Natural health and family

I haven’t vaccinated either of my boys for chicken pox. It doesn’t seem to make much sense to me and finally I’ve come across an article that addresses my very concerns.

When it was time to vaccinate my eldest son, I asked the nurses how the chicken pox vaccine was meant to work. I had chicken pox as a child and didn’t have horrific memories of the event – just a few days in bed wrapped in a wet towel. Kind of novel. As such, I questioned the need for vaccinating against this ‘common’ and apparently mostly harmless disease.

I was told that the the vaccine would provide protection from chicken pox for about 40 years. But hang on, isn’t it meant to be dangerous for adults, in particular males? So here we are protecting our children, who often breeze through the infection, while exposing our future 40 year old sons to possible death or infertility? I asked the nurse how we’ll deal with this problem, and she said the adults can get booster vaccines. Really…is that going the happen?

I then felt trapped…here are all the kids Oli’s age being vaccinated against chicken pox. That reduces the likelihood of Oli catching the disease naturally while he is still young, putting him at risk for when he is older. I am now hoping he’ll naturally get chicken pox so I don’t have to vaccinate him, but chances are, he’ll need to be vaccinated before hitting puberty.

Today I came across an article that beautifully voices these concerns. I’ll reprint the information here, but for the full article go here “Herd Immunity.” The flawed science and failures of mass vaccination, Suzanne Humphries, MD.

“Prior to the universal varicella vaccination program, 95% of adults experienced natural chickenpox (usually as school aged children)—these cases were usually benign and resulted in long term immunity. This high percentage of individuals having long term immunity has been compromised by mass vaccination of children which provides at best 70 to 90% immunity that is temporary and of unknown duration—shifting chickenpox to a more vulnerable adult population where chickenpox carries 20 times more risk of death and 15 times more risk of hospitalization compared to children. Add to this the adverse effects of both the chickenpox and shingles vaccines as well as the potential for increased risk of shingles for an estimated 30 to 50 years among adults. The Universal Varicella (Chickenpox) Vaccination Program now requires booster vaccines; however, these are less effective than the natural immunity that existed in communities prior to licensure of the varicella vaccine.”

Am I mistaken, or is this total stupidity?