measles revisited

MEASLES REVISITED

photo from cdc

this is how many cases of measles i saw in my career in family medicine from medical school to retirement
a span of 32 years
zero is how many i have seen

those doctors who have been trained since i started have probably never seen a case of measles

the only case i ever saw in my life was me
i was probably 5 or 6
i remember being in bed sick for several days feeling lousy and being covered with a rash

maybe if a doctor had been to a third world country they might have seen a case of measles
but not in the usa

all of us trained who are alive saw cases only in textbooks

in fact a few years ago measles was declared wiped out in the us

well i guess they didnt wipe good enough as now its back again
gradually increasing each week
only 1 child has died
saddenly unnecessarily preventable
that hasnt happened for years

why

people not getting their kids immunized against measles

you need 95% vaccination rate to get everyone protected
when the rate drops below that that is when measles can appear

1/2 of the counties in texas have a vaccination rate of < 92.7%
this makes the inhabitants or visitors there vulnerable
the county where the outbreak occurred  has around a 67% vaccination rate

one person with measles can expose 18 people to the virus

imagine the kid with measles that recently traveled to austin via a plane and then wandered through the usually busy airport
how many did they infect and how many did those infected infect

we in the usa are at a 92.7% vaccination rate
thats below the needed rate of 95%

measles is the most contagious disease on the earth

there is one way to prevent it
get your measles shot

the most vulnerable are 
immunocompromised persons
children
pregnant women

there are 159 reported cases in texas
107 cases in gaines county the one with the 67% measles vax rate
22 have been hospitalized
one child died 
needlessly i must add

measles can cause
fetal abnormalities
blindness
pneumonia
meningitis
encephalitis
permanent neurological damage
suppression of the immune system for a period of time
deafness
then 
the  
worse

death

no vitamin a wont really help you
but a vaccine will prevent all of this

are we regressing in our health as a nation
we already rank lower than most of other industrialized countries especially in maternal and child health
Texas being one of the worst states for maternal and child health

i tell folks frequently 
i dont want to die from something i can prevent


the organic green doctor