Vaccination

[Sarah_88]

I'm in a Facebook Free cave at the mo, so this is the first I've seen of this story. Very very sad

We don't vaccinate. And for pretty much the same reasons Totara gave. Initially it just didn't sit right with me, and what I found to read about it was very biased one way or the other. I figured it's the kind if thing you can start doing at any time, but you can't take it out once it's in.

Almost three years on and I absolutely do not regret my decision one bit. And I've found many of the parents I've become friends with over that time share a similar view. I find talking to people on both sides of the fence to be really helpful, and no one has yet convinced me to vaccinate my DD.

[DonQuixote]

I haven't investigated Kaliah's story, so I won't comment there.

However, the 'whooping cough outbreak' story simply says that the vaccine's effectiveness decreases over time. "The majority of cases were in fully vaccinated children" - because the majority of children were fully vaccinated. The proportions given for pertussis cases line up almost exactly with the vaccination rates reported in the recent CDC survey, which certainly doesn't indicate that the vaccine makes children more susceptible.

In fact, in the linked article, the doctor running that study says that the vaccine is about 50% effective across all children, and 24% effective in the 8-12 year old age group, as effectiveness decreases; the incidence rate dips again at age 13, as that's when the booster shot occurs (which would seem to indicate that the vaccine works).

"For pertussis, having even 24 percent helps (mitigate an epidemic), but you'd sure like it higher than that," he adds.

On whether vaccination is effective, I'll add this chart: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/article ... figure/F1/

From this 2010 study on the prevalence of disease among vaccinated and unvaccinated children (they also studied whether vaccination promoted the development of allergies and reached the conclusion that it doesn't): http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3057555/

[princesscatherine]

I've vaccinated my daughter in accordance with the MOH immunisation schedule and she is fully up to date at 18 months, I read the information that came with her immunisation card and was happy enough with that to go ahead with having her vaccinated.

We ended up getting MMR done at 12 months as there was a suspected exposure to one of our coffee group. For me there is too much risk not to immunise - I'd rather take our chances against measles with the vaccine than without it.

There are now cases of whopping cough being reported where I live which only reinforces my decision as being the right one for us.

I also don't want my daughter being sent home from school because she isn't vaccinated. Which happened during the measles outbreak here in Akl and the parents of the non-vaccinated children complained. Which is the consequence you risk for not vaccinating.

I'm the opposite Sarah not one non-vaxer has convinced me that I shouldn't immunise my daughter.

[DonQuixote]

I was chatting with an epidemiologist elsewhere on the net recently - someone else had been living with a family in which the son had suffered encephalitis and manifested epilepsy shortly after he'd received the MMR vaccine.

The epidemiologist said that:
---------
The CDC estimates a less than 1 in 1,000,000 doses rate of severe complications, some of which could result in brain damage. But:
1. There are myriad other reasons for sudden shifts in development at that age. There's a temporal correlation, but there's a number of things, with much higher rates, that cause similar effects. Someone had a precious, intelligent, happy perfect baby, and then something went wrong. Also, around that same time, they got a shot. Also around that same time thousands of other things happened to them - no one seems interested in asking about any of those..

2. As tragic as that is, it doesn't mean anything for vaccine policy. The rate of encephalitis for actual measles is 1 in 1,000 - and the rate of death is nearly the same. If we assume the rate of complication for the vaccine is roughly equal for both doses (I doubt it is), for every one child that suffered brain damage/epilepsy, we'd know 1000 children who suffered the same fate from the disease itself - and 1000 or so children who were no longer with us.
------

So yes, there are risks associated with vaccination. By the numbers, though, it seems like the risks associated with not vaccinating are higher - and I would speculate that as the rate of vaccination drops, the risks associated with not vaccinating increase.

[DonQuixote]

I'm pretty sure they would have liked to have more unvaccinated subjects. Those were the proportions among those who agreed to take part in the study. They don't say, but perhaps parents of unvaccinated children would also have been more reluctant to participate in scientific studies? (I'm pretty sure they can't ask parents not to vaccinate their kids so that they have more unvaccinated children in the study! )

Nevertheless, they do supply confidence intervals for their results; a sample size of 94 is certainly large enough to draw statistical conclusions, particularly as they did have so many children in the vaccinated group. Note that the error bars on the chart for the unvaccinated group are always much larger than for the vaccinated group. Even with the uncertainty of the much smaller unvaccinated group, they can still make claims with over 99.9% certainty about pertussis prevalence, 99% certainty about measles, 96% about mumps and 89% about rubella.

[DonQuixote]

When you say placebo control studies, do you mean placebo-vaccinating one group so that they believe they've been vaccinated? I must admit I've not heard of the placebo effect fooling infectious diseases!
You've seen the vitriol at a (literally) one in a million adverse reaction to a vaccine. Imagine the reaction if, say, 12,000 kids went unvaccinated for a study like the one you're suggesting. Based on the numbers from the study I linked originally, about one in ten would get measles - that's 1200; based on the usual effects of measles, the probability of encephalitis in at least one child of the 1200 is over 63%, and the same probability for at least one death. I would not want to be the scientist conducting that study.

[Hopes]

Vaxing or not aside, why didn't the story sit right with you, Plush? My 'load of coddlefot' antennae are pretty strong, and that story sounded as if it was possibly believable... I only glanced at it once days ago and never checked, but it didn't set off my radar.

[Hopes]

I did read it quickly, and had missed both the fact that Mum had been given the vaccine and that she'd had to persuade the Dr to test them. Although, like I said, this one didn't trip my whatever-meter. It is so so sad for the poor family

[DonQuixote]

In one of the vaccination threads on the main page, a link was posted to charts that purported to show that infectious diseases were already vanishing before vaccines came into use.

Apparently those charts are a common resource for the anti-vaccination movement, which I think is unfortunate. For a start, some of them show a declining death rate (as medical treatment improved) but don't show the what happened to the incidence of the disease when the vaccine was introduced. However, one of them does show the incidence rate - of measles, in Canada - and it's that one in particular I'd like to discuss.

Exhibit A.jpg (47.09 KiB) Viewed 834 times

This chart (Exhibit A, attached to the post) purports to show the incidence of measles in Canada, from 1935-1983. I say purports, because at the bottom it shows where the creator got his data, and the full story looks somewhat different. I have attached the source chart as Exhibit B.

Exhibit B.gif (30.46 KiB) Viewed 834 times

Note that Obomsawin (the creator of Exhibit A) shows 1935-1983, rather than the 1924-2005 in Exhibit B. This is because he chose to start his chart at the peak of an epidemic, to ensure that chart showed the effect he wanted (a sharp decline in incidence before the vaccine was introduced).

Note that he also cherry-picked certain points from Exhibit B to give that impression of a constant decline. Measles doesn't follow a smooth curve like that, it comes and goes, as you can see in Exhibit B.

And to top it off, 10 years of data are missing (measles wasn't nationally reportable in Canada during those years). He just drew a smooth line through the gap.

The potential adverse effects from vaccines are intimidating, and this can lead people not to vaccinate. I understand that. But if the truth doesn't sway people to his point of view, perhaps, rather than mislead and obfuscate, he should reconsider his point of view.

(I did mention most of this in my post on the Facebook thread, but if I want to link to this explanation later, it will be much easier to find here than on the Timeline!)

[Hopes]

That cracks me up, DonQuixote! That has got to be one of the best cases of dodgy data-manipulation I've seen. I almost admire it...

(I do know that data manipulation occurs everywhere. But that is pretty legendary.)