why vaccinated kids get those diseases

[Trillian]

Bx, as far as I know locally, there have been some cases around here in the past few years of children getting c-pox even if vaccinated and the odd case of shingles in adults (some of which have also had c-pox). Don't get me wrong, I"m not against vaccination by what I've said - heck I have 3 vaccinated children and a baby who was vacced till 6mths, I am choosing not to vaccinate any further for any of them. You just can't assume that even vaxed people are safe or wont become carriers is all my issue was in relation to the OP's 'theory' so I don't have links, just my mind thinking overtime . I won't be relying on herd immunity either because I think that's a pretty poor and lazy way to choose not to vacinate.

And since the chicken pox vaccine has been brought into the discussion, I have come full circle on that one. I was a staunch supporter of it and had my older three vaccinated for it even though it wasn't on the schedule for them, but in light of my own research I don't think it gives a strong enough protection for long enough.

[Lulu]

Um side question - can diseases truly die out?

[Nai]

Um side question - can diseases truly die out?

To this day, smallpox is the only human infectious disease to have been completely eradicated. Apart from the samples of it that they have stored in 2 sites in the USA & Russia..... biological warfare anyone?

[paradise lost]

That's why it's not been offered in the UK so far Trillian, the NHS cannot AFFORD to blanket-vaccinate with an ineffective vaccine, and i think the varicella vaccine efficacy is the lowest at around 80%, though as i said, of the 20% who aren't immune after vaccination, they do seem (anecdotally to me, because i've not looked for any studies) to get less severe attacks. Unlike Dach i didn't find the pox too bad and certainly not bad enough to go out of my way to vax for (she'd have to be offered catch-up as it wasn't on her schedule), but if the 80% who don't get chickenpox after vaccination ALSO can't get shingles, it really *might* be worth it for DD.

Bx

[paradise lost]

Lulu, yes. Like any living thing, they can become extinct. Smallpox is extinct in the living population, though it exists as a bilogical weapon (allegedly, though it's almost certainly true).

When you get measles, while you have the disease it is multiplying like crazy in you and getting out via liquid droplets (in sneezes, coughs and your breath) to other people. If they inhale it and are not immune (through vaccination or previous exposure) they get infected. However, your body launches an attack on the measles cells and kills them all, and you get better. If enough people are vaccinated that there is no-one for your measles to infect then it dies out.

Polio is on the verge of eradication right now, which is tremendously fantastic news.

Bx

[Phteven]

Diseases can die out like any other living thing.
One example is a disease called The Sweats that killed large numbers every summer in Medieval Europe. Now its disappeared.
Of course it might exist in tiny pocket rather than being totally extinct just as some animal and plant populations do.
Of course human agency makes them more likely to die out - same as other life forms.

[Lulu]

So how did smallpox get eradicated do you know? Why not more diseases? Good to see Polio go, my mum put the fear of gd into me about that, made me watch I Can Jump Puddles.....

and The Sweats, I wonder what happened to get rid of that so long ago?

[Nai]

Smallpox was eradicated through vaccination.

[paradise lost]

Yup, smallpox was the first disease to be eradicated through vaccination. Guinea-worm disease, which is caused by a parasite, is close to eradication, but there's no vaccine, it's being eradicated by implementing safe drinking water and teaching people how to avoid it. Once it dies out it will be the first parasitic disease to be eradicated without vaccine or cure (pretty amazing). The guinea worm relies on humans as part of its life cycle, it HAS to pass through it's human-reliant phase every year, so once everyone stops getting it it will die out.

Polio is being eradicated by vaccine. The main obstacles to eradication are under-reporting (in remote areas where there are no doctors so those with polio see no-one who could report and implement vaccination), conflict (when areas become wartorn Unicef and the Red Cross, who are key players in the WHO's work on vaccination of populations, often have their vaccination programme's interrupted). The WHO has marked measles for eradication in the USA by 2010, but because of parents declining the vaccine it's unlikely now that they'll hit that target. Many of the diseases still in existence today would have been eradicated by now if every person who could have been vaccinated had been.

Bx