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The Allergy Epidemic - ShadowHM - 06-05-2006

Hi

The increasing number of allergic people has puzzled me for some time, and researchers have been just as mystified.

I only became aware of this epidemic when I started having children. In 'my day' the only allergies we knew about were to bee stings and poison ivy (and that only because there were a couple of mysteriously 'immune to poison ivy' kids).

But soon after enrolling my first-born in a nursery school I was alarmed and shaken to discover that there were children who could go into anaphylactic shock from peanut butter - that staple of my childhood's lunchbox food. It became clear that there was much more to it than that. Eggs and milk could do the same. I can still recall the visceral horror I felt as I watched one woman I knew slather her child with cortisone cream after each outbreak of hives from touching egg products. She had not removed them from her home, and blithely said that her doctor had told her that he could use it for twenty years before ill effects showed up. I had to bite my tongue hard to not ask how long she expected that child to live. :(

The numbers just keep growing. Over the twenty years since I have been observing this, more and more chidren in my sons' schools have allergies. According to an article in Macleans magazine:

Quote:Almost 50 per cent of infants today suffer from some form of eczema, and the prevalence of hay fever stands at between 30 and 40 per cent of the population -- a two- to threefold increase in the last few decades.

The good news is that there are researchers who are just as alarmed and puzzled by this as I am, and that government agencies of all kinds are equally concerned. A new study here in Canada has just been announced that may (eventually) shed more light on the topic.

Quote:AllerGen has also coralled an impressive pack of immunologists, epidemiologists, asthma specialists, geneticists and others to collect data from what its researchers are calling the "birth cohort" -- a group of 10,000 families that they hope will be involved in the largest study of its kind in the world. The goal is to observe pregnant women soon after they conceive and then follow their children for as long as possible, perhaps into adulthood, if funding allows. They can then examine as many aspects of the families' environments as possible to determine why, and in what circumstances, people may develop allergies.

I thought I would share this article and the information given about the current hypotheses about the phenomenon, as I expect that many of the Lurkers will have the same observations and likely a more intimate comprehension of the problems it causes than I do.

Article in Macleans Magazine

Shadow, who has blessedly allergy-free children

The Allergy Epidemic - Nystul - 06-05-2006

Not sure if this correlates, but the thing that really stands out to me is ear infections. When I was in elementary school, it was like a really big deal if someone got an ear infection, and it almost never happened. Almost all of my nieces and nephews have had ear infections. A few of them having had *many*, going through multiple ear tubes and other treatments and risking permanent hearing loss. This type of thing appears (anecdotally) to be fairly commonplace in their generation.

My parents theory on ear infections was that contemporary parents were setting up these supersterile home environments for their infants, and then sending them to daycare where they were exposed to massive germ attacks with no built up defenses. Throw in the increased use of antibiotics and the resistant strains of bacteria that are evolving, and it gets worse. This almost makes sense, and I guess it is similar to one of the article's theories on allergy increase as well.

For what it's worth, my cousin's wife and one of my mother's best friends seem to each have hundreds of very bad allergies (as do their children). So it is not as though these things haven't existed in the older generations. And the seasonal allergies can easily be mistaken for colds or just not reported... parents now may be more hasty to take their kids to the doctor for whatever reason.

The Allergy Epidemic - Munkay - 06-05-2006

I think Nystul hit the nail on the head.

Quote:My parents theory on ear infections was that contemporary parents were setting up these supersterile home environments for their infants, and then sending them to daycare where they were exposed to massive germ attacks with no built up defenses. Throw in the increased use of antibiotics and the resistant strains of bacteria that are evolving, and it gets worse. This almost makes sense, and I guess it is similar to one of the article's theories on allergy increase as well.

