Are you guys for or against childhood vaccines?

The best prevention for cancer is regular screenings. An immunization is a false sense of security in this instance, I think.

ETA: And the best prevention of STDs is CONDOMS! When I was a kid, everybody was pushing condoms, not it's like condoms don't even exit anymore. smh

Actually, no. The best prevention for cervical cancer is to get the HPV vaccine to help prevent contracting the HPV strains it does cover, and then regular pap smears including the advanced HPV screening (not more than every 6 months for most women or, at minimum, annually) and if positive to do further testing and then retest every 3-6 months until clear.

We can eliminate abnormal cells by removing them, sometimes in pretty painful ways, if we catch them in the pre cancerous stages. That's still not as good as preventing the contraction of a virus, since the virus will remain in the body and reappear and since most procedures for removing the cells cause permanent scarring, damage, and fertility and childbearing problems.

Even if an infected woman does not have her HPV result in precancerous cells, she is still passing HPV on to other men, who then pass it along to others.

And, condoms do not and cannot prevent the transmission of HPV, which technically does not specifically require a sexual act for transmission.

Condoms protect against unwanted pregnancies and STDs. There is NO SHOT or MED that will provide the same protection as condoms. PERIOD.

Condoms may be good for REDUCING the risk of contracting certain STDs and be passable as birth control (12% failure rate with perfect, lab condition usage is better than nothing, but not ideal BC for anyone wishing to be serious about not having a pregnancy), but they do NOTHING to even reduce transmission of the HPV virus. Ever.

They also don't do much to reduce liklihood of chlamydia which is commonly asymptomatic and can fairly rapidly lead to infertility in men and woman, but is detectible with simple testing. The upsurge in comdom usage has actually correlated with an uptick of undetected chlamydia infections leading to PID and infertility because people thought condoms prevented everything...and they stopped getting tested. Is the answer to stop telling them to use condoms so they won't have a false sense of security?

No. The answer is that complex, multifactored health risks require education and a complex, multifactored approach to prevention. For HPV that means vaccines and frequents paps WITH HPV screening.

Transferred a 1 month old baby to the NICU from my emergency department with pertussis ... have no idea if they lived or died. It was horrendous.

I am definitely pro-vaccine.

Even if every adult or older child in the family had been vaccinated (which is unlikely), that is no assurance that the baby would not have contracted the bordetella p. infection. The best insurance against infection in newborns is breast feeding---the mother's immunity is passed through her breastmilk. And that is the case with all infectious diseases--and there are many for which we do NOT have vaccines (and likely never will have). Vaccines are not some magic elixir.

Recommending condom use in casual sex and giving HPV vaccines are not mutually exclusive.

I don think anyone in favour of HPV vaccines is against condom use.

I don't think ANYone advocates condoms anymore the way they used to. It's like it's long forgotten.

In cuz thats life!

The best prevention for cancer is regular screenings. An immunization is a false sense of security in this instance, I think.

ETA: And the best prevention of STDs is CONDOMS! When I was a kid, everybody was pushing condoms, not it's like condoms don't even exit anymore. smh

Actually, no. The best prevention for cervical cancer is to get the HPV vaccine to help prevent contracting the HPV strains it does cover, and then regular pap smears including the advanced HPV screening (not more than every 6 months for most women or, at minimum, annually) and if positive to do further testing and then retest every 3-6 months until clear.

We can eliminate abnormal cells by removing them, sometimes in pretty painful ways, if we catch them in the pre cancerous stages. That's still not as good as preventing the contraction of a virus, since the virus will remain in the body and reappear and since most procedures for removing the cells cause permanent scarring, damage, and fertility and childbearing problems.

Even if an infected woman does not have her HPV result in precancerous cells, she is still passing HPV on to other men, who then pass it along to others.

And, condoms do not and cannot prevent the transmission of HPV, which technically does not specifically require a sexual act for transmission.

Condoms protect against unwanted pregnancies and STDs. There is NO SHOT or MED that will provide the same protection as condoms. PERIOD.

Condoms may be good for REDUCING the risk of contracting certain STDs and be passable as birth control (12% failure rate with perfect, lab condition usage is better than nothing, but not ideal BC for anyone wishing to be serious about not having a pregnancy), but they do NOTHING to even reduce transmission of the HPV virus. Ever.

They also don't do much to reduce liklihood of chlamydia which is commonly asymptomatic and can fairly rapidly lead to infertility in men and woman, but is detectible with simple testing. The upsurge in comdom usage has actually correlated with an uptick of undetected chlamydia infections leading to PID and infertility because people thought condoms prevented everything...and they stopped getting tested.

That's not true! Sorry. I will repost this here:

http://www.cdc.gov/condomeffectiveness/latex.htm


Also: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/ReproductiveHealth/story?id=2102991
And: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn9383-condoms-provide-protection-against-hpv-study-finds.html#.Uxne3fldVzo

Nothing is 100% effective other than abstinence, but condoms remain the best form of protection, in spite of efforts to downplay their effectiveness.


