Why do pertussis vaccines fail

Commentary May 01 Why Do Pertussis Vaccines Fail? Cherry, MD, MSc. Address correspondence to James D. E-mail: jcherry mednet. This Site. Google Scholar. Pediatrics 5 : — Article history Accepted:. Cite Icon Cite.

That means the current vaccine is not a perfect match to the bacteria. But a new vaccine for whooping cough is nowhere near ready, he said. Babies and children currently receive a vaccine called DTaP. Studies have shown the vaccine is safe and works very well against diphtheria and tetanus, protecting nearly everyone who gets it for a decade.

But the DTaP is less effective in preventing whooping cough. Nearly all children who receive all five recommended doses are protected for one year.

After that, immunity wanes. Paradoxically, many babies with whooping cough may not cough at all. They may simply stop breathing, leading to dangerous and life-threatening situations. Neurological complications of pertussis immunization. Neurological complications of pertussis inoculation. Arch Dis Child ; 49 : 46 — 9. Further experience of reactions, especially of a cerebral nature, in conjunction with triple vaccination: a study based on vaccinations in Sweden Stewart GT.

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That you cite Sweden and Japan as examples of reduction in DTP uptake causing increased mortality just shows that you are not familiar with what really happened there.

Hillary does a great job deconstructing your claims. The fact that it is pushed so hard on the public, despite its many flaws and the harm it has caused over the years, really upsets me. My son is one of those harmed. He nearly died. His seizures looked identical to Hypotonic Hyporesponsive Episodes HHE , which I have found very interesting considering that HHE used to happen to 1 in every 1, infants after the whole cell pertussis vaccine according to a study sent to me by the CDC.

Perhaps the only difference between HHE and his seizures was that he was hooked up to an EEG machine in the hospital and it happened to catch one of his episodes and detect seizure activity. Frankly, it makes me wonder about the SIDS cases that occur within proximity to the DTaP vaccine and that occurred with its predecessor, the whole cell version. I also asked the CDC if any studies had ever been done — by any government agency — to determine whether these children had long term neurological effects from experiencing either HHE or the type of seizures my son had.

I specified that by long term, I meant had any study ever followed these kids until they entered school and remember, with the whole cell vaccine, there were a TON of them as it happened to every 1 in 1, children, so they had plenty of potential subjects. I know my son did. My point in sharing this with you is to show that neurological adverse events were probably nowhere near as rare as you think, and that the CDC never did its due diligence to protect our kids, and still does not, when it comes to this vaccine.

If the vaccine saves lives, keep in mind that it has harmed thousands of other lives. I wonder if we would be much better off at this point in time with a very aggressive public announcement campaign teaching adults, teenagers, and especially teachers and medical professionals, what whooping cough can look like in older kids and adults, encouraging people to get tested if they think they might have it, and stressing that the illness is very dangerous for infants and how important it is to get antibiotic treatment and stay out of public spaces until you are not infectious anymore.

Vitamin C cures pertussis. No need for any shots. A study of nonvaxxed vs vaxxed kids doesnt inherently have to result in dead babies, to say that it does, is fear mongering. To my knowledge there is no such thing as a pertussis vaccine anyway. We are talking Tdap or DTap depending upon the age of the potential recipient. Those inoculated could, I believe, shed pertussis bacteria for weeks, endangering the very newborns the vaccine is supposed to protect.

Mother Nature and Father G-d are wiser than man, providing for IgA immunoglobulin in the milk of naturally immune mothers to provide passive immunity to infants.

Denying natural immunity to a mother by vaccination is robbing her of the ability to protect her child, IMO. Thank you for opening an important discussion. First, its true that pertussis antigens are usually given in combination with tetanus and diphtheria antigens, and we call that DTaP when formulated for kids and Tdap when used as a booster for adolescents and older.

It would just be vaccinating against pertussis and diphtheria as well, and that costs a bit more money for the vaccine. Second, acellular pertussis vaccines do not contain live pertussis germs, and so cannot lead one to spread pertussis as implied. They are a concoction of several protein subunits that alone, or in combination, seek to limit the ability of pertussis to cause illness.

What we had assumed, and which now seems not to be true after all, is that these would also block infections, even if those infections were asymptomatic. What we have since learned is that aP vaccines are great at stopping one who is infected with pertussis from showing symptoms, and so are great at preventing hospitalizations and deaths, but are less effective than one would wish at stopping pertussis from moving through populations.

Lastly, not to be a stickler, but the details of the immunology are important. Secretory IgA in human breast milk is NOT absorbed by babies systemically, meaning it does not get into their blood streams.

This is in contrast to mice, where breast milk antibodies ARE absorbed systemically. This has an important effect on the kinds of diseases that breast milk protects against. And there are many many that it does protect. Sadly, to my knowledge, pertussis is not one of them. To inactivate pertussis toxin, for example, the antibodies must be in the blood stream. But IgA in breast milk cannot get into the blood stream.

By contrast, maternal antibodies that cross the placenta are VERY effective at inactivating pertussis toxin. And its also important to note that vaccinating a mother against pertussis, or other infectious diseases, or the baby after birth, in no ways denies maternal antibodies from also protecting.

They merely augment those defenses. It is not a case of either or.