http://www.thescotsman.co.uk/index.cfm?id=120653

 

Another vaccine added to MMR jab


HEALTH officials are preparing to add a chickenpox vaccine to the controversial MMR jab to create a quadruple vaccine for toddlers in a move set to create a furore among parents.

Thousands have already chosen to give their children single jabs for measles, mumps and rubella after reports linking the triple vaccine with autism.

Although the Department of Health (DoH) insists MMR is safe and no autism link has been proved, one critic said it "beggared belief" that the government was considering adding a fourth live vaccine before the existing controversy had been resolved.

There are also certain to be questions over whether a chickenpox vaccine is necessary. In Scotland, cases have dropped from 30,381 cases among children in 1989 to 19,202 cases in 1999. The number of deaths from chickenpox in Scotland last year was two, neither of them children.

But a single chickenpox vaccine has been in use in the US for five years - and Dr David Salisbury, the head of immunisation at the DoH, told The Scotsman he believes chickenpox poses sufficient risk to warrant a childhood vaccine in the UK.

He said: "This has so far proved very safe and will probably turn out to be very effective. Giving children the chickenpox vaccine at the same time as the MMR jab is obviously something we have got to explore very carefully. There is work going on to combine the MMR with the chickenpox vaccine."

He added: "Chickenpox is very common and for most people it is mild. But there are deaths every year, so it is not entirely trivial. And there are long-term consequences such as shingles which for older people is a horrible disease. One of the hopes is that the chickenpox vaccine will reduce shingles."

Dr Salisbury said health professionals dislike administering multiple jabs because it is "not in the best interests of children".

He added: "We have a real problem in giving parents the assurance that what we are doing is the best thing for their children.

I understand why parents feel that it’s better not to get the vaccine and take their chance, but that is not in the child’s interests either."

Trials that involve combining the chickenpox vaccine with the MMR jab are already under way at Sheffield Children’s Hospital. The results have not yet been published.

Any decision on including a chickenpox vaccine will be taken at a UK-wide level with input from the DoH and Scottish executive. An executive spokeswoman said: "The only way we would introduce a chickenpox vaccine is if it was recommended for the UK as a whole."

The chickenpox plans met with fury from families who believe their children have been damaged by vaccines.

Bill Welsh, chairman of Action Against Autism, said: "Quite frankly it beggars belief that anyone would consider adding another live vaccine to the controversial MMR jab at this time. One of the largest-ever class action lawsuits is on-going in the UK courts. Rather than add more vaccines, they should be providing single vaccines as a choice."

Jackie Fletcher, spokeswoman for Jabs, an action group for parents who believe their children were damaged by vaccines, described the proposals as a "backward step".

She added: "The government have adopted this policy because they want to put more and more vaccines together because it is cheaper and easier for them to do so.

"They don’t want to relent on MMR and allow parents choice because that would sow further seeds of doubt about its safety and cast doubt over the safety of future jab combinations."

Chickenpox and shingles are two diseases caused by the same virus, varicella. Most people catch chickenpox as children and suffer fever, rash and poxes. Shingles is caused when the chickenpox virus, which the body never really gets rid of completely, is reactivated after many years.

 

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