Vaccine preventable outbreaks are real

Vaccine preventable outbreaks are real
Aaron Carroll
January 20, 2014 at 9:57 am

A few things to note:

All of that red, which seems to dominate? It’s measles. It’s even peeking through in the United States, and it’s smothering the United Kingdom.
If you get rid of the measles, you can start to see mumps. Again, crushing the UK and popping up in the US.
Both measles and mumps are part of the MMR vaccine.
Almost all the whooping cough is in the United States.

Vaccinate your kids. Please.

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Vaccines Work. These 8 Charts Prove It.
More kids die of vaccine-preventable diseases every year than the entire population of Philadelphia—but that's a lot less than just 30 years ago.
—By Kiera Butler
| Mon Apr. 21, 2014

In honor of World Immunization Week , which begins this Thursday, UNICEF crunched the numbers on vaccines around the globe:

• If all children were immunized with existing vaccines, by 2020 we would save nearly 25 million lives.
• If existing vaccines were scaled up in 72 of the world's poorest countries, over the next decade that could save $6.2 billion in treatment costs.
• In 1988 there were 350,000 cases of polio worldwide. Today there are fewer than 500. Polio remains endemic in only 3 countries: Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Nigeria

And now we have another outbreak happening.

Low vaccination rates at schools put students at risk
Meghan Hoyer and Steve Reilly, USA Today
February 5, 2015

Hundreds of thousands of students attend schools — ranging from small, private academies in New York City to large public elementary schools outside Boston to Native American reservation schools in Idaho — where vaccination rates have dropped precipitously low, sometimes under 50%. California, Vermont, Rhode Island, Arizona, Minnesota, Florida, Illinois, North Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia also were included in the analysis.

The 13-state sample shows what many experts have long feared: People opposed to vaccinations tend to live near each other, leaving some schools dangerously vulnerable, while other schools are fully protected.

More troubling in an outbreak that has sickened more than 100 people in 14 states: how few states keep records of school immunization rates, despite repeated recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In 2013-14, only 13 states met federal standards for collecting data on vaccination among school children as part of the CDC's annual nationwide analysis, which calls for a comprehensive survey or a statistically rigorous random sample in each state.

That's unacceptable, Osterholm said.

Colorado kindergartners have lowest measles vaccination rate in the nation
By Electa Draper, The Denver Post
Posted: 02/03/2015

Colorado kindergartners have the lowest vaccination rate for measles in the country, a distinction that health experts say makes the state especially vulnerable to a major outbreak.

"For almost a decade we have been accumulating people without protection," said Asturias, an expert in infectious diseases and vaccines. "We are like a forest waiting to catch fire."

Measles, CDC

Measles is a highly contagious respiratory disease caused by a virus. It spreads through the air through coughing and sneezing. Measles starts with a fever, runny nose, cough, red eyes, and sore throat, and is followed by a rash that spreads all over the body. About three out of 10 people who get measles will develop one or more complications including pneumonia, ear infections, or diarrhea. Complications are more common in adults and young children.

Information for Parents
Measles can be serious, especially for children younger than 5 years old. It can lead to pneumonia, encephalitis (swelling of the brain), and death.

People die from the measles...and these outbreaks are only going to continue to happen if people don't get themselves and their kids vaccinated.
No, it's not 100% effective.
Yes, it could have side effects.
No it does not cause autism.
Yes, outbreaks will stop again once there is a higher portion of the population that is protected by vaccination.
No, not everyone can get the vaccine so those who can should to help protect the immuno-compromised, allergic, too-young, and too-old who can't.

Measles breaks out at MGM Grand Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas
Gavin Stern
3:05 PM, Feb 27, 2015

The Southern Nevada Health District said that the measles cases were caused by an “under immunized” staff member working at Emeril’s New Orleans Fish House at the casino from Feb. 18-21. The infected person also visited a nearby Walgreens pharmacy and Chili's restaurant on Feb. 22.

The source of the staff member's infection was believed to be an infant at the casino restaurant who was too young to be vaccinated.

In 2014, more than 600 people were diagnosed with the measles — the worst year since 2000, when the disease was declared "eliminated."

Measles is often brought to the U.S. from overseas, where it is more common. In 2013, more than 145,000 people died of measles, according to the World Health Organization. In 1980, measles killed an estimated 2.6 million people worldwide.

Vaccination efforts cut measles deaths by 75 percent from 2000 to 2013, saving an estimated 15.6 million lives, according to WHO.

- Worldwide, 122,000 people die from the measles each year.