I was a child in a time before there were vaccines for most

[MineralMan]

common childhood illnesses. I got measles, chickenpox, whooping cough, mumps and just about everything else that was going around. I survived all of them, without any lingering consequences. However, not all of my friends were so lucky.

One friend died in third grade from complications of the measles.
Another kid I knew lost his vision due to the measles.
Another friend developed encephalitis from chicken pox and missed a year of school. She always had weakness on her left side.
Three kids I knew got polio. Two died. The other is my brother-in-law.

When I was in 7th grade, the polio vaccine became available. We all lined up for our shots. All of us. Nobody was exempt. Period.

Today, smallpox has been eradicated. Most doctors will never see a case of diphtheria, and polio is not a thread to American children.

Vaccination prevents diseases and saves lives. Childhood diseases kill and cripple children. It is that simple.

[panader0]

1. In 1956, when I was 6, my father got stationed in Morocco.

I got so many shots I had my arm in a sling.

[MineralMan]

3. Wow! When I was in the USAF, in 1965-69,

I got shots for just about everything, including an experimental vaccine for the plague. They did both arms at the same time during Basic Training. No pushups for a couple of days. So, that was a good thing, I guess.

[panader0]

5. My dad was USAF too.

I'm pretty sure one of the shots was for bubonic plague.

[MineralMan]

6. Yes, if he was sent to Morocco.

I got the plague vaccine because I was headed for Turkey. Typhoid and typhus, too. My vaccination record even shows a vaccination for cholera. That must have been an experimental one, too.

The plague vaccine took two shots. Both made my arm swell up badly.

[SoCalDem]

70. aaaack... typhus shot.. I thought they had killed my arm

We went to Panama (USAF) we had shots for EVERYTHING....

Luckily a shot saved my life.. I was bitten by a poisonous snake ( I was 8... IFIR) and I got every anti-venom they had.. something worked ( we did not see or catch the snake)

[MineralMan]

72. No fun!

[bobbieinok]

9. In 62 some of us in grad school went to Germany. We got a ton of vaccines. V sore arm!

Never knew why so many vaccines for Germany!

[OnlinePoker]

15. That's how I found out I was allergic to eggs.

MMR and Yellow Fever were gestated in egg yolks and my arm swelled to almost twice its normal size and I went into mild anaphylaxis. I spent two days in the base hospital until I was through the worst of it. They gave me hell saying I should have told them I was allergic, but I'd eaten eggs all the time as a kid so I didn't know. Haven't eaten an egg on its own since though will eat them if they're baked in something else.

[3Hotdogs]

32. Regarding plague, I visited Badlands National Park. There are Prairie Dog "villages."

Signs on the roadway advise that plague is found within the area.

Of course, idiots are walking among the mounds to get better photographs.

[Basement Beat]

52. Interesting!

I'll have to look up some details on that.

[MineralMan]

55. Yes. Plague is endemic in burrowing rodents in many places.

There was an outbreak of it in ground squirrels in California some years ago. I clearly remember seeing some with swellings around their necks. I gave them a wide berth.

There are a few cases of plague from those sources every year. Fortunately, it responds pretty well to antibiotic therapy in most cases.

Here's a map from the CDC, showing plague cases from 1970 through 2017. There has been an average of 7 cases per year:

[samnsara]

64. oh crap we did that!!! well, i sat in the car but my car mates when out..

..into the villages to get photos. I think they basically chased them. I never saw those signs or I would have hollered.

[sarge43]

44. Why service personnel are walking dart boards for the medics.

From The Oxford Companion to American Military History

Until well into the 20th century, disease, rather than the effects of enemy weapons, was the the single most important producer of casualties.

Percentage of disease casualties to overall:

Revolutionary War: 90%
Civil War: 71%
Spanish America War: 30%
WWI: 16.5%
WWII: .6%

Note the significant drop between 1865 and 1917. The vaccine for typhoid, also called the soldier's disease, was developed in 1898. In 1911 the entire US military had been vaccinated for it.

