Should your family be vaccinated for whooping cough?

[Guest guest]

Should your family be vaccinated for whooping cough?

 

By Bill Sardi

 

Government health authorities are calling for adults and children to be

vaccinated, or re-vaccinated for whooping cough. The reason: whooping cough is

on the rise, largely due to an antiquated vaccine that sometimes causes local

inflammation and fever that prevents children from receiving the entire series

of pertussis inoculations, and because the vaccine wears off over time among

adults who have never been exposed to this infection during childhood. Illegal

immigrants are a new risk group for pertussis since they may have never received

vaccines whatsoever.

 

In the 1940s more than 200,000 cases of whooping cough were reported annually,

with as many as 9,000 deaths. Eventually there were as few as 3,000 cases

annually and only a few deaths per year. But pertussis rates have risen in

recent years, to 7,000 to 10,000 cases annually, which has health authorities

concerned.

 

Fortunately there are newer vaccines that do not cause as much local swelling

and fever, so more children can successfully receive the entire course of

inoculations for pertussis. [Drugs 54: 189-96, 1997]

 

The new vaccine

 

Vaccines are not fool proof. The vaccines may not protect against variant

strains of pertussis. [Nede Tijdschr Geneeskd (Dutch) 148: 916-18, 2004] In many

instances in the US, children who were adequately vaccinated still develop

whooping cough. A study published in 1996 reveals that the old DTP vaccine only

worked 36 percent of the time among properly vaccinated children. The newer

vaccines claim a 76 to 90 percent rate of effectiveness. [New England Journal

Medicine 334: 341-48, 1996] The newer vaccine has been available since 1991 but

for unexplained reasons, has not been widely used. However, a report published

in the Archives of Pediatrics Adolescent Medicine surprisingly doesn’t predict a

cost savings for the new acellular vaccine ($4.36 billion) over the old

whole-cell vaccine ($4.47 billion), even though the new vaccine is reported to

work better. [Archives Pediatric Adolescent Medicine 154: 797-803, 2000]

 

Regardless of the type of vaccine used, immunity begins to wear off over a

period of a decade or so. Revaccination is required throughout life.

 

The greatest at-risk group, young infants under 6 months of age, is too young to

receive vaccines. A recent study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control

reveals that young infants from Hispanic families are at the greatest risk,

presumably because the disease is transmitted from their unvaccinated family

members who may have immigrated to the US from Mexico where vaccination rates

are low. [Pediatric Infectious Diseases Journal 22: 628-34, 2003] The

possibility that undocumented (and unvaccinated) immigrants may be spreading

diseases like whooping cough is politically charged.

 

Promoting vaccination

 

As health authorities begin a whooping cough vaccination program, the vaccine

companies will ramp up production of the vaccines, producing millions of doses

in anticipation of the public rolling up their sleeves for the series of

inoculations. Government health agencies will attempt to make sure the vaccine

makers yield a profit. Such a commitment predisposes the government to

over-promote the vaccine without recognition of its drawbacks.

The idea of recommending whooping cough vaccination to older adults, who often

have compromised immune systems, is untested. Pertussis vaccination among

retirees may be fraught with serious problems in this vulnerable population

group. However, expect many millions of retirees to willingly submit to

vaccination without question of its safety.

 

The stated rate of whooping cough is about 2.7 per 100,000 (2001), which means

999,997 people will undergo vaccination in the first year of a re-vaccination

program to prevent 3 cases of whooping cough. If the entire population of

children and adults were vaccinated and there was a 100% effectiveness rate,

about 17 lives would be saved per year, not counting a decline in the

effectiveness of the vaccine over time.

There are mover 200 million American adults, ranging in age from 10 to 60 years

of age, whose immunization may be wearing off and are potential candidates for

the new pertussis vaccine.

