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Such a condescending and arrogant way to say, “I can think for myself and make decisions for myself and my children but you cannot”. It is very hypocritical.
You Lee leaving out key words. Well informed should be in front of decisions.
If you are saying “depends” that means you see some reason when the government would take into account the safety of the public at large over the basic right to freedom of an individual. If it were really an issue of body autonomy outweighing anyone else’s rights than you would never see a reason where the government could deprive someone of freedom even if it might save someone else’s life. Therefore we are dealing with degree and only disagree with the line at which the government has drawn that line.
As for me and the flu, there are no immune compromised students or family members in my school at this time. Therefore there are no students nor their family members who cannot get their own immunizations for the flu. If and when other students enroll who have such issues I will likely get vaccinated again.
As for mandates, I think all teachers should be vaccinated for the same childhood diseases kids are unless they have a medical exemption. For the same reason that kids should be vaccinated, they should not be vectors of disease for students who are immune compromised.
As I have stated many times not all viruses are the same nor are their vaccines. Flu is a perfect example. I have no safety qualms with flu vaccine what so ever but there is evidence that there are benefits to having your own acquired immunity to the flu. However this potential benefit to an individual does not outweigh the real harm to the immune compromised. So yes, I think teachers are morally obligated to get a flu vax if they can ,epically and they have a student with CF or another immune compromising illness. But the flu is a very complicated illness, whose vaccine works by a completely different method, and for who, the herd immunity model is not really applicable.
I think anyone who takes a personal, non medical exemption from mandatory vaccines for their school aged children should be held liable for ignoring that mandate should an immune compromised classemenra their child makes ill dies from a preventable illness.
Few problems with your post. HIPPA. Unless you are a Teacher with an immune compromised student in their classroom, you would not have that right to know their medical history. It is the same under HIPPA and knowing who is vaccinated and who isn't. Absolutely under HIPPA, you would not have the right to know which Teachers or Staff in the school were immune compromised, or had flu shots.
When my daughter goes back to teaching, should she be going around the school announcing her medical condition to everyone? Her choice, and her's alone.
You’d should read up about ghost effect. The research on flu in the last few years is abundant changing and fascinating. For example the role of B cells specifically to response or not just initial strain but multiple variants is likely involved in how the 2009 flu season was so hard on the typically resilient middle aged adults and relatively “safe” for senior citizens. Saying you are only immune to that one strain is just not correct, it is much more complicated than that.
And yes, I acknowledge I am not following the CDC guidelines. I would also point out your refusal to acknowledge that flu vaccine is fundamentally different from the other vaccines makes it very easy for people to say “the flu vax doesn’t always work and they say to get it, maybe none of the other vaccines are necessary”. A blanket response of all vaccine are equally wonderful and effective is just not true. Now maybe it is the scientist in me but we will never get to a universal flu vax until we acknowledge the relatively lackluster efficacy of the flu vaccine because you cannot fix a problem until you acknowledge it exists.
How cute! A separate lecture for Suzy, MissTerri and me! Maybe you should take off your teacher hat and treat us like adults!
I actually have read a lot of that research, including the "ghost effect" though I never heard it called that. Surprisingly maybe to you, the CDC is aware of it and says that until this is all replicated, etc and becomes accepted science, AND there is an alternative vaccine or vaccines, their recommendations stand. For now, it's the best we have.
Allow me to add-the media coverage of flu this past season was awful, just awful! That the virus mutates while being grown in the eggs was a big story, along with these stories about a "universal" vaccine (not strain(s) specific), with people demanding a universal vaccine like researchers can just wave a magic wand and make one.
Finally, I want to say I never "(refused) to acknowledge that flu vaccine is fundamentally different from the other vaccines".
Last edited by Katarina Witt; 07-18-2018 at 09:41 AM..
Sorry but you’re wrong. The vaccine law applies to Private Schools in California.
This is a body autonomy issue. People should have choice as to whether to take medications, vaccines, or to get abortions or not get abortions. There is no need to force people into these decisions through the use of coercion. The threat that an unvaccinated person poses to the general public is pretty small.
I think that people who are actively sick and contagious should make the decision to stay home.
