California Whooping Cough Cases "an Epidemic" 387
As reported by the San Jose Mercury News, the state of California is "in the throes of a whooping cough epidemic, state health department officials announced Friday. Dr. Ron Chapman, director of the California Department of Public Health, said 3,458 cases of whooping cough have been reported since Jan. 1 -- including 800 in the past two weeks. That total is more than all the cases reported in 2013." Public broadcaster KPBS notes that of the 621 people known to have come down with whooping cough in San Diego county, the vast majority (85 percent) were up to date on their immunizations.
Stay in the basement! (Score:5, Interesting)
It's much safer. Stock up on Doritos and Dr. Pepper and wait the epidemic out.
Pertussis is a big deal and, as usual, the media is Doing It Wrong. For most adults, pertussis is annoying (very annoying) but not life threatening. It is also rather contagious and worse, it is most contagious early on when one's symptoms are mild and non specific. So when you are sick, stay in the basement. Wash your hands. Communicate with the rest of the world via Slashdot.
For young children it can be fatal, hence the importance of immunizations.
What is pretty clear is that the primary immunization series works pretty well (not perfectly). Immunizations of adults doesn't work well at all. What TFA didn't make clear was how immunized the adults were. They would be up to date if they had received their primary children's series but no adult Dtap (typically given as part of a tetanus immunization, not directly 'for' pertussis). But we know that the pertussis component of Dtap wanes after five years. So even if you were technically up to date by tetanus standards, you'd be behind for pertussis.
We've known this for decades. What I can't figure out is why a pertussis only booster hasn't been marketed. We have the vaccine, we have much of the data. It would be fairly easy to do. (Insert favorite rant about the Medical Industrial Complex here.)
Re:So there's 100 or so unimmunized? (Score:1, Interesting)
There are precisely two viruses like this that have been "eradicated" by medicine, in the entire history of humankind. Two.
And one of those is suspected of making a comeback in a related form.
"Immunisation" buys you time, not immunity. We can't get 100% of people to pay taxes or abide by the law, what makes you think we can get 100% immunised?
Like using one particular chemical in weedkiller or rat poison - doesn't matter how many rats you kill, one will get immune to it and breed a generation immune to it really quickly, or a branch of the same genetic family will evolve to take it over. Even if you legislate (as some countries do) that you MUST use 2 or 3 totally unrelated chemicals at all times and never deploy them singly - still there are rats. And still there will be diseases getting through that are related to those you immunise.
Hell, we offer flu shots to the elderly for free in my country - hasn't even dented flu-like diseases. Immunisation helps. Blaming those percent that choose to decide what they put into their own bodies is just peer pressure and bullying. And, guess what, if you were actually "immunised" you wouldn't be able to catch it from them, or the evolved strains...
Re:So there's 100 or so unimmunized? (Score:2, Interesting)
Thanks mom...
Re:Adults are the carriers (Score:4, Interesting)
Having had had family members with whooping cough I looked into this. Adults are believed to be carrier's with silent symptoms. This year (2014) when adults get their physical they will very likely be offered an immunization for whooping cough. I just got mine since I was exposed to it. Although vaccines after the fact may not be useful for protection, the wisdom apparently is that the vaccine helps your body supress the silent infection. Not sure I understand why.
This. The immunity imparted by the pertussis vaccine was not as long lived as previously thought. Combine that with a larger community of unvaccinated children (some due to medical reasons but many due to parents choosing not to) and we get a resurgence of whooping cough. This problem has been know and building for quite a while now but the other problem is that adults tend to not keep up on their tetanus boosters. I know back in 2007 when I got my last booster they had already started giving adults Tdap (Tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis), as opposed to the Td vaccine that used to be the norm for adults.
Re:So there's 100 or so unimmunized? (Score:5, Interesting)
The 'flu shots' are one of the best proofs of the total and utter fraud of 'vaccination', since they simply DON'T WORK, and figures from hundreds of thousands of sufferers of the flu prove this.
Congratulations on your complete failure to understand influenza.
Flu shots "don't work" because influenza is such a simple organism. Most big organisms (pretty much anything you can see with the naked eye) have mechanisms to protect their DNA from changing too much. Cells that mutate are killed off, and offspring that mutate too much can't grow. That's why it takes thousands of years for even small changes. The benefit, of course, is that once such an organism thrives, it stays that way. There are practically no single-individual species out there (some exceptions apply [wikipedia.org]).
Influenza completely lacks those mechanisms. It is free to mutate rapidly, often leading to significant differences in only a few years. Part of those significant differences are the proteins exposed to the body's immune system, so the particular strain of virus that was most aggressive one year may give way to a completely different strain for the next winter season (when human immune systems are at their weakest).
To produce a flu shot each year, researchers track the incidence rates of many different strains, and the ones that seem most troublesome for the coming year are what the vaccine protects against. There is a balance that must be struck between providing enough material for the body to develop immunity, and providing too much material, such that the person actually gets sick.
Flu shots, therefore, are not an absolute shield against the diverse array of viruses we call "influenza".
This whole article PROVES that 'vaccination' is a massive fraud
No, it only provides still more evidence that vaccines work exactly as we expect them to. There is only a good chance that a person will develop an immunity from a vaccine, and only a good chance that an immunity will protect them from the actual pathogen, so we hope to also give them a good chance to never encounter the pathogen in the first place. Skipping vaccinations increases the likelihood that you will be a safe harbor for the pathogen, greatly increasing the chances of exposure for someone whose immunity is ineffective or not even present.
Immunity is a collective endeavor. You're undermining it.
Re:Mexico Vaccinates Better Than The US (Score:5, Interesting)
of the 621 people known to have come down with whooping cough in San Diego county, the vast majority (85 percent) were up to date on their immunizations.
Here's the problem with that statistic: If 90% of the people in San Diego county are up to date on their vaccinations, and the per capita of individuals was equal, then you'd end up with about 63 of the 621(or 90%) of whooping cough individuals as having their vaccinations. To truly see how well the whooping cough vaccination is working, you need to compare it to the percentage of total vaccinations. If the % is higher than the vaccinations total, you've got a problem, otherwise we can continue to blame un-vaccinated individuals as the problem.
Re:Yes, be good sheep and take big pharma shots (Score:3, Interesting)
Do you mean thiomersal, the mercuric component of which is readily excreted by the body in less than a month with no ill effects
Still a matter for debate.
and hasn't been used as a vaccine preservative in US, Europe and elsewhere since 1999?
False [cdc.gov].
Comment removed (Score:2, Interesting)