On Oct 21/13, the Citizen published an article about measles which said "A new analysis of the 2011 outbreak, which involved a surprising number of children who should have been protected against the virus..." (because they were vaccinated) suggested that they shouldn't be giving the vaccine to babies under a year old.
On Feb. 5/15, the Citizen published an article: "Measles Count in Ontario Rises" and, horror of horrors, it was discovered that "they had found a case, a woman who had never been vaccinated." That must mean that all the rest of the victims had been vaccinated because "Jaeger said whenever a measles case is found, public health investigates the immunization status of the person's household contacts" and presumably also the person with the measles.
This article ends with the statement "People born before 1970 - when measles vaccine use began - are assumed to have previously had measles." Which would have conferred immunity on them.
Having been born well before 1970, I remember when children had the measles in the measles season each year. Some medical doctors would take their children to visit those with measles so they would contract it and the parents would not have to worry about them getting the disease when they were older. German measles - Rubella - could potentially cause a threat to babies of pregnant women if the mothers had not had the disease during childhood.
Often after a child had a childhood disease, a growth spurt would ensue, and their immune system would become stronger. In an editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine it states: "One theory proposed to explain this increase in the prevalence of autoimmune and allergic diseases is that it results from a decrease in the prevalence of childhood infection."
Kids used to get the measles (mumps, chicken pox etc.) once in childhood. It usually was no big deal. Now when a few people get the measles (most of them probably having been immunized against it) it makes the headlines. Strange!
Diane Fuller
Prince George
