Spot on Vinay. All I can say is that now that Weldon nomination for CDC director has been withdrawn, Vinay should absolutely be nominated. He would be the best thing ever for the CDC and reintroduce common sense into the place. How does one find out RFK Jr's email address at HHS to write in that suggestion?
For those of us who believe in evolution (sadly, most MDs just give lip-service to it), the various childhood diseases provide important cardiovascular and immunological benefits. For instance, this study publlished in a major cardiology journal has shown that people who get the real mumps or measles are later in life much more likely to survive a heart attack than those people who got vaccinated against these diseases.
Except for infants and children who are starving or who are grossly malnourished, the average first world country children should GET the real mumps or measles.
An interesting take. I had measles, mumps and chicken pox as a child. I did not have whooping cough as a child (and I can't remember whether I was immunized or not) but got it as an adult when almost all the students in my daughter's high school came down with whooping cough. Nobody suspected this because who would have guessed that all the 15,16 and 17 year old kids who had been immunized as children against pertussis would then get it as teenagers. In fact the Maryland Department of Health was so dumb they thought that I was the index case (only because the pulmonologist I went to see tested for antibodies, not that that was necessary for a diagnosis since the symptoms were really obvious). Likewise I didn't get Rubella as a child but when I was vaccinated for Rubella as a resident, 3 weeks later I woke up one morning and felt a massive lymph node in my neck and on examination and an enlarged spleen. At the time I'd completely forgotten that I had had the Rubella shot 3 weeks prior and only remembered this later. Biopsy of the lymph node (and at that time in the UK an enlarged lymph node in the neck was considered to be a lymphoma unless proven otherwise) revealed non-specific inflammation. Well lesson learned especially since the chances of my examining a pregnant woman in internal medicine/gastroenterology while suffering from Rubella (which would have been obvious) was close to zero.
When it comes to all things medical I rely on Vinay Prasad to help me understand things. When it comes to all things political and historical I rely on Victor Davis Hanson to help me understand things.
Fear based medicine and the politicalization of such has really left a bad taste for me personally. I learned a lot about my own fears and reactions during COVID’s early stages (now it’s just something we will deal with forever and future generations will make fun of us for the way we handled it…”remember those stupid cloth masks? What a bunch of losers those 2020’ers were!”). What I learned about fear is that people in power will knowingly use it against those who are afraid. The sad part is that the public health wolf cry has ruined the credibility they could have to really be helpful.
I had them both-- I am 84-- but since most American are obese or getting there and one third of kids are too they are all teeming with inflammation. This complicates everything that happens to them.
Completely agree! That’s been one of my points on this measles issue exactly. Those who are currently 65 and under are more likely to be vaccinated against measles. There is some discussion as to whether or not this conveys protection as good as actually having the disease and I don’t think it does. The incidence is so low however especially when compared to other countries (even first world countries). We Americans as a group are extremely unhealthy, ie inflammation at levels much higher than are health promoting are present. We have poor resistance/immune health overall, and since we are generally over fed yet undernourished, we cannot fight infection as your generation was able to fight. Babies are born to inflamed moms who aren’t healthy themselves. What kind of resistance will that convey to them? Add on our toxic world, C- section birth, and formula feeding, if a child has all of those strikes against him or her, they may not fare very well with a case of measles. It’s a mess that needs a multi pronged approach but this type of article from Slate fuels fear(which is its objective), and does nothing to help. Drugs are not the answer. We need to get back to basics and I am happy to see that many are working on this.
In addition I love Vinay’s no nonsense approach. Spot on as usual.
Dr. Vinay Prasad recommends injection of unvaccinated children with the MMR vaccine in areas where measles is prevalent. MMR vaccine is a product whose long term health effects have not been studied (beyond perhaps one month at most) so the safety of it can not be well characterized. I wonder how he gives informed consent in the absence of reliable safety data on MMR. I also wonder whether he can compare the relative benefits and risks of MMR vaccine to using Vitamin A supplementation, in the form of Cod liver oil or other high retinol preparations vis a vis MMR vaccination. I do not believe there are any good trials comparing these interventions as prophylaxis. The use of homeopathic Morbillinum or Pulsatilla is another historically well demonstrated prophylaxis which Dr. Prasad does not mention. There are no research studies proving its effectiveness, just hundreds of years of anecdotal evidence of success. Perhaps Dr. Prasad would like to steal a chapter from Mr. Kennedy's recommendation that "the decision to vaccinate is a personal one" and best made examining the pluses and minuses, with knowledge of alternative interventions, together win one's PCP.