Condoms save lives. And I have personally known people that had sex with HPV-infected partners who did not contract it because of condoms. I also remember the feeling of waiting for test results to come back. Why should a new generation ignore everything we learned during the AIDS scare?

I can't believe anyone is seriously asking this question. There's a reason childhood mortality is so low now in comparison to pre-mass-vaccination eras. Get your children vaccinated, unless there is a serious medical reason not to. Herd immunity keeps us all safer (see last summer's measles deaths in Wales), and there is no credible scientific evidence that supports any of the popular anti-vacc rhetoric.

It doesn't make sense to use condoms, every time?

For the last time. Try following. You are arguing against NO ONE. Why? Because no one was arguing "It doesn't make sense to use condoms." Period.

That's not true! Sorry. I will repost this here:

http://www.cdc.gov/condomeffectiveness/latex.htm


Also: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/ReproductiveHealth/story?id=2102991
And: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn9383-condoms-provide-protection-against-hpv-study-finds.html#.Uxne3fldVzo

Nothing is 100% effective other than abstinence, but condoms remain the best form of protection, in spite of efforts to downplay their effectiveness.

Condoms save lives. And I have personally known people that had sex with HPV-infected partners who did not contract it because of condoms. I also remember the feeling of waiting for test results to come back. Why should a new generation ignore everything we learned during the AIDS scare?

For the last time, condoms are only effective for the skin they cover, and no one has stated they should not be used. Latex is a barrier for lots of things. The problem is that almost all bacterial STDs and HPV strains are highly transmissible skin to skin and some even through undergarments. The best protection is offered against HIV, which does not survive long exposed to air.

But, you cannot have known people that had sex with HPV-infected partners who did not contract it because there is no way to test for the presence of the strains of HPV that cause cervical cancer. The only thing we can do is detect when HPV has resulted in abnormal cell growth. You cannot test negative for HPV and you can have it for many years (decades) and never have abnormal cell growth. In fact, there's no way to tell if males have those forms of HPV at all.

I am For childhood vaccines

Why: the risks are outweighed by the benefits

Meh. My husband's monster-in-law got shingles. We didn't feel a bit sorry for her mean *kitten*.

Not to digress from the main conversation, and this might be a silly question, but...wouldn't your husband's mother-in-law be your mother?

That's actually her least nonsensical post this morning.

I don't know when it become okay to avoid using condoms, but I find it appalling.

http://www.cdc.gov/condomeffectiveness/latex.htm

You should note that no one in this entire discussion has asserted they shouldn't be used.

But, using a condom to prevent HPV transmission is like trying to shovel snow with your umbrella - it's not the tool for the job.

Oh, like you are just going to know, oh it's only warts, not herpes. Seriously, babe. ****!


ETA: And yes, it *CAN* prevent infection in times when there isn't an outbreak. Like with herpes, using a condom when the "afflicted" partner is showing no sign of outbreak, can protect them.

You are not making any sense. The discussion is about vaccines to prevent transmission of HPV. That has nothing to do with your rant.

It doesn't make sense to use condoms, every time?

Derp.

Also I don't know how this started like 14 pages into the topic, but as someone else has said, we're talking about the pros and cons of vaccines, not condoms. No one is disagreeing with using condoms. This kind of came out of nowhere lol

I don't know when it become okay to avoid using condoms, but I find it appalling.

http://www.cdc.gov/condomeffectiveness/latex.htm

You should note that no one in this entire discussion has asserted they shouldn't be used.

But, using a condom to prevent HPV transmission is like trying to shovel snow with your umbrella - it's not the tool for the job.

Oh, like you are just going to know, oh it's only warts, not herpes. Seriously, babe. ****!


ETA: And yes, it *CAN* prevent infection in times when there isn't an outbreak. Like with herpes, using a condom when the "afflicted" partner is showing no sign of outbreak, can protect them.

You are not making any sense. The discussion is about vaccines to prevent transmission of HPV. That has nothing to do with your rant.

It doesn't make sense to use condoms, every time?

Derp.

Also I don't know how this started like 14 pages into the topic, but as someone else has said, we're talking about the pros and cons of vaccines, not condoms. No one is disagreeing with using condoms. This kind of came out of nowhere lol

It is related to the HPV vaccine. The HPV vaccine is not as effective as condoms.

I'm for every vaccine!

I am for childhood vaccines because the disease is often more of a risk to life than the vaccine is. I play the numbers game, if the risks are higher from the disease than the prevention, I go with prevention.

For example, my daughter and myself don't get flu shots, why we are often exposed to flu in others, but have not had it to date. My brother gets the flu every year, he should get a flu shot. My mom is over 80 she needs a flu shot.

This is basically how I feel too, though I don't have kids. I don't know if I have ever had the flu shot (I'm 30). Maybe as a kid and I just don't remember, but I don't get sick very often and I feel it's good to expose my immune system to things to build natural immunities. If I worked in a hospital I would do it for the sake of the patients (pretty sure it's required in that situation anyway). For sure I think the major ones you do as a kid though...polio and things like that...are important.

