Whooping cough, I haven't been following closely but I think they're finding the same in the UK

[saintlyjimjams]

Can't say I'm particularly surprised

www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/03/us-whoopingcough-idUSBRE8320TM20120403

then again you cannot get an aP booster for your child in the UK (we had to go private for that)... but I am not surprised either, we absolutely need a better vaccine than the acellular pertussis...

it seems to have become years for this to become 'official'. One of the reasons I felt comfortable not giving ds2 whooping cough vaccine in 2002 was because the research I did then suggested it didn't actually work that well (and that whooping cough had mutated anyway - that hasn't been mentioned in the latest outbreaks so not sure what the thinking is there now). As it was he was exposed to whooping cough when I was still dithering (didn't get it), although I think he had it a few years later.

I won't let ds3 have it because he has had seizures.

Oh, so they were wrong (and admit it 40 years after the event........)
I had it in Feb last year, early pregnancy, fully vaxed as a child.

SO unless I had got the actualy disease, my baby would not have recieved any maternal antibodies. Nice......

actual, not actualy :-)

neither vaccine-induced, nor 8 weeks cough your lungs out induced immunity is life long.

I don't claim that it is. I'm pretty sure it's not lifelong. It should be enough to get my baby through infancy when it is dangerous though.

yes, and it is, if you get vaccinated directly before pregnancy, but not if you had a series of DPT as a child and get pregnant umpty years later.

I had the actual disease at four weeks pregnant.....
I know it's not the same for everyone. I consider myself and baby lucky.
I'm not sure what you're getting at really, because I agree with your original post.

(I'm the original poster analogue, not Catherina)

I think naturally acquired immunity is better though catherina? I thought it was lifelong (although admittedly doesn't pass across the placenta that well to babies, and will be less reliable without circulating disease providing regular boosters). My friend had whooping cough as a child (when I had measles, we played together when we were off school!) and when her kids contracted whooping cough she didn't so presumably had immunity from her childhood bout.

Lol saintly I know. Didn;t mean OP, I meant Catherina's 1st post on the subject :-)

Ah! I am easily confused :)

not at all, confused myself because I didnt agree with her first post at all, had misread!
I think like all things, the best, longest immunity is acquired by actually having the disease, which is why I think it is nonsensical to risk some of the well-known and not that uncommon side effects of that vaccine, cellular or acellular, for something so ineffective and short term.

Ultimately, it's not protecting babies because most of the population is susceptible. SO other than potential short term protection until an infant is old enough to shake of the disease without becoming seriously unwell, what really are the benefits of the pertussis vaccine?

Well yes. My thoughts exactly. I suppose whooping cough can be serious in very young babies (I was worried when my unvaccinated 4 month old was exposed although he didn't get it) but it is recognised as a vaccination that does have a lot of side effects. So the benefits really do need to outweigh the risks and I'm not convinced (particularly if the virus has mutated as has been suggested).

I had the DPT as a baby, pertussis (contracted from unvaccinated toddler babysitting at age 15), titer test at 40 was a flatliner, absolute zero. I know a pediatric nurse who had pertussis (culture confirmed) three times as an adult (all under 10 years apart). So yes, pertussis the cough probably gives you some more years of protection than, whole cell pertussis, the vaccine and that, in turn, is still better than acellular pertussis vaccine. However, not one gives life long immunity.

I'm not sure you're right Catherina. Pre mass vaccination someone would catch a childhood disease such as whooping cough and then have a natural booster every time they came across someone else who was contagious. Which might have been every few years or so. With mass vaccination and very limited circulating disease natural immunity isn't as good as it used to be as there's limited exposure to disease and so the natural boosters frm exposure don't occur.

Of course some people have poor immune responses to infection and don't develop immunity but in the pre mass vaccination era I would have expected catching whooping cough to have given lifelong protection in the vast majority of cases. And for that to be the norm.

See this to me is a bit spinny

journals.lww.com/pidj/Fulltext/2005/05001/Duration_of_Immunity_Against_Pertussis_After.11.aspx

Because surely an infection which is so mild it isn't recognised outside a clinical research setting is as a result of remaining protection- even if it's not enough to completely prevent any infection.

