Calling the Shots

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http://www.starbanner.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/FP/20040719/HEALTHMATTERS/40716001/1017/FEATURES01 & template=printartArticle published Jul 19, 2004Calling the shotsTo doctors' chagrin, some parents say no to vaccinations Suzanne Walther was pregnant with her third child when a well-meaning friend - a proponent of holistic medicine - shared her concern that vaccines are risky and ineffective. Though both of Walther's older children, now 12 and 8, were fully immunized, she started to wonder about the dangers of vaccinations.She questioned her doctors. They gave her informational pamphlets on vaccines.Walther, a former medical technologist, did research on the Internet and at her local library. But by the time Mary Catherine was born on July 19, 1999, Walther and her husband, Leonard, didn't feel they had enough information. So they continued their fact-finding mission and put off making a decision. Then the unthinkable happened. Mary Catherine came down with meningitis and was admitted to Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville a week before her first birthday.Haemophilus influenzae type B (Hib) was found to be the cause, a disease preventable by the Hib vaccine, typically given during the first year of life. ''All of the doctors asked me 'Why wouldn't you vaccinate her? We haven't seen this disease in years,' '' said Walther, who now lives in Kentucky with her family.When she found out that Hib meningitis could lead to death, paralysis, seizures, hearing impairment and learning disorders, words could hardly describe how she felt. ''I was angry at my friend,'' she said. ''I was mad at all the doctors who were not able to answer my questions. And I was mad at myself for not getting more reliable information before my daughter was born.''NO LONGER ON THE FENCEMary Catherine was hospitalized and received antibiotics and blood transfusions. Walther used the time to speak with more doctors and do more research in Vanderbilt's library. By the time their daughter was discharged 10 days later, fully recovered and complications free, the Walthers had decided that Mary Catherine would get all recommended vaccinations.Health professionals say the Walthers story illustrates the importance of immunization. Vaccines, they say, have eliminated the threat of catching many once prevalent diseases.Some parents and advocacy groups, however, contend that vaccines have injured their children. Some choose not to vaccinate or do so selectively.''There are certain individuals with certain genetic profiles that can't handle certain vaccines,'' said Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, based in Vienna, Va. ''We believe that in the end biodiversity has to be acknowledged. Not everyone is going to have the same reaction to a drug, why wouldn't it be the same for vaccines?''School immunization laws were established to control outbreaks of smallpox, according to the National Network for Immunization Information based in Galveston, Texas. They have subsequently been used to avoid epidemics of vaccine-preventable contagious diseases, such as measles, whooping cough and polio.Currently, all 50 states have school immunization laws - although there are differences in what states require. As of May 2004, each state allows vaccination exemptions for medical reasons; 48 states allow exemptions for religious reasons, but Mississippi and West Virginia do not; and 20 states allow exemptions for philosophical reasons, including Louisiana and California.In most states, a child can attend school or day care without being vaccinated if a proper exemption is obtained. If an outbreak of a vaccine-preventable disease occurs, however, these children are often excluded from attending until the risk is over.CONVERN OVER MERCURY POISONINGA.J. Jillani said when his daughter, Savannah, was vaccinated 10 years ago, she received about five different shots that day.''We had expressed concerns that she might be getting too much mercury at one time,'' Jillani recalled. ''They pretty much laughed at us when we told them that.''Thimerosal - a mercury-containing compound that's used as a preservative to prevent bacterial and fungal contamination - is a concern for parents. It is nearly 50 percent mercury by weight and has been part of the manufacture of vaccines since the 1930s. Currently, all routine pediatric vaccines are manufactured without thimerosal. Other vaccines - such as influenza, tetanus and diphtheria - for older children and adults continue to contain thimerosal, though the influenza vaccine is available without it.Jillani, spokesman for the Charlotte, N.C.