This doesn't make sense. By getting a vaccine you are exposing your immune system to "things" (an attenuated virus) to build natural immunity. I'm not saying the flu shot is extremely effective but it can provide some preventative measures. For the average over 10 year old and under 70 year old person who isn't around those age groups or people with immunodeficiencies or pregnant women getting a flu vaccine doesn't make a huge difference. So you're laid up in bed for a week, not a huge deal you won't die or anything. Also, the vaccine is predictive of the most common strain for the season, there will always be other flu viruses around you could contract or the virus you were vaccinated against could mutate enough to render your vaccine kind of useless. But there are not really any negative effects of the flu shot and getting a vaccine certainly isn't cheating the system or technically "unnatural". It's simply choosing what you expose your immune system to, when, and how much in an effort to increase its efficacy against fighting later infections.

I disagree. The flu shot has a bunch of things in it that I just don't think belong in our bodies, like formaldehyde for one. I don't think that helps my body to create natural immunities. I've always been very healthy (never ever laid up for a week in bed) and it's just my personal belief that allowing my body to fight things off on it's own is part of that. I think my immune system is the stronger for it. If I do get laid up in bed for a week from sickness that will be alright. That's what sick time is for and I can afford that. But I don't think getting the flu shot will prevent that from happening. The chances that the flu shot are actually made to prevent the current flu strain is so slim I'd just rather not put all that other junk in my body that is in the flu shot.

The only thing regarding vaccines that I don't necessarily believe in would be the HPV/ Gardasil vaccine, but only because it's a relatively new vaccine and I don't believe that there's enough research done about it yet to rationalize getting it. Perhaps on that one I could or should do more research, and perhaps by the time I have a girl child (if I do) and she's old enough to get that particular vaccine there will be a lot more information available, but that would probably (hopefully) be at least 15 years from now.

Wrong wrong wrong. The HPV vaccine was already under development over 15 years ago. In order to be approved by the FDA, vaccines have to go through numerous levels of research. First, animal trials are done extensively. Then, trials are conducted with a small number of subjects. Phase 2 consists of clinical trials with a few hundred subjects, followed by Phase 3 with thousands of subjects. If the vaccine fails to show any efficacy or has harmful effects at any of those stages, it will not be approved. Because the vaccine (and it's competitor, Cervarix) were both approved by the FDA, we KNOW that they work and are safe.

Not always. A lot of clinical trials aren't long enough to really parse out long term effects. They do the best they can to investigate side effects, but there is only so much that can be done in the time frame - it's just not always feasible to follow a drug for years on end before moving onto the next phase, and thus a number of side effects are found in post-marketing. For example, Zofran (an anti-nausea drug) was later found to have the potential to cause long-QT syndrome (a heart rhythm disorder). A lot of antidepressants are taken for much longer than was ever tested and again, post-marketing side effects are discovered.

My point is, we don't KNOW they are safe - we have reasonable certainty, but not everything is always known at the time they come out. I've been on drugs in the NDA phase, and I am definitely for vaccines and pro-medication in the right circumstances, I can just completely understand the trepidation with a brand new medication on the market.

What we do know, all too well, is that cervical cancer can be fatal and even where not fatal can leave a woman infertile or unable to carry a child to term. Pap smears have definitely cut the numbers of deaths and HPV screening and removal procedures have helped, but those carry complications for fertility and life in the future as well, and are highly dependent on close monitoring and early detection.

This year around12,360 new cases of invasive cervical cancer will be diagnosed and around 4,020 women will die from cervical cancer.

The best prevention for cancer is regular screenings. An immunization is a false sense of security in this instance, I think.

ETA: And the best prevention of STDs is CONDOMS! When I was a kid, everybody was pushing condoms. Now it's like condoms don't even exist anymore. smh

Um... screening doesn't prevent cancer. If they can find it by screening, it means you already have it. And, sometimes, then is too late for treatment.

Prevention > screening. And vaccines are one tool in the arsenal for prevention. Condoms are another.

The amount of formaldehyde in a shot of vaccine is essentially negligible (if it is even present at all). Even if a six month old got all their shots at one time, the amount of formaldehyde they got would be 160 times less than what their body produces normally, through metabolism, in a day.

http://www.harpocratesspeaks.com/2012/04/demystifying-vaccine-ingredients.html
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Fair enough Richard. As long as my body can handle the flu though, I'm still not going to get the flu shot as I just don't see it as needed. I feel much differently about polio vaccines, etc. as that is not something I can rely on my body to just flush out and the vaccine in cases like that is an actual proven preventative, unlike the flu shot trying to match the right strand. At a certain point in my life, I'm sure the flu will be a much riskier thing for me or my family due to age, health, etc. and when that time comes I'll get the flu shot in the hopes that it's match for that year's version.