I have a feeling the increase in cases is linked to the super squeeky clean households. When my aunt gave birth to children she become super germaphobic, replacing every product with an antibacterial, cleaning the house obsessively with cleaners, and buying anti allergin filtering machines for every room. The more frequently her children got sick, the more it fueled her clean habit. When her kids turned about 5 the situation worsened, they were getting sick more frequently and to a worse degree than all the other kids in school. My young cousin new what an Epi-Pen was before I was trained how to use one (from first aid courses I took). The list of allergic reactions is absurd, there are only specific types of brocolli my cousin can eat :wacko:

Nystul is also right in pointing out this,
Quote:For what it's worth, my cousin's wife and one of my mother's best friends seem to each have hundreds of very bad allergies (as do their children). So it is not as though these things haven't existed in the older generations. And the seasonal allergies can easily be mistaken for colds or just not reported... parents now may be more hasty to take their kids to the doctor for whatever reason.

The amount of reported cases has increased. When I grew up I used to play in the dirt, washed my hands only when I got caught and was forced to, and in certain situations like Chicken Pox was actually sent over a friends house to catch it.. ahem... to play. When I did contract chicken pox, there was no doctor visit. Just a few weeks out of school and a whole lot of itching and oatmeal baths. Not the same, my young cousins and my neices and nephews are carted off to the pediatrition for every mundane cough. I won't deny there may be some justification for this behavior to be found in these new stronger strands of disease, but even as a 20 something, I find these new practices rather absurd.

Cheers,

Munk

The Allergy Epidemic - Doc - 06-05-2006

Pfft.

City dwellers, with kids afeared of getting dirty. Spend all that time indoors watching tv and being protected from every dangerous element, with these hepa filtered vacuums and floridated city water and these overly sterile homes. Spend no time around animals and plants and fresh air full of things like hay dust and pollen and flowers, just nasty car exhaust. And city swimming pools with all that overly chlorinated water. Take your kids out in dunk them in some lake water or a good clean river, full of all kinds of organisms. Kids don't get that nearly enough these days. Buids their immune systems it does. Or those moronic parents that run for the sanitation wipes the moment some goat in the petting zoo snots all over their kid. For cripes sake, a little goat snot is good for your kid. And all the antibiotics they pump in to meats and foods now. Eggs are full of antibiotics from factory farmed chickens... God only knows what does does to people.

Shadow, you are your kids are healthy because you get the hell out of the city. Cities are filthy disgusting places of disease and disgrace... All concrete and steel, not enough plants. Not enough animals. And they SMELL REALLY BAD. All that hustle and bustle and bad vibes, and pissed off people with to little time and road rage and God knows what in the air sapping away your vitality and making you sick. I mean, you can't even stand and piss off of your porch in the city... And Lord knows that has to have some kind of health benefits airing that thing out and exposing it to the breeze.

And parents don't need to swab out every little nick and cut with some super powered anti-biotic. Damnit, when I was a boy, they used iodine. It taught you that you didn't need to be a snotty nosed little brat that ran to an adult the moment you cut your self. That iodine taught you that life could indeed, go on with a boobooed finger, and it would heal up just fine with nothing at all. If an adult wanted to apply iodine, they had to catch you first. And all that running from iodine bearing adults probably had a good effect on the old immune system as well. My Goddaughter knows better than to sniffle or cry at little minor booboos, because now, I am the iodine bearing adult. She knows the rule... Don't stop running and don't fall for any empty promises of milk and cookies.

The Allergy Epidemic - DeeBye - 06-06-2006

Quote:Almost all of my nieces and nephews have had ear infections. A few of them having had *many*, going through multiple ear tubes and other treatments and risking permanent hearing loss. This type of thing appears (anecdotally) to be fairly commonplace in their generation.

My son (now 3 and a half) has had three infections total, none of them serious. Two of them were minor eye infections when he was an infant (very common) which was cleared up by an over the counter gel, and the third was an ear infection which required a prescription antibiotic (actually, it required two different antibiotics because he had an allergic reaction to the first, which was very scary). It also cleared up within a few days. he hasn't had any sort of infection in well over a year now.

