Did anyone vaccinate one child and not another?

[dinny]

Can't believe it's already time to start thinking about what to do for ds with regard to MMR. DD had single measles and single mumps (mainly because at this age - 16 months - she was at nursery and not breastfed). DS isn't at nursery, doesn't go to any creches and is breastfed (I've had mumps and measles as a child).

So, am thinking may not give him any jabs, at least for now. But it feels really unfair to DD. I'm more paranoid about him & jabs as he's a boy.

.......... and maybe this is a bit of a parp for me now?!!

From what I remember the official reason why the Hg-based preservative went out of the baby-infant jab is because it wasn't compatible with the polio component in the new 5-in-1. "They" are talking about a new way of preserving vaccines in sugar cubes, would be a way to cheaply preserve vax in unrefridgerated conditions in the 3rd world, avoid the hazards of other preservatives (maybe).

Also, it was thought previously that thimerosol was biologically inactive & entirely excreted by the body, that's why it was used for years (but I doubt that assumption had been properly researched). Not that much is understood fully about the health risks of alternative preservatives, either.

Am very sad to read about your DD, Amyjade. My dad nearly died of meningitus at age 2.

Yep
DS had an anaphylactic reaction to MMR so no way was I giving it to dd
She had measles at 18 mths so in a way it made the decision a little easier
We had the paediatrician to back us up too.

highlander i appreciate what you're trying to say and i agree with you it is a crappy call. But i'm not sure parents of vaccine damaged children would agree with you comparing their children as 'vegetables'. I'm sure you weren't but thats how it kind of came across.

sorry - writing in a rush. No direct comparison with the word vegetable and vaccine-damged kids. Just putting into words what was in my head after DS's vaccines. Absolutely no offence meant

Highlander, have you given your ds MMR?

yep, at 15 months. He's reacted (in an expected way) to every vaccine. Coupled with teething nightmares, it's been a bit of a long haul. His GP said to wait until his canines came through then go fo it in the time gap before his back molars emerge. He was all right with it, puked up one night and a bit grizzly for a week but no rash or anything. However, don't know if his monstrous BF habit has mitigated the immune response.

i am struggling with the decision regarding the mmr for my ds at the moment

i have read extensively on both sides of the argument and am well aware of the public health argument pro. the clinical trials have definitely not proved a link, but nor, to mind have they conclusively disproved it, although current govt reports choose to interpret them in that way.

it still just doesn't feelright. i think we will probably take him for single vaccines.

(btw thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of infants died as a direct result of smallpox vaccinations)

And in the interest of balence, thousands if not hundreds of thousands have been saved disfigurement and death by the small pox vaccination

Typical death rates for smallpox where around 30% of people infected. Of those who survived disfigurement was near universal, and blindness a common outcome

zebra- and others! Thimerosal was removed from paed jabs in Oz in 1999, began to be removed from paed jabs in the States at the same time. It was removed because of the recognition that as a neurotoxin it could be at risk of causing damage. The UK govt removed it in 2004 having maintained that any risk was "theoretical" (interesting choice of words there)- a few months after the publication of a paper showing that thimerosal affects mouse strains prone to autoimmunity very differently from other strains. One of the big risk factors for autism is a family history of autoimmunity, and certianly in some cases it appears to be autoimmune. The research showed that thimerosal caused structural changes in the brain and changes in behaviour that mimic some autistic behaviours. The polio thing was imo used as an excuse for the sudden change in direction. I watched the interviews and listened very carefully to the phrasing that was used. Can you imagine the furore if the dreaded A word was mentioned in the same breath as baby vaccines (and lets face it everyone dreads the A word these days don't they).

My son is by no means a vegetable but I am pretty pissed off that had he been born in Australia he would probably be talking and dsoing all those things that people with normal kids take for granted. Instead he's been up screaming since 4.30am I I will go to the grave still cleaning his teeth for him, and we will never have a conversation (he won't with anyone else either). And the cost of making the jabs minus thimerosal? $1 extra per jab.

