Shot of Prevention

By Amy Pisani

I hope everyone had a happy and healthy Thanksgiving weekend. I wanted to give everyone an update on a very special project that the Colorado Children’s Immunization Coalition put together.  Their Healthy Kids Thank-A-Thon urged parents, grandparents and mommies-to-be to submit gratitude statements, photos, videos and blogs online explaining why they are grateful for a healthy child on the Health Kids Thank-A-Thon website.

Well, the results are in and I thought it was worth sharing with our Shot of Prevention readers, and not just because I am one of the participants! There are some really touching videos from parents and family members, and I thought that even though it’s not Thanksgiving anymore, we can still take a moment to reflect on this important topic.  Check out the YouTube videos here. Visit the Thank-A-Thon Web site here.

 By Frankie Milley, Meningitis Angels

As we end the year and the new year approaches, I find myself walking through a memorial garden planted in memory of Ryan, my only child who died from a vaccine-preventable form of meningococcal meningitis.

This cool fall day brings new blooms on a white mum given to me by Ryan on the last Mother’s Day he was with me. Yes, eleven years have passed and somehow it still finds its way to the light above the earth in which it is planted.

The blooming is comparable to the long, hard fight to educate and raise awareness for the prevention of vaccine-preventable diseases. The little flowers are like facts coming to the surface and finding the light of day through the cover of misinformation.

After the walk, I returned to my office to check e-mail and find yet more lives taken by the same disease that took Ryan. My heart screams. Once again, we reach out to help a family cope and educate those who surround them with the information on prevention.  

Very shortly we will celebrate Thanksgiving. This year I am giving thanks for those unsung heroes, the parents who choose to vaccinate their children. These parents are choosing life over illness caused by vaccine-preventable diseases, which can be accompanied by death and/or debilitation.

I will celebrate the individuals and organizations like those listed here who dedicate themselves with great passion and love of children to protect them through truth and facts about disease and prevention.

Once again I will give thanks for the little mums blooming in Ryan’s garden reminding me that like them we must stay the course and find our way to the light and the eradication of deadly disease.

Lastly but not least I will remember my beautiful child, my son, my life who needlessly died from a vaccine-preventable disease.

My New Years wish/prayer will be that no infant, child, teen or adult will suffer or die needlessly.

Vaccines save lives.

By Amy Pisani

I recently sent a very brief word of praise to a few colleagues down at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC ) for all that they have done to ensure that my two children were able to receive their vaccines against both seasonal and H1N1 pandemic influenza.  One of those colleagues replied that I had no idea how much she needed to receive my email, today of all days. 

This really got me thinking about all those who have toiled so tirelessly to help keep millions of people healthy and disease-free.  As of last week 49.9 million doses of vaccine against H1N1 have been made available and shipments of both the H1N1 and seasonal flu vaccine are increasing daily.  A quick perusal of the CDC’s website is enough to make your head spin. They provide information on a whole host of issues such as the tracking of vaccines shipments, the ongoing safety surveillance, provider and public education, funding allocations, and negotiations to reduce cost as a barrier and ensure provider reimbursement by health plans, etc.  As if that weren’t enough, the CDC must also address its various stakeholders including parents, health care providers, adults, immune-compromised people, and everyone in between.  They must explain to the panicking public why there may have been a delay in their shipment of flu vaccine, where they can go to find a vaccine in their community, and why they must wait until a certain time every year before they can ship the vaccine.  I don’t envy their task list! 

Health officials are also responsible for reporting on the many casualties of this flu season, including heartbreaking statistics such as this one – “Government health officials say H1N1 flu has sickened about 22 million Americans since April – about 4,000 have died, including 540 kids.”

On Thanksgiving Day I will say my thanks aloud to the researchers who invent vaccines, the manufacturers that create those vaccines, the distributors who arrange the shipments, the state and local program staff who toil to ensure that those in greatest need have priority access to the vaccines, the private physician offices who take the calls and schedule the appointments again and again for their patients as supplies arrive, and to all the volunteers whose contributions are often unseen. 

Most of all I give thanks to the staff at CDC and health departments who have given up months and months of precious time with their children and loved ones in order to ensure that we Americans are able to protect ourselves and our families against this terrible disease. 

To all of those in public health who toil day in and day out to keep me and my family healthy – I wish you a Happy, Healthy Thanksgiving.

By Amy Pisani

Every Child By Two Spokeswoman Actress Amanda Peet is featured on the cover of this month’s Self Magazine including a story on her work with Every Child By Two and the Measles Initiative. Pick up a copy of the magazine at your newsstand today to read her full story.

Below is an excerpt from the online version – On her work with Every Child By Two (a nonprofit group that wants all kids vaccinated by age 2), the Measles Initiative, and standing up for how important it is that children be vaccinated, which Jenny McCarthy and groups like Autism United have reacted to strongly. “This is about children’s health. This is about the future of our children’s health. It’s about what happens when you become complacent and you’re not vigilant as a community. It’s about the fact that I don’t think parents feel like they’re part of a community anymore. We all have to make this barricade together and if anybody drops hands, it’s like…I always think of it as a door opening. With polio, they were able to eradicate it in this country, but if the door opens even just a little bit, our children are at risk and we are at risk.”

