Attention Parents: Vaccinate Teens For Whooping Cough

I once walked out on a chiropractor when she claimed that  it wasn't necessary to vaccinate kids, because "whooping cough wasn't that big a deal".   NOT.   It is very contagious and can be fatal to infants who are not old enough to be vaccinated.  You are contagious before you feel ill!   Now the American Academy of Pediatrics is recommending a second round of vaccinations:

Bordetella pertussis has hit the pre-teen and teenage population particularly hard, noted the academy. In 2004, there were almost 26,000 cases of pertussis in the United States -- the highest number since the 1950s -- and 34% of the cases occurred among those ages 11 to 18.                            

                           

In turn, the increase in adolescent pertussis has led to a greater exposure risk for unprotected infants, the AAP said. Pertussis-related deaths among infants nearly doubled from about 10 per year during the 1990s to approximately 20 per year in this decade, Infants under six months of age are particularly vulnerable because of the immunization schedule.

There have been outbreaks in Montana (several counties) Cattaraugus County (New York State) across Kansas, in Ohio (forcing school closure), Illinois,  some counties in California, some locales in Iowa

Mary-Clayton Enderlein was in her ninth month of pregnancy when she came in contact with an unvaccinated child who had pertussis (whooping cough). Because pregnancy can compromise the immune system, Enderlein contracted the disease, despite the fact that she had been immunized against it. Although her symptoms were relatively mild, she was still suffering with the disease when she gave birth to her son Colin and unknowingly passed the disease on to him. Young infants are within the age range in which pertussis poses the most danger for severe complications and even death.

Enderlein's story highlights the potential repercussions that can come from a choice not to vaccinate a child. When individuals are immunized, they not only protect themselves from disease but they also protect their family and friends. Mary-Clayton Enderlein talks about the impact that contact with an unvaccinated child had on her family.

Q. How was your son Colin affected by pertussis?
A.  I gave my son Colin pertussis with my first kiss, and I watched him suffer with the disease for the first few months of his life. Pertussis left him exhausted because he would cough continuously until he turned blue and threw up, gasping for breath. At one week of age, he was hospitalized for ten days and placed on continuous monitors and intravenous medications. The effects of the disease continued for many months even after his discharge from the hospital. Listening to his every heartbeat, I came to understand what it feels like to watch your child battle a potentially fatal disease long before he even took his first steps. I encourage all parents to be on the lookout for pertussis so that they do not spread it to younger children and infants. No child is safe unless he or she is vaccinated against pertussis. Unfortunately, for Colin, we never had the choice to make.

Comments

[Whooping Cough Vaccine]

I had to laugh after reading what you just wrote about the lady that WAS vaccinated, yet got Whopping cough 'supposedly' from an unvaccinated child. THen why was she vaccinated and why did she have that virus shoved into her body when it did more harm than good? The UNvaccinated children, like my own, should be the ones living in 'fear' as you sould put it. We are the ones that will DIE if we get the fatal diseases that have plaged our society. It's amazing how none of my children have ever gotten the flu, let alone really sick....but the children that get the flu vaccine...GET THE FLU!!!!!!! How do you justify that one? I would love to debate further on this issue and also from a chiropractic standpoint. I believe that we heal from the INSIDE-OUT...not by injecting foreign things into our bodies to show them how to function. What made the body, heals the body....it happens no other way.

[liz]

The previous commenter's name is Katie.  She reveals her ignorance:  She wrote "have that virus shoved into her body ".   The organism that causes pertussis is the bacterium Bordetella pertussis.  It's a bacterium, not a virus.

Katie writes, "the lady that WAS vaccinated, yet got Whopping cough (sic) ...why was she vaccinated"? Vaccination against whooping cough became nearly universal in the United States in the 1950s. The vaccine is given to infants. However, antibody-mediated immunity wanes in approximately ten years, leaving teens and adults unprotected. According to emedicine.com, "Neither acquisition of the disease nor vaccination provides complete or lifelong immunity." Other diseases requiring periodic re-vaccination include tetanus, also caused by a bacterium.  Unlike tetanus, whooping cough in adults is less severe, so until now, there has not been a recommendation for revaccination.

