Declining 8 week vaccinations for my baby - experiences?

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I don't want this to be about whether you should or shouldn't vaccinate your baby. I have chosen not to and I'm looking for experiences from others who have done the same. What did you say? What did the doctor say? Did you discuss vaccination once the child was older or flat out decline all vaccines?

Lobby your MP then. It doesn't have to be either/or.

Are you going to lobby them too Silence? If you take the WHO's word for it then we really should be administering VitA to children with measles - even if they are well-nourished.

Might do, yes.

Ummm.... well no, no-one on here died from any childhood illnesses patently obviously. And how many people discuss with their children what other children die from it was generally whispered about behind childrens backs.

My uncle as I said upthread died from whooping cough. He was two and had no other illness/weakness. Though this was in the days before antibiotics and steroids today he may well have survived.

Aren't the majority of measles death in low per capita income countries because they don;t routinely vaccinate and have insufficient treatment once the disease is caught? It isn;t as simple as "well we're a high income country, we don;t need to worry"

I looked after a teenager with brain damage from measles related encephalitis and that would have been caught in the 1970's - it isn't just about death but life affecting long term problems. We just don't see them and therefore don't appreciate the risks because we haven't grown up seeing what a whole raft of childhood illnesses can do to even a healthy child.

Yes I am old enough to have had measles along with my brother and sister and according to my mother it wasn't pretty at all, a pretty grim illness in fact and even to avoid just the illness itself never mind the risk of lifelong problems she would have vaccinated if it had been available.

Not sure I would bother to vaccinate against CP without a risk factor because often it's a fairly mild illness - on average much milder than measles I understand. But if it were deemed appropriate to have a nationwide programme I would agree to DS having it probably.

So those of you who had measles, was it fun? You were lucky not to be one of the 30% who suffered some measure of complications.

I had rubella as a child. It didn't hurt me because I wasn't pregnant. Were you pregnant?

Were you a small baby when you had whooping cough? Because that's who they are fearing for the most?

When I say speak to someone, I mean speak to the thousands of people in the UK who have been permanently affected by these preventable illnesses. It's bad enough the "just getting ill". I wouldnt want my child to suffer a painful illness that was preventable.

Most people don't have permanent issues after having measles. A large percentage do. A smaller percentage die.

It's facetious to say "I'm fine so everyone else will be". You know what I meant.

I would be interested to hear from a polio sufferer.

Ah yes, and it's coincidence that whooping cough outbreaks are happening as vaccinations decline.

I'm bowing out.

I have no problem with anyone who worries and looks into it and maybe chooses a different vaccine for the same purpose, or alters the timing slightly to spread them out. That's fine. But I will never understand the selfishness and idiocy of the anti-vaccers.

I know in my Mum's circle there was a friend made blind by measles. Polio left my uncle with a lifelong disability. The small ones who were killed we never got to meet of course.

Measles for me wasn't particularly bad, but my brother had a worse dose, although suffered no after effects. I spent a lot of time with him when he got mumps in his teens, and no, he's not sterile and I didn't catch it at all.

Rubella I caught at school which for me was a most delightful 'illness' because I had a few spots, and slightly swollen glands, stayed off school thus missing a French test which I hadn't bothered to revise for, and was thus immune when I got pregnant.

I didn't think that whooping cough vaccinations were declining. I also thought that MMR rates are now quite high.

I am not being facetious. I and possibly others, am saying that vaccinations are only part of the story, and the rest of the story isn't being told.

I have not read the thread but in response to the OP, I declined ours after a bad reaction to the four week ones - with ds3 - that is, he had no allergic response but cried for at least three hours after them.

I did not see the point of putting him through that again so soon when he was so tiny so I told the surgery I was going to think about it and postpone it for the time being. He had them at about 8 months I think in the end. No issues. He managed it far better being so much older.

I guess they do it so young for good reasons but for me it was hard to reconcile. Maybe if everyone had them later though more babies would die?

We declined all vacs when DC were little but recently decided to catch up with them all. DC are now early teens. Are now both up to date with all vax.
HCPs pretty good throughout though have sensed some disapproval at times. Decided to go for it especially as DC now traveling more widely (a couple of recent trips) and following a recent measles outbreak.
Fortunately no harm done as they never caught any of the illnesses, but MN threads have made me realise perhaps it was a slightly selfish and un-wise decision - and I don't think I'd make the same one again but would accept the vax programme as offered (but they do seem so small at 8 weeks don't they? I think that was part of my difficulty)
However I do feel I would consider the possible effect on others more now (including those with weakened immunity often due to illness), and not just think about my pfb/ newborn
As always best wishes to all

"Aren't the majority of measles death in low per capita income countries because they don;t routinely vaccinate and have insufficient treatment once the disease is caught? "

Malnourished children are more at risk (see VitA info above) and yes, if there are complications then there is limited access to treatment. Even complications such as diarrhoea which we don't worry too much about in this country can be deadly in developing countries.