Incidentally the baby jabs used to be given over the course of the first year- they were then changed to 2,3 and 4 months. Of you look up metallothionein and autism you'll see why that aint so great if you are not the best at getting rid of heavy metals from your body. Wakefield these days ties thimerosal damage in with his work as well (thimerosal then exposure to a virus - live or vaccine and wham autism- that's what happened to ds1 (live virus in his case- he had eczema herpeticum) we think- at least to get him as severe as he is and damage the gut etc). Incidentaly again whenever I've said to medics that ds1 regressed following eczema herpeticum and I think the herpes virus played a role they nod their heads sagely in agreement. Which is interesting (so OK to regress following live virus).

It doesn't take much to tailor the vaccination programme. I remember reading an article by a neurologist a few years ago, She reckoned it would take about 5 million to set up it would only be a simple family history quesitonnaire and checking gut function etc) - which was the same amount the govt supposedly spent on that stupid patronising series of adverts where not giving your child MMR was equated to leaving them in a jungle next to a lion or some such crap. Might have the exact figures wrong but they equated.

great post bakainyourjj.

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Well I'm talking about doctors I meet in passing.Doctors you meet and who are more involved ime will often agree that vaccines can cause damage, and may be implicated. My friend's paed told her (off record) that although nothing could ever be certain it was highly likely that the MMR caused her son's problems (he is 6 non verbal, in nappies, SLD). He treated him when he had very long seizures (his first ever) within 24 hours of the MMR and has remained his paed.

DD1 had all her baby jabs, (as Aloha said though, i wasn't aware that they may be injecting mercury into my baby, as it happens they didn't as they had run out of the normal vaccine and gave dd an, apparently, less effective one, they 'forgot' to tell me this at the time too after all, i'm only her Mother). I found out when i was recalled for the Hib and looked into it, so she didn't get the Hib booster and then she got single measles and rubella and Mumps when she was nearly 4.

DD2 has had her 3 doses of DTP and is going in a few weeks for her first Men-C + Hib. I've spaced them more but am not totally anti-vaccine. I do worry that she's 11 months and not yet had them but i also worry that they might not work anyway and at the minute she's healthy as can be.

My Uncle died of Meningitis last year too, literally overnight in his bed so that's the main one that scares me silly.
She will also be having seperate MMR.

Dinny, i hope you make a choice you're happy with, it's Hell isn't it? TBH, it's the only thing i hate about the baby days, all these massive decisions. FWIW, i wouldn't worry about your dd having them and feeling guilty, time never stands still, you're in different circumstances now and you must do what feels right for you and DS

Strong opinions so don't read if potentially offended

My DS had all his vaxinations and suffered no ill effects as a result.

I think that often it's easy for us to say that we don't want to vaxinate our children because we have not lived in an age where there are frequent outbreaks of measles/mumps/rubella. Chapsmum is right in that Smallpox was iliminated by global imunisation and it is no longer a threat and children no longer have to be vaxinated against it. I had a great uncle who was blind as a result of measles, at the time he caught it, several members of his family caught it as well, and most of them died. The effects of rubella on a pregnant woman are absolutely devostating. An unborn baby that is exposed to rubella is usually born deaf and blind, and more often than not, with severe learning difficulties. Mumps, while not as devostating for girls, can cause infertility in boys. IF the government scrapped the vaxination scheme, would we be having a debate in 10 years that the government were putting our children at risk of these terrible diseases that there are vaxinations for? I totally can sympathise with someone who has an autistic child and who feels that their child's condition is attributable to the MMR vaxination, however studies that have been carried out have failed to prove any link between MMR and autism, whereas there is very clear proof of what happens when children are unvaxinated and diseases such as measles are allowed to spread amongst the population. My BIL's boss is a microbiologist and was very involved in studies carried out by the World Health Organization. My sister and BIL had extensive conversations with him when their son was due to be vaxinated, and the information he gave them was interesting. He said that although there had not been any link between the trippple vaxine and autism, the study they did had looked very extensively into all the components of the vaxination, and that the concerns raised had not been about all three components, but only the measles component, and that parents who were choosing to give their children single vaxines weren't, in actual fact, putting them at any less of a risk by doing so as it was only the measles vaxine that had raised any questions.