According to The online textbook of bacteriology, pertussis has two stages.  The first stage is called colonization, and may resemble the common cold.  It increases in intensity over about a 10-day period.  During this period, the victim is able to spread the disease because the bacterium is present in large numbers in bodily fluids such as mucus and saliva.

It is this stage that is most dangerous to those susceptible to the disease who are exposed to the victim, as the victim may not have obvious signs of serious illness. 

In countries where the vaccine is not used whooping cough is an important cause of mortality in children, with an estimated 51,000,000 cases and 600,000 deaths annually.

The second stage is where the characteristic cough develops.  It comes on gradually with prolonged and paroxysmal coughing that often ends in a characteristic inspiratory gasp (whoop). To hear the characteristic sound of whooping cough click whoop.wav (whoop.wav is copyright of Dr Doug Jenkinson, Nottingham, England. www.whoopingcough.net). 

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, among teens who are infected with whooping cough,

up to 100% report paroxysmal coughing, difficulty breathing and difficulty sleeping, up to 70% have post-tussive vomiting, up to 65% have whoop, up to 2% have pneumonia, are hospitalized, or have a rib fracture, and up to 1% have a seizure or lose consciousness, the academy said.

I ask you, Katie (and other readers) would you want your child to undergo this preventable suffering?

Katie goes on to make a rather incoherent point:

The UNvaccinated children, like my own, should be the ones living in 'fear' as you sould put it. We are the ones that will DIE if we get the fatal diseases that have plaged our society. It's amazing how none of my children have ever gotten the flu, let alone really sick....but the children that get the flu vaccine...GET THE FLU!!!!!!!

I think what she is claiming is that children who are vaccinated get the diseases they are vaccinated against, while unvaccinated children remain healthy.

She bases this claim on her observation of her children and her children's acquaintance.  Unfortunately, case observations are not sufficient for proof, only to formulate a hypothesis.

Hypothesis for Disease X:   children not vaccinated against X do not contract X, while children who are vaccinated against X do contract X.

Prediction: there will be a statistical difference in rates of illness with X between vaccinated and unvaccinated children.

Experimental design:  The most stringent standard would be a large-scale double-blind study. 

But let us suppose that Disease X is a high-rate-of-mortality disease.  This imposes ethical questions.   Perhaps a cohort study   would be more appropriate. (In this instance, a cohort study would follow two matched groups of children: ones that have not been vaccinated against Disease X vs. those who have. )

How many children would we need?  The larger the cohort, the more robust the answer.    Let us posit 100 children who have been vaccinated, and 100 who have not.  Since Katie's hypothesis is that vaccination against Disease X causes an increased incidence of acquiring Disease X, we will formulate the hypotheses in those terms:

• The null hypothesis would be that there is no difference--childen would fall ill with Disease X at the same rate, whether or not they had been vaccinated.
• The alternative, two-tailed hypothesis would predict that children who had not been vaccinated against Disease X exhibited a lower risk of  falling ill with Disease
• The alternative, one-tailed hypothesis would be that children who had not been vaccinated against Disease X had a markedly lower risk of falling ill with Disease X.

Katie closes by saying,

I would love to debate further on this issue and also from a chiropractic standpoint. I believe that we heal from the INSIDE-OUT...not by injecting foreign things into our bodies to show them how to function.

Katie, in order to debate, we have to be speaking the same language.  Belief is not enough.   Show me the numbers.

And while you are marshalling the numbers, I sincerely hope your children do not fall ill with pertussis, polio, measles, mumps, rubella, diptheria, typhoid, tetanus, or any other preventable disease.

[Kim]

Go and get 'em Katie!

I have 3 children and have never vaccinated them. They grew up strong and healthy - far healthier than any other children I have seen! They rarely got colds too!

If you DO look at the numbers most cases of Whooping Cough right now are from those who HAVE BEEN vaccinated already! Mmm...doesn't make sense to me!!

Kim