Home safe and some pondering on vaccines

[mamagotcha]

We're back safe and sound, the van is unloaded, and the cats have shown their disdain at the return of the dog. We tried to go see the Midnight Circus at Daley Plaza, but only got there for the last 30 seconds of the finale. Still, we had a nice outing in the brisk autumn air. Hardly any trick-or-treaters here tonight, and Linc made a huge haul (that he kindly shared with his big brother). Bill made some cinnamon rolls, and I've been puttering around unpacking, reading magazines, and fooling around on the computer.

I've been seeing posts about that WIRED article about vaccines, and had several people questioning my decision process about choosing not to vaccinate my own children.

For those who are new to the story... I dutifully took Cordell in at the age of 4 months for his first round of shots (this was at the recommendation of the family practice doctors who provided care for the clients of the midwives who did my homebirth). He was given several shots that day, including MMR and DTP, and within a day he had a very high fever, with bright eyes, red cheeks, and no crying... he just sat there and didn't move for several days. I know I called and asked about this reaction, and was told that it was perfectly normal, everything was fine, don't worry about it.

This set off every alarm bell in my new-mama brain, and I finally started doing some serious research about vaccines. I dug through the UCD library (the internet as we know it wasn't around 21 years ago), asked a lot of friends and professionals about their experiences, and finally concluded that I didn't want to muck around with my baby's developing immune system. Like circumcision, I figured I could do it later if I changed my mind... but I could never, ever undo it, and until I was certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was the right thing to do (and fully willing to accept the risks and consequences), I wasn't going to do it.

I have one particularly strong memory of that time. I asked another mom who had given birth around the same time as me what she thought of vaccinations... she was an experienced veterinarian, who worked with valuable racehorses. She said she wasn't going to vaccinate her babies until they had weaned, just as no veterinarian would dare to upset a foal's developing immune system before weaning. This reasoning resonated with me at a deep level.

When I look for studies comparing the rates of SIDS, autoimmune problems (allergies, arthritis, asthma, Crohn's, diabetes, eczema) and neurological disorders (autism, Asperger's, ADHD) between vaccinated and unvaccinated populations, it seems that there is very little to be found. I did see the Generation Rescue survey, focusing on the increased rate of NDs among vaccinated boys, and a study showing an increase of diabetes corresponding to the increase of vaccinations. Then I see sites like this, and wonder how valid those statistics are...

This call for a federally funded look at the long-term effects of vaccinations is extremely heartening to me. Perhaps my reluctance to vaccinate will, if nothing else, help provide a larger sample for Science to settle the answer once and for all.

The whole "FEAR" thing feels inappropriate to me... not only do I think my not-vaxing was a very careful and studied reaction to something that very easily COULD have been entirely dictated by fear, but I was amused by a front-page article in USA Today that quoted a pediatric clinic worker as saying that parents were "in a panic," resulting in a lot of verbal abuse. Seems to me the fear is kinda working the other way...

As I look through discussions, the terms "pro-disease" and "anti-vaccine" really irk me, too... the whole "pro-abortion" thing over again. Raising emotions and using inflammatory rhetoric won't help anything. Nobody is "pro-disease," we are instead choosing a different set of risks to assume than those who accept the whole (or partial) vaccination schedule from their physicians.

There isn't even really an agreement on when the human immune system is fully developed... I can find sources saying 6-8 months, 7-8 years, and 14 years. The 7-8 years sounds most likely to me, because that's around the time human children would wean naturally, and so the fully developed immune system would coincide with the loss of immune support from mama milk.

My thinking was that Julia and Cordell's systems were developed enough when they both decided to become vaccinated in the last few years (Cordell so he could go to Japan, Julia for her entry into Clark), and this was confirmed when I spoke with our family physician at that time. Clay is old enough to make his own health decisions, too; we will of course help him get whatever vaccines he decides to do.

I don't think Lincoln is ready yet, although I do think he's far closer to it than he was when he was younger. I might do something like pertussis or measles if those start going around, and I would definitely look into specific vaccines if we were going to travel overseas. I would consider doing H1N1, but I suspect that he has probably already had it... I know he (and I) have been exposed at least twice on this trip to cases who were later confirmed H1N1, and he (and I) didn't come down with anything (he also had vomiting, fever and a cough for a few days just before we moved, and I had a similar but less nasty case right after). I'd rather he caught wild chickenpox, but will revisit that once he's heading into puberty.

Anyway, I wanted to put all this into one place, since I've been typing out versions of it recently and thought it would be nice to have a link.

ETA: jedusor has one of those conversations going on over in her LJ.

Comments

[misterajc.livejournal.com]

The problem is that by not vaccinating your kids, you are putting other people's kids at risk, as well as your own. Please have the good manners to keep your potential disease carriers away from public places.

Generally I am in favor of a parents' to refuse medical treatment for their kids as it helps remove stupid genes from the gene pool, but I actually like you and your family so I think you owe them better than that.

[mh75.livejournal.com]

Katje,
You may not have chosen not to vaccinate out of fear, but i don't think that it is incorrect to say that there are people out there who are selling non-vaccination through fear. Frankly, i think every 'horror' story about vaccination is selling non-vaccination through fear - telling some horror story about how your kid was diagnosed with autism shortly after receiving vaccinations without any sort of scientific context really is using fear to sell your viewpoint, and people who make their choices based on those types of stories are making choices out of fear. I don't suppose people who try to encourage vaccination through the horror story of their own kid dying after being exposed to a non-vaccinated person are any better, although i do think that side of the argument needs more exposure.

(My one gripe with what you have decided is that it works as well as it does, in part, because you still live in a society where the vast majority of people are vaccinated. I'm pretty convinced that a personalized modified schedule is probably the best of all possible choices, but i still think that the general recommendations that we have vaccination programs are well founded and supportable.)

It really seems to me that the people who have the education, intelligence, and access to make a truly informed decision are less common than those who do. I suppose i may be quite vain in assuming that i am one of those people, but the more i read about arguments on this and other scientific 'controversies' the more i am convinced that it is true.

I actually thought the article did a pretty good job of exposing how complex the situation is without being particularly inflammatory.

[eub.livejournal.com]

Like circumcision, I figured I could do it later if I changed my mind... but I could never, ever undo it

I would just note that no decision can be unmade. You can always vaccinate later, but you can't undo what may happen before that vaccination -- if the child contracts a preventable disease, or shows no symptoms but passes rubella to a pregnant friend, or to a stranger whom you never know.

Our minds have a natural tendency to see the potential consequences of taking an action -- especially regrets, I think -- more sharply than we see the consequences of non-action, of the status quo. You have corrected for this tendency in weighing the decision, no doubt, yourself; I only suggest we bring it clearly into these conversations, as well.

[uncanny-npl.livejournal.com]

And this is why mothers go mad. I quite literally can't count the number of times I've second-guessed myself on every action I took--or didn't take--during the seventeen years of my daughter's life. I know more about the autism/vaccination controversy than I would ever have wished to learn, and right now I'm feeling just sadly, wearily grateful that I don't have to think about it anymore. For the record, the vaccine issue's been raised, discredited, raised again, on and on, for at least the last fifteen years. Add to this the *dozens* of other theories of causation that keep making their way into the public imagination. (Read this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_autism

and you'll get an idea of what I mean; my own personal favorite possible autism cause: "rain".)

And don't get me started on all the various newfound "cures" that make it to the cover of Newsweek every few months. Those stories will kill you faster than anything.

Which is not to say you should stop the debate. Just try to keep in mind, as you're arguing with each other, that we're all doing the best we can with what little we know.