[snowybirdie]

2. As a young mom

back in the day, I saw a friend, a young mother like me, who contacted measles from her child. She was pregnant. That child was born profoundly handicapped and developmently disabled. A tragedy that lasted for generations.

[MineralMan]

4. That, too.

[Ilsa]

7. My first polio vaccine was a sugar cube.

And I had a friend with cerebral palsy on one side of the body which was almost useless, barely able to avoid a wheelchair, all because the mother contracted measles while pregnant in 1957.

There is a reason for the money spent on research for these vaccines. It is to save lives.

[MineralMan]

8. I was among the first to get the new vaccine in 1957.

It was a shot. In fact, the place where all of us kids lined up for it had the fancy injection guns, so we marched through, single file, and got whapped with the injection in the left arm. I'm left handed, and that arm hurt for a couple of days.

The sugar cube thing came later.

It was quite a big deal in my small town. The line of parents with their children went all the way down the block at the Veterans Memorial building.

Looked something like this:



and this:

[pnwmom]

13. They have switched back to the shot because the sugar cube used a live virus

and it got to the point there were more cases from exposure to the vaccination than from other sources in the "wild."

The shot now used provides excellent coverage using a killed virus.

[Hekate]

45. Those pix look very much like my elementary school when the shot clinic was held...

Last edited Sun Feb 10, 2019, 04:01 PM - Edit history (1)

Parents knew. Parents were not screwing around with addlepated ideas about vaccines. There was always a risk that someone somewhere would have an adverse reaction to a vaccine -- but there was a much more potent risk that many people right in front of you, in your neighborhood, town, and family, would die or be crippled for life from the actual disease.

I'm just old enough to remember the last big polio epidemic. Parents were terrified, and with good reason.

The shot clinic held in a classroom at my elementary school had families lined up across the playground and down the sidewalk outside the school. The sun went down. The clinic stayed open as long as people kept coming.

My grandchildren are not vaccinated -- my daughter gets her medical information from Face Book. I try not to think about it, I really do.

[MineralMan]

47. Yup. That scene was repeated everywhere.

People didn't resist because almost everyone knew someone whose child had gotten polio. I remember being five years old on a trip to Grandma's house in Arizona. I guess I threw up in the car, and the next thing I knew I was in the Emergency Room at some little hospital in Arizona, getting checked out. that would have been in 1950, and in the midst of a polio scare.

As I said in an earlier post, most people having children today don't have any knowledge of childhood diseases. They were all vaccinated, and didn't get them. So, they can't conceive of the worry and fear that comes with a case of the measles or whooping cough. Our mothers knew, though, all too well. So, they took us in for our shots, when they became available. But, that wasn't in time for me. I caught everything, so Mom got to play nurse with all three of her children.

Scary stuff for a young mother.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

46. Your memory of the year is slightly off.

The Salk vaccine came out in 1955, and I likewise well remember the mass vaccinations.

It was tested in Catholic schools for nearly a year before it was declared effective. The Catholic school I attended was one of those, and my older sister was in what turned out to be a control group. She, and everyone else in her grade got the non-polio vaccine injections, and then had to get the real thing the next year.

If you go to a public library and look at newspaper archives for early April, 1955 it really brings home how amazing and wonderful it was to have an effective polio vaccine.

[MineralMan]

48. Could be. It could have been when I was in fifth grade in 1955.

I remember the scene, but not my age, necessarily, at the time. I know it was right after the vaccine was available, though.

[dhol82]

77. I remember getting the shot in 1954 or 55.

I know it was before 1956 because we moved when I was ten and the shots were given in my old elementary school.

[MineralMan]

78. Yes. I think I've disremembered my age.

[catrose]

82. I got the shot one year, sugar cube the next time

My parents thought I had polio as a baby, so they were grateful for the vaccine. Vax to the max!

[Hermit-The-Prog]

23. cube here, too

All of my siblings have that tell-tale scar on the shoulder from the polio shot. I received the sugar cube, instead.

[Ilsa]

34. The scar likely from a smallpox vaccination,

using the air gun. Not very painful, or I would have freaked out. It formed a round scab. I still have my smallpox scar, although it has faded to where it is almost imperceptible.

