Vaccine Safety

The premise of vaccines is a good one: modify an infective agent (bacteria, virus) in the laboratory so it is no longer virulent (disease-producing) without destroying its antigenic characteristics (immune-stimulating). When administered, a vaccine will then theoretically not produce the disease but will create immunity to it.

The approach is similar to that used in homeopathy whereby the toxin responsible for the disease condition is diluted and administered to stimulate the body to fight the disease. Like fighting like.

But, as always, there are slips between the theory and practice of vaccines. For one thing, because large, not homeopathically small, doses of modified infective agents are in vaccines, the immune system can be taxed. Give several different vaccines and repeat them periodically and the immune system can be exhausted. The immune system has finite, not infinite capacity. The net result can be increased vulnerability to cancer, autoimmunities and other infective agents.

There is also the problem of route of administration. The normal point of entry for disease agents is across oral, digestive or respiratory mucous membranes. The exposure is usually only to a small number of organisms, maybe even one. In contrast, vaccines are commonly given by injection, bypassing several layers of important immune-stimulating mechanisms with the mucous membrane barriers and can contain tens of thousands of modified disease agents.

Some vaccines are modified, but are still living. Who is to say what such living creatures do over time when injected into the body in enormous quantities? Viruses are very clever and capable of remarkable change and adaptation. I'm not sure I like the idea of these guys floating around in my body trying to decide how best to attack me. When we take such vaccines, we are volunteering for an experiment.

I will not go into a litany here of all the proven dangers of vaccines or enumeration of tragic results. This has been done elsewhere.

But here are a couple of new problems. Some vaccines contain high levels of thimerosal mercury. Mercury is a potent toxin and its level in some vaccines exceeds Federal Safety Guidelines. Problems linked to thimerosal include autism and speech disorders, as well as heart disease.
J Am Physicians Surgeons, 2003; 8(1):6-11
http://www.jpands.org/vol8no1/geier.pdf

A new vaccine is being developed for Alzheimer’s based upon the theory that increased brain plaque is the cause of the disease. However, plaque is not the likely cause, but a symptom (similar to high cholesterol in atherosclerosis), and initial trials of the test vaccine caused 6% of the participants to suffer from severe brain swelling.

In the recent effort to prepare the population for bioterrorism, almost 26,000 people were vaccinated with small pox. So far, seven cases of cardiac problems and ten cases of myopericarditis have been associated with the vaccine. Although this temporal association is being downplayed (like smoking being associated with respiratory disease), it is reason for caution. Additionally, the smallpox vaccine is known to cause hypercoagulability, a condition particularly threatening to those with vessel narrowing atherosclerosis. Some researchers believe that the pox vaccine virus (along with a host of other pathogens) has the capability of adhering to the endothelium (lining) of blood vessels. These nodules stimulate an inflammatory response resulting in platelet adhesion, thrombin release and fibrin formation. When this occurs, the vessel is narrowed depriving distal (downstream) tissue from oxygen and creating the ideal anaerobic (oxygen devoid) environment for proliferation of pathogens (infection), neoplasia (cancer) and sclerotic plaque (heart attack, stroke).
by: Dr. Randy Wysong
Read Full Article...>>>

Immunizations

Immunizations are a necessary evil of childhood. As a mother, it’s heartbreaking to have your one year old begin to cry as soon as you enter the pediatrician’s building out of fear of a shot, but every time you take him to the doctor, but immunizations are the reason the death rate for infectious disease among babies and young children is...

so low today. Following are the immunizations your child should receive, and the approximate ages at which they will receive them.

DTP - (Diptheria, tetanus and pertussis) – Your child will receive this vaccine at around two months of age, four months, six months, 12-18 months and the final dose between the ages of 4 and 6 years. The pertussis vaccine has a high risk of reaction, those most reactions are mild. However, you should ensure that your child is well at the time of the vaccine, and that you watch them closely for about 72 hours after the vaccine. Your doctor should provide you a complete list of possible reactions, and how to treat them. However, for certain, if your child runs a fever over 104°F or becomes limp or difficult to wake up, seek treatment immediately.

MMR – (Measles, mumps, rubella) – Your child will receive this vaccine between twelve and fifteen months of age, and then again sometime between the ages of 4 and 12 years old. Reactions to this vaccine are common, but mild, and don’t usually occur until about two weeks after the shot, so they are often not recognized as being associated with the vaccine. Some children have a mild rash and low grade fever, often accompanied by swelling of the glands in the neck.

VZV – (Varicella) – You probably didn’t receive this vaccine for chickenpox, but your child will receive it between 12 and 18 months of age. Reactions are few, and usually include just a mild fever.