Fuck, I had rubella as a child too. That meant I didn't have to worry about it as an adult when I was pregnant. Why do you think it is necessary to vaccinate very young children against rubella when it is usually a very mild illness with no complications?

Again whooping cough, you know that the vaccine can't create herd immunity because it wanes after a few years don't you?

Why do you think a large percentage of people are left with a permanent issues after measles?

Re polio - are you aware that >97% of polio cases are mild/asymptomatic? You may know quite a few people who had polio without realising it.

The WC vaccine is part of the 5-in-1. It has a high level of uptake which is not declining.

I was horrified to find out (when pregnant with my first child) that my mum hadn't vaccinated me for measles, mumps or rubella. I have no idea why as I was a child in the early 80s and I don't know of any scare stories re vaccinations at the time, although that is the excuse she used when I talked to her about it. I don't think the MMR was available then but I'm sure there were some vaccinations that she didn't let me have.

I was mostly upset that she never told me, until it was potentially too late as I was already pregnant. I love my mum and we have a great relationship but this really bothers me still. In one sense I was fortunate as I seem to have had all of the above and thankfully come out relatively unscathed, so I have a natural immunity to the diseases, but what if I hadn't caught them as a child and instead contracted one when pregnant? I'm not sure I could have forgiven her then to be honest.

My best friend is having a terrible time at the moment as she and her husband now have to have IVF with donor sperm to try and have a child, he has been left infertile as a result, they think, of contracting mumps as a child. They didnt find this out until recently, after trying to have a baby for quite some time. I wonder do people who don't vaccinate their kids take into account that, whilst not always fatal, side effects like this can be hugely damaging in the longer term.

School, how did they determine that it was a mumps infection in childhood that led to his sterility rather than anything else? From the PHE there is no firm evidence that mumps causes sterility

To be honest bumbleymumy, i don't know. I only know what my friend and her husband were told and she in turn relayed to me. As she is understandably very upset I wasn't going to start quizzing her on the exact details.

Schoolaround - you would not have had mumps vaccine in the early 80s because it wasn't introduced until the MMR came in. Nor was mumps even a notifiable disease, so no one can say how prevalent it was before the MMR.

The measles jab was given a bit later than other vaccines at about a year, I think.

There were scares around the whooping cough vaccine in the early 80s, and the uptake of the vaccine dropped substantially, so I think they then re-introduced an early version which still had parents confidence.

The rubella jab was given to girls around puberty - last year of primary school, or roundabout then.

It's interesting that you seem to have the natural immunity by the sound of it, without being conscious of getting the diseases.

Oh I remember mumps but not the others LaVolcan. I just hadn't connected the dots as to my immunity/vaccination status although I know now I should have been more aware myself and asked my mother. It just did not occur to me she would have skipped the vaccinations that were available at the time as she never raised it as a concern later on.

Of course. It just seems a bit strange to suggest that it was a mumps infection in childhood when there are many men(and women) out there with fertility issues for any number of reasons.

The mumps component of the MMR isn't as effective as was originally thought anyway. There have been several outbreaks over the last few years as a result. Tbh, given that it is much less likely for children to have complications from it (over a third of cases are completely asymptomatic), I would rather my sons had it in childhood.

I think, although rare, male fertility issues have been linked to mumps, particularly if caught in early adolescence which is when I understand he contracted it. Perhaps this is why they have linked his infertility to mumps.

I just linked you to a PHE document that states that there is no firm evidence that mumps causes sterility - even in cases of bilateral orchitis. Maybe people used to think it did but studies have shown otherwise?

If they are linking mumps caught in early adolescence to infertility, then it seems extremely strange that they are choosing to vaccinate babies against it, with a likelihood that the immunity will wear off, just at the time when it's most necessary.

I think there are other studies out there that show a potential link. As I've said, I'm not the expert, this is just what they've been told.

I wonder why Public Health England are saying otherwise then?

They don't say otherwise bumbleymummy, they say there is no firm evidence. That is, i assume, because complete infertility is rare, however, subfertility has been noted and that's not something I'd like to take a gamble on either.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1633545/

Anyone who does not vaccinate their child is totally irresponsible. There is much more evidence that vaccination is a good thing for your child and the rest of humanity than evidence of risks of vaccination.

I strongly believe choosing not to vaccinate your child should be illegal in the UK. You are putting public health at risk.

They're not saying it doesn't cause infertility problems, they're saying there's no firm evidence. The only way to have firm evidence would be to test the sperm of everyone pre and post mumps. This doesn't happen. So there's no firm evidence.

Now you're just twisting words. It is down as a potential, rare side effect of extremely swollen testicles (a potential complication of mumps).

If it read "there is no evidence" that would be a different thing.