Measles You Can Catch (But Not Autism)
August 26, 2008 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Health
“I can spot an autistic child anywhere in a minute.”
How often have you heard someone say this; how often you thought it yourself?
In contrast, a quote from Jane Seward, deputy director of the division of viral diseases at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in reference to the reported 131 cases of measles so far in the US this year.
“People have forgotten what measles looks like and have forgotten how infectious it is.”
On an August 25th Scientific American blog, Seward discusses measles and vaccines in other countries and notes that measles is “the most highly infectious virus there is. If you have 100 unvaccinated people in a room and a person with measles walks in and coughs, 90 people or more will get measles.” On August 22nd, Seward noted on NPR that measles, which can lead to encephalitis and pneumonia, is “‘just a plane ride away.’”
Indeed: A 7-year-old San Diego boy, who had not been vaccinated, was the first case in the current measles outbreak. He contracted the measles while traveling to Switzerland with his family. On returning to the US, the boy then passed the measles onto “schoolmates, infants at his doctor’s office and children around him in the hospital”; while he had a “visible rash….. he had not been quarantined at the hospital or doctor’s office.” More about some of the other children (including an 11-month-old baby who was infected at the Children’s Clinic of La Jolla) can be read in February post.
Measles is, once again, “just a plane ride away” and—-unlike autism—it’s infectious.
I have a good friend who refuses to vaccinate her children until they are 2. And then will only get one per visit every few months. They also travel around the country.
And who says you cannot catch autism, I thought it was common knowledge that one catches it of the internet as surely as one catches certain diseases off the toilet seat
And who say’s we are incapable of irony, I caught that particular disease of my English teachers.
Just because measles was a common childhood disease in the past does not make it any less risky or unpleasant, diptheria was common too, and typhus, and cholera. It is all avoidable.
Statistically it more risky to cross the road than to get on an aeroplane, but phobics like me don’t see it that way, and if my fear of flying can be considered an irrational mental aberation (and something one can seek a cure from) then why should not the equally irrational phobia of vaccines be treatable …….
Once in a while someone who once had a fear of flying will be killed in an air crash, that is accident and rarity, just the same as the proportion of genuine (not hyped up) vaccine damage to the dangers one faces by not being vaccinated.
And is this vaccine phobia catching, you bet it is.
i think we over vaccinate our kids. i really do.
What are the stats on the various results you get from having measles?
I had measles when I was a kid. And I can eat anything, live on my own, had no problems in school, didn’t need therapies or ABA….I could go on….
Oh, and just because you get the measles vaccine, doesn’t mean you can’t get the measles….
Theory analysis:
If ASD is purely genetic, which is 1 theory, then you cannot “catch” ASD. However if that theory is incorrect and any environmental exposure causes or significantly increases the risks of being diagnosed with an ASD, then you can “catch” an ASD.
The “herd immunity” theory also has some serious troubles in the modern era. Given that any individual can be on any continent or major city in less then 24 hours instantly makes the theory impractical as there is currently no “herd immunity” on a global scale for most of the major vaccines.
What, exactly, is the relevance of the argument that “just because you get the measles vaccine doesn’t mean you can’t get the measles?” Do you or do you not accept that the measles vaccine significantly–SIGNIFICANTLY–reduces the chances of transmission or contraction of measles in a population? Do you or do you not accept that this significant reduction has significant relevance to public health?
And why is everyone talking about measles as though that’s the only disease against which we vaccinate? The way ONE THING gets latched onto among some groups doesn’t just border on the Obsessive. It crosses straight over into Obsessive, builds a house, and settles there for life. Thimerosal, MMR, measles, blah blah blah. Turn your head, for God’s sake. Look around.
In fact, none of the arguments I see here is relevant. My special favorite, which I see a lot, is “Well, it didn’t happen to me, and I’m still here,” or its variant, “Well, it happened to me, and I’m still here.” Guess what? I had the measles. I don’t have antibodies to it in my blood, so I guess that doesn’t work any better than the vaccine for specific people. I had social skills problems and all kinds of other developmentally related issues–just like my son–when I was a child. If I’d been mentally retarded, someone would have paid attention to it all, but I was not, and suffered years of depression, anxiety, being bullied, confused, unable to interact, weird, miserable, isolated, and alone from the age of six. I engaged in intense suicidal ideation from second grade because of my anxiety and misery, all stemming from social dysfunction at school. My mother didn’t vaccinate us until well after our toddler years. I was NOT OK, but it wasn’t because of vaccines. It was because people did not recognize what I needed, the way I was born, what I inherited, and how it could be made better for me.