Hib – (Hemophilus b) – This vaccine prevents a range of infections, including meningitis, caused by the hemophilus influenzae b virus. Your child will receive this vaccine at two, four and six months, and then again between 12 and 15 months. Some doctors offer Hib combined with DTP in one vaccine.

Hepatitis B – Your child probably will receive the first dose of this vaccine at birth, and will get doses again between two and four months and six to 18 months. This vaccine typically causes no reactions.

OPV – This is the polio vaccine, which has been successful at all but eradicating this crippling illness. Your child will receive doses at two and four months, at eighteen months and between four and six years. Children rarely suffer any reaction to this oral vaccine, though it is typically postponed if your child is sick.

Your child’s vaccinations are typically administered at well baby care visits. This is one of the reasons it is so important to regularly attend these appointments. Receiving the right vaccines at the right time is critical to your child’s health.
by: Sarah Veda
Read Full Article...>>>

Bird Flu Vaccines: What is Taking So Long?

With the current development of a vaccine for the H5N1 strain of the Bird Flu Virus still 2 to 3 years away. We don’t have much of a choice but to really be very cautious that the H5N1 strain does not mutate with a human flu virus.

If the outbreak we fear does happen without the vaccines ready yet, all we can

possibly do is just quarantine the geographical area where the virus is rampant. Give them the vaccines that have been developed and prevent them from spreading it further. This will only work if the outbreak is limited geographically. When the outbreak does happen to 10,000 places, we’re in Big S*%T.

The development of a vaccine is so slow because we still use methods dating back 50 years ago. Ironically this is because they still use chicken eggs to develop the vaccines. New methods are on the horizon, instead of using chicken eggs, they may be able to use mammal cells.

Scientist would be storing the mammal cells in large numbers. So that when a flu strain or threat develops, they can just inject it to the cells. The injected cells will then burst and die. The scientist will then harvest the proteins of the influenza and distribute them as vaccines already.

Vaccines made from DNA are really appealing because they could be made and administered quickly. However this kind of vaccine is still being tested on humans. DNA vaccine works by attaching itself to a segment of our DNA. It contains the coded information of the flu virus’ protein.
by: Michael Colucci
Read Full Article...>>>

How Vaccines Work

When an organism gets into your body and causes an infection, your body gathers its defences and fights against them. This is the basic principle of how vaccines work.

Certain cells in your blood make what are called ‘antibodies’, molecules which are designed to attack specific germs and viruses. These attach to

the invaders in your bloodstream and prevent them from invading other cells. Each virus or bacterium has an individual shape, and the antibodies are designed to fit exactly to that shape.

This is how vaccines work to convince your body that the vaccination is a ‘full-blooded’ attack by the offending viruses or bacteria, and stimulate them into action to develop the ‘memory’ or ‘blueprint’ for the antibody in the event of future invasion.

This is all done by your white blood cells. You have two types called B cells and T cells. The B cells manufacture the antibodies while the T cells have two functions. The ‘helper’ T cells help the B cells to make the antibodies while the ‘killer’ T cells kill any cells which have been invaded by the viruses or bacteria, and prevent them from reproducing. . How vaccines work to stimulate this action is to mislead the white cells into believing that your body has been infected.

Your body reacts to kill the invaders in two ways: directly through the antibodies, and indirectly through the T cells destroying any infected cells and preventing reproduction.

Viruses cannot reproduce by themselves: they have to use the host’s cells for this. If the T cells continually kill off any invaded cells, the invaders themselves must eventually be killed off by the antibodies If the virus or bacterium is strong and reproduce too quickly, the host can be overcome before it can produce enough antibodies to kill them off. The pus which occurs during an infection is the mix of dead white blood cells and bacteria/virus cells destroyed by them.

If your body survives the attack, your B cells retain a memory of the structure of the invaders and should the same viruses or bacteria ever return, antibodies can rapidly be produced and the infection killed off before it starts. The stimulation of this memory is exactly how vaccines work.

Vaccines produce the same memory effect without the patient having to suffer the disease. The organisms that cause the disease are either killed or weakened, then introduced into your body. The strength is calculated to be just enough to enable your white cells to manufacture the antibodies. This is how vaccines work to give you protection against future infection without actually making you ill. The strength of the vaccine is designed to allow this. The dead vaccine can also work, but less efficiently, and the effect is not generally as long lasting.

The ‘live’ vaccines produce life-long immunity after only one or two doses, but the ‘dead’, or ‘inactivated’, ones need multiple doses to get the correct effect. Some dead vaccines even need booster doses throughout your life. Examples of these are tetanus and diphtheria vaccines, normally given together every 10 years as the Td vaccine. The measles vaccine is an example of a ‘live’ vaccine’.

Vaccinations do not affect your ability to fight off other infections you have not been immunized against
by: Peter Nisbet
Read Full Article...>>>