My wife and I keep our place and our son as clean as we can, but we don't go nuts with antibacterial crap. He spends most of the day outside playing in the dirt with other kids at the babysitters'. He always comes home filthy, but happy :) He rarely gets colds, and when he does it's always minor and only bugs him for a day or two before clearing up on its own. He's as healthy a kid as a parent could hope for.

On the other hand, I was a very sickly child due to allergies. I was allergic to pretty much everything under the son before going through intensive and often painful allergy shots for many years. My parents let me get as dirty as I wanted to in and around our rural home, so my anecdotal evidence fails at anything worthwhile.

The other weird thing is that after being allergy-free for 20+ years, a couple of summers ago I developed a nasty and really painful sinus infection. My doctor said it was allergy-related. I asked him how that was possible after being "cured" of all my allergies when I was a child, and he said that allergies can pop up at any time :huh:

Quote:That iodine taught you that life could indeed, go on with a boobooed finger, and it would heal up just fine with nothing at all.

My son proudly displays his eternal collection of booboos as badges of honour. He always invites me to poke at them and then tells me how they don't hurt at all because he's "tough", or that they only hurt "a little bit". He took a good chunk of skin off his foot the other day after stepping on a toy, but he refused all treatment and shows to it to everyone he meets.

I have a weird kid.

edit: whoa! That's a cool feature. Apparently when you quote and reply to two people in succession, this new forum software automagically condenses it into a single reply. I like this.

The Allergy Epidemic - kandrathe - 06-06-2006

An allergic reaction is an immune system (hystamine) response to a supposedly lethal attack. I believe that the number of chemicals and toxins in our air, soil, water, and food are fooling our immune systems into creating antibodies for what would normally be ordinary things. So as a hypothetical example, the reaction to peanut butter might be due to an antibody developed against some caustic oil residue one came in contact with that shares a molecular structure similiar to peanut oil. Your research should also show that women are twice as likely to suffer auto-immune ailments.

So, my theory is that it is pollutants and our increased use of chemicals.

The Allergy Epidemic - Hammerskjold - 06-06-2006


I grew up in a tropical country, when I went to school it was in the cities where smog and pollution was fairly high. The house I grew up in was at the time, in a fairly spacious suburb. I definitely didn't grew up in a super sterile environment, my family had a dog and I briefly had a cat, along with various fishes and birds. I did have slight allergies to the birds when I was a kid, but that seems to have dissapeared nowadays.

I also rode my BMX bike around and had my fair share of scraped knees and sprained wrist etc, no antibiotics, just iodine. I didn't have any food allergies like shellfish or peanut butter when I was a kid, and thankfully nothing so far currently.

But it wasn't until I came to North America that for some reason, I now have varying degrees of hay fever and pollen allergies, and I'm now apparently allergic to cat dander.

Now I'm not a scientician or anything, but the country I grew up in was a lot more polluted than North America, yet I didn't have severe allergies growing up. At first I thought maybe it was because I wasn't exposed to hays and grass much until I came to N. America, but then that's kind of bunk the more I think about it. I rode around fields of grasses and dirt plenty of times in my bike growing up, and in my teen years in N. America, and I didn't have any reactions back then. It's possible that maybe it just took that long for me to develop these allergic reactions, but I don't think I can discount the pollution factor either.



@ people who say rural living is always better than city living, pollution wise.

I don't buy that rural living somehow automatically makes a cleaner and allergy free living. Yeah for the most part rural areas are still cleaner (in some respects) than smog ridden cities. But let's not kid ourselves here, not every rural area is some green shangrila where there is no such thing as pollution. I've cut the soles of my feet wading in a river filled with zebra mussles. I've seen a-holes who don't care if they spill a little gas on the lake when they're refueling their boats or jet skis (and no, not all the perpetrators are ' dem evil city folks'). I've drove past farm areas when they're being sprayed with chemical fertilizers like they're going out of style. And I've drove past it when they oversprayed it with organic fertilizers, and it smells exactly like this 'farm life always = the Good Life' some are trying to shovel around. Horse crap.

