Most of today’s adults don’t really think about measles very much. After all, it is a childhood disease. And most of today’s adults either were exposed as kids (if you were born before 1957) or were vaccinated with the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine as children and both scenarios result in lifetime immunity.
But we should be concerned about measles since it is on the rise, purely as a result of misguided parents deciding not to vaccinate their children.
Measles is a disease caused by a very infectious virus. A Morbillivirus. Similar to Covid, it is not a seasonal virus. It can infect people year round. Unlike Covid, it is much more infectious, with a long incubation period (21 days vs 10 for Covid). Also unlike Covid, once you have been vaccinated, or have been exposed to the virus, immunity against reinfection is lifelong.
As more and more parents are electing not to vaccinate their kids, the incidence of all of these infectious diseases is not surprisingly on the rise, worldwide. Much of this is a result of the made up studies suggesting that autism was caused by vaccines. This has clearly been disproven and the original author, who falsified his data, was discredited and his credentials revoked. Unfortunately, the damage has already been done.
As of this week, there have already been 41 cases of measles in kids in the US, mostly in Florida, but also in 10 other states. This is in contrast to the 58 cases that occurred in all of 2022, the highest it had been in many decades. We have 9 more months to go so we will very soon surpass that record.
Although in most people, measles causes a high fever, rash and general malaise, lasting for a few weeks, it can have some devastating consequences.
- 20% of kids require hospitalization.
- 5% develop serious viral pneumonia often requiring oxygen.
- 1 in 1000 die from complications of the disease, like encephalitis (brain inflammation).
- One particular type of encephalitis, subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE), is 100% lethal.
As I mentioned above, this virus is very infectious, spread by aerosolized droplets. It is not spread as easily just by breathing, as is Covid, but since the symptoms when infected include a lot of coughing and sneezing, it’s a mute point. The recommendations are that if a child is not vaccinated but someone in the school came down with measles, they should stay home for the full 21 days to make sure they are out of the incubation period. This will prevent them from getting infected and also prevent further spread of the disease.
That’s where the irresponsible comments made by the idiot Florida Surgeon General come in. A known anti-vaxer who is against Covid vaccination as well as other simple measures like masking, he announced that the decision whether to keep unvaccinated kids home from a school with known measles cases should be up to the parents. That recommendation is malpractice and dangerous. Next, he’ll start saying that the decision whether to put a child in a car seat or even wear a seatbelt should be up to the parents.
The MMR vaccine is 95-98% effective at preventing those diseases and in those who still get it, it diminishes the severity of the disease and reduces the duration of contagiousness. It has been around for decades and has proven to be extremely safe. And it does NOT cause autism.
Sadly, there are some school districts, in fairly well off communities all over the country where updated vaccination rates are as low as 50%. Those parents are not just putting their kids at risk, but everyone else’s as well.
COVID. Fortunately, case numbers, hospitalizations and deaths continue to slowly go down. The number of weekly deaths was still ~1600, if you want to call that an improvement. Part of the problem on a worldwide scale remains lack of reporting. Dozens of countries are simply not reporting anything anymore so the WHO doesn’t have a good handle on the world Covid situation.
Similarly, FLU and RSV are on the way out.
All this having been said, all of these, and many other bugs are still out there causing illness so please be careful, and if ill, be courteous and stay away.
It may be too late for bothering with your FLU or RSV vaccines, but certainly not your Covid primary or Covid booster shot.
Mask appropriately, and remember that an N95 is dramatically better than a surgical mask (which is almost useless).
Have a great weekend.
Stay safe and Be Well
AC