There are few thing in the world that upset me, but I get very upset when I see a someone sick with a disease that could have been prevented by a vaccine. It wrangles me even more if the sick one is a kid.
There was an article in the June issue of “Pediatrics” which studied the effect on infants whose mother received the flu vaccine during her pregnancy. There were 245,386 women and their 249,387 infants from Utah and Idaho in this study which ran from Dec 2005 to March 2014.
Unbelievably, only 10% of the mothers had been given the flu vaccine. A total of 866 infants under age 6 months were diagnosed with influenza. 151 of whom required hospitalization; fortunately, none of these infants died. Thirty two of the infected infants were born to mothers who acknowledged having had the vaccine, while 834 had mothers who had not had not been immunized. That means the flu vaccine cut the risk of flu in infants by 65% and the risk of flu serious enough to require hospitalization by 81%. WOW!
Because of the serious nature of infantile influenza the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) have endorsed the importance of immunizing pregnant women against influenza. Yet in this poll article only 10% of the women were immunized.
The take home message today, is if you are pregnant, get the flu shot. If a friend or relative of yours is pregnant or if you have a friend or acquaintance who is a gynecologist, or any other kind of doctor, send them this blog. You might save a family the stress of having a sick baby. And, you’ll keep me from becoming upset. Thanks.