The bottom line for me is if we're talking about pollution in all it's forms, no one has any claim of superiority, rural or urban. I'm just one of those crazy kooks who thinks in the long run, this planet is too damn small for anyone to seriously say their own backyard is untouched by pollution.



The Allergy Epidemic - kandrathe - 06-06-2006

I grew up on a farm as well. No allergies until I was about 20, when I was living in a basement (moldy) apartment while at the University. I finally had to move due to lung issues from the mold spores there. After that I had more severe allergic reactions to mold, tree pollens, grass pollens, and some animals including cats. I went to an allergist and after hundreds my symptoms are livable. They flare up in the spring when everything gets coated with a green pollen haze, but I chug a little Dayquil for about 4 weeks and my symptoms are gone. I'm very careful when I handle animals to wash my hands afterwards.

It almost seems like in my case it was the mold that permanently affected by immune system, but it could be alot of other things.


The Allergy Epidemic - Chaerophon - 06-06-2006

I'm exactly the opposite of you Kandrathe. I used to have horrendous allergies when I was a child - particularly to ingesting raw egg (which they feared would put me into anaphylactic shock and landed me in the hospital twice - once over christmas at age 5:(), but also to bacterial culture (cheese, yogurt, etc.), some yeasts (donuts, pizza crust, root beer...), vinegar, citrus fruits, rice, corn, cooked egg (minor), strawberries, pet dander (had a dog and cat anyways), and the usual hayfever stuff. Especially during my teen years, I wasn't very good about not eating what I wasn't supposed to. However, long story short: today I have very few allergies - not even hayfever/grass/cottonwood, etc. My wife, on the other hand, has developed terrible pet allergies and hayfever. And she used to make fun of me for being "fragile"!:P

I have heard it suggested that exposure to certain foods at a young age can trigger the allergic response in later life, ie giving your child eggs early may increase their chances of being allergic at a later date.

The Allergy Epidemic - mutagen - 06-06-2006

Quote:I'm exactly the opposite of you Kandrathe. I used to have horrendous allergies when I was a child

My sister was horribly allergic to stuff as a child. Excema, severe reactions to fish, tomato products, poultry (but not eggs) and a laundry list of other stuff. She grew out of much of it but still suffers reactions to a few items.

We grew up in a small town and played in the dirt tons. My brothers and I didn't suffer from these kinds of allergies and were generally pretty healthy. One of my brothers and my sister did get the tubes in the ear treatment and one of them got the adenoids removed but fortunately I missed out on that. I do suffer hay fever symptoms as I've gotten older but fortunately they are mostly mild.

As with many of our modern diseases, allergies are complicated. It is probably a combination of genetics, environment and specific incidents in our lives.

The Allergy Epidemic - ShadowHM - 06-07-2006

Quote:As with many of our modern diseases, allergies are complicated. It is probably a combination of genetics, environment and specific incidents in our lives.

It is definitely far more than genetics. One of the side-bars in that magazine (that is unfortunately not available online) mentioned that the incidence of allergies in East German children skyrocketed following the fall of the Berlin Wall. Since the genetic stock on either side was substantially similar, it can only be concluded that something in the lifestyle and/or environment is a trigger.

The points raised above about increased reporting of allergies are also germane to the topic.

And, heretical as it is to say so, I harbour the suspicion that the increased vaccination rates in so-called 'First World Countries' also has an influence. The timing of the onset of this practice correlates suspiciously (IMO) with the increases in reported allergies.

The Allergy Epidemic - kandrathe - 06-07-2006

Quote:...
And, heretical as it is to say so, I harbour the suspicion that the increased vaccination rates in so-called 'First World Countries' also has an influence. The timing of the onset of this practice correlates suspiciously (IMO) with the increases in reported allergies.
I've heard some reports of a link between the mercury in Thimerosal used in immunizations causing Autism in children. But, with some diseases like polio or smallpox, given the choice between being allergic to cats and the devastation, I'd stick with the allergies.


The Allergy Epidemic - ShadowHM - 06-07-2006

Quote: But, with some diseases like polio or smallpox, given the choice between being allergic to cats and the devastation, I'd stick with the allergies.

