Vaccinations on my personal and family immunization lists over several decades.

This and That

Looking backward in my lifetime, I have always been only vaguely informed about Vaccines and even the terrible diseases that once ravaged the population…such as Polio…75-odd years ago, but fortunately have been almost eliminated throughout the world. But now…it appears to me…those killer/maimers are peeking out of the holes they once disappeared into.

The last day or so we are finding that Omicron, the latest strain of the Corona-virus to threaten mankind….which may be more hideous because it attacks our children. Oh No! How will the Anti-Vaxxers spin that development.?

They are saying the new strain causes new threat to children in the form of what the first reports described as the “croup.” Then the parenthetical word— “pertussis” sounding the nature of the new wave of horror… begging the question: What is “pertussis”? … whooping cough. A terrible affliction that fortunately was more or less wiped out before I was born in 1934. They called it the “croup,” and whenever one of us kids had even a hint of a cough, Mom would start to worry.

A quick Search of Google tells me that the DPT combination vaccine (against diptheria, pertussin, and tetanus) was developed in the 1930s by a pediatrician names Leila Denmark. I’m not sure when I was given the DPT vaccine. I do recall the Smallpox vaccine when I was about six years old, possibly given me after I had started school. I still have the scar from the bifurcated needle, a single needle which contained multiple small needles.

My first memories of the DPT vaccine was when my oldest child was a baby, in 1957. I believe when the next baby arrived in 1961, that the recently-new Polio vaccine had been added in or with the DPT. Incidentally, I note that when the oldest was six, she became very ill with the hard Measles. The boys were very young, and there was as yet no vaccine against Measles.

My personal vaccine history included a battery of shots before I went to Germany in 1955. Those included vaccination against Malaria, and boosters for anything I had had previously. I also had the series of Polio vaccinations, the Sabin, Salk, and the one given on a sugar-cube.

6 thoughts on “Vaccinations on my personal and family immunization lists over several decades.”

  1. I had the full gammut of vaccinations too, and so did the Offspring. In fact, Australia is a highly vaccinated country, or was. I think herd immunity gave a lot of people a false sense of security, plus the rise of natural remedies instilled in a lot of parents the idea that their child’s immune system would not develop and grow strong unless they fought off disease on their own – i.e. without vaccines.
    While herd immunity kept the worst of these diseases at bay, they would have seen the lack of serious disease as proof that their theories were working. I hate to think what will happen as the level of herd immunity drops.
    Somehow we humans find it very hard to learn from the past.

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    1. We were young at a time when many of the terrible diseases had been controlled to some extent. Now the ravages of those diseases have been largely forgotten, and the state of education…under-education, actually…serves to hide the danger.

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      1. Yes. It’s an odd human quirk that we have such short memories. Just because something is okay /now/ we assume that’s ‘normal’ and that things have always been that way. When a lack of education is added to that myopia, the results can be deadly.
        Govts are supposed to supply the wisdom we lack, but politicians ignore the science and history as well. Makes me want to hit my head against the nearest wall. :/

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      2. Our government is in peril … talk about science and history! tRump is very much still in the picture… the Republicans shivering in their boots all ga-ga from Evil&Stupidity… bah humbug. grumble grumble…

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      4. A sick combination of Evil and Stupidity. The covid hasn’t helped, either…our education system is woefully lacking and has been for years. Having said that, I am happy to say that there is also an enhanced intelligence and education level among the already better educated. I know the home schooling has not harmed kids that have been required to produce organized learning at home. My great grands are examples, they had strict rules at home for doing their prescribed lessons, not only the two in high school, but the younger boy as well. I hesitate to go on about this here…

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