The "myth" of herd immunity

[Eos of the Eons]

Sanitation DOES NOT work well on its own. Being deluded into thinking humans have a super immune system without due respect to microbes will put us back to dying before age 1 in droves, and only making it to 50 if you're lucky. Well, we'd have a lot less seniors around to take care of, by dying in misery by age 50 and seeing grandkids suffering of pertussis and dying of measles is not a good way to go.

We had good sanitation by the 40s and 50s and the vaccine preventable diseases were why vaccines were developed in the first place, because microbes really love a nice healthy host. They can use you longer.

Having no clue about the immune system and microbes is what keep antivaxxers so darn sure of their ignorance.

http://skepticlawyer.com.au/2009/11/the-bent-spoon-2009/
Only the very poorest and most war torn countries on the list are as bad or worse than the ‘best’ figures from the past. A world without vaccines but with good sanitation is almost impossible for modern westerners to imagine, but since we can’t hop in a time machine and go back to the ancient world, maybe we should send the anti-vaxxers on an all expenses paid holiday… to Sierra Leone. Even that, however, is distortionary, because NGOs sometimes manage to administer vaccines even in war zones, some parts of the country are sewered while some are not, and some of the deaths are no doubt caused by HIV.

Antivaxxers rewriting history about smallpox in 1872 Leicester also does not bode well for people who take this kind of anecdote as "evidence". Antivax sites commonly misquote dishonestly, along with rewriting history.

This BS comes straight from whale.to... go figure:
www.whale.to/vaccines/biggs_ch_78.html

Instead, actual history does point out that Leicester had higher death rates from disease until authorities stepped in to clean things up, and started vaccination. This failed with smallpox because people refused vaccination and herd immunity WAS NOT Achieved!

So, they had to start quarantines instead.

Actually history shows sanitation did not stop the spread of smallpox. Vaccine refusal winded up causing deaths when a strong epidemic hit. In 1868 isolation had to be used, and this also helped to stop the spread of disease. I guess we can go back to isolating people, but people seem to think they have rights and still run around infecting others because they have to work or go to school.

By 1877 there were only 6 deaths.

I will try to quote directly from the pdf in the next post, but I can't copy and paste from it.




http://www.le.ac.uk/lahs/downloads/RossPagesfromvolumeXLIIIsm-7.pdf

 

[Eos of the Eons]

The numbers between 1864 and 1868 rose to 120 through the new Medical Officer of Health, J. Wyatt Crane, argued that this would have been very much worse but for the efficiency of vaccination. In 1871-1872 a smallpox epidemic swept the country... he had to admit... that there were 314 deaths...

This is where antivaxxers misquote and say that "vaccination failed", but they leave out the part that there was not enough uptake to prevent the increasednumber of deaths. Those that died were NOT vaccinated. "Sedulously attended to" does not mean most people were vaccinated. In fact, if you read the pdf, they were jailing people who were refusing it. This is where they started isolating people instead. They started doing that before 1872:

Thus, once the Vaccinating Officer began to take out proceedings against defaulting parents, the numbers who were sent to prison for defying the vaccinating ACTs resulted in a total of 61 imprisonments between 1869-1884...

Because of the reluctance of many parents in Leicester to submit their children to vaccination, and the fact that neither compulsion nor prison was proving effective, an alternative method of preventing smallpox spreading, gradually came to "compete" wth vaccination. This method which came to be practiced by the Local Board of Health in Leicester from 1877 onwards, adopted the practice of quarantine and isolation in cases where an outbreak of an epidemic disease was suspected. This was neither a new nor revolutionary approach...


The whole business of quarantine was as result made compulsory in Leicester by a Local Act passed on 13 September 1879...

As a result of his opposition to the question of compulsory vaccination and his considerable organising ability he was instrumental in directing much of the anti-vaccination opposition emanating from Leicester. It was only because of the strenuous effort efforts of Biggs that the Leicester Anti-vaccination Leagues came to have an influence out of all proportion to its size...

Compulsory vaccination only made the whole thing political, which is chronicled in the rest of the article. It would be stupid not to allow people to opt out. But nowadays those same people who refuse do not self-quarantine, instead they tell everyone to eat healthy (as if we're all so very nutrient-deprived) and live healthy (as if most of us don't already).

