ooh that does sound bad

cross fingers that's all over in one hit then

OH was scared he might get it as his mother doesn't ever remember him having chicken pox. He was glad when work sent him out of the country. He didn't catch it.

I read that Italy now offers the vaccine to any kid who has hit 13 without ever having had chicken pox as a child. It's not part of the vaccine NHS list so I presume that if you want it - you have to pay for it.

that's a good idea - shingles is so much worse than chickenpox

My eldest had it for the second time when she was due to take her GCSE´s. Cleared them up very quickly by taking baths with bi-carb in them and then when the sores were dry we used surgical spirit.

I have had German Measles 3 or 4 times, so I obviously did not build up an immunity.

Rosemary

omg surgical spirit!!!

what a lot of people don't realise - or in my experience refuse to believe - is that with chickenpox you are contagious (and feel ill) long before the rash appears - and as soon as it dries out you're not any more - even if you can still see it

I actually had to get my GP to write a note to school to tell them this - they wanted dd1 to stay off until all signs had gone - there's nothing worse than making an active kid who actually WANTS to be at school, stay home!

I felt off-colour before the shingles broke out. Really dizzy spells. I had rubella in my twenties and felt really ill for about a week, all my joints were really painful.

Shingles is horrendous, specially if it affects your eyesight. Mine was perfect before I got it 7 years ago, now its so bad I can't even pass the eyesight test for a driving licence, all down to Shingles

If you have been vaccinated against chickenpox, can you get shingles?

I wouldn't have thought so (unless the vaccination didn't take, and you got chicken pox for real.)

What predisposes people to get shingles?

From the NHS website :


Chickenpox and shingles
One you have had chickenpox, you usually develop antibodies to the infection and become immune to catching it again. However, the virus that causes chickenpox, the varicella virus, remains dormant (inactive) in your body's nerve tissues and can return later in life as an illness called shingles.

It is possible to catch chickenpox from someone with shingles, but not the other way around.

forgot to add the link.......


http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Chicken...roduction.aspx

so having chickenpox, or I imagine the vaccination, doesn't stop you getting shingles

and having chickenpox can actually predispose you to shingles

There's a bit in ther that says "The decision of the UK not to routinely vaccinate children is actually based on the risk that preventing the circulation of wild virus will, rather counterintuitively, increase the risk of shingles among older people.

Basically, there's a risk that by vaccinating, you'll prevent re-immunising people in older age groups by exposure to wild virus, and thus actually put them at greater risk of shingles rather than the reverse. At least, until enough time has passed that the youth among whom you've prevented infection have become the elderly."

They are right, it is counterintuitive if vaccination with the weak virus can't leave dormant viruses in the nervous system that can cause shingles.

Neither my brother nor myself had chickenpox as a child according to my mother. Unfortunately, I caught it from daughter1 (aged 3) whilst I was pregnant with daughter2. Whole pregnancy was filled with antibody counts (weekly) - back in the 1980's nobody knew for sure what effect it had on a fetus (about 15 weeks), but daughter2 escaped unscathed, only to catch it herself when she was about 5 years old. Not a pleasant experience for any of us.

That's what I can't understand if vaccination with the weak virus can't give you shingles in later life, and also it will prevent you getting chicken pox, and you can't get shingles if you haven't had chicken pox.

Looks to me that someone has got their wires crossed, surely?

so why haven't we eradicated it ??