Smallpox was eradicated and only survives in hot zone labs, from what I've read.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

43. must have been coincidence

Something must've changed with the smallpox vaccination at about the same time the polio vaccine was being distributed via sugar cube. I'm the only one amongst my siblings who has no scar and received the cube.

Thanks for the info.

[dflprincess]

37. The only scar I have from shots is from the smallpox vaccine

My polio shots (we got boosters every couple years until the Sabine vaccine came out) didn't leave a mark.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

49. The only vaccination that leaves a scar is the smallpox one.

[AnotherMother4Peace]

10. Almost died from the mumps - I was a toddler. I have a scar on my neck from the draining tubes.

The polio vaccine/sugar cube was a God send, and all the kids in my large family were immediately vaccinated. Vaccines are a great medical breakthrough.

[curlyred]

11. In the early 60s

My mom took us to the University of Oklahoma in Norman and enrolled both of us in a vaccination trial program. I remember we both had the mumps prior to being vaccinated, but not the measles.

And we got the sugar cube. My dad told us stories about his buddies getting polio one summer and how scared everyone was to go to the movies or even out of the house.

I had whooping cough a few years ago as an adult and it was horrible. That’s when I found out adults need a booster shot.

I’ve never understood the anti-vaccination logic, such as it is.

[Scarsdale]

17. Me, neither.

All 7 of us kids got vaccinated, no questions asked. We all survived. We used to get a scar from the smallpox vaccine, but our parents thought it was a small price to pay. People really should stop being so easily led by false information.

[pnwmom]

56. All 5 of us got all our vaccinations, no questions asked, and only 1 of us died the day after.

It broke my parents' hearts though.

The same thing had happened in my mother's generation, when a cousin died within hours of getting a DPT vaccine, and the doctors said it was a "bad batch."

Finally they took that vaccine, with its whole-cell pertussis component, off the market, and replaced the pertussis part with the much safer split-cell or acellular vaccine -- which I and my children have had, and I'm grateful for it. But there is a reason that the anti-vaccination movement sprang up.

[pnwmom]

21. The anti-vaccination movement grew out of the fact that there were rare cases

of encephalitis from the older (no longer used) whole-cell DPT vaccine.

My sister received her second dose of the whole-cell vaccine and developed encephalitis and died the next day. One of my mother's cousins also died years before and they were told the baby had gotten part of a "bad batch."

After one of my children had the vaccine and developed non-febrile seizures, the pediatrician decided not to give my children the pertussis vaccine. Luckily, my son is an adult now and those seizures weren't the first sign of a epilepsy -- it was just his reaction to the vaccine. But in the last few years, after the birth of a grandchild, all the adults in the family, including that son, had the new, much safer acellular pertussis vaccine, with no problem.

The organizations that rose up during the decades before the FDA admitted the problems with the old DTP vaccine are still in place. It's unfortunate that there was so much denial and delay in replacing the whole-cell vaccine with the acellular, because I think that gave impetus to the anti-vaccine movement.

[Chemisse]

12. I grew up in the shadow of the old polio terror, but the other diseases were expected and 'normal'

Polio was feared far and wide and I was warned to be cautious even after the vaccine had already stopped the carnage in its tracks.

The measles, chicken pox and mumps were different though. I never knew anybody who had complications from them, although it was common knowledge that it was better by far to get the diseases as children than as adults.

So when all the newer vaccines came out, I was skeptical that they were really needed. I was surprised to read of all the complications that were possible and how often they really happened. I grew up in a rural area in an age where it was not that easy to get news of things that happened to other people in other places.

I think this is how the vaccine apprehension started. People were desperate to protect their children from polio and were immensely relieved to have a vaccine. But the other 'routine childhood diseases' were not feared in that way and there was not desperation to have them stopped.

Suddenly there were vaccines for all sorts of diseases that parents hadn't even been concerned about. They had to be 'sold' on them. The more that came out, the more likely it was that there would be suspicion and concern that they were being conned into something that could actually hurt their children. I think the HPV vaccine really shattered the trust for a lot of religious parents, who feared that their daughters were being nudged into promiscuity.

