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Old Sat Jan 6, 2007, 09:06 PM
Wendy Beltrami Wendy Beltrami is offline
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 269
I completely agree Julie. I think we should all think twice before automatically vaccinating. It doesn't take much effort to find out the number of cases in your area of a particular disease and to evaluate the risk vs benefit for your particular situation.

For example, my oldest son recently left for college and I read a lot about how he should get a meningitis vaccine because freshmen living in dorms are considered a group at risk.

I followed a link on his college's website and found that In Oregon where he is attending college, unlike the rest of the country, 66% of the reported cases of meningitis have been serotype B, not covered by the current vaccine. For this reason, the Oregon Health Division does not support routine vaccination in college students. This wasn't advertised, it was information I had to go looking for.

We all take risks every day, but there are some that simply aren't worth it.
If I had a do-over, you can be sure that my son with AA would not have gotten his Hepatitis B vaccine at age 7. He had absolutely zero chance of getting Hep B but the result was that the vaccine triggered something in his particular immune system that resulted in Aplastic Anemia.

Wendy/mom to Grant, age 15
dx 12.4.98 AA
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