What devastation? I don't mean to be facetious about this at all. As an example, the diagnosis of polio seems to be completely correlated with whether or not one has had a polio vaccination. If not, it is labelled polio. If so, the same cluster of symptoms is dubbed viral meningitis.

Smallpox did kill a lot of people. We are all descended from people who had it and survived it.

The incidence of death from the diseases we vaccinate for might well be as high as the incidence of death from allergic responses. Or not. This is a non-studied issue.

The Allergy Epidemic - kandrathe - 06-08-2006

Quote:What devastation? ...
The incidence of death from the diseases we vaccinate for might well be as high as the incidence of death from allergic responses. Or not. This is a non-studied issue.
Smallpox is extremely infectious, and at this time with mostly unvaccinated populations it would kill at least 30% of the worlds population if it were ever released.

[Image: spx.jpg]

The after effects of small pox are severe scarring throughout the body and lungs, and a high incidence of blindness.

For children who are paralyzed by polio:
  • 30% make a full recovery<>
  • 30% are left with mild paralysis<>
  • 30% have medium to severe paralysis<>
  • 10% die<>
    [st]
    [Image: m1135501.jpg]

    Polio virus excretes a powerful neurotoxin that destroys the nervous system.
    Quote:Post-polio syndrome (PPS) (also properly but not commonly called post-polio sequelae) is a condition that can strike polio survivors anywhere from 10 to 40 years after their recovery from polio. PPS is believed to be caused by the death of individual nerve terminals in the motor units that remain after the initial polio attack. Symptoms include new or increased muscular weakness, pain in the muscles, and fatigue. PPS is not a re-emergence of the polio virus, and is not contagious. It is a condition resulting from years of overcompensation by existing motor neurons for those neurons that were damaged or killed off by the polio virus. It is characterised by a set of unexpected new symptoms occurring some 15–40 years after the initial infection. PPS can include new muscle weakness, joint pain, fatigue, increased sensitivity to cold, sleeping, and swallowing difficulties.


The Allergy Epidemic - ShadowHM - 06-08-2006

Hi kandrathe

You have posted some alarming numbers and pictures. However, you did not address my quoted comment.
Quote:Smallpox is extremely infectious, and at this time with mostly unvaccinated populations it would kill at least 30% of the worlds population if it were ever released.

That same number is cited at the WHO website.

Quote:Smallpox had two main forms: variola major and variola minor. The two forms showed similar lesions. The disease followed a milder course in variola minor, which had a case-fatality rate of less than 1 per cent. The fatality rate of variola major was around 30%.

The key word there is "was". Any projections to current populations is an estimate. The impact of poor nutrition and poor quality of water supplies in populations is not part of the calculation. Of course, the flip side of that is that populations today may have access to better nutrition, but may not be availing themselves of it.



Quote:Unfortunately, historical data are available only from periods with substantial population immunity either from vaccination or from having survived natural infection.

I found no data giving the proportions of those who contracted variola major and variola minor.

Additionally, the same site also gives us this (bolding mine):
Quote:Vaccination is contraindicated for certain groups. These include pregnant women, persons with immune disorders or experiencing therapeutically-induced immunosuppression, persons with HIV infection, and persons with a history of eczema.


Now, for polio. First, as I noted, there are issues with the diagnosis of polio in the first place.

Quote:For children who are paralyzed by polio:
  • 30% make a full recovery<>
  • 30% are left with mild paralysis<>
  • 30% have medium to severe paralysis<>
  • 10% die<>
    [st]

Alarming, yes, but incomplete. According to the CDC:

Up to 95% of all polio infections are inapparent or asymptomatic.

Approximately 4%–8% of polio infections consist of a minor, nonspecific illness without clinical or laboratory evidence of central nervous system invasion. This clinical presentation is known as abortive poliomyelitis, and is characterized by complete recovery in less than a week.