I think the anti-vaccine movement could have been predicted and prevented with some consideration of how people think and what makes them nervous or suspicious.

[csziggy]

26. I don't understand how anyone can not be worried about any childhood illness

In my neighborhood we had a girl who had polio and had to wear leg braces for years. A boy whose mother had contracted measles while pregnant and he was born with a heart problem and developmental difficulties. Another boy (my age) who got measles and was profoundly affected - the rumor was it messed up his testicles - and he lost two years in school.

I've had lung problems all my life possibly from whooping cough as a baby.

I remember when the polio vaccine was introduced, when vaccinations for many other childhood illnesses were introduced. Before that I remember how sick many of the kids I knew got when they caught those diseases and how worried the mothers were that they would suffer lasting problems from them.

I don't understand how ignorant a parent has to be to risk her child getting the full blown expressions of those diseases. They cannot have looked into the history of them!

[Chemisse]

71. While all the parents knew about the dangers of polio, the others were more uncommon

less well known, and less fear-inspiring.

My children all had chicken pox, although they were by then getting vaccines against regular measles and mumps, and I wasn't particularly worried about it, provided they were not under one year of age.

As I mentioned, I've never known anyone who was permanently damaged by those diseases (except polio, of course). I only know how dangerous they can be because I've read about it.

There are multitudes of people who are not interested in reading about diseases. If they don't know somebody who has been severely stricken, see reports on the news, or hear stories of disease morbidity and mortality, they are simply expected to comply with their pediatricians' vaccine schedule and societal requirements.

That's fine when there is trust in the system. But once there is doubt among some portion of the population about the legitimacy or safety of any one of the vaccines, it can fall apart, such as what we have seen in the US in recent decades.

[Hekate]

59. "Childhood diseases" were never trivial -- they just winnowed out children into the graveyard.

Old graveyards are full of headstones memorializing infants and children. Old diaries and letters testify to the grief, as do old medical records.

But if we fail to teach the next generation, they will forget. And our anti-science and anti-history public education did just that, with the enthusiastic encouragement of the yahoos among us.

Facebook mommy groups are full of disinformation, and I wonder why that would be.

[Chemisse]

73. I guess the only way is for the resurgence of disease among the unvaccinated,

the 'discovery' of what can happen, and a newfound embrace for vaccines.

And the more we fight it and call them idiots, the more they will dig in their heels in self-defense, and the longer it will take.

Hopefully our Public Health officials have learned a lesson on how to introduce and present new vaccines so people don't feel they are being forced upon them. People should be lining up for them like in post #7.

[colorado_ufo]

14. So true!

When I was a child, polio was so feared that for whole summers public swimming pools were closed. Scientists weren't even sure how polio was spread. The first vaccine, the Salk vaccine, was the injectable. Years later, when I was in high school, came the Sabin vaccine, which was distributed on sugar cubes. I was a member of the Future Nurses Club, and we actually helped distribute the vaccine by putting it on the sugar cubes and giving it to people in public places.

There were no vaccines yet for many common illnesses, and I had had chicken pox, measles, and other childhood illnesses. When I had the measles, the doctors were so afraid that I would lose my sight that we had to keep the room completely dark for days, perhaps up to two weeks. The shades were down and curtains drawn, and I was not allowed out of bed.

So many things are forgotten with time that it is critical for those of us who remember and understand to tell our story to others.

[MineralMan]

19. That's what I remember about the measles, too.

All the curtains were drawn and we got put on total bed rest by my mother. For the chicken pox, my mom made mittens for us out of rabbit fur, so we couldn't scratch ourselves raw. I got the mumps in high school, and it was my tear glands that were affected. I had to stay in bed then, too, and that was the only time my girlfriend ever got to come into my bedroom. She had the mumps when she was much younger. She came and read my homework reading assignments to me. Mom made us leave the door open, though. That was funny, because I wasn't feeling like fooling around anyhow.

