The one thing most of us have in common with each other from childhood (amongst other things) are the immunisation jabs that were administered by our GP’s. There are a few that I can’t personally remember, but then again, there are some that I do. One of those jabs was the MMR jab, thereby making me immune to measles, mumps and rubella. It was many years ago that catching measles as a youngster was fairly common place; my mum was unfortunate enough to catch it twice during her childhood. Possibly due to the jab, I don’t recall anyone at my infant or primary school catching the condition…if anything the one condition we were all weary of was the chicken pox. I was lucky enough never to catch it when seemingly everyone around me caught it, including my sister. It was an outbreak that caused the cancellation of many a birthday party, much to everyone’s chagrin.
Both the measles and chicken pox appear quite similar to each other; both cause irritation of the skin, are highly contagious and, in a worst case scenario, can be life threatening. Admittedly, the older you get, the thought (and the fear) of catching either condition is the furthest from your mind. You rarely hear about people above a certain age coming down with either. That’s not to say it’s impossible, but it’s rare. In fact when thinking about measles, the one thing that keeps popping up is the controversy surrounding the MMR jab…more on that controversy later. However the condition itself has been back in the news recently due to a recent outbreak in Swansea. Many questions have been asked since this hit the headlines, the most important (in my eyes) being the most obvious; how on Earth has this happened?
The number of cases in the Welsh city had reached 765 by Tuesday, with warnings that that number will continue to rise for several weeks. Health officials reported that the number had increased by 72 since last Thursday. It’s believed that there have been up to 77 people who’ve been hospitalised since the beginning of this outbreak, all the way back in November of last year. The Welsh Health Minister Mark Drakeford believes that the only way to stop the outbreak dead in its tracks is to ensure that those who need the MMR jab get it as soon as possible. Drakeford told the BBC News website, “We can fully expect cases to continue to occur for a number of weeks yet. The only way to halt the outbreak is to ensure as many people as possible have the MMR vaccine to protect themselves, their children, family members and others in the community who may not be protected for a variety of reasons”.
The Minister was forced on the defensive when Conservative opponents accused the Welsh government of responding slowly to the outbreak. Mr Drakeford revealed that Public Health Wales convened its first outbreak control management meeting on the 18th February, in a letter addressed to the assembly’s children and young people committee. He has strongly rejected complaints that the Welsh government was “behind the curve” in dealing with the Swansea outbreak; apparently health officials met on November 28th last year to discuss how to respond to the first batch of reported cases. The officials decided to focus on vaccinations in schools, however, as you can see, that didn’t quell the problem. Drakeford went on to say, “It was only in the post-Christmas period, as media reports increased, that greater awareness and parental action began to pick up. I don’t think there is any sense that either the Welsh NHS or the government have been behind the curve in responding to the outbreak”.
With that last point in mind, how has this outbreak been able to escalate over the course of several months? How was it not nipped in the bud at the first sign of trouble? First Minister Carwyn Jones believes he has an answer to that question; he told assembly members that the campaigns suggesting risks attached to the MMR jab by “elements” of the media had played a significant part in the continuation of the current outbreak. The UK Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt somewhat concurred with Mr Jones’ line of thought in a statement he released, urging parents in England to have their children vaccinated with MMR. The statement read, “Today I am urging all parents, anywhere in England, who did not get their child vaccinated with two doses of MMR because of scare stories a decade ago to contact their GP surgery and make an appointment”. So, what is the “MMR Controversy”? As Mr Hunt alluded to there, it was a decade ago when one doctor claimed to have a made a shocking discovery…
In 1998, a paper was published in the medical journal The Lancet, which claimed that the MMR jab could cause autism in children. The research paper was written by Dr Andrew Wakefield, and the media storm that resulted from it is still talked about to this day. The paper was discredited and Dr Wakefield was struck off the medical register, with health officials insisting that the vaccine was completely safe. Even though the report was discredited, the number of children being vaccinated dropped in the aftermath. Mr Hunt continued by saying, “Disgraced doctor Andrew Wakefield’s discredited and inaccurate research caused great harm to the MMR vaccination programme and led to thousands of parents choosing not to vaccinate their children against measles, mumps and rubella”.
It’s understandable that even though the report was essentially rubbished, that people became wary of the jab…is the risk of measles, mumps and rubella greater than autism? It could be argued that line of thinking came about, not just because of the publication of the report, but also because of the coverage it received by the media at the time. In fact, Dr Andy Williams, of the school of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies at Cardiff University believes that the UK media’s coverage of the controversy has contributed to the situation in Swansea. Talking to BBC Radio Wales, Dr Williams said, “I think that the UK news media collectively dropped the ball over MMR, with very few exceptions. They gave far too much prominence to claims from Wakefield based on very thin evidence. The media failed to check the facts to evaluate this evidence”. Some health experts agree, believing that this outbreak is a result of a 10-15 year “legacy” of concerns surrounding the jab.
It seems that regardless of the reassurances, some just aren’t willing to let their children take the jab. Risks that seemingly don’t exist appear to still be holding people back. Even though the number of cases are set to rise in the next few weeks, with fears that around 5,000 children are still at risk in the Swansea area, this outbreak will surely peter out eventually. Up to 1,750 people had the jab last weekend at special clinics held in four hospitals. As obvious as it may sound, the more people that get vaccinated, the less chance of this outbreak continuing and (in a worst case scenario) spreading even further. To most of us, a condition such as measles appeared a thing of the past…until this problem provided a stark reminder that it isn’t…not just yet anyway.
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