In another article it was stated that "many had been vaccinated against the mumps". It didn't give any other statistics though. It certainly would be interesting to find out why the vaccine didn't provide adequate protection from the disease.

I'm going to take a guess, and I may be wrong, but I'll bet that the majority of these kids were vaccinated.

The next question I would have for the mass vaccination agenda is how many died and how many were permanently injured. And again which category did they fall into? vaccinated or unvaccinated?

The purpose of articles like this are usually to promote vaccine compliance. So when there is a title of "outbreak" it is fair to ask some deeper questions to find the true motive.

Hm - Robert - not sure about that, given the Orthodoxy. But - I'm definitely on the same page as you re: vaccinated kids and disease.

All people need do is look at the statistics re: MMR or most of the diseases we vaccinate for. In most cases the incidence of disease was significantly decreasing LONG BEFORE the development of any vaccine. Could it be that the disease naturally ebbed because we stopped living in our own filth. From a scientific perspective, you cannot prove that a vaccine prevented contraction of a disease. There's no way to know for sure.

A significant objective of public health initiatives is to minimize lost productivity of the worker. Sick kids, mean sick days for Mom and Dad. Healthy kids - no sick days.

Fearmongering to get support for healthcare.

Yes Mark, 300 people are faking a potentially severe disease as a publicity stunt for health care. Sure. Happens all the time. We should tell all the cancer victims to stop all their fear-mongering too.

Kent,

My great aunt had mumps when she was 16. The disease spread to her breasts and she had to have a double mastectomy. My grandfather had mumps as a young adult and he lost a testicle. Actually, losing one or both testicles was a big concern with mumps.

Maggie Mae - sorry to hear that. Those are really very rare complications of this disease. I don't know how old your grandfather was - but your great aunt was definitely on the older side of children who contract it.

The over whelming majority of kids who contract the disease - before age 10, come through it without any complications what so ever.

Now we have to get into the whole vaccinate, don't vaccinate conversation which I really don't want to do. All I can say is - once you've had the disease, you have life long immunity. The vaccine "lasts" about 20 years - so they say.

We know what the over use of anti-biotics has caused.

The new question is what is the over-use of vaccines causing or going to cause? What are the unintended consequences?

i think that they just wanted to state that fact so they could talk about if Orthodox Jews have a higher chance of contracting it? I don't know. I could definitely be more educated about matters like this. I don't think anyone would shun them.

That's what I want to know..... I wonder how many werent and I wonder if the boy from England was vaccinated.....

I wonder if the New York Orthodox Jewish community is accepting any requests for mumps parties. I know there are many parents who would like to give their children lifetime immunity to mumps so they are protected as adults from a disease that is dangerous only for adults. Of course there are exceptions to this rule, but the vaccine itself can be quite dangerous, so parents should have the choice and opportunity for natural infection.

Mmmm. Steak.

.leading us on to an idiocracy.

We are turning into a corporatocracy.

Corporatocracy or corpocracy is a form of government where corporations, conglomerates or government entities with private components, control the direction and governance of a country. This is sometimes considered to be a form of fascism.

Regulatory capture

Regulatory capture is a term used to refer to situations in which a state regulatory agency created to act in the public interest instead acts in favor of the commercial or special interests that dominate in the industry or sector it is charged with regulating. Regulatory capture is a form of government failure, as it can act as an encouragement for large firms to produce negative externalities.

"In 1913 Woodrow Wilson wrote: "If the government is to tell big business men how to run their business, then don't you see that big business men have to get closer to the government even than they are now? Don't you see that they must capture the government, in order not to be restrained too much by it? Must capture the government? They have already captured it."[7]"

Sorry but Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey do not have the authority of power to control public health policy.

The members of the ACIP board do.

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

Most ACIP members, if not all, have ties to vaccine makers, such that the CDC must grant them waivers from statutory conflict of interest rules.[citation needed] This professional experience contributes toward the development of their immunization expertise, and is the rationale offered by the CDC to justify waivers. The United States Congress has accepted this justification for service on federal advisory committees by experts with conflicts, and has provided for waivers from such prohibitions, under 18 USC § 208, when the need for the individual's service outweighs the potential for a conflict of interest.

