When I take Willow to the Pediatrician and she gets any kind of shots, the doctor gives us a pamphlet with information on the shots. So, since everyone is all up in arms about the links between vaccinations and things like autism, I thought I'd take an in-depth look at the vaccinations. Next in line is the Mumps Vaccination.
The United States' Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Vaccinations and Immunizations section has a recommended immunization schedule that you can download. They also have a lot of great information for each and every vaccination so this is where I will start in my search for information. Here is their pamphlet on the MMR Vaccination.
The Mumps Vaccination (MMR) is given in two doses. The first dose can be administered when your child is between 12 and 15 months of age and the second when the child is between 4 and 6 years old. These are the recommended ages. But children can get the second dose at any age, as long as it is at least 28 days after the first dose. This vaccination is may be given at the same time as other vaccinations.
Note: A “combination” vaccine called MMRV, which contains both MMR and Varicella (chickenpox) vaccines, may be given instead of the two individual vaccines to people 12 years of age and younger.
First, what exactly are Mumps?
Mumps is a viral infection that primarily affects the parotid glands — one of three pairs of salivary glands, located below and in front of your ears. If you or your child contracts mumps, it can cause swelling in one or both parotid glands.
Complications of mumps are potentially serious, but rare — and your odds of contracting mumps aren't very high. Mumps was common until the mumps vaccine was licensed in the 1960s. Since then, the number of cases has dropped dramatically.
Why get vaccinated? Mumps is best known for the swelling of the cheeks and jaw that it causes, a result of inflammation of the salivary glands. Mumps also causes a fever and headache. It is usually a mild disease, but it leads to meningitis in about 1 child in 10 who get the disease. It can occasionally cause encephalitis, deafness (about 1 in 20,000 cases), or even death (about 1 in 10,000 cases).
Because outbreaks of mumps still occur in the United States and mumps is still common in many parts of the world, getting a vaccination to prevent mumps is important.
How about a brief History of Mumps? Mumps has been a common disease for centuries. Hippocrates wrote about it almost 2500 years ago. It’s not all that serious an illness. It doesn’t even affect male fertility the way that most people think. So why was a vaccine developed? Well, about 1/3 of the men who get mumps develop exquisite pain and swelling in one or both testicles, which then shrivel up and remain permanently atrophied. Perhaps that had something to do with it!
By the way, mumps can affect the ovaries as well.
Now that we know about Mumps, how was the vaccination Developed?
First, you should know that the MMR Vaccination is actually a combination of three vaccines; Measles, Mumps, and Rubella. Like the DTaP vaccination, it inoculates against three diseases.
The component viral strains of the MMR vaccine were developed by propagation in animal and human cells. The live viruses require animal or human cells as a host for production of more virus.
For example, in the case of mumps and measles viruses, the virus strains were grown in embryonated hens' eggs and chick embryo cell cultures. This produced strains of virus which were adapted for the hens egg and less well-suited for human cells. These strains are therefore called attenuated strains. They are sometimes referred to as neuroattenuated because these strains are less virulent to human neurons than the wild strains.
The Rubella component, Meruvax, is propagated using a human cell line (WI-38, named for the Wistar Institute) derived in 1961 from embryonic lung tissue. This cell line was originally prepared from tissues of aborted fetuses, raising religious objections.
MMR II is supplied freeze-dried (lyophilized) and contains live viruses. Before injection it is reconstituted with the solvent provided.
The MMR vaccine is administered by a subcutaneous injection.The second dose may be given as early as one month after the first dose. The second dose is not a booster; it is a dose to produce immunity in the small number of persons (2-5%) who fail to develop measles immunity after the first dose. In the U.S. it is done before entry to kindergarten because that is a convenient time.
The more common symptoms of mumps are:
Other symptoms of mumps can include sore face and/or ears and occasionally in more serious cases, loss of voice.
Now, on to the vaccination itself.
Some people should not get MMR vaccine or should wait.
Mild problems:
Moderate Problems:
Severe problems:
Note: The first dose of MMRV vaccine has been associated with rash and higher rates of fever than MMR and varicella vaccines given separately. Rash has been reported in about 1 person in 20 and fever in about 1 person in 5. Seizures caused by a fever are also reported more often after MMRV. These usually occur 5-12 days after the first dose.
As you may or may not know, the MMR vaccination is the vaccination at the center of the claim by many parents whose children suffer from autism that vaccinations are the cause. Claims of a connection between the vaccine and autism were initially raised in a 1998 paper in the respected British medical journal The Lancet. After it was discovered that Andrew Wakefield, the paper's lead author, had received major funding from British trial lawyers seeking evidence, ten of the paper's twelve coauthors retracted its interpretation of an association between MMR vaccine and autism. It was also discovered that Wakefield had previously filed for a patent on a rival vaccine using technology that lacked scientific credibility, and that Wakefield knew but did not publish test results that contradicted his theory by showing that no measles virus was found in the children tested.
Following the initial claims, multiple large epidemiologic studies were undertaken. Reviews of the evidence by the Centers for Disease Control, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, the UK National Health Service, and the Cochrane Library all found no link between the vaccine and autism. The Cochrane Library's systematic review also concluded that the vaccine has prevented diseases that still carry a heavy burden of death and complications, and that the lack of confidence in the vaccine has damaged public health.
I found an awesome website that lists the package inserts and ingredients for all available vaccinations (e.g. provided by MERK or GlaxoSmithKline). It's called the World Association for Vaccine Education. You can find their page on the Mumps Vaccine here.
More Information:
And since there are those people that are concerned about links of vaccinations to neurological disorders and the like I thought I'd include some of their links as well:
Generation Rescue is an international movement of scientists, physicians and parent-volunteers researching the causes and treatments for autism and mentoring thousands of families in recovering their children from autism.
The Thinktwice Global Vaccine Institute was established in 1996 to provide parents and other concerned people with educational resources enabling them to make more informed vaccine decisions. Thinktwice encourages an uncensored exchange of vaccine information, and supports every family's right to accept or reject vaccines. Thinktwice's Mumps page.
I asked my pediatrician if she had a lot of parents who were choosing to NOT vaccinate their children. She said she could count on one hand the total number and that she, of course, recommends AGAINST not vaccinating your children.
Previously:
Hepatitis B Vaccination Information
Rotavirus Vaccination Information
Diphtheria Vaccination Information
Tetanus Vaccination Information
Pertussis (Whooping Cough) Vaccination
Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) Vaccination Information
Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccination Information
Polio Vaccination Information
Influenza (Flu) Vaccination Information
Measles Vaccination Information
Next week: Rubella
December 18, 2008
About Vaccination - Mumps
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