But in Leicester the vaccine didn't fail. What failed was convincing people to get it, and then trying to force it on them by putting people in jail. Yeah, that worked well. An outbreak in 1872 showed them that this did not work at all. Herd immunity would have worked had people given the vaccine a chance and enough people had gotten it.

Antivax spin on this tale is shameful. Nowhere in the history does it say the vaccinated people in Leicester died of smallpox. Instead, it is tale of what happens when threatening jail to people who don't get it. It just spawns support for antivaccine movements.

 

[Estellea]

Thanks everyone for the feedback. Interesting points raised.

There are 3 types of lies:
White lies
Black lies
Statistics

Spoken like a true denialist.

I'm not saying herd immunity doesn't work - I'm saying it does have serious flaws. It is not a simple answer. For example, most people seem to think that vaccines are the main contributer to decline in mortality of diseases such as measles. Well we know that before the vaccine was introduced mortality decreased by 90% in the UK & USA - why? Largely due to improvements in public health measures & improved nutrition. Herd immunity may have an effect, but don't tell me it's more important than proper nutrition & sanitation.

First, measles mortality only appeared to decline by >90% because deaths due to secondary infections went grossly under reported and SSPEs were latent infections that were rarely diagnosed until the last 2 decades. Mortality did decline due to increased medical care but death is not the only outcome of interest; morbidity did not decline until the introduction of the vaccine: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez/1180255 and in spite of your so-called nutrition and public health improvements, the U.S. experienced a large measles outbreak during 1989-1991. There were more than 55,000 cases of measles reported in the U.S. Forty-nine percent occurred in children less than 5 years old. Ninety percent of all the reported deaths occurred in non-vaccinated people. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez/1289115

Some seem to be implying it is herd immunity alone that is preventing the disease from taking hold. A healthy person is able to fight the disease off. For example, why do I never get a cough, cold or flu? Is it because I have been vaccinated? No, I have not. Is it because we have herd immunity? No, not yet. It's probably because I actually look after my body. 50% raw food intake,appropriate Vitamin D levels, low sugar intake etc.

Your anecdote is worthless and so is Weston A. Price (a disgraced dentist cum woo food guru). Herd immunity is keeping you from contracting measles, mumps and rubella. Adequate nutrition is essential for better health but it isn't a panacea.

Is an antibody sufficient to provide protection for a child against disease?
More & more studies are showing that:
the proper studies haven't been done
antibodies are not the final way in which your body is protected
there is a difference between how children process material through air and food versus through injection.

You are transferring your own ignorance of both humoral and cell-mediated immunity to others. Vaccination for prevention of disease is preferable to wild-type disease acquisition when sequalae is avoided, which it is. So it is a specious argument to state that nachurel disease is preferable simply because it may illicit better CMI than vaccination does.

it's important to understand that the natural illness has a greater influence on the health of your body. When you have the active illness it actually imparts a certain boosting to the immune system. Also, exposure does not necessarily lead to infection. A lot has to do with the overall status of your immune system.

Maternal rubella infections actually increased post WWII and pre-vaccine period. So explain your wootastic love affair with diseases to the tens of thousands of women that were infected with rubella and either miscarried, had stillborn births or gave birth to babies with congenital rubella syndrome: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6700106
And even as recently as 5 years ago: http://www.pediatricsupersite.com/view.aspx?rid=43990 I guess they didn't get your memo about how wonderful natchurel infections are.

Many seem to be missing that most of the population doesn't have herd immunity. We know that vaccines last only 3-10 years at best. While most people may think they are immunised, the vast majority have no immune protection - so for the past 40 years or so we have been living without herd immunity.

Then explain why there are no endogenous cases of measles and rubella in the U.S. and why we observe an inverse correlation between vaccine uptake and diseases.

You don't need to be replicating the virus to be a carrier! Anyone can carry the virus. This is why someone who has no symptoms of swine flu & is immune can have a nose swap taken & be found to be carrying the virus. I agree that when the virus is replicating you may have more chance of passing it on, but there is still a chance that it can be passed on because they are carrying it.

This doesn't negate herd immunity, quite the contrary in fact. A reduction in carriage reduces transmission and a sustained interruption in transmission leads to herd immunity.

