There is a new outbreak of measles in France and Switzerland. If you have never had measles, might be a good idea to get innoculated.

http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-04-...-outbreak.html

Yeah...twice!!

There was a story in the paper the other day about a weird cult-like family that was, allegedly, deliberately infecting their children with measles.

I'll see if I can dredge up a link.

Nasty disease, it is. I'm with the OP: If you've never had it, get innoculated, and get your children innoculated, too!

EDIT: Here you go. It's in German, I'm afraid, but I'm sure our welsch friends will get the gist of it.

There is this fancy tool called Google Translate. We can read web pages in various languages. Nifty idea, isn't it?

It would be, if it was actually any good.

Which, when it comes to articles written in Swiss High German, it often isn't.

Of course, if you'd ever been to Switzerland, and ever read any newspapers here, you'd already know that.

I remember when I was a kid going to a party and everyone caught measles there.
In my class at school there was only 1 girl in.
My elder sister told me that years ago they actually had "measles party" so if someone had it they would invite all their friends round to catch it!!

I think I understand the tradition of chicken pox parties, though diapprove, but measles parties?

It's true it has been a wave of measels, I know only of canton GE and VD and 3 of my local friends with kids who have not been vaxed got it. Apparently it is quite rough, with older teens.

I would be careful with the fast vaxing, though, since it takes a while for the vaccine to get effective, it might actually weaken the immune system right in the period of incubation if the child has been exposed, which might invite complications. if the child has just been vaxed and is ill, at the same time. I think I would wait up this wave and right after, get vaccinated.

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The idea of "sharing", and spreading around all the usual childhood illness wasn't so uncommon when I was growing up in 60's and 70's Britain. It was just normal practice that before leaving primary school (preferably even infants), that we should have contracted chicken pox, mumps (especially boys), measles and German measles/rubella (especially girls), at all costs. I, still to this day have managed to avoid rubella - maybe I have a natural immunity, or just been lucky.

With my girls it's just a case of the MMR (not available in my time), although, without checking, I don't know if they're immunised against rubella (I think so) - although I don't seem to hear much about it anymore, despite it's serious ramifications in adulthood.

I was vaccinated against measles as part of the normal run of vaccinations when I was a baby. The rubella vaccination (in my experience) comes a lot later - we were vaccinated at about 12 or 13.

Measles is pretty nasty and has a habit of developing complications which can turn serious or even deadly. I think the clown who posted that article linking the MMR to Autism a few years ago caused a panic and a subsequent drop in vaccinations which has probably caused this upsurge in cases of measles.

I think the rubella immunisation is recommended for girls at around 12 years.

I am wondering how effective the measles vac is - apparently I had measles three times as a child. Although that may have included rubella, it still leaves one extra lot of measles.

I think it's the case. But, despite the conflict of interest, and the fraudulent nature of the paper, Andrew Wakefield is not the only party to blame. Irresponsible journalism, and, to a lesser extent, parental hysteria should also shoulder the burden of responsibility.

I'm shocked if anyone thinks a measle party can be a good idea. It's a potentially lethal childhood illness. Forgetting the seriousness of the disease also contributed, I think, to the fall in immunisations.

It's very rare, once you've had measles, to get it again. If you've had it three times, I'd suggest a more likely explanation is that you had something that maybe your parents thought was measles.

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Down with racism. Long live miscegenation!

MMR stands for Measles-Mumps-Rubella, so if your girls got the MMR shot they must be immunised against rubella (how protected they are against it, is another story)

...... d'oh ... 'course it does (whilst at the same removing head from where the sun don't shine, and promising self to mix with water next time, and also add tobacco)

[it's because, despite that I've written rubella, I always think German measles]

I remember, We were given the vaccination at school.

We were given a shot at 12 too. These days it is in MMR, I opted for our child to have the vax spread, so she didn't get MMR and 4th shot of the regular big hexa vax given all at once, but that's all.

Before the vaccine existed, yes I am quite older than you, everybody used to get measles (I did of course) and it was no big deal. One week on antibiotics and off school for a while.

In some cases, this could cause death, but occurence is smaller than 1 for 100 000.

The vaccine is extremely controversial not because it is a multiple vaccine but because it contains aluminium solutions and god knows what that are known to be a probale cause of neurologic and auto-immune disorders. Scientifi experts still debate on it. They also debate on the date of birth of Christ (not the same experts hopefully).

Rougeole is Back - Measles are back is the title of all magzines in France and Switzerland. Now guess in which 2 main countries in the world the vacinne is produced and guess who sits on the board of WHO (World Health organisation) which recommends vaccination against measles?

Vaccine against a destructive disease such as smallpox is no more in use. And smallpox is much more dangerous than measles. Measles is extremely contagious though, which is good, everybody get sik at the same time, and once for all.

make your own informed choice.

good lord, would you please ignore these deluded conspiracy theorists and have your children properly vaccinated?

Absolutely. Make you own choice.

Read the WHO information on measles.

If you decide not to immunise your children then make sure they stay away from others who have it, if your children are suffering from any other illness that has weakened their immune system.

And stay away from my kids, too.

Measles was very close to being eradicated in the western world due to the MMR inoculation in the same method that polio and previously small pox was eradicated, the idiotic behaviour of a minority of delinquent parents and quacks has allowed this disease to not only remain in existence in the west but also be given a foothold again by decreasing the group immunity of the western population.

I think the 'chicken pox' is the condition often caught by children at parties, not measles.

When I was 15 one of my classmates died as a result of measles. It was before the time of routine vaccinations and the majority of us in the class had already had measles when we were much younger.

This lad obviously hadn't had it already and died as a result of the virus infecting the membranes of his brain. (I think that was it but I didn't pay too much attention to the details at the time). It was all pretty horrible as I remember.

I would recommend the vaccine to anybody (I had my son vaccinated without any hesitation) as I have seen first hand the results of a measles infection.