Small pox is in the same family, but totally different. Small pox is deadly most of the time. Shamefully, the early traders in Canada gave the natives blankets infested with small pox. They had no immunity at all, it was an Old World disease. On Vancouver, Island alone, 20,000 natives died within a year of small pox.
The small pox immunization is to infect you with cow pox. Edward Jenner, a doctor in the 17th century noticed milk maids rarely got small pox. He tracked it down to the fact they had all had cow pox, another mild disease like chicken pox (came from chickens??) and starting inoculating children with the cow pox bacteria. None of the children got small pox in the next epidemic, so he extended his theory and started vaccinating everyone. Probably the first known vaccine, I would guess.
I am old enough to have had the small pox vaccination as a 5 year old. I remember having a high fever and a large, itchy pox on my arm, on my birthday. Not fun! I thought I was immunized forever, but recently heard I would need a booster, to make me safe. If there is another outbreak of small pox, I will certainly get it.
I am also old enough to have had Red Measles (very, very sick), Rubella or German measles, (not sick at all, just a rash) and chicken pox. Chicken pox is nothing, if you get it young enough. But, as an adult, it is dormant in the spine, and it becomes active as shingles, which is horrible. I’ve had shingles 4 times, the first one took 6 months to get over, because I would not go off my RA meds, which suppress the immune system. I might make a different choice if it happened again.
The problem with German measles, is that if a pregnant mom gets it, her child can be born deaf. I used to live in near Vancouver, and there was a whole cohort of deaf children, whose mother’s got it during an epidemic. They literally set up a whole program for those children from K to grade 12. I knew several moms whose children were deaf, and they were so pro-vaccine, you coudln’t imagine. How traumatizing to know a disease you got, destroyed your child’s chance of ever hearing.
As far as the flu shot, I can’t take it. I used to get it in the 1980s. The first 2 years I was fine. The third year, I had the flu 7 times, the last time I had to be hospitalized I was so bad. The doctor in the hospital told me I should have had the flu vaccine. When I told him I had, he told me to never have it again. I haven’t, and I have never had the flu. I wonder what that doctor knew that he wasn’t telling me! I mean, if it works, well, great. Except, how do you know you would not have had it, anyway?
That being said, I absolutely believe in vaccines for children. So many diseases have been eliminated, or were, before this anti-vaccine nonsense conspiracy happened. Children used to die all the time of these diseases, which are unknown today. Well, like I said, till someone brings a disease back from a foreign country or elsewhere, and all the kids who have not had the vaccine get sick.
The small pox immunization is to infect you with cow pox. Edward Jenner, a doctor in the 17th century noticed milk maids rarely got small pox. He tracked it down to the fact they had all had cow pox, another mild disease like chicken pox (came from chickens??) and starting inoculating children with the cow pox bacteria. None of the children got small pox in the next epidemic, so he extended his theory and started vaccinating everyone. Probably the first known vaccine, I would guess.
I am old enough to have had the small pox vaccination as a 5 year old. I remember having a high fever and a large, itchy pox on my arm, on my birthday. Not fun! I thought I was immunized forever, but recently heard I would need a booster, to make me safe. If there is another outbreak of small pox, I will certainly get it.
I am also old enough to have had Red Measles (very, very sick), Rubella or German measles, (not sick at all, just a rash) and chicken pox. Chicken pox is nothing, if you get it young enough. But, as an adult, it is dormant in the spine, and it becomes active as shingles, which is horrible. I’ve had shingles 4 times, the first one took 6 months to get over, because I would not go off my RA meds, which suppress the immune system. I might make a different choice if it happened again.
The problem with German measles, is that if a pregnant mom gets it, her child can be born deaf. I used to live in near Vancouver, and there was a whole cohort of deaf children, whose mother’s got it during an epidemic. They literally set up a whole program for those children from K to grade 12. I knew several moms whose children were deaf, and they were so pro-vaccine, you coudln’t imagine. How traumatizing to know a disease you got, destroyed your child’s chance of ever hearing.
As far as the flu shot, I can’t take it. I used to get it in the 1980s. The first 2 years I was fine. The third year, I had the flu 7 times, the last time I had to be hospitalized I was so bad. The doctor in the hospital told me I should have had the flu vaccine. When I told him I had, he told me to never have it again. I haven’t, and I have never had the flu. I wonder what that doctor knew that he wasn’t telling me! I mean, if it works, well, great. Except, how do you know you would not have had it, anyway?
That being said, I absolutely believe in vaccines for children. So many diseases have been eliminated, or were, before this anti-vaccine nonsense conspiracy happened. Children used to die all the time of these diseases, which are unknown today. Well, like I said, till someone brings a disease back from a foreign country or elsewhere, and all the kids who have not had the vaccine get sick.