Many seem to think that antibodies are the best way for protection, but the immune response is far more complicated than that.

Gee, you don't say.

If I said to you I'm going to put you in a room with a disease, but don't worry because we have herd immunity. How many of you would be willing to go in the room? Clearly there are other issues that need to be looked at.

Huh? Like what?

The rest has been addressed so please provide complete citations or links.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

If I said to you I'm going to put you in a room with a disease, but don't worry because we have herd immunity. How many of you would be willing to go in the room?

Yeah, I'd go into the room, cuz I'd be vaccinated too. We are always in rooms with diseases, every day. If you choose to not be vaccinated, then you are going daily into rooms and relying on herd immunity. You are also relying on a delusion that "good eatin and good livin" are protecting you too. I don't go on that illusion. I get vaccinated and know I'm contributing to herd immunity that will hopefully protect babies too young to be vaccinated.

 

[paximperium]

Yeah, I'd go into the room, cuz I'd be vaccinated too. We are always in rooms with diseases, every day. If you choose to not be vaccinated, then you are going daily into rooms and relying on herd immunity. You are also relying on a delusion that "good eatin and good livin" are protecting you too. I don't go on that illusion. I get vaccinated and know I'm contributing to herd immunity that will hopefully protect babies too young to be vaccinated.

I'm vaccinated and contribute to herd immunity as well.

I and a multitude of others provide a service to the leaches who refuse to get vaccinated and yet reap all the benefits and yet threaten the multitude of premature babies, AIDs patients, cancer patients etc etc etc who cannot get vaccinated.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

I'm vaccinated and contribute to herd immunity as well.

I and a multitude of others provide a service to the leaches who refuse to get vaccinated and yet reap all the benefits and yet threaten the multitude of premature babies, AIDs patients, cancer patients etc etc etc who cannot get vaccinated.

Precisely why they also now want to say vaccinated people are carriers too, when they are NOT. Gotta make themselves not accountable somehow.

 

[Estellea]

I'm vaccinated and contribute to herd immunity as well.

I and a multitude of others provide a service to the leaches who refuse to get vaccinated and yet reap all the benefits and yet threaten the multitude of premature babies, AIDs patients, cancer patients etc etc etc who cannot get vaccinated.

You know there is a very vile belief amongst some hard-core anti-vaxxers (I wouldn't doubt the current company is one) of essentially eugenics. The 'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger (and better to breed)' type that thinks we are molly coddling the weak by vaccinating.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

...The 'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger...

I interpret that more insidiously. I feel they are saying those people that don't live right should die... cuz they eat toxic sugary salty carbs, or feed their kids only junk - like chips and chocolate. If you live right, you won't get a disease. The type that says "my kids won't die cuz I breast fed em until they are 8 and are only fed organic food". So, who needs vaccines when you've got breast milk and organic food!

They feel vaccines give people weak immunity that makes them even more susceptible to disease, and that it's a conspiracy to depopulate the planet. So, avoid those nasty killers and eat organic! Then you'll have superhuman immune systems and NEVER EVER get sick, no matter what! You gotta "exercise the immune system" with viruses as "a natural part of gut flora".

Too bad they are so ***** clueless about microbes and the reality of our mortal selves.
But, yeah, hang around parenting boards and you'll hear any of these claims, including what you wrote and what I printed here, and far far far more. It's absolutely bleedin' insane, most things I've read.

 

[Deetee]

I think the troll has gone to ground.

 

[rjh01]

I think the troll has gone to ground.

I think you need the person at least 48 hours before you can say that.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

*waits*

I really wish people like that would answer the questions we pose at least.

 

[ponderingturtle]

I think the troll has gone to ground.

bad metaphore, gone under the bridge.

 

[Travis]

I'm somewhat dubious that eating plenty of antioxident rich food would, in and of itself, protect you from polio. Can we get an anti-vaxxer to put this to a test?

 

[Eos of the Eons]

You'd have to find one that isn't vaccinated. Ironically, most were vaccinated as kids and enjoy the benefits, but balk at getting their own kids vaccinated now. Putting their kids to the test wouldn't be fair, as it's no their fault their parents are listening to idiots.