@californiaaa what the heck are you talking about? Chicken pox vaccines from 30 years ago before such a vaccine existed, forcible vaccination programs for children? Children don’t have to be vaccinated, they have to be vaccinated in order to go to school - in most states. Parents are free to skip all vaccines and homeschool.
Doctors and health professionals who aren’t vaccinated? Where on earth do you get this? One of my best friends is a nurse in a hospital who is not from the US and she had to get everything she hadn’t had, plus a few more because she works in a hospital. If you are aware of some evidence that medical professionals are skipping vaccination for themselves, please share it.
@californiaaa
"Why does it apply to children, only? Why adults are not mandatory vaccinated? Immigrants (a population of several millions) are not vaccinated according to USA protocols. Many doctors are not vaccinated themselves (even when they are working with vulnerable population, even when they are at high risk of spreading diseases). Doctors, nurses, receptionists, facility managers at hospitals, … why no one talks about vaccinating this population? Adults working at Disneyland spread infection during the last outbreak, yet no one mentions mandatory vaccinating of adults that are in close contact with children.
Why are we so focused on vaccinating newborns (sensitive subject), yet so lax on vaccinating medical professionals (which would make bigger impact on herd immunity than newborns)?"
All of your questions have been answered previously in this thread. Newborns are vulnerable and the most likely group to die of these infections. Adults have much stringer immune systems. Furthermore, there are some vaccines that confer lifelong immunity and others that last for decades. Adults are also not mandated to be vaccinated because they know not to engage in risky behavior. Little children lick everything, it is normal. If adults do that there are behavioral conditions which these people have. The young will lick something toughed by dirty hands day in and day out which dramatically increases their chance to be infected by whatever pathogens are there. Newborns do not know how to properly sanitize things after they come in contact with the ill or filth but adults do.
What about the stories of people affected by side-effects of vaccines? Anyone interested to hear their stories?
I almost died from anaphylactic shock when I was four years old and I got several shots simultaneously. Why did I get several shots? Because day care center urgently required documentation and nurse assumed that it is OK to give four shots in one day Since that day I have many allergies and asthma. Asthma is a very nasty disease. Choosing between a week-long chickenpox and a life long asthma, I would strongly suggest chickenpox.
As a parent with a child in a dorm at a residential college, I absolutely want to be assured that every other student living in the dorms has been fully vaccinated (aside from medical exemptions). I’d bet that the vast majority of parents feel the same way. The colleges are also going to be concerned about the risks of any kind of infectious disease running through the student population, so they’re going to do whatever is needed to reduce that risk–namely, require immunizations.
It’s not a perfect or foolproof solution, any more than immunizations are. D1 still got chicken pox even after being vaccinated–a milder case, but it still kept her home for a few days. And there are things that one can’t vaccinate against, like mono. Back in undergrad, two of my housemates were showing mono-like symptoms. Everyone in the house was immediately called into Student Health for a gamma globulin shot, even before the blood tests came back negative. If illness starts running rampant then at best a school has to deal with canceling classes and postponing exams, along with some quarantining of dorms. At worst, there could be deaths. Lawsuits as well.
But it’s the best option available, for both the student population and the schools.
Certainly folks can fake their child’s immunization records for schools that accept hand-written records. I sincerely hope that those students are fully aware of their true immunization status in the event that they travel abroad or work in an area where there’s been an outbreak of a disease where they have no immunity.
Waiting for the mods to move this discussion over to the cafe.
“I almost died from anaphylactic shock when I was four years old and I got several shots simultaneously. Why did I get several shots? Because day care center urgently required documentation and nurse assumed that it is OK to give four shots in one day Since that day I have many allergies and asthma. Asthma is a very nasty disease. Choosing between a week-long chickenpox and a life long asthma, I would strongly suggest chickenpox”
That nurse was unqualified and is not representative of the doctors who work on making vaccines and making sure they are safe. You also have no way of blaming that incident for your conditions as you mentioned previously that you had a family history of them (there is this little thing called genetics).
I’m the one who posted, and that was exactly my point.
My classmate could not have been protected against congenital rubella syndrome because a vaccine against rubella was not yet available. Today, people can be protected. I think that’s great!
Somehow, I never caught rubella as a child, even though it was extremely common and there was no vaccine available at the time. But by the time I wanted to start a family, there was a vaccine. I was able to get that vaccine before my husband and I started trying to conceive, which meant that we didn’t have to worry that our children would be exposed to rubella in the womb.