Examples of ACIP conflict of interest issues:

* Advisory committee members own patents for vaccines under consideration.[citation needed]
* The CDC grants conflict of interest waivers to every ACIP member.[citation needed]
* Former committee chair, Dr. John Moldin, owned stock in Merck & Co.[citation needed]

Let's see, the 2 areas population combined is around 20900, 303 cases, puts it at an infection rate of 1.4%. They say the MMR is around 90-95% effective..........so it looks like it's doing better than expected :)

See, anyone can toss numbers out without the necessary details and make it look how they want to.

Mitchell

It's actually well over 1000 cases. And per the CDC, of the over 1000 infected more than 3/4 were fully vaccinated. Nice try though.

There is the immunity of one person, and then there is herd immunity. Even if most individual people become immune after receiving the vaccine, if the herd percentage drops too low, outbreaks can occur. Add variable response to vaccination into the mix, and you increase the chance of outbreaks even more.

Different diseases require different levels of herd immunity to prevent outbreaks. Many different factors affect herd immunity for a given disease.

They say the MMR is around 90-95% effective.

Depends on the age at which it is given:

"The effectiveness of 1 dose declined from 96% (95% CI 81%–99%) in 2-year-olds to 66% (95% CI 30%–83%) in 11- to 12-year-olds, and the effectiveness of 2 doses declined from 99% (95% CI 97%–99.5%) in 5- to 6-year-olds to 86% (95% CI 74%–93%) in 11- to 12-year-olds (p

Oh Gwen, once again you are just tossing a number out. Those 1000 are not confined to just those two towns, therefore you can't speculate on the infection rate. For all you know, that includes the entire states of New York and New Jersey which would mean the rate would be even lower than 1.4%.

But look on the bright side, most 'viners show a complete lack of knowledge in statistics or math in general so you're in the majority here.

Mitchell

@took - Heh, it is true the effectiveness varies. My point was that without any context, numbers for the most part don't really mean much.

Mitchell

I completely agree with you on all of these points, Mitchell:

"anyone can toss numbers out without the necessary details and make it look how they want to."

"most 'viners show a complete lack of knowledge in statistics or math in general"

"without any context, numbers for the most part don't really mean much."

My comment was not meant to be a criticism of yours, but I did quote you in my reply to gwen because it was a good starting point for discussing effectiveness rates.

Actually it appears to have affected primarily the Orthodox Jewish community.

Only seven of the infected are not Orthodox Jewish

The outbreak has disproportionately affected Orthodox Jewish communities,

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/02/08/mumps.outbreak.northeast/index.html?iref=allsearch

They do know the populations of the areas infected. And the fact remains that the mumps are continuing to spread, even among the vaccinated.

"And the fact remains that the mumps are continuing to spread, even among the vaccinated."

This outbreak may indicate a need to change the mumps vaccine schedule.

Remember the measles (rubeola) outbreaks in kids and college students back in the late 80s? Most of those were unvaccinated or given the vaccine too early in life to mount a proper immune response. I participated in special mobile clinics at that time, dispatched to schools to collect blood from students so we could determine who lacked immunity and needed another dose. There was a blip in mumps cases around the same time, too.

They updated the MMR dosing schedule in response to those outbreaks, changing from a single dose at 15 months, to a total of two doses--one at 12-15 mo and one at 4-6 years--so that kids who had either missed the vaccine entirely, or had not received the first dose at the proper time, could be re-vaccinated prior to starting school.

Recommendations change as circumstances change: I'm one of those old farts who was routinely vaccinated for smallpox as a kid; I remember lining up for it at school during the mass vaccination campaign.

When I was an infant and toddler, there were separate vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella, too (the MMR combo came later.)

• I had the oral polio vaccine, but these days herd immunity is good enough to make OPV risks outweigh the benefits, so now they only give IPV in the USA.

Those vaccines were the "right" ones, and were given on the "right" schedule based on medical and scientific knowledge at the time, yet I still failed to mount a protective response to measles, and did not mount a lasting response to rubella.

