Wendy Marsden wrote:

PF Riley wrote:

While I agree with you that the benefit of vaccination outweighs the
risk, which society are you talking about that "requires" such?

I just had a conversation with my child's preschool he's starting in the
Fall. A full vaccination record is the default with any other option not
mentioned as even a possibility.

I'm holding off on the chicken pox vaccine (with my ped's approval) and
despair of him ever catching it normally if the school gets fussy about
needing the vaccine to admit him. I'm not sure what religious grounds I
have when he's had all his other vaccinations.

Well, how lucky do you feel? If an unidentified viral infection
was killing 100 or so kids a year and putting thousands in the
hospital ... how would you feel about getting the vaccine? Just
because it's got a familiar name doesn't mean it's not capable of
causing harm.

http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/c...icken.pox.html

"One of the challenges facing public health professionals is to
educate the public and health-care providers that chickenpox is
not an entirely benign disease. There are approximately 100
deaths and 9,300 hospitalizations due to complications of
chickenpox each year. The majority of these deaths and
complications occur in previously healthy individuals, and should
be preventable by vaccination,"Dr. Jane Seward, CDC
epidemiologist.

Chickenpox can be complicated by a variety of serious conditions
including skin infections which can progress to blood borne
infections, infections of the brain which may result in
disability, and serious pneumonia. In rare incidences, these
complications can progress to death.

A chickenpox outbreak at a daycare center in Atlanta provided CDC
epidemiologists an opportunity to study the effectiveness of the
vaccine. "Among children who had not been vaccinated prior to the
outbreak, 88 percent of the children contracted chickenpox," said
Dr. Seward. "Among those who had been vaccinated, only 14 percent
developed chickenpox and in all cases the disease was mild."

Tsu

--
To doubt everything or to believe everything
are two equally convenient solutions; both
dispense with the necessity of reflection.
- Jules Henri Poincaré