Religious School - Measles Outbreak

[tropaka]

This time in B.C.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014 ... chool.html

A British Columbia school has been temporarily closed amid fears the extremely contagious measles virus could have infected as many as 100 students, the Chief Medical Health Officer for the area says.

There have been two confirmed cases of the potentially fatal disease — which is preventable — in the greater community of Chilliwack, 100 kilometres east of Vancouver.

Dr. Paul Van Buynder said the outbreak hasn’t spread further into the wider community, as the students at the Mount Cheam Christian School have returned to their homes.

“What we don’t know is if it will leak into the community,†he said in an interview.

The students are members of a Christian Reformed congregation.

The school’s principal declined to comment to the Star.

Van Buynder said he’s frustrated that 25 to 30 per cent of the surrounding community isn’t vaccinated against measles even though there are readily available and free vaccines.

Measles can cause fever, a rash, brain inflammation, pneumonia, brain damage, blindness, deafness and even death. It’s particularly dangerous for toddlers and infants.

Van Buynder has issued a warning to the Fraser East communities of Abbotsford, Mission, Chilliwack, Agassiz, Harrison Hot Springs and Hope.

“That’s not enough to provide herd immunity,†Van Buynder said.

“We supposedly had eradicated measles.â€

Since measles has an incubation period of a couple of weeks, it’s too early to assess the scope of the problem, he said.

There have been recent outbreaks in Orthodox Protestant groups in Holland, as well as in India and the Philippines, Van Buynder said.

“We get sporadic access all of the time from people who go and visit these places and bring it back,†Van Buynder said.

Van Buynder said he’s thankful the school cancelled a planned trip to Haiti, which would have had potentially disastrous results to fellow airline passengers and people in Haiti.

“They cancelled the trip to Haiti,†he said. “That (the trip) would have been an absolute nightmare.â€

All residents who may have been exposed to the virus are strongly urged not to travel during the spring break.

Van Buynder said he’s extremely frustrated that some people take their cues on vaccination from conspiracy theorists and celebrities on the Internet rather than listen to medical professionals.

“We have a whole lot of pseudo-science,†he said.

“Parents are focused on stories they hear or read on the Internet,†he said.

He said that parents become confused with conflicting information, and end up doing nothing.

“They take the path of least resistance, which is not to vaccinate,†he said.

[Rebelwife]

OMG, can you imagine if they'd actually gotten on a plane to Haiti, of all places. It would be the UN workers bringing cholera all over again. :angry-banghead:

[Swamptribe]

Was watching the news last night, and they are afraid there is a case of polio among the Syrian refugees. UNICEF is supposedly running around like crazy trying to make sure that children fleeing the fighting in Syria have been vaccinated. They are terrified of outbreaks of disease in refugee camps. In this case, pending confirmation, there may be a case of polio. It' involves an infant daughter, and a mother who already lost her husband and two sons to the fighting. Horribly tragic, but this is happening in a WAR ZONE not in the supposedly civilized suburbs.

[Talitha Cumi]

Was watching the news last night, and they are afraid there is a case of polio among the Syrian refugees. UNICEF is supposedly running around like crazy trying to make sure that children fleeing the fighting in Syria have been vaccinated. They are terrified of outbreaks of disease in refugee camps. In this case, pending confirmation, there may be a case of polio. It' involves an infant daughter, and a mother who already lost her husband and two sons to the fighting. Horribly tragic, but this is happening in a WAR ZONE not in the supposedly civilized suburbs.

POLIO??? Holy fuck.

As for measles, I feel terrible for the kids, but not the parents.

[salex]

This time in B.C.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014 ... chool.html

I wonder if it will take some of their kids dying or going blind for them to get over this, or if even that will not change their mind. Thinking of the family that lost 2 kids to trying to cure them by prayer, I wonder if anything will change their minds.

[Swamptribe]

Yeah, polio. I'm old enough to have gone to school with children in braces from having had polio. I honestly think some of these people think these diseases aren't 'real' anymore. They haven't seen the damage outbreaks cause, so in there minds, it's not really a problem.

One of the real problems with fundies is that they do not look at the world in any normal way. To them, such suffering is caused by sin or by not having the right kind of faith. They are detached from reality.

[Cleopatra7]

POLIO??? Holy fuck.

As for measles, I feel terrible for the kids, but not the parents.

All it takes is one international traveller to bring polio to the US. Honestly, I think the only thing that will convince some parents to vaccinate will be to see a modern child (not one from 50 or 60 years ago) in an iron lung.

[Rebelwife]

Yeah, polio. I'm old enough to have gone to school with children in braces from having had polio. I honestly think some of these people think these diseases aren't 'real' anymore. They haven't seen the damage outbreaks cause, so in there minds, it's not really a problem.

