Immunisation Urged in NZ After Measles Outbreak, page 1

Ministry issues warning on measles
5:00PM Monday Jul 20, 2009

A rapid rise in the number of cases of measles is a reminder for parents to make sure that their children's immunisations are up to date, say health officials.

There have been 90 notified measles cases so far this year - more than seven times higher than the total number of cases for all of last year, according to the Ministry of Health.

The measles, mumps and rubella vaccine was very effective if children got it on time at 15 months and four years of age, and once fully immunised, 90 to 95 per cent of children were protected from measles, said the ministry's chief adviser for population health, Greg Simmons.

"Talk to your family doctor or practice nurse if your child is behind with an immunisation - it's never too late to catch up," he said.

Source

There has been a lot of reassurance in the NZ media lately, that it is vital that your children are vaccinated. In the case of Measles, we have the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine which is often given to children at 15 months, then again at 4 years old. The latest measles outbreak has been blamed on children not being immunised.

Here is an excerpt from another article from the same news source

Half of all the children who had contracted measles since the outbreak began were not immunised.

"Our investigations have excluded that a defective batch of measles vaccine was a cause of this outbreak.

"We are now investigating other reasons why children who have

been immunised may have still caught measles," Dr Pink said.

Measles Outbreak in Canterbury Continues

So half the people who contracted measles weren't immunised. That means half the people that caught it WERE immunised.
If thats the case, how do they keep saying the vaccine is 90% to 95% effective?
It's hard to say, as we don't know what kind of ratio of the children are vaccinated.
If there are more children that are vaccinated, that means that they have in fact, been more likely to contract measles!

But it's not just the MMR which is being recommended and reassured that it's safe, but also the Gardasil vaccine being regularly reassured.
Govt says cervical cancer vaccine safe
While most schools offer this vaccine to their young girls, some have stood up and said they refuse to due to the risk of serious side effects. Some will say that is stupid and the benefits outweigh the risk. But i give a big

to them for making a stand, as who knows how effective it actually is, while there are now close to 50 deaths linked to the Gardasil vaccine.
Yet the reassurance in the media continues.

This is all being brought out just before the push for swine flu vaccinations. Is this coincidence, or an actual push to encourage more people to take the vaccines?

I know our neighbours across the ditch in Australia are prepared to start administering the "swine flu" vaccine soon, and I don't think we'll be too far behind. I'm pretty sure there is no way the vaccine will be mandatory, as cases here have been relatively mild (although there have been some deaths, and my heart goes out to the victims families), and people are no longer being tested for it. But why the consistent urge for people to take the vaccines?