I had to get two doses of MMR as a 1st year med student in order to mount a proper response to rubella; my mumps titer was still protective from the (single) childhood vaccine, and my natural immunity to measles (rubeola) was still intact. My previously-documented immune titer to rubella (confirmed by my pre-employment blood work when I took a job in a hospital lab during undergrad) had waned by that time, and it was more convenient to obtain the MMR than a separate rubella vaccine.

As it turns out, they vaccinated some kids from my generation too early in life for measles, while maternal antibody was still present. At the time I don't think they realized that the persistence of maternal antibody depends on how your mom obtained her immunity.

Since my mom was born in the 1940s and had wild-type measles, I would have had longer persistence of her measles antibodies in my system, making me one of those people who got the vaccine at the recommended age (still a single dose at that point in history,) but unable to mount a proper response. Add kids like me to kids who never got the recommended vaccine(s) in the first place, and we had quite a few outbreaks of wild-type measles in the 70s.

So vaccine schedules get altered as new data comes in, as new vaccines are introduced, and as old diseases become rare. Changes in schedules sometimes are prompted by outbreaks in large numbers of previously-immunized persons.

I suppose you could characterize this mumps outbreak, the 1970s measles outbreaks, the 1980s measles and mumps outbreaks, and so forth and as vaccine failures, but these "failures" allow us to adjust the methods used to protect future generations.

Maybe they will need to alter the ages at which these vaccines are given. Maybe this will prompt them to change from the MMR and go back to separate vaccines for each disease. Maybe a new formulation of MMR will end up being better for mumps protection. Maybe it is just as simple as the lowered herd immunity I mentioned previously. Only time and the analysis of the data will tell.

"Actually, most were vaccinated"

Agreed. Ergo my statement that most were

"unvaccinated **or given the vaccine too early in life to mount a proper immune response." **

You even included that part in the quote from your own post!

Most of the non-immune kids we found in the local schools in '89 had valid vaccination records that included the MMR. But in other 70s and 80s outbreaks, there were significant numbers of unvaccinated kids.

Remember, many states did NOT mandate vaccination or enforce existing regulations about immunization status for entering Kindergarteners prior to the 60s and 70s, so outbreaks in the 60s-80s often involved unvaccinated kids. The current trend of allowing parents to opt out for religious and personal reasons is starting to bring those circumstances back.

Measles --- United States, 2005

"Of the 66 persons with measles, one had been vaccinated with 2 doses of a measles-containing vaccine and seven (11%) with 1 dose; 50 (76%) were unvaccinated, and eight (12%) had unknown vaccination status (Table). Fifteen of the 17 U.S. residents who acquired infection while traveling abroad had been eligible for vaccination with 2 doses of measles-containing vaccine, according to recommendations from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) (4). However, four (27%) had been vaccinated with only 1 dose; eight (53%) had not been vaccinated (including three infants aged 11--12 months), and three (20%) had unknown vaccination status. Two of the 17 U.S. residents were ineligible because they were born before 1957 (one had not been vaccinated; the other had unknown vaccination status). Of the seven visitors (non-U.S. residents) with imported measles, one (14%) had been vaccinated with 1 dose; four (57%) had not been vaccinated (including one infant aged 8 months), and two (29%) had unknown vaccination status. Among the 42 U.S.-acquired cases, one patient had been vaccinated with 2 doses; two (5%) patients had been vaccinated with 1 dose, and 37 (88%) had not been vaccinated (including 29 [69%] persons aged 1--19 years). The vaccination status of two patients (5%) was not known."

http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/131/1/57

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/21/us/21vaccine.html?th

http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/148/11/1103.pdf

I'm not making a knee-jerk response of "more vaccines," but pointing out we may need to alter the way in which we give these vaccines.

For example, giving a dose later, when the maternal antibody has waned, does not automatically require more doses. Combo vaccines may make us unable to customize the scheduling for each individual disease and patient. My single mumps dose gave me lasting immunity even though my single rubella and rubeola doses did not.

