itigo

Here we go.............bet this causes some ructions.

In Geelong this year so far there have been 457 reported cases of whooping cough compared to 39 in 2008. I think this is quite shocking. It's because the childhood vaccine wears off so when there's an outbreak more adults get it now. I know there was a thread where some of the QLD members had it a few weeks ago (hope you are feeling better now!).

I have booked me and hubby in for jabs this week as I don't want us to get it and more importantly pass it on. The littlies are ok as they are fully immunised. My friend had a baby last week and I want to visit but I would feel more comfortable doing so knowing I had done everything I could to prevent her precious baby from contracting it.

My daughter (5) thinks it's great that for a change, she gets to hold our hands when we get jabbed instead of her!

We haven't done the flu jab but hubby is going to ask about getting it too when we go. For some reason I feel that getting the whooping cough jab is more important for the general community. In my job, I work with families and I know that at least one of them has a newborn too.

Sooooooo, has anyone else got the Tdap jab? Would any consider it now? Those who have had whooping cough this year, would you recommend people to get it? I have read some views from the anti-immunisation brigade as well to stay balanced but am still pro-vaccine.........

Pollyana

I actually can't have the vaccine. They gave me part of it when I was a baby, nearly killed me; i was rushed to hospital, stopper breathing, had to be resucitated. I was always sceptical as to whether it really had been that serious till I got my medical records before I emigrated and read it all for myself. So from my personal point of view there's no choice, I can't be vaccinated against it.

itigo

With a household of serious allergies, I appreciate that one Polly! Bums..........

daunted

Yes I'm having it next week after being crook with suspected Whooping cough (turned out it wasn't) but was offered the triple vaccine so off i go

squeezzii

I was told by a mate who works in a local Gp's office that there is a load of cases at the moment.

sonlymewalter

i was recently diagnosed with whooping cough and quarantined for 3 weeks which was like being a prisoner. I had the vaccine as a kid but apparently some of us lose immunity as adults. You cant have visitors and the constant coughing means you cant talk on the phone its bloody annoying i can tell you

As for getting the vaccine as an adult. Sounds all well and good but apparently it's like the flu virus in that there's loads of strains of whooping cough so the vaccine might not work anyway. The antibiotics they give you are apparently used for people who have aids and can cause abortions - so that tells you how strong these antibiotics are, and in my case they created an increase in heart rate so I felt my heart was in my stomach and I could feel it beating which meant I felt nervous and edgy

It's a crap virus and the effects last for months. Still exhausted from the weeks of lack of sleep, still coughing up clear phlegm, still have spasms of chesty coughs - it's not called the 100 day cough for nothing

Apparently there's been an epidemic of it in adults in Brisbane this year. At the end of the day it's all about choice and it's like the flu vaccine, you get the jab and it could help ......but it's not guaranteed

quoll

My son's partner is avidly anti vaccination and my poor granddaughter spent a week in intensive care plus several weeks with regular trips to the hospital with whooping cough just after she turned 1. For over a month she didnt go anywhere without a mini oxygen cylinder once they let her out of IC. Personally I wanted to smack the D-i-L - it is a nasty nasty thing for little kids to get and I hope she will vaccinate the next baby when it arrives in November.

My own kids were vaccinated as babies but when they were 4 and 7 (according to the paediatrician) they got it too but were old enough to cope with it. Still very distressing.

Petals

My children were vaccinated however when my daughter was in year 11 she was diagnosed with late stage whooping cough, in other words she had been spreading the bug around to all and sundry before diagnosis.

This should tell those people with very young infants that its not to be messed with and they are better to get fully informed.

Same with rubella, I had that at 18 and once again it was late stage as the infection stage is before the spots.

itigo

Yes, we weren't sure whether there were lots of strains of it. But we figure, some protection is better than none.

TiddlyPom

The pertussis vaccine is only around 54% - 68% effective when given. So just over half all children vaccinated with it will actually develop an immunity to whooping cough. Immunity is quite often incomplete even after immunisation.
Pertussis is also considered a superbug in some countries, which is resistant to antibiotics.

'A study published in the Journal of Paediatrics indicates the pertussis vaccine may only be 40-45% effective and immunity is not sustained. In 1986, 1300 cases were reported in Kansas. Of the patients with known vaccination status, 90% were adequately vaccinated. In 1993 an outbreak of pertussis in Ohio, 82% of younger children stricken had received regular doses of the vaccine.'

There's also a suspected link between SIDS and the DTP vaccine.

Quoll, all vaccinated and un-vaccinated babies are at risk of Pertussis. Perhaps it might be better to not blame.

itigo

There always seems to be a counter claim.........

One myth that won't seem to go away is that DTaP vaccine causes sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). This belief came about because a moderate proportion of children who die of SIDS have recently been vaccinated with DTaP; and on the surface, this seems to point toward a causal connection. But this logic is faulty; you might as well say that eating bread causes car crashes, since most drivers who crash their cars had probably eaten bread within the past 24 hours.

If you consider that most SIDS deaths occur during the age range when 3 shots of DTaP are given, you would expect DTaP shots to precede a fair number of SIDS deaths simply by chance. In fact, when a number of well-controlled studies were conducted during the 1980s, the investigators found, nearly unanimously, that the number of SIDS deaths temporally associated with DTP vaccination was within the range expected to occur by chance. In other words, the SIDS deaths would have occurred even if no vaccinations had been given. In several of the studies, children who had recently gotten a DTaP shot were less likely to get SIDS. The Institute of Medicine reported that "all controlled studies that have compared immunized versus nonimmunized children have found either no association . . . or a decreased risk . . . of SIDS among immunized children" and concluded that "the evidence does not indicate a causal relation between [DTaP] vaccine and SIDS."

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/...me.htm#dtpsids

TiddlyPom

Hmmm, it appears that whilst that site says there's no causal connection, other research and sites (reputable, not hillbilly anti vac sites) are saying that there's been no study done that would prove or disprove this as of yet.

'For some vaccines there was a strong evidence of no causal relationship; for others, the evidence was inadequate to accept or reject causal relationship, which was due to a small number or no epidemiologic studies evaluating the relationship between vaccination and SIDS.

For example, the Committee concluded that "the evidence is inadequate to accept or reject a causal relationship between DTaP vaccine and SIDS." '
http://www.sids.org/nmontharticle.htm

I'm trying to find the results of this clinical trial which I still haven't read up on. Anyone find it?

'DTaP and Apnea/Bradycardia in Preterm Infants'

itigo

Have just found this, but it isn't the one you were looking for........http://pediatrics.aappublications.or...ct/121/5/e1085

http://www.springerlink.com/content/j25w57j610h3g715/

TiddlyPom

It's similar but not it. I know it's been completed though.
The Pre-term one once again draws on the lack of conclusive and good data, though I don't know if I'm reading the conclusion right... It would be a very difficult study ... Whilst babies may die anyway of 'SIDS', no-one truly knows if they still would have died without the immunisation prior or not. It's ok to say that 'statistically' it would have happened anyway. I would personally like to see more conclusive evidence than just 'statistically your child wasn't going to make it anyway'. There should be better evidence offered than this.

Ozzidoc

These threads are like a train wreck in my eyes. I know I shouldn't, but I just can't help but look!!!!

I hope that everyone on here gets better/stays well.