The choice to have or not have an abortion does not affect the family next door.
People with vaccine preventable diseases are spreading them before they know they are sick.
The threat from scattered individuals who are unvaccinated is small. Unfortunately, there are communities where there are large numbers of people who are unvaccinated. That is why there were 79 cases of measles, predominantly in the Somali community, in MN last year.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lkb0714
I was referring to the fact that the flu vaccine is very unusual in that it is constantly updated due to the high evolutionary drift of influenza itself. Not whether it is live or killed. That is not the case with the majority of other vaccines. Most flu vaccines are tailored to antigenic/HA but those tend to be most variable across different influenza genomes which is why matching can “fail” as it did last year not to mention manufacturing drift.
This is further complicated by the thee main strains (not to mention the less common ones) have reservoirs that are not effected by a yearly vaccine. The traditional herd model does not apply to influenza and it’s vaccunes especially regarding A which has multiple animal reservoirs. In order to follow the herd model you need to be able to remove the reservoirs via acquired immunity or vaccination. This is not possible with flu and even if a nonvariable antigenic vaccine makes it through the baculovirus expression process (a major hurdle to the universal vac happening) it still won’t address the reservoir issue unless we develop species specific varieties. That is unlikely due to cost factor alone. You appear to be claiming that flu vaccine would be effective for the long term if only people would take it. That is not the case. Additionally, I would argue that those scientists are incorrectly using the herd immunity model knowing it is at best a limited immunity, which is counter to the very definition of the herd immunity model.
Additionally there is the so called ghost antigen left over from first childhood exposure which could be a thread in and of itself. Anyway, flu is complicated much more so than other viruses. If those of us who accept the medical validity of vaccines are unwilling to discuss the disappointing reality of flu vaccine we just open ourselves up to people seeing the flu not working and assuming that all vaccines are like flu. They are not.
This is an open source article (I think?) from Science mag (the top tier journal I the US) talking about exactly that.
The point I was making is that it is the influenza virus that is different, not the technology behind actually manufacturing the vaccine. Antigenic drift in the A virus as it adapted to being grown in eggs was responsible for last year's vaccine being less effective. There are now production methods that do not need to use eggs, including a recombinant vaccine, so there are ways around that problem.
Vaccine uptake does influence the effectiveness of a vaccine. Flu vaccine can hardly be effective if no one takes it, can it? Keep in mind the difference in effectiveness and efficacy.
"Vaccine effectiveness is proportional to vaccine potency or vaccine efficacy but is primarily affected by how well target groups in the population are immunized, difficulties in storing, administering, cost, accessibility, availability, stability and manufacturing of the vaccine."
Herd immunity does not have anything to do with the source of the infection, only the level of immunity in a population. If there is no herd immunity for flu, why are there all those articles about it? Vaccinating children against flu results in less flu in the elderly. That is herd immunity at work. All herd immunity says is that if there are fewer susceptible individuals in a population, the less likely a susceptible person is to come in contact with someone with the disease.
What lack of a non-human reservoir does do is to set the virus up for eradication, as was done with smallpox.
The "disappointing reality" of influenza vaccines is not a reason to avoid using them. They are not worthless, and many people use that belief that they are as a reason to not take the vaccine. Low uptake results, which pushes down the effectiveness of the vaccine.
Diptheria, Tetanus & Pertussis because they were immunized at 2 mo, 4 mo, 6 mo, 18 mo & 4 years. Instead of at 2 mo, 4 mo, 6 mo, 15 mo & 4 years?
Rotavirus because they were immunized ar 2 mo & 4 months. Instead of 2 mo & 3 mo?
Haemophilus influenza type B because they got the vaccine at 2 mo, 7 mo & 15 mo. Instead of 2mo, 4 mo & 12mo?
Pneumococcal disease because they received the Pc at 3, 5, 7 & 15 months. Instead of 2, 4, 6 & 12 months?
Because those are some of the exact differences between the alternative vs CDC schedule. Asking parents:
“Which VPDs do you want your kids to get?” Only reinforces their suspicions that their child’s health is not your first priority. In fact; talking to a parent in that tone might foster enough doubt that the parents opt to decline immunization altogether with not just that child but any subsequent children they have.