@californiaaa, since you don’t care about “the population” please keep your (unvaccinated) child safely away from it. Homeschool, and socialize only with other unvaccinated kids.
As it happens, back on topic, I am taking D for a titer test tomorrow. Her college says she got her second Hep B shot too early…she got it 3 weeks after the first rather than a month later. This was when she was in infant. My doc will give her a booster but we’re doing the titer first because they think it’s highly unlikely that she isn’t immune. If she is immune, I’ll need to forward proof to the college.
< Vaccines are not injections of active virus particles. If you get vaccinated and DON’T GET THE VIRUS then you won’t get shingles form the virus.>
Actually, you own publication says otherwise. <although chickenpox="" vaccines="" do="" contain="" a="" weakened="" version="" of="" the="" live="" virus,="" which="" can="" reactivate="" later="" in="" life="" and="" cause="" shingles,="" this="" is="" very="" rare,="" he="" said.=""> … Please read it carefully! Vaccine lobby is very misleading in their statements!
Briefly, vaccine may trigger shingles later in life. Vaccine itself, not the chickenpox infection. If you get chickenpox, your chances of getting shingles are higher than if you get vaccine. However, if you get no vaccine and no chickenpox, your chances of getting shingles are ZERO, significantly better than with vaccine. Since the probability of chickenpox infection in USA is low, ABSENCE of chickenpox vaccination protects you against shingles better than vaccination itself.
< chickenpox results in merely a mild inconvenience for the vast majority of children who get the disease in developed countries such as the United States>
I vote for a very low probability of mild inconvenience of chickenpox.
There was another thread on this, but if you are sending your kid off to college, consider the meningitis B vaccine. The A version is usually required, however there have been nasty outbreaks of the B strain at colleges that include Princeton, UCSB, and Oregon.
Also, if Gardasil came along after your kids were 13ish, consider HPV vaccination, which can prevent cervical and other cancers.
The only disease that is eradicated is smallpox. That’s why the smallpox vaccine is no longer given. A disease has to eradicated worldwide before regular vaccination is stopped. That’s because bacteria and viruses don’t know anything about political boundaries. They travel wherever their hosts take them.
Prisoners do get vaccinated. The rules for who and which vaccines vary by state. In federal prisons, prisoners get vaccinated if they have not already been.
The only reason newborns are immunized against sexually transmitted Hepatitis B (although, sex-workers, truck-drivers, prison population, heroin addicts, etc. are not required to be immunized) is ECONOMICAL. It is very cheap to immunize newborns, because they visit pediatricians often. It is very expensive to immunize populations that would benefit most from this immunization.
The probability of chickenpox infection in the USA is low because most young people have been vaccinated and most older people had chickenpox in childhood and therefore are immune. If we stopped vaccinating people against chickenpox, the probability of chickenpox infection in the USA would no longer be low.
Hepatitis B is a very useful vaccine. I immunized my children when I realized that day care providers are NOT required to be immunized and may spread the disease. Honestly, I think health care, day care, medical providers, etc. should be mandatory immunized.
Just one question: Are you (personally) immunized? Do you have all booster shots? Do you know that most of your childhood vaccines are, probably, not active anymore? Do you know that adults spread infections in schools and medical centers? Do you remember last outbreak at Disneyland?
@californiaaa You still miss the point. For an individual mooching off of herd immunity they do have a better chance of not getting shingles because they are protected by the rest of the population. I also said active virus particles. If you read what you quoted “can reactivate later in life” how do you reactivate something if it was never inactive? Also the chance of the reactivation of the vaccine is not very far off from 0 which makes your statement “chances of getting shingles are ZERO, significantly better than with vaccine.” patently false.
“I vote for a very low probability of mild inconvenience of chickenpox.” Yes and if everyone did the same and we lost our herd immunity that very low probability would jump to a likelihood.
If my children are not allowed to attend public schools and colleges … may a get a tax refund for it? Our school district spends approximately $8,000 per student per year. May I get these money back?
@californiaaa Your money going to fund public education teaches the people who grow up to invent the technology that you sue in your everyday life. If you want to forgo using any of this technology that is invented by these people after you stop paying then it is a fair deal.
Hepatitis B is sometimes transmitted from an undiagnosed mother to a newborn infant. Those who get hepatitis B as infants are much more likely to be chronically infected than those who get it later in life.
Since that day I have many allergies and asthma. Asthma is a very nasty disease. Choosing between a week-long chickenpox and a life long asthma, I would strongly suggest chickenpox.