I was interviewed for this weekend’s edition of the Tweed Daily News regarding an ‘epidemic’ of measles in a High School in Tweed Heads. One of the things I asked the reporter to find out (because of course, it hasn’t been reported anywhere) is how many of the 8 confirmed cases of measles had received the measles vaccine. Below is the response from Mr Corben (the same Mr Corben from the Health Department who contacted the parents of the 4 week old child who died of whooping cough last year to tell them that I had requested information on their daughter’s diagnosis…) to that question. According to Mr Corben, “The overwhelming majority of them had not been vaccinated.” There’s a scientific answer for you! Out of 8 cases, the overwhelming majority were not vaccinated. What is that Mr Corben? 7 out of 8, 6 out of 8? If you know the number, why don’t you release it? And if you don’t release the number, are people to assume that means you really don’t know? Either they are vaccinated or not. Either you know or you don’t. It is time to get some straight answers to straight questions. Especially when the unvaccinated are being blamed for this outbreak.

There is a vaccine poll on this page so please be sure to vote.

Below is the quote from the Journalist at the Tweed Daily News who interviewed me – this was in response to my request that he find out whether or not the 8 cases were vaccinated or unvaccinated:

Hi Meryl.

I put the question to Mr Corben about how many of the eight confirmed cases of measles in the latest outbreak were vaccinated.

“The overwhelming majority of them had not been vaccinated,” Paul Corben.

Of course, despite a long interview, the reporter did not use any of the information I had given him in his 3 articles on this subject. To give him some credit, it was probably the sub-editor who deleted any reference to my interview or the AVN. At least they did include the information I had given them on the fact that vaccination is not compulsory and parents won’t miss out on any government entitlements if the choose not to vaccinate. Below are the articles. I will highlight some of the important points. If you would like to respond to this newspaper on their reporting, the editor’s email is:

Growing fear of measles epidemic

James Perkins | 28th August 2010

HEALTH authorities are adamant immunisation is the best way to combat disease, but are battling low childhood vaccination rates across the Far North Coast.

NSW Health targets a minimum 90 per cent of vaccinated kids to create a “herd immunity” to disease in the community.

The Tweed Shire has a 89.1 measles, mumps, rubella vaccination rate for children aged 24 to 27 months, but that figure drops off to 83.3 per cent who return for the follow-up shot at five years of age.

Parents can become conscientious objectors against vaccination and not lose government benefits usually reserved for those who do.

While vaccination statistics are only available at shire level, Paul Corben, the North Coast Area director of Public Health said Tweed Valley had a high conscientious objector rate.

“Certainly in the area around Murwillumbah, we do see conscientious objector rates of about 25 per cent and that is extraordinarily high,” Mr Corben said. (Murwillumbah is about 20 kms from Tweed Heads. If the objector rate is so low in Murwillumbah – why are we seeing the outbreak in Tweed Heads? What point is Mr Corben trying to make here?)

Doctor Graeme Burger, spokesman for the Tweed Valley General Practice Network said some parents didn’t want their children vaccinated “for all sorts of strange reasons” and acknowledged it was their decision. However he is an advocate of the practice.

“Vaccination is one of the major advances in medicine and is a way of preventing diseases that is simple, easy and without complication,” he said.

There had been a few concerns raised with vaccination in the past few decades, including fears it could lead to autism, but Dr Burger said they had been totally debunked.

Dr Burger urged people to vaccinate their children and continue with the recommended vaccination schedule.

“Vaccination is the single most effective thing we can do to prevent major, catastrophic and killer diseases.”

In the case of measles, a person vaccinated as a child was considered vaccinated for life. (why are we now seeing vaccinated adults being pushed to take boosters for measles then? And where is the information that those who are getting a measles vaccine are actually getting mumps and rubella vaccination as well?)

Measles spreads to eight in Tweed

James Perkins | 28th August 2010

Protected: Public Health nurse Sue Devlin vaccinates Kara Garchevic yesterday.

EIGHT students have contracted measles in a Tweed Heads outbreak and health authorities are expecting more victims.

A student recently brought the disease back from an overseas holiday and subsequent cases have been confined to the student’s siblings and fellow school students.