Please explain how a shortage that caused my child’s 4th & 5th DTaP to be delayed for two & a half years; is not relevant to my child’s health, while my choosing to delay the 4th DTaP for 3 months ... is?
Following an two & a half year long DTaP shortage in the US, the incidence rate of Pertussis went from 45 in 2000, to 100 by 2005.
January 4, 2002:
“During the shortage of DTaP, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices recommends that providers who do not have enough DTaP to vaccinate all children with 5 doses give priority to vaccinating infants with the first 3 doses.
To ensure an adequate supply of DTaP to vaccinate infants, providers should first defer vaccination of children aged 15--18 months with the fourth DTaP dose. If deferring the fourth dose does not leave enough DTaP to vaccinate infants, then the fifth DTaP dose (given to children aged 4--6 years) also should be deferred.” https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5051a3.htm
So 2 out of 4 companies stop production & the US is immediately in crisis mode? No warning, predictions ... nothing? And then there is an outbreak. Are outbreaks relevant? Are they indicative of evidence-based medicine? Is the priority that people do not question Immunization policy?
Is that why this doctor in California has been disciplined?
The recommended schedule is designed to get a child fully protected against vaccine preventable diseases in the shortest period of time. It is safe and effective. Placing children on different schedules is not safer or more effective - even "Dr. Bob" Sears knows that. All it does is delay establishing protection and increase the risk doses will be missed, increase discomfort for the child and inconvenience for the parent, and increase cost.
Shortages have to be dealt with. That does not mean it is wise to give vaccines on the schedule used to deal with a shortage because that schedule is just as safe and effective.
Sears was disciplined because he practices bad medicine.
Diptheria, Tetanus & Pertussis because they were immunized at 2 mo, 4 mo, 6 mo, 18 mo & 4 years. Instead of at 2 mo, 4 mo, 6 mo, 15 mo & 4 years?
Rotavirus because they were immunized ar 2 mo & 4 months. Instead of 2 mo & 3 mo?
Haemophilus influenza type B because they got the vaccine at 2 mo, 7 mo & 15 mo. Instead of 2mo, 4 mo & 12mo?
Pneumococcal disease because they received the Pc at 3, 5, 7 & 15 months. Instead of 2, 4, 6 & 12 months?
Because those are some of the exact differences between the alternative vs CDC schedule. Asking parents:
“Which VPDs do you want your kids to get?” Only reinforces their suspicions that their child’s health is not your first priority. In fact; talking to a parent in that tone might foster enough doubt that the parents opt to decline immunization altogether with not just that child but any subsequent children they have.
Please explain how a shortage that caused my child’s 4th & 5th DTaP to be delayed for two & a half years; is not relevant to my child’s health, while my choosing to delay the 4th DTaP for 3 months ... is?
Following an two & a half year long DTaP shortage in the US, the incidence rate of Pertussis went from 45 in 2000, to 100 by 2005.
January 4, 2002:
“During the shortage of DTaP, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices recommends that providers who do not have enough DTaP to vaccinate all children with 5 doses give priority to vaccinating infants with the first 3 doses.
To ensure an adequate supply of DTaP to vaccinate infants, providers should first defer vaccination of children aged 15--18 months with the fourth DTaP dose. If deferring the fourth dose does not leave enough DTaP to vaccinate infants, then the fifth DTaP dose (given to children aged 4--6 years) also should be deferred.” https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5051a3.htm
So 2 out of 4 companies stop production & the US is immediately in crisis mode? No warning, predictions ... nothing? And then there is an outbreak. Are outbreaks relevant? Are they indicative of evidence-based medicine? Is the priority that people do not question Immunization policy?
Is that why this doctor in California has been disciplined?
Hmmm! You totally misunderstoond.
Do you think anyone talks to parents like that? This is a message board, people are free to speak frankly. Your schedule wasn't *that* bad, but some people spread vaccines out much further, leaving kids vulnerable much longer. Interesting that you chose to delay Hib and pneumococcal, as those diseases are still circulating. Did you not vax for polio?
