Parents refusing to have their children vaccinated with the MMR vaccine is now being blamed for a large jump in the number of mumps cases being reported in the UK.
Poor children.
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Well if the parents refused to have their children vaccinated against what could potentially be life threatening, then they should be blamed for the large jump. Their stupidity and selfishness, all under the banner of some wild delirous ideaology hasnt helped matters. How would they feel if their child contracted mumps or measles and died from it as a result of their actions. No they would be stupid and blame someone else .
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We’ve had all our children immunised and we are both nurses. But it would be wrong to suppose that we didn’t entertain some fear that our child might be the one who reacted very adversely to immunisation by being brain-damaged.
However remote the risk, and however one values the principle of immunisation, no parent should be judged stupid to have profound concerns for their child’s well being, especially as the latter have no choice in the matter or agency to refuse.
It does not do service to community health or community cohesion in a broader sense to call people stupid for having second thoughts about immunisation. Better IMO to acknowledge fears, including ill-founded ones, and offer patient and empathic reassurances, backed up by realistic information on potential and actual risk.
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Don’t think I need to add any comment really.
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If parents choose not to vaccinate their kids, who’s to blame?
Not the kids - at any rate until they turn 18 and don’t get themselves vaccinated.
I fear that it is time for the schools to insist on seeing / checking vaccination records for all children that wish to attend their school - no vaccination, no place at the school. The government cannot allow the minority to put the majority at risk.
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That was already the case here for the compulsory vaccinations (diphtheria, polio, tetanus) and you couldn’t register a child for school without the TB vaccine either, all the others were highly recommended but optional. This has now changed
Les 11 vaccinations obligatoires sont les suivantes, pour les bébés et les enfants :
- Diphtérie, tétanos et poliomyélite (DTP)
- Coqueluche.
- Infections invasives à Haemophilus influenzae de type b.
- Hépatite B.
- Infections invasives à pneumocoque.
- Méningocoque de sérogroupe C.
- Rougeole, oreillons et rubéole.
11 mars 2019
https://www.service-public.fr › vosd…
You can’t register a child for school without the carnet de santé and it is checked every year even in lycée.
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I did 2 years as a community nurse giving vaccination to under 5’s.
The one thing I learned is that calling anti vaxxers names and accusing them of being selfish or stupid is counter productive. The title of this thread sums up what is wrong with the attitude of most of us who vaccinate our children.
A few of the parents may be stupid but the majority are anxious, over thinkers and unfortunately suggestible to the many theories put forward by people who should know better.
Andrew Wakefield has ,imo, done huge damage to the public perception of vaccines and their safety.
I spent a lot of time trying to allay the concerns of worried parents. Their fears are very real to them and should be treated as such.
Rarely will a parent deliberately risk a child’s health and I sometimes gave separate vaccines to children rather than no vaccine. It cost more and took more time but it got the child vaccinated and built up trust.
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It’s not just Wakefield though, social media has had a big influence in this.
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I agree but when Andrew Wakefield is seen escorting the likes of Elle Macpherson to public events then unfortunately it gives him the kudos of acceptance by those with influence when he should be seen for the shabby charlatan that he is.
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More evidence if it were needed.
Measles has killed nearly 5,000 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2019, authorities said, after the disease spread to all the provinces in the country.
Close to a quarter of a million people have been infected this year alone.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says this is the world’s largest and fastest-moving epidemic.
Measles in DR Congo has now killed more than twice the number who have died of Ebola there in the last 15 months.
The Congolese government and the WHO launched an emergency vaccination programme in September that aimed to inoculate more than 800,000 children.
There have also been two cases of diphtheria in Scotland
Still not buying into it this end…one of my daughters despite making her stance clear that until they can provide relevant safety studies that she won’t be vaccinating just received a phone call allegedly from her Gp surgery…when she rang them back they had no such doctor working there…
Flu vaccines have just been administered at her primary school which she also refused to give consent for…lots of children who had the flu vaccine now off sick…
My mom has a district nurse twice a day and they are short staffed at the moment because so many are off sick due to side effects from the flu vaccine…relying on agency workers who are travelling way out of their districts…
Helen… did you daughter get this “bogus-Doctor” phone call in France ???
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How can you be sure of cause and effect? Has the number of children off sick risen abnormally? As at this time of year kids are off sick.
And as for the nurses this just sounds bizarre. I have never known an adult need to take time off work after a flu vaccine, and worked in big organisations with large numbers of staff who were vaccinated.
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I had the flu vaccine, I have had no side effects at all.
I don’t have a problem with people not vaccinating their children, I do have a problem on the one hand with these children infecting immuno-compromised people and on the other hand parents blaming someone or something other than themselves and using the public resources they previously refused, when/if the children are ill.
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It has been recognised this year (in the UK ) that the flu vaccine can cause a cold or the sniffles. However it isn’t fatal unlike flu can be and it only lasts a short time
I’m also doubtful of the reliability of anecdotes like this, Helen. It’s a matter of professional responsibility for community nursing staff to be immunised against infectious diseases.
They go from home to home, so they are ideal vectors of disease-causing germs, and the people they visit are vulnerable to any diseases visitors may carry. Agency staff have the same responsibility as salaried NHS staff in this respect.
Anti-flu immunisation has been carried out for healthcare staff for several years now. I have always had the flu 'jab and have not noticed any significant reaction to it, certainly not anything that would put me off sick. The same is generally true of colleagues, but there are always one or two who will “pull a fast one”, and do a bit of Christmas shopping!
Véronique’s point is a very fair one. I don’t think parents who value their children’s health have good grounds for refusing immunisation because they might be off colour. I think it is more likely because they think it’s a chore, they will have to make an effort, the children will say “Oh, Mum! Do I have to have it, it’ll hurt?! My friends aren’t going, their Mum says it doesn’t work anyway, and it might put me in a coma!”
I know that’s an anecdote, but it’s distilled from real life experiences! 
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