But there are fears more people will soon come down with the highly infectious preventable disease, and health authorities have renewed their call for parents to have their children vaccinated.

The Far North Coast has some of the lowest vaccination rates in Australia, and North Coast Area Health Service director of public health Paul Corben said there had been multiple opportunities for people outside Tweed River High School to have been exposed to the outbreak.

Mr Corben said the overwhelming majority of the eight people already infected were unvaccinated.

“Measles can be a serious condition which can be trivialised by some anti-vaccination groups, but one-third of people who get the disease suffer complications including ear infections, pneumonia and diarrhoea,” Mr Corben said. (first of all, ear infections and diarrhoea are NOT considered to be serious complications. Secondly, the figures used here come from a CDC publication called the Pink Book and in that publication, there are NO references to this information whatsoever. So our Health Department is referencing a CDC publication which references nothing. In other words – they are saying whatever the heck they like – may as well say that measles kills everyone who gets it and the vaccine is absolutely harmless – there is as much evidence of those statements as there is of the one-third complication rate)

He said 10 to 15 per cent of cases could result in inflammation of the brain. (Could result. Where is the reference, Mr Corben? I can easily say that 10 to 15% of Public Health Officials misquote and make up statistics…but unless I actually have a reference for that, it would just be an assertion on my part. Without Mr Corben’s reference, this is just an assertion on his part.)

Doctor Graeme Burger, spokesman for the Tweed Valley General Practice Network, said vaccination was the single-most-effective measure to prevent major, catastrophic and killer diseases.

And the last article in the trilogy. Whilst I have great sympathy for any parent who has lost a child to a disease – the fact is that those families whose children have died of vaccine reactions are ignored, vilified and treated like dirt in many cases. It is time for both sides to be heard.

Mum speaks out about measles death

James Perkins | 28th August 2010

Protect your kids: Immunisation advocate Cecily Johnson with a picture of her daughter, Laine, who died of measles complications 15-years ago.

Blainey Woodham
IT was 15 years ago this week that Cecily Johnson lost her daughter Laine to a terrible, degenerative disease she suffered because of a measles infection.

Laine died of subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, or SSPE , a disease that left her blind within two weeks of diagnosis at seven years old, mute not long after and bedridden by her death, aged 12.

Ms Johnson has understandably become a passionate advocate of vaccination because of the ordeal. The Pottsville woman said she usually tried not to mark the anniversary of her child’s death, but rather remembers her birthdays as a more positive anniversary.

But it was hard not to remember it this week after a measles outbreak in Tweed Heads that has infected at least eight people.

Laine became infected with measles at 10-and-a-half months old, too early for her 12-month measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccination.

SSPE usually hits seven to 10 years after a young child has had measles. About one in 100,000 people who catch measles get the disease.

Ms Johnson was, and still is, a registered nurse who regularly administers vaccinations, which made Laine’s infection with measles and subsequent death more tragic.

“I am big time for it (vaccination),” Ms Johnson said. “SSPE is a terrible disease, every time I hear of an outbreak of measles I freak out.”

Not only is there a risk of suffering SSPE, but contracting measles itself can be devastating for anyone with a compromised immune system.

Unvaccinated babies are among the hardest hit by measles. (Which is another reason to question why we vaccinate since it is KNOWN that women who are vaccinated – even if they subsequently contract measles – are less likely to be able to pass on placental antibodies to their unborn children that will protect them from measles within the first 15 to 18 months of life)

Ms Johnson goes to anti-immunisation meetings to ask questions, then shows the audience pictures of her daughter, even ones of her body in a coffin on the day of her funeral.

“I went to one two days after my daughter’s funeral,” she recalled.

A chiropractor told the audience no child had died as a result of measles. “I pulled out photos of her in the coffin and told them it was my own daughter.

“They say there could be a reaction to vaccination … but look at it, look at the odds, a lot more kids died of measles itself, or later of SSPE than suffer a side effect from a vaccination. (when most of those who die or react as a consequence of vaccinations are denied – how can she say that more kids die of measles and SSPE than from the vaccines? This is just a guess)

“All of you who don’t want to vaccinate … I get so upset, because you are putting all the little bubs at risk,” she said.