[luvtheGWN]

27. You just reminded me of the "dark room, shades down"

during my bout with the measles (or what were called Red Measles, as opposed to German measles, aka rubella). I had chicken pox in Grade 1, measles in grade 4 and mumps in grade 13 (back in the days when Ontario schools actually had K through 13). When I was hoping to have a family, my obgyn insisted on the rubella vaccine because there was considerable research showing pregnant rubella patients giving birth to children with serious debilitating effects.

We received all our vaccinations (other than those given to infants) at school, by the visiting nurse and doctor. We were also given Vitamin D capsules daily during the winter months. I must have received the polio vaccine as soon as it became available, because I recall my mother being so incredibly relieved about it. Finally, I could go to all sorts of places, especially in the summer months!

[treestar]

16. I had measles and chicken pox

never got the mumps.

I recall one called "German measles" that pregnant women absolutely could not get. It caused problems.

[TexasBushwhacker]

42. I got Red Measles, German Measles (rubella) and Chicken Pox

The thing about German measles is you don't feel all that bad when you're infectious, so you can be out, walking around, infecting others.

Actress Gene Tierney contracted rubella while she was pregnant from a fan who wanted her autograph. Gene's daughter was born deaf, partially blind with cataracts and severely mentally disabled. Agatha Christie used the incident as a plot point in her novel "The Mirror Crack'd".

[treestar]

57. That may be how it became

Known that rubella could cause damage to the child. It was a great fear when someone was pregnant.

I had a bad flu and so weakened got the chicken pox. I got better and then my siblings got it. Two of out friends were next. They may have been sent to get it, so they could get it over with. That was a thing people did too back then.

[TexasBushwhacker]

58. Yes, beyond toddlerhood

it seems like the older you are when you get mumps or chicken pox, the worse it is. I had a friend whose teenage daughter got CP and she had blisters inside her mouth and rectum. She was miserable. Adult mumps can cause sterility in men.

[Brainstormy]

86. my son likely became sterile from mumps

which he contracted at 20. He was in the hospital for days before it was finally diagnosed. The doctor said at the time that they never saw cases of it anymore. They adopted, btw.

[TexasBushwhacker]

88. Glad he adopted

I have a friend who is sterile and he and his wife went with a sperm donor and in vitro. They are now the parents of TRIPLETS. They love them to pieces, but they're in middle school now, so college is on the horizon. He's hoping they can get financial aid, because there is no way they can put 3 kids through college at the same time.

[OnlinePoker]

18. Meanwhile, the CIA set the polio eradication efforts back trying to find Bin Laden in Pakistan

Their using a ruse of a fake polio vaccination drive to get DNA samples from his compound became common knowledge and the people in the tribal regions now don't have any trust when true vaccinators come through.

[Peacetrain]

20. I remember standing in line in 3rd grade

at our school, to get our polio shots... it was that government intervention that stopped the epidemic..

[bdamomma]

22. That's why

I get so angry when people don't have their children immunized. Vaccines work and protect.

TB was another bad disease.

[MineralMan]

24. Tuberculosis is still around, and it has resistance to

antibiotics these days. What has made it less dangerous is testing. TB tests are required for almost everyone who works with schoolchildren and in medical facilities. Isolation or prevention of close contact works a treat in preventing new cases. But, it's not gone by any means. There are untreated or undertreated cases in every homeless shelter and many other places.

[ck4829]

25. Frightening that this anti-vax ideology is a thing. This isn't some prehistorical thing where

Infectious diseases were a source of terror.

[benld74]

28. My "Popeye" polio shot in my right

Arm is barely visible at 62 but I still recall getting the shot.
NO exemptions should be given
Mandatory is a must
Any medical personnel allowing exemption
Should have license pulled

[greymattermom]

29. Now that I'm medicare age I get lots of vaccines.

Pneumonia, flu shot every year, shingles shot, updated tetanus shot. Will these folks turn down those vaccines for themselves too?

[MineralMan]

30. A lot of people do turn those shots down.

I asked my doctor that when I got my 13-valent pneumonia vaccination. He said, "You'd be surprised how many do."

Me? If the doctor says I need a vaccination, I just say, "Does Medicare pay for it?" If so, his assistant wields the needle.