If the pendulum swings back, and we find that breaking those back up into three separate single doses (given at appropriate times) works better than two doses of the MMR combo, I have no problem with it. If giving the same number of shots at different times works better, I have no problem with that, either.

Western medicine and vaccines are not inherently evil, you know. Basing things on scientific data, and adjusting recommendations when new data is found is a reasonable approach.

The current trend of allowing parents to opt out for religious and personal reasons is starting to bring those circumstances back.

Ahh yes, the ever popular "run for your lives, we're all going to die" propaganda. How dare parents be allowed to choose what's best for their own children? How dare everyone not accept the "one-size fits all" strategy with which vaccines are administered!

If the pendulum swings back, and we find that breaking those back up into three separate single doses (given at appropriate times) works better than two doses of the MMR combo, I have no problem with it.

This was an option until last year when the vaccine maker quit making the separate shots after an increase in requests for them. More limiting of parental choices.

Western medicine and vaccines are not inherently evil, you know.

Agreed, never said they were. But they aren't the end all, be all either. But the people that control the vaccine industry wield a lot of power in this country and are driven by money, not some concern for the greater good. Most people I know that are in favor of delayed/limited vaccinating don't necessarily have an issue with the shots, but the issue lies with the way they are administered, how quickly they get put on the mass market, the sheer amount being pumped into children under 2, and the absolute refusal of the medical community and big pharma to step back and take a look at some of the things we are seeing within the population that correlate to the rapid increase in vaccination.

"Ahh yes, the ever popular "run for your lives, we're all going to die" propaganda"

Did I say we're all going to die? I said outbreaks will start happening again.

Most kids recover from measles, mumps, rubella, varicella, and so forth without a problem. It is the few who do not that we need to protect, but there is no way to predict these individual cases in advance. I'm not willing to take that chance with my own kid, but you are legally able to take that chance with your own.

I would hope that no parent wants to take that chance with polio or tetanus, however. Call it propaganda if you like. I call it evidence-based medicine.

"How dare parents be allowed to choose what's best for their own children?"

Actually, they are allowed to choose in most states by claiming religious or personal objections to vaccines, and in every single state for medical reasons. That will continue to work nicely for them in most cases as long as people like me maintain herd immunity.

"How dare everyone not accept the "one-size fits all" strategy with which vaccines are administered!"

Did I say I wanted one-size-fits-all situations? What I did say is:

"Combo vaccines may make us unable to **customize** the scheduling for each individual disease and patient."

...because I personally think we need to have flexibility.

Parents have every right to choose delayed or skipped shots--so long as those same parents don't complain later if their child gets sick, or try to sue the pediatrician or health department for not vaccinating the child if he (rarely) dies or has a severe complication from the illness.

The main problem is the fact that the incubation period of these diseases often allows others to be exposed well before the illness is recognized. Even if you isolate the patients as soon as symptoms or signs appear, the spread to others has already begun. At that point the anti-vaccination parent has put other children at risk, extending the consequences of his choice beyond his own family.

"the absolute refusal of the medical community and big pharma to step back and take a look at some of the things we are seeing within the population that correlate to the rapid increase in vaccination."

Correlation does not always equal causation. I'm wary of any new drug or vaccine, but once enough post-marketing data is collected showing safety and efficacy, my comfort level increases.

Correlation does not always equal causation

This is the official motto of the AMA and big pharma. I realize that correlation does not equal causation. However, they are worth checking into. Autism is not the only thing that has been on the rise since the massive increases in vaccines.

Yet I am no longer a member of the AMA--in fact I let that lapse long ago, after my initial med student membership.

Big Pharma? Meh. I have no respect for their business practices.

You will hear people from all scientific disciplines--not just medicine--say that correlation does not equal causation. Post hoc ergo propter hoc.

There have been plenty of other concurrent bad things like global warming, HIV, SARS, $4/gallon gasoline, Blackwater, internet addiction, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and Britney Spears--none of which are caused by vaccines.

I realize I will not be able to change your views, nor will you be able to change mine. Luckily we live in a society where both views are able to exist.