chicken pox

[Milkand2sugarsplease]

I'm sure there's a more specific category for this but I couldn't see one while quickly scanning through them....

Can I have a few opinions on paying for the chicken pox vaccine?? I have a couple of friends with older kids who had it rather badly (one of them admitted to hospital for a fortnight) and it's made me wonder about having DS vaccinated.
Opinions either way would be great so I can think it all through.

Thanks

DD is in the middle of her two doses of the vaccine.
I went to a doctor to chat it through as she scars really easily and I hadn't realised when DS was little that cp could be dangerous.
We've actually ended up getting it provided by the NHS because my mum is immune suppressed.
DD seems to have tolerated the jab fine so far. It was three weeks ago.
Do research but if you're not sure then maybe book an appt with your dr to discuss it?

We've been back and forth to tho docs lately as he's just been diagnosed with mild asthma and I mentioned it to her but was a little fobbed off with 'well it's jut a mild illness all children get' response which I know for a lot of kids it is. Just a little scary when you've seen how poorly some get with it.

if you have more than one child i would, in my experience if one gets a mild case, the sibling always gets it even worse.

MY son had 6 or 7 spots, my dd ended up covered from head to foot in them, they were EVERYWHERE and it was miserable.

i have had it 3 times!

If i could have vaccinated, i think i would have.

I'm thinking about this too, after one of my friends had a horrible experience with her kids getting cp and the younger one suffering badly and giving them a lot of worry. I hadn't considered getting the vaccine originally but have now been thinking about it, and am increasingly thinking that even mild chickenpox is pretty nasty, and why should I put dd through that? Also, since she is a girl, if she doesn't get chickenpox naturally, I would worry about her being at risk later in life if she becomes pregnant.

And even if it's just a normal childhood illness and your child doesn't get it really badly, it's still a week's quarantine, which sod's law means is going to happen just when you're due to go off on holiday, or when you have a really important week at work...

In Aus it's on the standard vaccine list for 18mo. I do not understand why it's not here. Children who get a bad dose of CP are much more likely to get shingles as adults. The vaccine doesn't stop you from getting it, but the dose is usually a lot more mild.

I would have paid to get it for my DS, who is 18mo now, but as it happens we will be returning to Aus shortly for a few weeks so we will do it then.

I was led to understand by my GP that the two doses that DD will have would make it unlikely she would get cp and that when they tested pregnant women for immunity they saw no difference between vaccination immunity for cp and "natural" cp immunity.

This was important for us as we don't want DD to pass it onto my mum.

We were lucky - DC1 got a very mild case (few spots, no fever, no itching) and DC2 seems to be naturally immune (shares a bath and toys with him, but never got it even though they were in close contact). DH is naturally immune to it too. But I have friends whose children were admitted to hospital with the same round of CP, and were very seriously ill indeed. I would vaccinate if mine hasn't already been exposed.