Leery of Vaccine, Some Parents Hold 'Chickenpox Parties'

Fox News ^ | 10/19/2001

[CholeraJoe]

PITTSBURGH

[Sabertooth]

I'm aware of the risk of shingles, my only point was that the parents who are doing the chicken pox parties aren't relying on herd immunity.

Those parents are incredibly selfish, as you correctly stated.

[537 Votes]

sicky sicky sicky, they must all home school also.

Where, unlike you, they learn to capitalize and punctuate?

[Ronnie Radford]

My parents exposed my to chicken pox when I was about 4. They told me I was going to get the chicken pox and took me to my friends house to play. He had little red spots on his face and looked a little weak, but I didn't mind. When my parents told me that I had to leave I started to cry. They asked me what was wrong, and I said "Where's the ckicken box, you told me I was going to get the chicken box." Apparently, the chicken box was something I really wanted.

[Trust but Verify]

Should we take our risks with Strept throat rather than be treated.

Good point. My 11 year-old nephew had strep develop into Rheumatic Fever. Took the stupid doctors in their town forever to correctly diagnose it. He now faces open heart surgery to replace a heart valve that was damaged. I say take the medicine whatever way you can; either prophylactically or for curative reasons. That's why God let scientists develop these treatments!

[trifona]

chicken pox nearly killed me when I was 9. My immune system turned against my islet cells turning me into a Juvenile Diabetic. In a matter of days I lost 30 pounds. I became unconscious and then was transported into the pedeatric ICU. My blood sugar was >1500 (normal is 100). Wasn't supposed to live through the night, but by some miracle I was spared. I spent 2 weeks in the hospital, and contracted pneumonia. Reading this thread has touched me emotionally in a way i havent felt before. The chicken pox gave me a walking death sentence. Now in my mid twenties I wear a pager sized insulin pump. It is the only thing that separates me from death. I remember the day i contracted the chicken pox, I wish I could forget it.

[snooter55]

This is silly. How come you quarentine someone with
chickenpox and let AIDS carriers run rampent ?!?!?
Someone please explain this to me !
Snooter

[okie_tech]

"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."

There's nothing new or weird about this, and it really has nothing to do with vaccines. It's been going on for ages. Much better to get it and get it over with when you are young, even better to get it when it's convienent for the parents and planned for when the kids aren't kept home from school.

[Dan Day]

Yeah, right. Rule #1: Steal Arab land.

Yup. The kids were peeved at the adults purposely infecting them with chickenpox, so they arranged for their parents to catch Herpes.

[Dan Day]

This is silly. How come you quarentine someone with chickenpox and let AIDS carriers run rampent ?!?!? Someone please explain this to me !

Because Chickenpox is spread by casual contact (i.e., just being in the same room is enough), whereas AIDS is not.

[BruceS]

Back in the 60's (or late 50's) my Mom did this to my brothers and I. As soon as one of us showed the symptoms, we were all (4 of us) put in the same room until we all got it at once. This wasn't because she was afraid of vaccines - as soon as the mumps vaccine came out, we all went to the Douglas County Nebraska Health Office and got our vaccines. None of us has had any problems with after-effects of chickenpox or has had mumps.

Frankly, I think it is stupid to expose your kids to a disease when there is a relatively safe vaccine (relatively safe meaning that the risk of death is greater for the disease than the vaccine).

[Rebelbase]

My #1 son got a mild case of the chicken pox. #2 son soon followed and got the worst case the doctor said he had seen in 30 years. Its been 6 years and he still has pox scars on his body.

[HamiltonJay]

The medical importance of chickenpox should be stressed. There are approximately 250 deaths per year in the United States from this infection. For the normal child, chickenpox-associated mortality is less than 2 per 100,000 cases.

Immunocompromised children, particularly those with leukemia, have more numerous lesions, often with a hemorrhagic base. Healing takes nearly three times longer in this population. [39] These children are at greater risk for visceral complications, which occur in 30 to 50% of cases and can be fatal in as many as 15% of cases.

Hogwash to you sir, 40 deaths per year from Chicken Pox, amoung childred! The rest are adults, of those 40 the vast majority have auto immune or other sever conditions when they contracted the virus.

When 40 is places over the Millions of cases per year of children infected with the chicken pox, you get a statistically irrelevant number. However 13 (deaths with links to the vaccine) over the total innoculations, you still get a statistically small number. But it is larger than the death rate for those contracting the disease naturally. This Vaccine is nothing more than a convience shot, for parents who would rather not have to miss a week of work, nothing more.

[cajungirl]

Ham, did you read all of the above posts. No one gets a vaccine so they won't have to take off work. Have you lost your mind? Parents get kids vaccines to protect their current health and future health. Read what some of the people above say about their pox,,it didn't kill them but boy was it terrible. Why not spare a kids that? And what kind of woman do you think most mothers are. The non vaccinators seem kind of loopy to me.

[FITZ]

I spent 4 months of my senior year in high school in bed,

That's why I exposed my kids to chickenpox when they were 1 or 2 years old, 4 at the oldest. It's a minor disease for small children but bad for adults.

[Logophile]

My own practice is to try to avoid any medical treatment that hasn't been in use for at least 100 years. The most effective and most trustworthy drugs are those based on naturally occuring substances that were known and used by paleolithic peoples.

I seem to recall reading that the life expectancy among "paleolithic peoples" was on the order of 30 years.

What naturally occuring drugs known to the ancients were effective against polio, rabies, plague, or smallpox?

[JenB]

My own practice is to try to avoid any medical treatment that hasn't been in use for at least 100 years. The most effective and most trustworthy drugs are those based on naturally occuring substances that were known and used by paleolithic peoples.

Yeah? What about penicillin and other drugs? If it weren't for modern medicine, I would have gone blind in one eye. A brother of mine would be dead. Diabetics would have a two, maybe three year life expectancy. Sure, nothing's perfect, but it's a heck of a lot better!

[JenB]

Wow, sorry about the double post. Obviously you have a superior intellect!

[NC_Libertarian]

I hear Condit throws some HIV parties every now and again.

[mag]

Most children who die from chicken pox, do so because of the high fever...an old family physician of ours told us to give ice cream to a child with fever and if its the chicken pox they will immediately breakout with the pustules...my 2 yr old granddaughter got the pox from my 70 yr old mom who had the worst case of shingles we had ever seen. Mom had them so bad we had to hospitalize her for the pain. At the onset of fever i gave my grnddtr some ice cream and within about an hour she broke out with the chicken pox and the fever left...of course prayer was also employed. Today at the age of 3 she has no scars! An ounce of common sense works wonders and prayer works miracles..peace