I recognize that you've been a reasoned voice in the hellstorm that is medicine and public health, and I applaud you for dedicating yourself to honoring science and humans alike, seeking the truth, and educating in effective ways. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news that you've got an area to investigate that will leave you deeply disturbed. But as a truth-seeker, you know that the truth is better than being a mouthpiece for an establishment that doesn't have your values in mind. Here's why recommending the MMR vaccine is bad science:
1. There was fraud and corruption with MMR vaccine trials and approval process. Pharma whistleblowers filed suit. Trials didn’t use true placebo controls. Adverse reactions were only tracked for 6 weeks. High rates of reactions were reported.
2. Before the vaccine was introduced, getting measles was an expected and typically uneventful occurrence among children with adequate nutrition.
3. As always, natural immunity is superior to vaccination.
4. Research shows the importance of an adequate dose of Vitamin A for managing measles. Vitamin A has been “recommended for decades” by the WHO to manage measles.
5. Measles complications and deaths “radically diminish” with proper nutrition. The measles vaccine causes harm.
6. In 2014, “measles outbreaks in highly vaccinated societies occurs primarily among… [the] vaccinated.” Serious vaccine reactions continue to be reported.
7. In 2019, “government research confirms measles outbreaks are transmitted by the vaccinated.”
8. In 2023, measles case was vaccine-induced. [Suzanne Burdick PhD]
9. “No proof MMR vaccine is safer than measles, mumps or rubella infection, physician group says.”
10. MMR vaccines provoked seizures in children. [Karl Kanthak]
11. “As of May 2019, VAERS recorded 93,929 adverse reactions to the MMR vaccine, including 1,810 disabilities and 463 deaths…. a Harvard Medical School study found that fewer than 1% of vaccine adverse events are ever reported.”
12. “Measles vaccine likely caused death of four infants in Nepal, authorities say.”
13. "Before the measles vaccine was developed, the annual death toll from measles in the U.S. was 450 to 500." In 2016, more than 20,000 children died. Major causes of death included cancer, drug overdose, heart disease, and chronic respiratory disease.
I understand VP is mad with public health, but his theory that the incompetence is related to lower wages and that higher paid physicians (not doctors) are better is as bad as they come. Surgeons do an important job that generally does not require top intelligence; they are doers, not thinkers and I would not want them to run public health and the health system in general. Who else should not run PH? Cardiologists, the ones that think Framingham is great science, that want all humans (soon the unborns?) to be on statins, that want to stent coronaries from people with stable angina even though science says otherwise? Urologists that still think PSA screening/biopsies saves lives and does little harm? Radiolologists (do I really have to explain?)? I rest my case although I could go on and on (including, yes, oncology).
There are many avenues with which to attack our dismal healthcare system. For today’s post, he picked MPH’s , possibly because they’re the ones in these articles making the ridiculous recommendations for adults to get MMR boosters. Tomorrow it may be another subset of healthcare. There are plenty of bad health ideas, lacking in scientific rigor, circulating in our legacy media and online forums. I wouldn’t get too caught up in the fact that he didn’t outline problems in other areas, of which there are many, and my guess is that he would agree with you on that point.
Maybe, but he still is besides the point. He should ask of himself what he asks of other: rigorousness. Again, it is not by giving higher salaries to MPHs and people in PH in general that we will get better results. North America (same here in Canada) has by far the highest paid physicians, but I would argue that does not translate into better physicians. Medical students are mostly exam performance machines, and they are told throughout their formation that they have intelligence by far superior to other the rest of us: nothing to develop humility and autocriticism. Do not expect other results from people that basically are asked to learn tons of algorithms, not to understand and develop their critical thinking. And thus we are leading the world in overdiagnosis and overtreatment. Same problem with Veterinary medicine, my field, by the way.
