Leave it to Science-Based Medicine to give a thorough and complete evaluation of the current situation as well as sage advice about not being too quick to point the finger of blame. Today’s post by Joseph Albeitz (Californians give a whoop – or I hope they do) provides excellent information on pertussis, the history of the disease, the symptoms, the threats, the vaccine, and all the details in between. Give it a read, it’s an excellent overview.

Remember, just because nobody’s sick where you live doesn’t mean that things won’t change. We have small outbreaks of pertussis in the province I live in every year, and there are plenty of people travelling in and out of affected regions every day. From what I gather from the article, though I am by no means an expert and am merely interpreting, it is primarily the adult population that are the pool for this virus. Adults often do not realize that their vaccination from grade 9 does not provide life-long immunity. I know I was unaware of this fact. It is recommended that ten years after the immunization, another is provided, but it is not known at this time if another will be necessary ten years after that.

My friend Tammy (HI TAMMY!) often comments here and has asked about more details about the vaccine. This linkis the Alberta Health and Wellness documentation about the DTaP vaccine, but to go one better I’m on hold with our local Health Link. Oh wait, it’s ringing… Now I’m on hold with the Communicable Diseases folks, who actually answered the phone, “Hello, communicable diseases.” I wanted to say, “No, it’s me, Jim. I’m not a communicable disease…”

For those in the Calgary area, the DTaP shot is available for $77 at any CHC location. The link will take you to Google Maps to see what’s nearby.

As with any epidemic, the answers are never clear until the data is evaluated. It is easy to blame the antivaxxers for a vaccine-preventable disease re-surging like this, but it is premature and likely one of many contributing factors.

Jim

I just read an article on Science-Based Medicine that contains some good news for sufferers of shingles, also known as herpes zoster (not to be confused with good ole’ herpes, the STD). Zostafax is a vaccine that was made to fight shingles, which in case you weren’t aware, is like leftovers from the chicken pox. Once you get chicken pox, some of it can live in your cells for years and THEN trigger an extremely unpleasant variation of chicken pox.

I’ve known people who had shingles, and it looks like a great big bag of suck. As I understand it, it is more a threat as we age, and despite being massively uncomfortable, is not generally considered life-threatening. However, who wants to come down with a vaccine-preventable disease described as a great big bag of suck?

The Zostavax vaccine has been around for a few years, licensed by the FDA in May of 2006. Prior to that, they’d gone through a lot of testing (as all vaccines do, despite what the nutbars will tell you) and it looked fairly safe, but the folks at Veterans Affairs (remember, this is a disease that makes life crappier for older people) have done a much more thorough after-the-fact evaluation and have found that the incidents of harsh reactions to the vaccine were identical to the incidents of harsh reactions in the placebo-controlled group. In other words, it looks like yet another safe vaccine.

The vaccine is recommended for anyone over 60, so if you’re an old-timer, consider getting this one.

Jim

Good news, folks. Pertussis is back. Oh, maybe you know it better as Whooping Cough? Well, whatever you call it, the little bugger’s on the rise in California, so much so that they have released a statement saying that it’s officially an epidemic. There’s more details in this post from Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy blog if you’re curious, and there’s also this article from the New York Times.

It seems strange to me that we live in a world where pertussis can still be a viable threat, but as I’ve dug into this a bit, I adequately certain that I am not up to date on my own vaccinations. It’s an important reminder that I’ve got to fix that. Funny to think, but as surly as I am towards the anti-vaxxers, I am (at least at present) a part of the problem. Fortunately, the solution is readily available.

My knee-jerk reaction was to bitch about the anti-vaxxers in this post, but the more looking into it I did (including the aforementioned embarassing realization) the more I came to realize that this is a bigger issue. One of the significantly largest outbreaks in the area is in an area highly populated with Latino immigrants, and the five children who have died were all Latinos. It is plausible (though simple speculation) that these particular communities may have significantly lower immunizaation rates due to a variety of factors ranging from not being aware of the free pertussis vaccinations to distrust of the medical establishment. However, one way or the other we are dealing with a disease that is largely preventable through immunization. There needs to be a greater push towards ensuring that more people understand the issue, including those who, like myself, have allowed their vaccinations to slip.

I for one will be getting caught up on my shots. How about you?

Jim