintaed. Entirely.

It is an argument I have seen on these threads before and I find it unlikely. That all/most of these children are getting single vaccinations.

If it were the case, why in my borough do they go around the schools offering MMR to famiies who have not taken vaccinations previously.

That is very low - 89% unvaccinated...does anyone know why this is ?

I'm getting at the fact that talking about individual cases of death or profound harm is often described as scaremongering by proponents of the vaccine argument.

But since the Dublin case has become prominent on the thread in a rather emotional way, I thought I would bring up the cases of children who are reported to have died following vaccination.

Likewise in discussion of events where children die or are harmed after vaccination, like Hannah Poling, who developed autism, the seriousness of what has happened is often dismissed as due to "an underlying health condition". For example in Hannah's case, mitochondrial disorder.

It is good that "underlying conditions" are now, apparently, "besides the point" for at least some proponents of universal vaccination.

Half the children were unvaccintaed against measles, that is.

Troublewithtalk. Afaik there was no mumps vaccine until 1988 when the first mmr came in. ( you know the one that used the urabe mumps strain that caused increased cases of meningitis and had been withdrawn in Canada before it was introduced here- funny enough it was withdrawn here a few years later too .

Interestingly mumps was described as a mild childhood disease that didn't require a vaccine before the mmr was brought in.