It does make the point about removing circulating disease though, although it seems pertussis vaccination has been around so long that it's hard to know what really went on in the pre-vaccination era and you coukd really think of a number and double it to fit whichever point of view you have.

They should be thinking about mumps like this. In fact more so because mumps is so mild (usually) in children - and more serious in adults. At least whooping cough is the right way round that the youbg babies being given the vaccination are the group most likely to benefit from it's effects and themselves be unaffected when protection decreases.

i work with someone who was found to have no immunity to any of the vaccinated-for diseases despite being vaccinated; this was discovered during pregnancy . i can't remember if they vaccinated her, i think so...

how funny that i had always assumed that once you are vaccinated, that's it, and everyone should be. i have a rather more nuanced opinion these days

Yeah my friend's son didn't develop immunity to measles despite two MMR's. I think Donna Williams has written about the same problem - there was something wrong with her immune system.

Saintly - mumps might be similar, in needed regular boosters; as varicella (shingles).

I remember hearing somewhere (but cannot remember where) the the newer immunisation regimes have simply not been studied to the same extent as the earlier ones. The newish recommendations to drop the 10 yearly single tetanus boosters being one example, and the multivalent jabs for children being another.

Rubella immunity also wears off. That is why it used to be given in year 6 or above, and it was thought to cover the childbearing years. Now it's given at by 3ish, and childbearing is often at an older age than in 1960s and 1970s, I wonder if we are storing up a problem here too.

Well chickenpox vaccination isn't given here catherina as it's seen as a mild childhood illness. Mumps definitely should fall into that category - a third of childhood cases are asymptomatic. I must have had asymptomatic mumps myself as I am pre-MMR and have never had it despite a few known exposures. I think mumps complications in childhood are even rarer than chickenpox complications. If the state was choosing to vaccinate either chickenpox or mumps based solely on clinical reasons I would have thought chickenpox had a stronger case. But hey ho. Maybe someone can enlighten me, I have been asking for years why we vaccinate against mumps (I understand the thinking behind the other vaccinations)

The figures are a bit hard to interpret as no records were kept on mumps until the late 80's, so it's difficult to know how many adults were catching mumps pre-vaccination, but post puberty cases have rocketed recently.

Agreed Edith. I'm always surprised that people aren't particularly encouraged to check rubella status prior to trying for a planned pregnancy (realise it might be difficult for unplanned). I asked for a rubella status check prior to TTC, and was given one without hesitation.

mumps definitely has more complications than chicken pox. CNS complications with chicken pox is only about 1 in 4000, if I remember correctly - you'll have 4 - 5 kids with hearing loss from mumps in 4000 alone.

But mumps meningitis isn't dangerous meningitis. And most cases of mumps hearing loss are transient. The figures I have for hearing loss from mumps are 1 in 15000

If vaccination is increasing the likelihood of catching mumps as an adult (and I have never found pre-vaccination adult figures so I have no idea whether this is happening - although know adult figures have increased dramatically in recent years) then you have to balance that 1 in 15000 against the potential fertility affects for adults catching mumps (although I'm aware that's a figure that is often overstated as well).

Here's my hearing loss source btw

virology-online.com/viruses/MUMPS.htm

The cost:benefit analysis at the bottom assumes a very high protection rate (and there's certainly a lot in the literature suggesting it's nowhere near as high as 95%) and seems to argue that mumps should be given as it's given with rubella (which has clearer benefits). Im not sure about 'no adverse reactions are associated with the vaccine' as a statement either. Seems rather bold (and I know a number of kids who have been hospitalised after MMR)

ah now this article pretty much summarises what I thought was the case for mumps

www.vaccinationnews.com/node/19916

I've had a search for hearing loss rates and found most quoting 1 in 15,000 to 1 in 20,000. The original source for the 1 in a 1000 rate seems to be a poster from a Japanese lab (I couldn't find a paper, there may be one). The rate was calculated from collecting info from 7000 cases of mumps in Japan and finding 7 cases of hearing loss. But the diagnosis of mumps wasn't confirmed by labs, and of course will only have included cases where the illness was serious enough to consult a doctor. Given then many cases of mumps (a third) are asymptomatic and another bunch only have very mild symptoms it's likely that the 7 cases of hearing loss were actually from a far larger number of mumps infections.