And is most of that relevant? No. It’s an anecdote. A single data point. But it just canceled yours, so I guess we’re back where we started.
“And is most of that relevant? No. It’s an anecdote. A single data point.”
Two wrongs don’t makke a right. so ,
“But it just canceled yours, so I guess we’re back where we started.” does not apply.
“If ASD is purely genetic, which is 1 theory, then you cannot “catch” ASD. However if that theory is incorrect and any environmental exposure causes or significantly increases the risks of being diagnosed with an ASD, then you can “catch” an ASD”
Prenatal infection with rubella has been found to ’cause’ autism, therefore you can ‘catch’ autism:
http://www.neurodiversity.com/library_chess_1971.pdf
Yes, it does. My anecdote zeroed out your anecdote, which leaves us where we ought to be: relying on data, not anecdote.
Although I don’t think it was your anecdote to which I was referring.
But are causing and “catching” the same thing?
They’re distinct. One can catch or contract rubella and have the attendant symptoms, but complications that arise from this or any other contagious disease are not, in themselves, contagious. Autism itself is not, per se, contagious, having no directly associated contagion vector.
Prenatal infection with rubella has been found to ’cause’ autism, therefore you can ‘catch’ autism:
Thank you for that reminder RAJ. Many of our now-shuttered state schools and institutions were once populated with people who had ended up there due to MR or other, from complications of childhood illnesses. I recall that the estimate, from measles encephalitis alone, in 1960 was 25,000. The factor most cited for the downsizing, and soon, closure of our schools for the deaf and the blind is the introduction of the rubella vaccination in 1969.
I suspect that there’s going to be some folks who are going to find themselves in an uncomfortable position weighing a hard-core anti-vaccine stance should there be an incident involving dog-bite or puncture wound normally calling for a tetanus shot, or if pathogens are not willing to wait 2 years to sicken an infant with pertussis or other communicable disease.
I’ve started to read some backlash from folks who have family members with immunosuppression starting to get riled up about the anti-vaccination fad because they believe that have rights too, and their family members have a lot at stake from their point of view.
Strong philosophical belief is well and good up to the moment that the decision has real implications vs. phantom ones, since that is where the rubber really meets the road. Because we are in the fortunate circumstances of not having to regularly encounter illnesses that were the bane of our great-grandparents, alot of this currently has the luxury of being dealt with in rhetoric and theoretical future forecasting. Generally the thing that has changed the equation is when diseases resurge and the experience becomes first-hand in a widespread way, or such has been the case in some other Westernized nations, and may be starting up here. I’m not a public health official, and people generally reach conclusions based on their own decisionmaking process, whatever that may be.
For our part, this ongoing public discussion has made my husband and myself seriously consider our vaccination status and since we both circulate in the community and travel by public carrier, sometimes internationally, we are scheduled to bring our immunizations up to date in the next week. My older daughter, being an adult, decided that she also wishes to do so, and in re: Eleanor, I will be talking to her pediatrician during her next scheduled physical.
“On returning to the US, the boy then passed the measles onto “schoolmates, infants at his doctor’s office and children around him in the hospital”;”
—————————–
Why isn’t anyone commenting on this? Apparently none of the other kids were vaccinated either, right? Or is it that they were vaccinated and still got measles? If it is the latter, what is the point of vaccinating? Just a little confused here…
Allow me to clear it up for you. Vaccines that are even partially effective in the population reduce transmission rates. It’s that simple. The measles vaccine is far more than “partially” effective. If you know anything about the vaccination schedule (and I assume you do, being a mother), you know that anyone who is an “infant” has not been vaccinated against the measles. If you know anything about immunity, you know that some of us can have the actual disease and still not have sufficient antibody levels against it. We’re yet another reason for building up herd immunity.