My father tells stories about his childhood summers where they'd be outbreaks in the neighborhood, public pools and other spaces closing, parents frantically and obsessively watching their children for symptoms, etc. He also talks about having recurring nightmares where he'd wake up convinced he was experiencing early symptoms.

I don't think people have any real conception of how bad a real polio outbreak could be. (And this is coming from someone who selectively delayed some vaccinations under my dr's supervision because my child had some health concerns.)

[NotALoserLikeYou]

So, not that it's something I'm particularly proud of, but I used to be heavily into attachment parenting including not vaccinating. I used to go to Dr. Sears, the one is on TVs The Doctors, whose father wrote all the books and whose brother specifically wrote The Vaccine Book. In my corner of the world it was very common to not vaccinate. And I still support a parents right to not vaccinate and to delay vaccines on an alternative schedule. But as I've moved through life I became really offended by the anti vax crowd. So many are self righteous and just too privileged to see any differently. They really judge those who vaccinate and many would not vaccinate no matter what you put in front of them. Half are religious who think we are messing with gods plan and half are non religious who think we are messing with nature. I had a good friend who said measles was even good for a child's development. A lot of them still post on FB about vaccines and how they make people sicker. But I am happy to report that many are choosing to start vaccinating their kids as they get older, probably because their initial fear was that vaccinating a baby would cause autism and now they've "aged out" of that.

[GeoBQn]

My mom's cousin had polio. I assume it's the reason that my mom decided that she wanted to be a physical therapist for special needs children when she was 8 years old.

[snarkopolis]

I'm all for the right not to vaccinate. I'm not for the right to spread a potentially fatal or life altering disease among the unsuspecting public because YOU believe something. Herd protection only goes so far.

[ThatSnark]

Ugh. My background is in geriatric medical social work; when I worked in nursing homes and home health in 1990s Alabama, I had many older clients who suffered from decades-old aftereffects of these diseases. Polio paralysis, blindness/sight impairment from measles, disfigurement from smallpox. Taking family histories, these people counted themselves the lucky ones as the survivors, since nearly all of them had lost siblings and parents to these diseases.

I think if more people saw the very real consequences of having a child go through these preventable catastrophic illnesses, they would make the choice to vaccinate. Maybe it's going to take another go-round this generation to convince people. *sigh*

[ADoyle90815]

Ugh. My background is in geriatric medical social work; when I worked in nursing homes and home health in 1990s Alabama, I had many older clients who suffered from decades-old aftereffects of these diseases. Polio paralysis, blindness/sight impairment from measles, disfigurement from smallpox. Taking family histories, these people counted themselves the lucky ones as the survivors, since nearly all of them had lost siblings and parents to these diseases.

I think if more people saw the very real consequences of having a child go through these preventable catastrophic illnesses, they would make the choice to vaccinate. Maybe it's going to take another go-round this generation to convince people. *sigh*

Unfortunately, it might take another go-around of these diseases to convince some people to vaccinate, especially if they saw what polio does to people. One issue is that mumps for those past puberty can cause sterility, which isn't usually noticed until adulthood and the person tries to have children of their own.

[teachergirl]

Have you ever noticed how many of them are so blase about pertussis? Raising Olives just had it go through her whole house and they think it is no big deal. They would if it took the life of one of their children.

[Stephanie66]

Have you ever noticed how many of them are so blase about pertussis? Raising Olives just had it go through her whole house and they think it is no big deal. They would if it took the life of one of their children.

I was so terrified of pertussis that I got an adult booster. I do not want to cough so hard that I pee my pants for two months.

[freedomjesusfootball]

I'm 30 and I have treated several patients with post-polio syndrome--terrible scoliosis, braces from ankle to thigh, just horrible, chronic problems. I sincerely hope that it never becomes an issue again, even if it may teach some smug anti-vaxers a lesson.

[paganhomeschooler]

I was so terrified of pertussis that I got an adult booster. I do not want to cough so hard that I pee my pants for two months.

It sucks. I have deduced that's why I was actually sick for 3 months last year. :embarrassed: It didn't sound like the babies on the commercial, so I figured I just had something nasty that was triggering my asthma along with the stress of moving and unpacking and such. Here, a friend posted a "please vaccinate" link on FB a couple months ago, and they had a link that said pertussis sounds different in adults. I watched the video, and it was the hell I had had. I had all of my boosters through high school. Still got whooping cough. I couldn't even go up and down the stairs without a coughing fit....which sucks in an old, drafty, 3 story farm house in January!

If someone thought pertussis was no big deal, I would beg to question if they really had that diagnosis. It was bad enough me going through it. I can't imagine watching one of my kids suffer like that!