 Check out SELF’s exclusive behind the scenes info with Amanda Peet here.

ECBT is also highlighted in Self’s online site under the “Charities We Like” section here. 

by Alison Singer
President, Autism Science Foundation

Newsweek has just posted a special “end of the decade project” in which they attempt to recap the last ten years.  They have produced twenty different top 10 lists, including one on overblown fears; threats that fortunately didn’t materialize or were later debunked.  Topping this list are Y2K, and the threat of shoe bombs (and frankly nothing is more annoying than having to take off your shoes at airport security, especially in winter when the floor is cold). I was very happy to see that number 3 on the list is “Vaccines and Autism”.

More than a dozen studies done over the past decade indicate that neither vaccines nor any specific ingredients in vaccines cause autism.  While research on environmental factors is important in autism, it makes little sense to continue to pursue a specific study of vaccines, the one environmental factor that science has already ruled out.

Writing in Newsweek, Dr. Paul  Offit explains the origin of the disproved notion that vaccines cause autism, and concludes with the following: “In the meantime children whose parents were frightened by MMR have died from measles and those frightened by thimerosal have died from bacterial meningitis: sacrificed at the altar of poorly conceived ideas.  The tragedy is, given all we now know about the neurological basis of autism, these hypotheses had no chance of bearing fruit.”

As we approach a new decade, let’s keep focused on areas in autism research that have potential to yield new, actionable information for families.  Let’s commit to asking new scientific questions in the coming decade and to putting the vaccine-autism myth squarely behind us.

To learn more about Autism Science Foundation, click here: www.autismsciencefoundation.org

To read the Newsweek article, click here: http://2010.newsweek.com/top-10/most-overblown-fears/vaccines-cause-autism.html

Guest Blog post by Laura E. Scott, Executive Director of Families Fighting Flu

After almost daily calls for the past two months to our pediatrician’s office, the Virginia Department of Health, and Arlington County Public Health Division asking when the H1N1 vaccine was going to become available in our area, I was elated last Thursday when I received an e-mail that listed the first H1N1 flu vaccination clinic for priority groups at our local community center for this past Saturday.  Both of my children fall into a priority group as my oldest daughter, Lauren (who is 4½ years old) has asthma and my youngest daughter, Claire, is two years old.  As determined as I was to get my daughters vaccinated, I was dreading the thought of having to stand in a long line for hours on end on Saturday – in the cold rain.  But, as someone who understands and knows how serious the flu can be, particularly in children, there was nothing that was going to stop me from getting my kids vaccinated.  I mentioned the clinic to my husband that evening, who had also read about it online and he said that he was going to camp out in front of the community center at 6am on Saturday to be one of the first in line when the clinic opens at 9am (I didn’t even have to ask him to do this!).  I naively said to him, “You really think you need to get there that early?”  And mind you, this is coming from someone who lives and breathes the influenza world as if I thought perhaps it would be different in our community.  Well, it’s a good thing he got there when he did because at 6am he was about the 10^th person in line.  By 8:30am when the girls and I arrived the line was wrapped around the very large building and down the street.  It was unbelievable!  But a part of me actually got a little emotional as I walked with my kids to the front of the line to meet my husband; I was very proud to see so many dedicated parents lined up and waiting patiently – all to get their kids vaccinated against the flu.  I thought to myself, maybe this year will be the turning point when many more parents finally start to understand how serious the flu can be and why vaccination is so important – every year.  All you have to do is go to www.familiesfightingflu.org to read about parents who have lost a child to influenza to quickly realize that there’s no better protection for your child than the influenza vaccine.

After listening to Lauren whine for 30 minutes about not wanting to get vaccinated, it was time for us to move out of the cold rain and inside the warm building to begin the process.  From the moment I stepped inside, I couldn’t have been more impressed with the entire system that the Arlington County Public Health Division had in place.  There were greeters at the front door with friendly smiles who very nicely led us to a room where we filled out consent forms.  After the forms were completed, we were then led into a large gymnasium where there must have been at least 20 different vaccination stations set up.  We immediately went to a station where there were welcoming nurses ready to vaccinate our girls.  Lauren had decided while waiting outside that she would get vaccinated first so that she could show her little sister how brave she was.  Well, things quickly took a turn for the worse and Lauren decided to have a major meltdown as we approached the vaccination table.  So, it was determined very quickly that Claire would go first.  Claire bravely got the shot with barely a whimper.  Lauren, on the other hand, gave a good fight and tried very hard to exit the gymnasium without getting a shot, but with two determined parents and three experienced nurses to hold her down, she successfully got vaccinated.  It was not a proud moment for me; actually, it was a little humiliating, but as we gathered our belongings and walked out of the gymnasium, I was comforted, in an odd way, by the chorus of crying coming from other children behind me.

As we sat in the “holding area” for about 15 minutes to make sure the girls did not have any reaction to the vaccine (which they had none), Lauren tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Mommy, I’m glad I got my flu shot so I will stay healthy.”   I looked at her with a smile and said, “I am too.”  Little does she know how much relief I feel now that she and her sister have been vaccinated – even though they’re not fully immunized yet, I am comforted in knowing they at least have a little protection now from this very serious virus.

In about 28 days (hopefully) we get to do it all over again for the boosters!