-based group People Advocating Vaccine Education, said he and his wife noticed a change in Savannah after she received those shots. She developed facial ticks and twitches and was later diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder.A research paper by physician Andrew Wakefield in 1998 established a link between measles, mumps and rubella - or MMR - vaccine and autism. However, additional research has been done since that refutes this claim, said Thomas Saari, a pediatrician and a member of the committee on infectious diseases for the American Academy of Pediatrics. ''They are unwilling to accept evidence,'' Saari said. ''How many papers will it take?''When the Jillanis' second daughter, Madison, was born, they decided not to vaccinate her at all. Madison, now 8, has been sick twice in her life and is a very healthy girl, Jillani said.''Scientists are always correcting their errors,'' he said. ''I and my kids are not going to be guinea pigs so they can make money off of this. I don't believe kids have to be soaked in pharmaceuticals to keep them alive.''DOWNFALL OF SUCCESSDr. Martin G. Myers, executive director of the National Network for Immunization Information, said the success of vaccines has led to some of the problems.''People don't see children paralyzed with polio or children who are deaf as a result of getting the measles,'' Myers said. ''The risk of diseases are real and the tragedy is waiting to occur.'' For instance, Myers said, ''we brag about the fact of the absence of certain diseases like diphtheria. One of the most common causes of childhood deaths in the early 20th century was diphtheria.''While Myers said he understands some children can't be vaccinated for medical reasons, ''I would prefer we didn't have any exemptions because it puts other people at risk.''Fisher, of the National Vaccine Information Center, believes the older DTP vaccine injured her oldest son, Chris, who is now 26. She said after he was given the third dose when he was 2 1/2 years old, he had severe diarrhea, became limp, was very weak and changed his personality changed. She said her once precocious, happy-go-lucky child, who loved books didn't want to read anymore and became learning disabled.She believes it was a pertussis toxin that made her son learning disabled. In 1991, a safer version of the vaccine - DTaP - was licensed for only the fourth and fifth doses in the series. In 1997, it was licensed for all five doses. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services says that the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program was established in 1988 because of reports of harmful side effects of the DTP vaccine, which posed major liability concerns for vaccine companies and healthcare providers. A coalition of physicians, public health organizations, leaders of industry, government representatives and private citizens developed the idea of a no-fault alternative to the tort system for resolving vaccine injury claims.Altom Maglio, a Sarasota, Fla., lawyer whose specialty includes vaccine injury cases, said it's hard to get compensation. The statute of limitations doesn't allow patients enough time to file, since an individual must make a claim within three years in the case of an injury, and two years if a death occurred.''If the onset of symptoms was six years ago,'' he said, ''we can't take the case.''He said his firm only takes on one of about every 25 cases that come to his office because the threshold of meeting the medical criteria for compensation is high.THE 'GOOD OLD DAYS'Fisher grew up in the 1950s and 1960s. She said she remembers when classmates got measles, mumps, rubella and chicken pox but that she believes there wasn't the incidence of learning disabled, autistic and attention deficit disorder that there is today.''The question becomes, 'Why are so many children chronically ill?' '' she said. Fisher admits that there are a multitude of reasons why those diseases have increased, however, she said vaccines shouldn't be excluded.Fisher has two younger children who she allowed to be vaccinated with everything except the pertussis vaccine.Pediatrician Saari has met and talked to Fisher about these issues and disagrees with her assessments.''For me, it's very personal,'' said Saari, a University of Wisconsin Medical School professor. ''I grew up in the age of polio. I lived through the polio epidemic. These diseases are all life threatening and can leave children harmed.''Saari said anecdotal evidence isn't good enough when one is deciding public health policy. Just because someone may have had the measles or mumps when they were younger and survived doesn't mean it's not harmful. Diseases like pertussis can easily come back to the population.''We don't want to return to the 'good old days,' '' when these diseases were prevalent, he said. ''The problem is when you have success, the vaccines are scrutinized more than the diseases they are meant to prevent. We have the luxury of doing that today.''Saari added that he has had his share of parents who have told him that if God means for their children to have a disease, then it's meant to be.''I used to tell these parents that they have never seen these diseases and the pain they can cause. I don't believe children were meant to get these diseases.''He said parents who opt their children out of vaccines and say their children have never been sick are just lucky. He takes issue with people who link vaccines to any number of other diseases ranging from multiple sclerosis and diabetes to asthma and autism.''These are diseases that don't have a known cause,'' he said. ''Then some people jump to the conclusion that it must be the vaccine since everyone gets vaccinated.''It's just a cop out.''(Marisa Osorio Colon writes for the New York Times Regional Newspapers.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LOVE PEOPLE AND USE THINGS -

NOT LOVE THINGS AND USE PEOPLE.Have nothing to do with the evil deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. Ephesians 5:11

"For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places." (Eph. 6:12).