Let's take Hib for an example, as it is still in circulation, though at much lower levels than pre-vaccine. You used a schedule of 2, 7, and 15 months instead of 2, 4, and 12-15 mo (assuming you used Pedvax instead of a different brand). Last things first, the last dose is within the acceptable range. The first dose does not give much immunity; it is more to "prime" the immune system. The second dose is the dose providing the immunity, and the third reinforces the immunity. So if instead of giving the second dose at 4 months you wait until 7 mo, that is three more months that your child is vulnerable to Hib disease. A kid at our practice got Hib disease just before his 4 month dose was due, he's lucky he only lost his hearing.
Re: DTaP, the booster is recommended between 15-18 months, you your child was on schedule. Rotavirus is supposed to be 2 and 4 months, assuming you used Rotarix. Pneumococcal is supposed to be 2, 4, 6 and then 12-15 mo. By starting at 3 months, then staying a month behind, you left your kid vulnerable longer at the newborn stage, and throughout infancy. They don't get full immunity until they've had the 3rd dose in this case.
As to why it was OK to delay the 4th and 5th doses of DTaP, those are booster doses and your child already had their full immunity with the first three. If there was a shortage of vaccine, that is something that could not be changed, and priority is given to the youngest kids and the totally unimmunized.
Yes, if 50% of the production of a vaccine is stopped, that would produce a shortage. I can't answer for the vaccine companies re: why this happened. Ironically, that is a time period when I was not giving childhood vaccines.
If you would read the thread, you'd know why the doctor is being disciplined.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tokinouta
While the science is good, the science behind vaccines isn't the reason we have mandates. Mandates are for profit. In a for-profit healthcare system, profit is the bottom line. Not the health of children. The health of our children is only used to blackmail our wallets.
So, with all the talk in this thread about the vaccines themselves being the motive for mandates, why not address the real reason? It's all about profit, no profit, no vaccines. Might as well be honest about it, nothing surprising in our for profit healthcare system. We are being forced to give vaccines for profit, or they won't make them. They need incentives in the form of $$.
Old vaccines have been reformulated with higher costs. New ones have entered the market at once-unthinkable prices. Together, since 1986, they have pushed up the average cost to fully vaccinate a child with private insurance to the age of 18 to $2,192 from $100, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Even with deep discounts, the costs for the federal government, which buys half of all vaccines for the nation’s children, have increased 15-fold during that period.
For most prescription medicines, the crucial hurdle to marketing is to win Food and Drug Administration approval. But for vaccines, the prize is the imprimatur of the federal Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. Once the committee recommends a shot for all children, states usually require children to get it before entering day care or school;insurers have to cover it, at least nominally. (Many states require home-schooled children to be vaccinated as well.) “We have to give it to every kid, so it’s a golden ticket,” Dr. Irvin said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/03/h...-It-Hurts.html
For most prescription medicines, the crucial hurdle to marketing is to win Food and Drug Administration approval. But for vaccines, the prize is the imprimatur of the federal Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. Once the committee recommends a shot for all children, states usually require children to get it before entering day care or school; insurers have to cover it, at least nominally. (Many states require home-schooled children to be vaccinated as well.) “We have to give it to every kid, so it’s a golden ticket,” Dr. Irvin said.
That requirement is a powerful incentive: Last year, Ms. Farris’s older child, Lenna, missed the first week of school as Ms. Farris, then new to Texas, searched for a provider willing to vaccinate the girl. Desperate, Ms. Farris took her daughter to a public health clinic and lied, saying she had no insurance. She found Dr. Irvin to immunize her son only this year.
The value of that “school mandate” is also apparent in the pricing. When Singapore’s national vaccine advisory group evaluated Prevnar 7 for mandated use, its price was about $80, said Karen Tyo, a researcher from Brandeis University, who was advising the government. After the government included it in the required national schedule, “the price jumped immediately” to about $120, she said. “Nothing had changed,” she noted. “It didn’t make any sense.”
Mandates are money makers, that makes perfect sense. It's not about the vaccine working or not, it's about profit in our for profit system. Our health will always come down to lining someone's pockets. Period.