[CatMor]

31. My father born well before the vaccine ...

had the measles as a young boy and lost his hearing. If only he would have had the chance to have s vaccine his life would have been better.

[montanacowboy]

33. I had Everything when I was a kid

Measles more than once, Whooping Cough, Mumps, Croup and I can remember it all.
My cousin died from polio, he was in an iron lung for a short time, he was 11 years old.

I can remember getting my vaccine for smallpox which left a huge scab and then a scar on my left arm. I had to wear a plastic cup over the scab so it wouldn't come off prematurely.

I have no sympathy for these anti vaxxers as they put everyone else's children at risk. I work in a private preschool and we have to accept littles without vaccinations.

All State laws should require vaccines or your children cannot attend school. Enough of this fucking bullshit. Washington State is a hot mess of measles and it could get lots worse.

[Danmel]

35. I had a friend whose parents were disabled by polio

I was born in 1960, so I was immunized for polio. Read Philip Roth's novel Nemesis, about what summers were like before the polio vaccine.
I had chicken pox and mumps as a child. I had a very high fever and hallucinations when I got the mumps.
When the measles and rubella vaccines became available, I was vaccinated.
Years later, when I was in law school in Boston, there was a measles outbreak and required every student born after 1957 to be re-vaccinated, which of course we did.
When I had kids they were vaccinated.
Unless you have a legitimate medical contraindication, get vaccinated or stay locked far away from everyone else.
We do not need to bring back the iron lung.

[appleannie1943]

36. I am 75. I remember the same things Mineral Man remembers

I remember iron lungs, my baby brother almost dying when he got measles and chicken pox at the same time. He was two. My mom sat in a rocker holding him for 4 days putting cold wet washrags on the back of his neck and top of his head one after the other while we took turns bringing her more bowls of cold water and emptying the ones that were warm. His temp was so high he barely moved, slept mostly and every once in a while would whimper. When my dad got home from work, he would take over from mom so she could take a nap. Both were terrified he would either die or have damage to his brain. Both of those things were common.

Measles is the only disease I remember as a child. I was so sick and my head hurt so bad it is seared into my memory. My eyes even hurt and everything that was white, like the bathtub, looked yellow instead. I was in bed over a week.

I don't remember the mumps or the chicken pox but know I did have mild cases of both.

Everyone had to get vaccinated for small pox before they were allowed to start school. My aunt had them do mine on my leg. She had a huge scar on her arm from hers, about the size of a silver dollar and did not want me to have one.

I dated a boy that had braces on both his legs from polio. Newspapers listed how many people contracted it and how many people died each year from polio and all the childhood diseases.

I remember standing in line in school to get my polio shots. I was in sixth grade for my first one and middle school for the other two. Everyone was overjoyed and no one complained about their children getting them.

[MineralMan]

40. Yes. People who haven't seen kids with those illnesses

have no idea. Most children recover fully. Most. The ones who don't but survive, though, often have after-affects all through their lives. Current mothers with children are simply not old enough to remember childhood illnesses. Mostly, they all got vaccinated.

What's funny is millenials who ask what that scar is on your upper arm. They didn't have to have the smallpox vaccination. Smallpox was eradicated before they were born. They have no idea. Nowadays, it's very rare to see someone with the scars from having smallpox. It wasn't rare when I was a youngster. Many people in my grandparents' generation had those scars.

[ginnyinWI]

65. When my husband and I showed the kids our

Smallpox vaccine scars recently (we are in our 60s) they were amazed. Also amused at how his jab was right in the middle of his arm, and mine placed toward the back of mine, because girls wouldn’t want their scar to show when they grew up.
Our kids all had the MMR combined vaccine (born in 70s and 80s), but did all get the chicken pox because there wasn’t any shot for that then.

[happybird]

79. I think that's the big problem

along with internet "experts" and conspiracy theorists. (Ugh). Young parents don't have memory of the devastation wrought by these diseases. Or the oral history, because their own parents were kids in the 80's and 90's. I'm only 44, born right after they stopped giving smallpox vaccines, but my sister has the scar on her shoulder. I heard from my parents and grandparents similar accounts to the ones told on this thread. If I had kids, they sure as hell would be vaccinated.