 

Let’s say the cost of the vaccine is $10 (not counting physician’s fees) and an

estimated 200 million Americans get vaccinated against pertussis. That would

amount to a cost of $2 billion. The vaccine begins to wear offer after about 10

years, so let’s assume over that 10-year period after vaccination some 100,000

cases of whooping cough (10,000 per year) and 170 deaths (17 per year) were

prevented. That would mean that vaccination would cost $1,176,000 to prevent one

death. Pertussis would still not be eradicated completely even with the best

vaccination program.

 

Treatment with antibiotics is problematic

 

What happens to the remaining people who get whooping cough because the vaccine

didn’t work? Pertussis can be successfully treated with antibiotics, usually

erythromycin. The problem is that erythromycin has just recently been found to

double the risk of sudden cardiac death (6 deaths per 10,000 users) and may

quintuple the risk if taken with some common drugs used by adults, such as

verapamil or diltiazem, both blood pressure drugs sold as generics and also

under various brand names (Verelan and Isoptin for verapamil, Cardizem and

Tiazac for diltiazem). Also the antibiotic clarithromycin (Biaxin) may cause the

same problems. [Associated Press Sept. 8, 2004; N Engl J Med. 2004 Sep

9;351(11):1089-96.

 

Even more troubling is the recent report of a pertusssis outbreak in a military

barracks who were treated with erythromycin. Many exposed military personnel

(35%) could not finish a 14-day course of erythromycin, mostly because of nausea

or diarrhea. [Military Medicine 169: 417-20, 2004] Some military personnel

required hospitalization. Unless medical personnel are trained to use alternate

antibiotics, erythromycin may traditionally be relied upon in a pertussis

outbreak with undesirable consequences. There is also the problem of antibiotic

resistance. The more antibiotics are relied upon, the more germs become

resistant to them. In one study, 35 percent of the S. pneumoniae germs were

resistant to erythromycin. [southern Medical Journal 96: 974-85, 2003] Overuse

of any antibiotic poses health problems down the line.

 

 

Fizzy vitamin C drinks are popular with children

 

Simple, inexpensive remedy

 

It’s possible that an antioxidant vitamin could be employed against pertussis.

In the 1950s there were numerous reports of vitamin C being effective against

pertussis. Some 60 years ago, M.J. Ormerod and Dr. M Unkauf of the University of

Manitoba reported that supplemental vitamin C shortens the duration of symptoms

of whooping cough with oral doses ranging from 150-500 milligrams per day.

[Canadian Medical Association Journal 37: 134-36, 1937] Decades ago Dr. Toshio

Otani of the Imperial University of Kyoto, in Japan, reported that 66 of 81

cases of whooping cough were successfully treated with relatively low-dose

vitamin C injections. [Klinische Wochenschrift 15: 1884-85, 1936] These reports

have fallen into obscurity.

 

We now know that greater concentrations of vitamin C can be achieved with oral

and intravenous doses of vitamin C than previously indicated. [Ann Intern Med.

2004 Apr 6;140:533-7]. It’s conceivable that humans of any age may endure a

short bout of pertussis with few symptoms by taking vitamin C supplements. But

medical authorities are less inclined to use vitamins over antibiotics, so don’t

anticipate hearing anything about conquering pertussis with vitamin C from your

doctor. But if you think this through carefully, the vaccine introduces a little

bit of the disease itself, and therefore it would be wise to take vitamin C

supplements before and after pertussus vaccination. Children receiving

diptheria/pertussis/tetanus shots (DPT) should be given extra vitamin C.

 

Whooping cough is on the rise, and no vaccine will eliminate it completely. The

habitual use of supplemental vitamin C may be a wise health measure in an age of

the re-appearance of once-conquered infectious diseases.

www.billsardi.com

 

 

Liquid vitamin C can be added to baby formula.

_________________

 

JoAnn Guest

mrsjoguest

DietaryTipsForHBP

www.geocities.com/mrsjoguest/Genes

 

 

 

 

 

AIM Barleygreen

" Wisdom of the Past, Food of the Future "

 

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