I agree to an extent that if people wish to vaxinate their children with single jabs then they should be able to choose to do so, but I do think that people who choose not to vaxinate their children at all are being slightly irresponsible, if this was Australia, or South Africa, you would have no choice but to have your children vaxinated, as children who are not vaxinated in these countries are not admitted to nurseries or school.

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had dd bloods taken today to see whether she'll be allowed live vaccines. the results will take two weeks. whilst there i spoke to the consultant paediatrician about this topic on mn. he told me that they have rcently been having talks about this as it seems to be some areas of britain more than others refusing to vaccinate their children. he also said that if dd wasn't allowed the mmr then with the way things are going there is a strong possibility that there will be an epidemic on these viruses soon. so unfortunately dd will also be at a higher risk of catching them. i am so that parents are choosing not to vaccinate their children and putting others like my dd at a high risk of catching these very dangerous viruses. i know it probably won't make much difference telling you all on mn as it's the whole country that needs to buck up its ideas. the goverment needs to prove to the country why the mmr is so important as well as all the other vaccinations.

wanabe1974 forgive me but there seems to be a contradiction in your post. First you say there is no evidence that MMR can be linked with autism, and then you say it may be the measles component that may be of concern, so singles don't protect any better than the triple. Unfortunately your post may have the effect of putting people off the single vaccine, and therefore not get their child vaccinated for Measles or mumps or rubella at all. The review paper that came out recently that journalists and medics pounced on and claimed cleared MMR's name, actually concluded it was impossible to conclude either way on the current scanty research, for or against MMR.

Wakefield has been demonized. However his current research, and others, suggests that singles are safer for a number of reasons, in terms of the mechanism of the gut. In Japan, they were giving singles 4 weeks apart, and therefore of course there was not going to be a reduced incidence in autism.

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I had both my children vax with all (including MMR) at the 'normal' (ie what most people do because that's what they're told to - except I did it through choice) times.

However I completely understand those who for their own reasons choose not to vaccinate using MMR, or choose vax againsdt certain things.

Just of our interest NannyL - what will you do if you/your children ever want to travel around Africa or South America. Some countries will not allow you to enter the country if you've travelled where Yellow Fever is found. I guess you'll just have to hope they don't

wannabe

"My DS had all his vaxinations and suffered no ill effects as a result."

Well halleluiah lucky you...... and your point is what exactly......?

kreamkrackers- the country isn't on the brink of an epidemic because people aren;t vaccinating with MMR- because the majority of people who don't give MMR give singles, but they are omitted from the figures ("only 75% of children in wandsworth have been given MMR, measles epidemic this year" Yeah right, bollocks because the Wandsworth yummymummies have paid to have singles and in fact the number of children not vaccinated at all is fairly constant, and has been for years-at my guess around 5% tops). There has recently been a mumps epidemic in young adults because supposedly immunity wore off - or they receieved MR because they were being vaccinated at a time when there had been problems with the mumps vaccine.

Ds2 and ds3 have not been vaccinated because thier elder brother is (we believe) vaccine damaged. My friend in her 40's has not been vaccinated because..... her elder brother is vaccine damaged. Nothing much changes really.

I'm slightly irresponsible then wannabe.

And my Cousin was not irresponsible - she has now an Autistic and Epileptic child.

A checking system to see if the vaccine mixtures are not bad news for your own particular child or children would stop people being "irresponsible"?

This is a very emotive and sensitve subject, so please to not let it desend into a tit for tat argument.
I is to important for that.
There are valid points to be made from both sides. Guidelines reccomened children are vaccinated.
The best advice anyone gan give on this subject is to be INFORMED. Discuss your concerns with your medical practritioner and come to a sesible medical conclusion, that is safe for your child and socially responsible.