I also worry about voting, civil, and womens' rights for the same reason. Young people have never known life with out these rights, and the struggles to win them must seem like ancient history.

Thank you for this thread and for keeping the oral history alive and real.

[nitpicker]

85. My mother made them stab my leg too

And the scar is still there.

Not everyone ran for the shots right away- I was at a school for six months where a classmate had leg braces.

I got German measles, and even worse, chickenpox, before vaccines came out for them.

Occasionally, flu shots don't work, but I get them anyway.

[Hamlette]

38. I agree 100% however you also recognize

taking the world's cutest, most perfect baby to the doctor for his shots which carry a risk of death (one in 400,000) is hard. Or it was for me. Yes, of course I did it. And that is absolutely no excuse not to do it. But I had a few sleepless nights.

[MineralMan]

41. The risks of taking that cute baby in your car to the supermarket

are far, far higher than any risk from vaccination, yet mothers routinely do that.

It's a failure of understanding, really. It's also a cognitive error.

[Hamlette]

89. there you go, being rational again

I didn't make myself clear. I was not rational as a mother. My good atheist mother would say "you have to have faith to raise children".

I'm much better as a grandmother.

[MineralMan]

90. I can't help myself, I guess.

I was raised by my parents to think things through before forming opinions. I'm still learning that lesson.

[Hamlette]

91. me too

but I learned to worry when I became a mom. And I know what it is like, which was all I was saying. To the anti-vaxers I would say
"Man up".

[Aristus]

61. If you agree 100%, please don't add 'Yes, but...'

It just gives ammo to the anti-vaxxers.

There's no excuse for not getting one's kids vaccinated.

[Demovictory9]

39. Kick

[MustLoveBeagles]

50. K&R

[appleannie1943]

51. The really sad thing to me is it is going to take a couple cases of history repeating itself

for some people to realize they have been misled. I realize there are medical reasons for some children to not get shots but if anything, they should be a reason for people that can get them for their children, to do so.

[MineralMan]

53. The current generation of young parents don't remember

any of the childhood illnesses. They never had them. Their parents got them vaccinated. So, they've never seen a child completely covered with the measles rash or chickenpox vesicles. They've never heard a child not able to catch its breath between coughing fits from whooping cough. They've never seen a child yelling with pain over the mumps swelling in their neck.

So, they simply don't get the reason to vaccinate. They never had those illnesses. They haven't seen those illnesses. They can't even imagine them.

It's a real problem.

[ck4829]

75. It's going to take an epidemic to truly discredit the anti-vax movement, but they won't suffer...

Immuno-compromised and those with no voice... the children the anti-vaxxers are claiming to protect.

And it is sad.

[MuseRider]

54. Same here. No no vaccines for most of those.

I got the polio vaccine in a sugar cube. My small pox vaccine was given in my thigh instead of my arm because my father did not think anyone would marry a woman with those ugly marks on their shoulders (jesus). Other than that I was the original, if it is going around I was going to get it and get it bad. The measles were the worst in terms of having to lay in bed in a dark room by myself for 3 days I think. The mumps I got on both sides and my neck got huge, I could barely breath or swallow. Anyway, I knew kids with polio and some of their parents had polio. I still know a few people who limp or use a cane that they have used their whole lives because of polio and one in a wheelchair.

Remember the big swine flu epidemic (1978 or so?) or scare I really do not remember much about it except I worked for the city and no one asked us, they came by with buses and took us to the auditorium and we stood in long lines until we got the shot gun then back to work. NO one was asked. I have to admit that is rather creepy but that is what they did. You could say no but then you had to find a ride back to your place of business and find another job.

Herd protection is a thing. I do think they need to go easier on the amount they give little one's at a time. Spread them out a bit and then only the kids of those who will cling to the "vaccines at bad for you no matter what" will get deathly ill. I do not remember large numbers getting deathly ill when I was vaccinating my kids.

