i remember when it happened to me
i was in elementary school
i was kept in a dark room all day long
im not sure why they did that something to do with blindness
i was covered head to toe with a rash
i ran high fever
i was born too soon
about 10 years later a vaccine became available for this infection
which was caused by a virus
the virus
measles
i managed to get through this illness ok without any long term effects
i could have developed encephalitis
as a doctor i saw one case of this at a long term care facility where this pretty teenage girl who had developed measles which developed into encephalitis with its residual neurological damage
she lay in bed or a lounge chair all day long with permanent severe brain damage
i could have died
1-2 of 1,000 children who get measles die
1 of 1,000 who get measles get encephalitis
pregnant women who get measles are at risk for miscarriage or stillbirth or premature birth
many who get measles devolop severe croup ear infections pneumonia diarrhea
i survived unscathed
not all do
those who are unimmunized or those who are immunocompromised are at high risk of catching the disease eg like those on chemotherapy transplant patients hiv patients
its easy to prevent all this from happening to the community
get your mmr at 12-15 months and at 4-6 years
maybe get another in the teenage years or later if in high risk environments
the mmr is measles mumps rubella
the first mmr gives you 93% effective immunity against measles
the second mmr gives you 96% effective immunity against measles
what this means is that there is a small percentage of kids and adults who arent immune even though they got the shots
they get protection by the rest of us being protected
those immunocompromised folks get protection by the rest of us being protected
there is really no excuse
in my 30+ year medical career i never saw a case of active measles
these outbreaks of measles should only be happening in third world countries
it the outbreaks should not be happening here
the organicgreen doctor
No comments:
Post a Comment