You ask, “What is the point of vaccinating?” It’s to avoid watching infants die from whooping cough or a child die from polio or staying up all night with a child dying from diphtheria as you fruitlessly try to clear the membrane away from his throat as he slowly suffocates or being the mother who gives birth to the baby with developmental defects as a result of in utero exposure to rubella. Oh, and to keep them from breaking their bones as they die from the muscle contractions that accompany tetanus. That’s pretty much the point.
Regan, good post, as always.
Anecdotal information is based on opinion and not scientific fact. One person’s opinions do not negate another person’s opinions.
Both opinions still stand.
“But are causing and “catching” the same thing?”
A fetus can ‘catch’ a rubella infection and that can ’cause’ autism. If that same fetus does not ‘catch’ a rubella infection it will not produce a child diagnosed with rubella autism.
Chuck, that’s simply not true. That’s not the definition of anecdote. And what I described about my life and vaccine history was not opinion, it was fact. It was a “biographical incident.” It also thus was anecdote, with an opposite outcome to a previously described anecdote. Ergo, cancellation. And this is a silly discussion about an offhand, sarcastic comment. THAT is an opinion.
@RAJ,
But perhaps still a child diagnosed with some kind of autism, thought maybe not rubella autism?
@bombaygirl,
The infants were not vaccinated and one, as noted, contracted measles. Some of the other children at the boy’s school (a charter school in the San Diego area) also got measles—-on those cases:
http://www.autismvox.com/5-cases-of-measles-in-san-diego/
Thanks for the clarification Kristina. I also believe that one of your posts noted that close to two thirds of the total cases involved patients who had not been vaccinated.
“Ergo, cancellation.”
Actually ergo, contradiction.
“And this is a silly discussion about an offhand, sarcastic comments. THAT is an opinion.”
Actually, that is a fact.
My comment wasn’t meant to be sarcastic. It’s merely my opinion.
The “herd immunity” theory also has some serious troubles in the modern era. Given that any individual can be on any continent or major city in less then 24 hours instantly makes the theory impractical as there is currently no “herd immunity” on a global scale for most of the major vaccines.
I’m not following. Is the point that for that reason that we shouldn’t bother or be concerned? Or the converse? You’re right that contractible disease is a global phenomenon to which anyone susceptible can be subject regardless of national boundary, and to mentally confine it to or exclude from “our” borders is provincial.
Consider that there is possibly a reason that we, as in no one anywhere, receives routine mandated immunization for smallpox–it is a “dead disease”, because the chain of transmission was broken throughout the planet long enough by vaccination and concerted public health programs to render it inviable. If I am recalling correctly, the last case was in 1980, within the timeframe of airflight and international travel. (Even well before that, steamship travel and railroad could get people from one point to another in less than a week–even my husband’s granny from the “old country”.)
A hopeful conclusion similar to smallpox had also been forecast for rubella and polio within a forseeable timeframe, so potential reestablishment of these diseases in widespread pockets would be unfortunate and, ironically, extend the time projected for vaccination programs against these diseases.
Moi, I was referring to my own comments.
Chuck, touche. Touche.
Your first response quoted Me.
And guess where the sarcasm is. Why there, in that response. That would be why I was referring to my own comments, Center of the Universe.
From An Open Letter to Parents Who Don’t Vaccinate:
I’d like to see the promoters of vaccine-preventable illness — Jenny McCarthy, TACA, AoA, Generation Rescue — establish a fund to compensate families who suffered financial or health losses from other’s failure to vaccinate.
Thought that those who think of Measles as a purely benign disease might want to see what Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE) looks like.
This is some news from Germany, where is more widespread refusal, and more active outbreak of measles than here in the US.
This is Micha, age 9, and Natalie, age 10 (wmv video),
who caught wild-type measles as infants from child whose parents had decided against vaccinating him, but brought him into a doctor’s practice when he developed a fever, which turned out to be an incubating case of measles. A number of too-young-to-be-immunized infants there that day caught the measles from this unvaccinated sick child.
That was in 2000. Micha was 5 months old, Natalie was 11 months old.
Micha developed SSPE in 2005. Natalie in the summer of 2007.
Did the parents of the non-vaccinating family feel that their rights extended to putting these infants in contact with a child actively ill with a case of measles, because that is a potential. It has the ring of familiarity to San Diego.