[Gothmog]

60. I had measles and chickenpox but not mumps

I am a type II diabetic and so I get flu shots every year. Vaccines are important

[Aristus]

62. Thank you for posting this, MineralMan.

I don't know why people tend to distrust medical personnel on this issue, but they do. So any help we can get from the community at large is most welcome.

I remember I hated getting my shots when I was a kid. But my parents (especially my father, an RN) told me it was to keep me healthy. So that made it better.

By the time I joined the military, I had no problem with the many vaccinations I was given during in-processing. 'Bring it on!' I remember thinking. Getting them made me feel like a superhero.

[MineralMan]

68. Like every kid, I hated shots.

I took them anyhow. No options.

[samnsara]

63. i remember lining up at the local high school to get a sugar cube with a polio vaccine..

… I remember a cpl kids in school who were in wheel chairs from polio. I don't recall anyone who died from measles. I had an immunity to them until I was older and I had a natural immunity to smallpox...so no round scar on my arm! I also remember my parents putting up a Quarantined sign on our front door. One thing I am forever grateful to my parents for is NEVER making us get those damned shots in school.

Ahhhh the 50s....

[gopiscrap]

66. mom had polio and it affected her right foot

I got encephalitis from a case of the measles, it was not pretty. I almost died, and I still have residual effects from it 60 years later

[MineralMan]

69. Yes. People with kids today never experienced those things.

[MicaelS]

67. Born in '57, I got all my shots.

There was never a mention of anyone NOT getting them. I got my smallpox vaccine with the six-needle gun. I still have a faint scar. I clearly remember getting Polio vaccine in a sugar cube.

[woody44]

74. Born in 1946........

had mumps, both kinds of measles at grade school age. My mother was an RN and volunteered with the Red Cross and I remember going with her to a huge tent set up giving sugar cubes for polio, which I got. Don't remember the year for sure probably '57 or so.

The weird thing for me tho was at the age of 20 I got chicken pox from some of our friends kids. I was 6 months PG! It really sucked, I called my obgyn and he told me to come in, but not through the front door..........go to the back door and they put me in a broom closet till the Dr was ready to see me. He was afraid all his PG patients would think I had measles and freak out. My son that I was pg with got chicken pox when he was about 7 and had a worse chase then any of my other kids, so apparently he received no immunity.

[MineralMan]

76. Thanks for sharing that.

I'm sure it wasn't funny then, but now...I can picture you as a young, pregnant, itchy woman, hiding in a broom closet at your doctors office. It's a funny scene to imagine.

[Buckeyeblue]

80. My grandfather survived polio in the hills of West Virginia

When anti-vaccinatinators start talking their shit around me, I just ask them if they know what the results of polio look like (if you are fortunate enough to live)? And then I tell them about his crooked spin, his twisted left leg, a lifetime of pain just to walk across the room.

[Bettie]

81. I was a little younger

but I had teachers who had polio as children.

You don't forget that.

Unfortunately, a lot of the anti-vaxxers don't recall a time when people got these diseases. They are young enough to not even understand how vaccinations have changed our lives.

Guess they want to experience "the old days".

[customerserviceguy]

83. Same here

I did miss whooping cough, however.

I wholeheartedly agree with your post. Vaccination is one of the wonders of modern medicine.

[geralmar]

84. My story

In 1955 I was in first grade in Austin, Texas. I remember one day being taken out of class in a small group of students and being led down the hall to a special room set aside for the the kids in iron lungs. We were introduced to our special classmates, who seemed eager to chat with us; but I was annoyed that they were lying on their backs, only their heads protruding from the cylinders and a small mirror above their faces which made it impossible to speak with them face to face. We were only allowed a few minutes of conversation before being taken back to class. All I remember about one kid was the top of his head covered in wispy blond hair. I sometimes think about him. It is improbable that he lived much longer.

[MineralMan]

87. Iron lungs! I think I read last year that the last person still

in an iron lung is now out of it.

Here's an iron lung room from the polio days:

[milestogo]

92. Polio is a horrible disease.

There are some countries where people still suffer from polio.

Yeah, I remember our whole family driving over to a school to get the polio vaccine.