Nonparalytic aseptic meningitis (symptoms of stiffness of the neck, back, and/or legs), usually following several days after a prodrome similar to that of minor illness, occurs in 1%–2% of polio infections. Increased or abnormal sensations can also occur. Typically these symptoms will last from 2 to
10 days, followed by complete recovery.

Fewer than 1% of all polio infections result in flaccid paralysis.


My point is still this: We don't know what the relationship is between the epidemic of allergies and vaccinations. And we still don't know whether we might be causing more deaths than we are preventing.



The Allergy Epidemic - kandrathe - 06-09-2006

Quote:My point is still this: We don't know what the relationship is between the epidemic of allergies and vaccinations. And we still don't know whether we might be causing more deaths than we are preventing.
Studies are good. It would be nice to know if there is any correlations between immunization and illnesses. My point was that with some very dangerous infectious diseases immunization would probably be more worth it.

Now, say with chicken pox, mumps, and some other mild or rare diseases I could readily believe that maybe the risks of contracting the disease are not worth the risks of the immunization.

So, yes. Something is messing up peoples immune systems and we should figure out what it is.

The Allergy Epidemic - Doc - 06-09-2006

Ripper: Mandrake?
Mandrake: Yes, Jack?
Ripper: Have you ever seen a Commie drink a glass of water?
Mandrake: Well, I can't say I have.
Ripper: Vodka, that's what they drink, isn't it? Never water?
Mandrake: Well, I-I believe that's what they drink, Jack, yes.
Ripper: On no account will a Commie ever drink water, and not without good reason.
Mandrake: Oh, eh, yes. I, uhm, can't quite see what you're getting at, Jack.
Ripper: Water, that's what I'm getting at, water. Mandrake, water is the source of all life. Seven-tenths of this earth's surface is water. Why, do you realize that seventy percent of you is water?
Mandrake: Uh, uh, Good Lord!
Ripper: And as human beings, you and I need fresh, pure water to replenish our precious bodily fluids.
Mandrake: Yes. (he begins to chuckle nervously)
Ripper: Are you beginning to understand?
Mandrake: Yes. (more laughter)
Ripper: Mandrake. Mandrake, have you never wondered why I drink only distilled water, or rain water, and only pure-grain alcohol?
Mandrake: Well, it did occur to me, Jack, yes.
Ripper: Have you ever heard of a thing called fluoridation. Fluoridation of water?
Mandrake: Uh? Yes, I-I have heard of that, Jack, yes. Yes.
Ripper: Well, do you know what it is?
Mandrake: No, no I don't know what it is, no.
Ripper: Do you realize that fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous Communist plot we have ever had to face?

Do you realize that in addition to fluoridating water, why, there are studies underway to fluoridate salt, flour, fruit juices, soup, sugar, milk, ice cream? Ice cream, Mandrake? Children's ice cream!...You know when fluoridation began?...1946. 1946, Mandrake. How does that coincide with your post-war Commie conspiracy, huh? It's incredibly obvious, isn't it? A foreign substance is introduced into our precious bodily fluids without the knowledge of the individual, and certainly without any choice. That's the way your hard-core Commie works.

I first became aware of it, Mandrake, during the physical act of love...Yes, a profound sense of fatigue, a feeling of emptiness followed. Luckily I-I was able to interpret these feelings correctly. Loss of essence. I can assure you it has not recurred, Mandrake. Women, er, women sense my power, and they seek the life essence. I do not avoid women, Mandrake...but I do deny them my essence.

Do I look all rancid and clotted? You look at me, Jack. Eh? Look, eh? And I drink a lot of water, you know. I'm what you might call a water man, Jack - that's what I am. And I can swear to you, my boy, swear to you, that there's nothing wrong with my bodily fluids. Not a thing, Jackie.



The Allergy Epidemic - SwissMercenary - 06-09-2006

Obviously the Illuminati are behind it.