[Jess]

My Mother decided to become anti-vaccines when I was 6 so I didn't receive all my vaccines. Its has been a nightmare trying to get everything and keep up with it all as an adult. It didn't help that at almost 18 when I went to the family doctor to get caught up. She lied to me and said I had all my vaccines. A few years later when i was planning to leave the country I went to a travel clinic and found out I would have had to have been missing the majority of my vaccines.

I decided to switch doctors to someone my mother didn't know. My now ex-family doctor "lost" my medical chart and tried to claim I wasn't a patient. After several calls I managed to finally get her office to send it to my new doctor and it showed up missing pages including any references to vaccines. She ended up claiming she had never given me any vaccines at all, even though I remember getting a few up until 1st grade.

This lead to needing to get blood drawn for tests to figure out what shots I needed at $55 a pop because insurance wouldn't cover it.

On top of that I still ended up getting whooping cough last year.

[YPestis]

Hubby ended up in a hospital as a baby because a kid at their church was not vaccinated for measles. Hubby had not completed his MMR shots yet. I'm glad the anti-vax family managed to avoid all those nasty shots for their child. Too bad their actions led to another child getting even more sick. I wonder if anti-vaxxers ever think through the consequences of their actions.....

[Sumeri]

So, not that it's something I'm particularly proud of, but I used to be heavily into attachment parenting including not vaccinating. I used to go to Dr. Sears, the one is on TVs The Doctors, whose father wrote all the books and whose brother specifically wrote The Vaccine Book. In my corner of the world it was very common to not vaccinate. And I still support a parents right to not vaccinate and to delay vaccines on an alternative schedule. But as I've moved through life I became really offended by the anti vax crowd. So many are self righteous and just too privileged to see any differently. They really judge those who vaccinate and many would not vaccinate no matter what you put in front of them. Half are religious who think we are messing with gods plan and half are non religious who think we are messing with nature. I had a good friend who said measles was even good for a child's development. A lot of them still post on FB about vaccines and how they make people sicker. But I am happy to report that many are choosing to start vaccinating their kids as they get older, probably because their initial fear was that vaccinating a baby would cause autism and now they've "aged out" of that.

Yep, I could have written this. I was exactly the same way with my older son - who was born in 1995 and attended Waldorf schools as a small child. Honestly, it was really rare for parents to vaccinate in our circle, and this was in the days pre-Jenny Mc Carthy. Also, I was vaccine damaged as a child (from the old-old pertussis shot, we're talking back in the 60's) so I felt very justified with my beliefs. He had the "biggies" (like polio) but no DPT, MMR, etc. The thought among my crowd was that these were illnesses that are no big deal! and if your kid gets them you just keep them at home!

But when my son was about three he got RSV, and in the hospital we met a doctor from India who handed my ass to me about my wishy washy vaccinating ways. He was so, so ill, and I realized how absolutely irresponsible it was of me not to protect him from entirely preventable illnesses. This guy had done his residency where children die every day from these diseases, and he didn't mince any words when he told me what he thought about my hippie little gang of non-vaccing mamas. And for the first time, I listened. I'm so glad I did.

[geeklove]

Sumeri, NotALoserLikeYou,thank you for your input. Most anti-vaxxers I know are still vehemently anti-vaccines, so it is nice to here of someone having a change of heart. I've always been rabidly pro-vaccines mainly because I have an uncle who was left mentally disabled due to whooping cough. (He was a preemie and was exposed to the disease when he was 3 months old. My grandmother used to say that after the fever broke it was like someone flipped off the light in his eyes.)

More recently, I have a friend whose niece died before she was old enough to receive her pertussis shots. Unfortuanely, it doesn't matter how many sick children there are as long as Natural News tells us not to vaccinate.

[lagenialester]

Um, as a mother of a 7 month-old born over three weeks early, this thread is terrifying. Excuse me while I go construct a plastic bubble for my child to reside in until she finishes her basic vaccine cycle.

[geeklove]

Um, as a mother of a 7 month-old born over three weeks early, this thread is terrifying. Excuse me while I go construct a plastic bubble for my child to reside in until she finishes her basic vaccine cycle.

I have a two year old.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

It is okay.

Sigh.

Now your mommy anxiety panic attack may continue. I'll let you know if mine ever subsides.

[docmom]

While I wish all the anti-vaccine nonsense would go away (and, yes, it is nonsense) I sincerely hope we don't have to have an outbreak of measles or rubella or polio in order for it to happen. Unfortunately, even our best vaccines protect only about 95% of people who receive them. In recent measles outbreaks in Europe 15% of people who got measles had had the vaccine. This is why herd immunity is so important. It protects not only those who have not been vaccinated, but those whose vaccines haven't protected them. In other, totally selfish words, my completely vaccinated kids could get unlucky.

[Joan of Snarc]

A doctor's perspective on the current measles outbreak in NYC:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... n-nyc.html

My kids' pediatricians also do not take unvaccinated kids at their practice.