General Chat

Just heard on TV that measles is on the increase... they are blaming the fact that parents aren't letting their children have the MMR jab.... Meales is really dangerous... my father lost his hearing because of it so why aren't they offering this as a seperate injection just to make sure that children are covered? I know someone is going to say it's expensive but so will the treatment needed for the after effects!! It makes me so mad that choices are no longer given and parents have to take chances with their childrens health!! RANT OVER SORRY!!

When my son had his MMR I was really worried. I don't think people do realize just how dangerous mumps and measles can be. I had the lot when I was little (fortunately not too badly though) and chickenpox just last year at the grand age of 41! Lorraine

My humble opinion is that if people weren't so quick to beleive the scare stories about the MMR (which have been continually discredited since) and given the kids the jabs, then there wouldn't be a problem.

My mother had measles as a child and was left with a severe squint in one eye as a result. I think many people are unaware of the dangers of these illnesses. I had both my children vacinnated -- youngest one still has to have the booster. As I have a scientific (but not medical) background, I read up on a fair bit of research before coming to a decision. I took the probability of damage from the MMR that the opponents claim and compared it to the probability of severe damage from measles * the probability of catching measles. At the time I did this - about 4 years ago - these worked out a fairly similar risks. So, if I believed the opponents of MMR I exposed my children to about the same risk of serious damage whether I did or didn't go ahead with the injection. However, medical consensus is that the risk of MMR is much lower than the opponents claim and as the take up of MMR reduces the risk of catching measles increases. So I believe that for most children the injection exposes them to the least risk. Despite this I believe many parents are happier to allow their children to take a so called "natural" risk of an illness for which they do not feel responsible rather then make the decision to have a injection and run a smaller risk of it being their choice that injures their child. In addition, I felt that if I had chosen not to have my children vacinnated, I was being selfish. There are children who cannot be vacinnated due to other health issues. Their only choice is to rely on so called herd immunity keeping the illness under control. In the end parents have to make the choice for their children and live with the consequences. I just wish that more people would investigate the science rather than reading newspapers. Ann

All 3 of my children have had the MMR vaccination. I was given the information to read over and it was left to me to decide if i wanted them to have it. I decided that the complications from the diseases far outweighed the risk of damage from the vaccination.