It really just shows the sad state of our monopolized pharmaceutical industry regarding vaccines, lead by a for profit machine, our healthcare system. If only it were as simple as "it's just good for your health." I think people would understand. But masked in marketing, it's easy to see that profit drives these mandates. This is why people are suspicious, it's not because of the science, it's because of the required profit by the pharmaceutical company that uses its production of vaccines as blackmail for profit.
That is untrue. Many states do not mandate all recommended vaccines. In fact, no state mandates flu vaccine for K-12 school attendance; only 2 plus DC mandate HPV, one state, HI, still does not mandate Tdap for secondary school; some only require 1 dose of MMR and/or chickenpox for some grades.
I don't understand why the Texas girl was unvaccinated in the first place. Usually a school will admit a child with an appointment, or just have the mom sign an exemption form, even if she intends to get the vaccines caught up. While I don't condone lying, I'd rather see a vaccinated child.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jo48
Few problems with your post. HIPPA. Unless you are a Teacher with an immune compromised student in their classroom, you would not have that right to know their medical history. It is the same under HIPPA and knowing who is vaccinated and who isn't. Absolutely under HIPPA, you would not have the right to know which Teachers or Staff in the school were immune compromised, or had flu shots.
When my daughter goes back to teaching, should she be going around the school announcing her medical condition to everyone? Her choice, and her's alone.
I agree Jo48. There is no way a teacher can know about every student's and every teacher's medical history. Some people will share, some will not.
Few problems with your post. HIPPA. Unless you are a Teacher with an immune compromised student in their classroom, you would not have that right to know their medical history. It is the same under HIPPA and knowing who is vaccinated and who isn't. Absolutely under HIPPA, you would not have the right to know which Teachers or Staff in the school were immune compromised, or had flu shots.
When my daughter goes back to teaching, should she be going around the school announcing her medical condition to everyone? Her choice, and her's alone.
Instead FERPA does apply to schools and it is not the same as HIPPA and does in fact allow (and in the case of immune compromised student encourages) a school wide plan to protect students. This is secondary school, students are not in self contained classes, teachers frequently cover each other’s classes we see relevant information for all students including allergies and immunocompromised status. And make no mistake the same privacy laws do not apply. For example we had two student who both had cystic fibrosis, one a mild type another more severe. Regardless they could not be in the same class together and thus had to be identified to each other despite FERPA laws because the risk to their health made it necessary.
If your daughter is immune compromised and going into teaching it is absolutely in her best interest to develop a school wife plan to protect her health. Would be idiocy not too.
How cute! A separate lecture for Suzy, MissTerri and me! Maybe you should take off your teacher hat and treat us like adults!
I actually have read a lot of that research, including the "ghost effect" though I never heard it called that. Surprisingly maybe to you, the CDC is aware of it and says that until this is all replicated, etc and becomes accepted science, AND there is an alternative vaccine or vaccines, their recommendations stand. For now, it's the best we have.
Allow me to add-the media coverage of flu this past season was awful, just awful! That the virus mutates while being grown in the eggs was a big story, along with these stories about a "universal" vaccine (not strain(s) specific), with people demanding a universal vaccine like researchers can just wave a magic wand and make one.
Finally, I want to say I never "(refused) to acknowledge that flu vaccine is fundamentally different from the other vaccines".
Sorry but research in Science mag absolutely is “accepted science” and I am not talking about media coverage. The CDC is a wildly successful organization but they are not the sole source of information regarding disease and should not be treated as such. This is exactly why the medical community and the science community are so far apart on so many issues in this country. It’s a shame really.
And I am sorry you have never heard of the ghost effect but it is common terminology in the lit.
Sorry but research in Science mag absolutely is “accepted science” and I am not talking about media coverage. The CDC is a wildly successful organization but they are not the sole source of information regarding disease and should not be treated as such. This is exactly why the medical community and the science community are so far apart on so many issues in this country. It’s a shame really.
And I am sorry you have never heard of the ghost effect but it is common terminology in the lit.
I said I'd heard of it but not that term, and contrary to what you think, I am educated in this area and read a lot of the "lit". A google search on ghost effect turns up nothing related to immunology. You do like jargon.
I never said CDC was the sole source of information regarding disease. Why do you keep twisting my words?
The CDC does set immunization policy.
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