The Allergy Epidemic - Griselda - 06-09-2006

More anectotal comments:

My daughter wasn't vaccinated when she was a baby. I wasn't completely dead-set against them, but had decided to hold off while she was a tiny infant and let her immune system develop on its own for a while. Although it wasn't that long ago, that was when they were still giving the oral polio vaccination (opv). At that point, the only way to contract polio in the USA was from the opv. (luckily they no longer administer the vaccine in that form)

She ended up in the hospital at 11 months with a very bad case of bronchiolitis. She was in an oxygen tent with asthma medication for about 3 days. She had been a baby who had barely been sick as an infant, but as soon as they heard that she was unvaccinated, their entire attitude changed. The ER doctor peeked at her ears and said, "Oh, she has an ear infection, let's get her on antibiotics right away." He barely looked at her ears, and she has never had an ear infection before or since. I think they just wanted her on antibiotics because she was unvaccinated. The same thing happened when they were about to release her. They said that she couldn't go home unless they tested her for pertussis first. Now, she did have a respiratory condition, but the symptoms didn't match those of pertussis at all. I let them do it, because we wanted to go home, but regretted it when they came in with these huge tubes that they stuck into her sinuses.

That was in December. Although she got better, she wasn't really 100% throughout the cold season. By spring, they were saying that she had asthma. We were sent to a specialist who said that we should start asthma medication in the early fall, before she would develop any symptoms. We decided to wait and see if she had similar problems the following fall, and we would start medication ONLY if she had any problems. Well, it's been 7 years and she hasn't had any trouble like that since then. She does tend to get a lingering cough after a cold that might be asthma-related, but since she rarely gets colds it's not much of a problem. But, we would never have known that if we would have started medicating her right away.

We did decide that since her respiratory sytem was not strong, pertussis would probably be particularly devastating for her. So, we did the DPT series in the summer, spread out to avoid cold season. The following summer, we did MMR, because there are enough unvaccinated kids in this area that measels does go around pretty frequently. I haven't heard of anybody having serious complications from it out here, but by that point we felt that she was old enough and healthy enough to handle the vaccine well.

There was a pertussis outbreak here a year and a half ago. A co-worker of mine caught it, in fact. Very few kids caught it (most were vaccinated), but a lot of adults caught it, because their immunity had weakened over the years. Luckily, it's not particularly lethal in adults, only very annoying (particularly because symptoms can last for quite a while).

We did NOT get my daughter the chicken pox vaccine. I don't see any point in preventing somebody from getting an illness in childhood if the illness is only particularly dangerous if you catch it when you're an adult. I can see the argument for those with weakened immune systems, but not for the general population. When she was 4, a vaccinated child in her class caught chicken pox. Naturally, she caught it. She got a pretty good case, but even so, she was over it in a week and none the worse for the experience. The interesting thing to me was that 25% of the kids in her class ALSO caught chicken pox, even though she was the only one who hadn't had the vaccine! I really believe that chicken pox will start to cause some serious public health problems once the genration of mandatory-vaccine kids grows up and starts to catch it in adulthood.

I wasn't too worried about the chicken pox, but we still had to take her in to the doctor to get him to verify that she had it, so that we would be exempt from the immunization requirements. The nurses acted like she had the plague, and we had to go in through the back entrance. The shuffled her into a room and scooted out of there quickly. Luckily, our doctor has been practicing for a number of years, and he had a more relaxed attitude about the whole thing. He did ask if he could bring his medical student in to show him the rash, though, because he said that he didn't get to see many good examples of the chicken pox rash any more, and he wanted his student to be familiar with it.

Anyway, I don't think that I answered anybody's question, but those were my two cents on the subject. I hope that they were at least interesting.

The Allergy Epidemic - cheezz - 06-09-2006

I don't know if it's true or not about the whole country living angle, but allergies do seem to be a bit rare amongst my family members and neighbors. (all raised in the wonderfully filthy country)

As for food allergies, a lot of parenting magazines seem to running articles about that lately. Apparently, introducing certain food items to an infant or toddler before their digestive system is ready for them can cause sensitivities to those items later. A bad reaction from the beginning primes the immune system to react later on, even if the stomach is ready. Makes sense to me.