Posted on 07/01/2005 5:27:57 PM PDT by neverdem
ATLANTA, June 30 - To reduce the rising number of whooping cough cases in this country, a panel advising the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended Thursday that a new booster vaccine be routinely given to all 11- and 12-year-olds.
During a two-day meeting here, the 15-member panel, known as the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, also strengthened recommendations on vaccines against hepatitis B and chickenpox.
The booster vaccine for whooping cough, or pertussis, is needed because immunity to it wanes 5 to 10 years after the initial vaccination. But an additional shot will not be needed because the new vaccine would be part of a booster routinely given for diphtheria and tetanus.
Current recommendations call for vaccination against whooping cough, diphtheria and tetanus at 2 months old, 4 months, 6 months, 15 t0 18 months and 4 to 6 years. In the past, no whooping cough vaccine was licensed for use past the age of 7.
In addition to those who are 11 and 12, adolescents from 13 to 18 who have missed a booster or received an older diphtheria-tetanus booster should receive the new vaccine, the panel said.
Whooping cough, a bacterial infection, is most severe among infants, who contract it from adolescents and adults. In 2004, more than 19,000 cases were reported in the United States. This figure contrasts with a low of 1,020 cases in 1976.
The Food and Drug Administration recently licensed two vaccines to provide combined protection against the three diseases. Boostrix from GlaxoSmithKline was licensed in May for use in children ages 10 to 18. Adacel from Sanofi Pasteur was licensed on June 10 for people ages 11 to 64. Recommendations for pertussis vaccines among adults will be considered later.
In an effort to eliminate the liver disease hepatitis B from this...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Here we go again. Recommending putting foreign substances into children's bodies. Children are fast becoming the druggies of this country and not of their own free will.
I'll add to the above statement with this, also from the N.Y.Times: ROCKVILLE, Md., June 30 - Federal health officials said Thursday that they were looking into a suggestion by a small Texas study that Ritalin and other stimulant drugs given to children might increase their risk of cancer later in life.
The cemeteries of the nineteenth century are filled with the short graves of children. Kids used to die from diphtheria, measles, whooping cough, scarlet fever, and tetanus. Now they don't. I'll keep on vaccinating my children, thanks.
While you are at it, don't forget the Ritalin.
There's a big difference between drugging up a child to make him behave in a manner that's convenient for you, and taking steps to save his life. Take a stroll through a country graveyard sometime, or go to a courthouse to read the coroner's office records, and you'll see how very many children used to die from communicable diseases that are no longer a problem in this country. The death rate for children used to be 20%. There's probably not much chance of that happening in America today, since everybody else except you has his child vaccinated and few such diseases circulate. But if we all stopped vaccinating, death rates would slowly rise again. Then our kids' morbidity and mortality rates would look much different from the numbers in ghastly Third World hellholes.
Full disclosure: I make my living by taking part in research for the US Public Health Service. I went to medical school. So I'm biased against kids dying from preventable diseases.
And I suppose, you are in favor of giving kids the flu vaccine, just in case there is an epidemic.When was that last time there was a so-called flu epidemic? And, what are the chances that the flu vaccine is the right vaccine for the strain? And, how many studies have been done to see if all these vaccines shot into children lead to diseases later in life? By the way, I believe the studies would be slanted in order to not bring negativity to the immunization system. Kind of like ignoring the fact that there is evidence that women who have had an abortion have a high risk of getting breast cancer. It is all politics which revolves around money.
Here, Here! Nice to see some common sense. Put on your flak jacket, however. These kinds of threads bring out the anti-vaccination crowd.
And, the Scientologists!
>rimshot
Yes, I am in favor of giving at-risk children and adults flu vaccine. Anyone who loves children would agree if he had the experience of watching a baby die of influenza. My son and I get it because we have asthma, and just one bout with the flu, with hospitalizations for both of us, was enough for me to say, Never again. Considering that tens of millions of people have respiratory disease in this country, vaccinating them is a sound medical choice.
And, how many studies have been done to see if all these vaccines shot into children lead to diseases later in life?
It would be very difficult to do a study on how the vaccines affect children in later life when the children haven't yet reached later life.
By the way, I believe the studies would be slanted in order to not bring negativity to the immunization system. Kind of like ignoring the fact that there is evidence that women who have had an abortion have a high risk of getting breast cancer. It is all politics which revolves around money.
Of course you would believe that. You're quite right. Clever of you to have figured it out. Yes, all of us involved with biomedical research got into it for money, politics, and sheer power. We don't care a whit for human life and health. All those nights at the lab, those years of struggling in poverty, the Thanksgivings we gave up to wait for some crucial to finish--it was just for politics. We have no integrity, no dedication to the truth at all. And we would never dream of writing an honest scholarly paper.
Only difficult because the industry doesn't want to. To claim that the children haven't grown up yet is an assinic statement. Children have been given vaccinations for decades. I was even given vaccinations and I am an adult. All those nights at the lab, those years of struggling in poverty
Now you got me crying. NOT! Years in poverty? Give me a break. Sounds like a liberal who interprets poverty to be anything that prevents them from having everything they want.
But vaccines change all the time. There's no way to test the long-term effect of a flu vaccine that's only administered once.
All those nights at the lab, those years of struggling in poverty Now you got me crying. NOT! Years in poverty? Give me a break. Sounds like a liberal who interprets poverty to be anything that prevents them from having everything they want.
Of course--that's the classic rebuttal: if you disagree with someone, call her a liberal. That takes care of the problem nicely. As it happens, when I was doing my graduate work I had a $4000-a-year stipend and lived in the ghetto. Finding 35 cents for a cup of coffee was a major triumph. I am 5'10" tall and my weight went down to 112 pounds due to overwork and lack of food. I am not asking for your sympathy--heaven forfend!--but it's evident I did not go into the field to get rich. Nor am I rich now; my income is modest. Your suggestion that biomedical research is done for politics and/or money is ludicrous. If one wants to get rich, there are preferable ways.
Your posts make several things clear, to me and to other posters on this thread. First, you are determined not to let mere logic stand in the way of your beliefs; second, that you have no experience with research, either in experimental design or statistical analysis; third, that you have no graduate-level education with the hard-science areas. It would be the course of dignity and reason to consider an alternative point of view.
I am not referring to only flu vaccines. I am referring to all those drugs that you have administered to your children and also the states mandate that children have before they get into school. How many drugs are yanked off the market because someone gets sick or dies? It doesn't take years for it to happen but immunizations continue on. Your suggestion that biomedical research is done for politics and/or money is ludicrous.
I am not suggesting that it ALL is done for politics/money. However, even the so-called uneducated such as I can see what drives research. Let me give you a recent example. E-coli. When was the first time this came to light? 1999 or thereabouts? How many cases? One. At a fast food restaurant. Where are we today? Take a gander at this site: http://www.ecoliblog.com/Archives/001065.html So, in closing I will say that it doesn't take a person with a shingle to read and observe, but granted, it does take one with a shingle to do research. I give researchers credit for their work but I still believe that a lot of research is funded by utilizing scare tactics on the public and that is wrong.
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