The leaders get an idea in their head and anyone who doesn't want to play along gets replaced. Are they dumb? People in science have to have some smarts, I've seen the gaslighting, everyone believing their own bs, it's hard to find a job in science.
Extremely inflammatory and misleading post. This statement reads as particularly ridiculous: "The lesson that public health seems unwilling to learn is you have to pick your battles and focus on the interventions with the greatest risk/ benefit ratio." Prioritization is central to the public health ethos. Any public health expert would tell you the priority is to reach unvaccinated children in outbreak areas. CDC providing guidance to older adults who may be concerned about their vaccination status and that is not important to you personally is not cause for vitriol. Dr. Schaffner went out of his way to say this is not urgent or the priority. No one is saying this should be an area to invest resources. It's simply some information for those who want it.
Most of the public health community do this work because protecting health and alleviating suffering is core to their values, not because they're "the dumbest people in the country." It's bizarre that an MD would not understand that. Many people in public health are MDs as well, and I know the people in this field to be extremely bright, highly educated, values-driven, and well paid by the way. A lot of them are reeling from suddenly losing their jobs and the irreparable damage done to decades of work. Why pile on with the useless outrage (which could be much better targeted to the weak vaccination recommendations from HHS leadership) instead of focusing on actual policy and implementation work to control the outbreaks?
Yes people in public health are MDs but unfortunately the last 5 years have shown that public health officials (except in Florida) have been a complete and utter disaster and the CDC is a complete disgrace whose reputation in in the toilet. The whole childhood vaccination schedule needs to be revisited, and vaccines have to be administered with informed consent. Not biased information from a family physician pressuring parents (and it is really hard not to cave) but completely open and frank information detailing the benefits and potential risks (and there are always risks no matter how "safe" a product may be).
But as we saw during the pandemic these bright values driven individuals did not follow evidence based medicine. They went political and they went anti-anti-vax. That approach hurt public health. Speaking as an MD MPH
I read Prasad's book, Malignant. I found it to be a profound indictment of the oncological/academic-medical-industrial complex. And the abysmal quality of clinical studies that guide oncological practice. Which robs us of money better spent elsewhere.
Subsequently, I read or heard Prasad saying that oncologists ignore him.
OK, so tell me this Vinay. Are highly paid (!) oncologists idiots? Why don't you heap such contempt, scorn, derision, and venom on them? And other highly paid specialists like orthopedic surgeons doing BSBM (bullshit based medicine) and PBM (profit-based medicine). I agree with Vallliek about PH people. Not rocket surgeons, perhaps. Often misguided perhaps. But not idiots. And not "on the take" to use Jerome Kassirer's title about clinical, not public health, practitioners.
I used to trust PH to a certain degree but covid blew all that away.
I was trained in chem/biochem/micro and so I went back and took online immunology lectures and within a few months I realised the atrocious failure of PH officials to do their jobs.
I don't understand why you claim it's "important". Measles stopped being a deadly disease in the West before the vax came about. Everyone my age had it. Catching measles is a social immune synchroniser. Catching it is overwhelmingly a good thing.
The old medical textbooks described measles as primarily infecting children age 3-15. It was considered a childhood illness, not an infantile one. Before the vaccine was introduced, newborns were already protected at birth for up to 3 years from maternally conferred antibodies -- and this was in the 1950's, when few mothers breastfed.
We're now on our second or even third generation of infants born to women who never had measles, whose mothers and grandmothers didn't have measles. What used to be 3 years of immunity is now only around 3 months, according to a 2018 Canadian review: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29398276/
So, yes, it is now worrying when infants are exposed. Not to knock vaccines, but it's ironic that the measles vaccine seems to have shifted the risk of disease severity and complications to a population that was rarely if ever at any risk before the vaccine was introduced.
On the other hand, that Canadian study shows that newborns are still born with a protective level of measles antibodies. So it is very troubling that in the recent Texas outbreak, when infants at Lubbock's University Medical Center Children's Hospital were exposed to measles in hospital, medical staff gave 3-day-old babies injections of measles immunoglobulin. https://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local/article/newborn-babies-exposed-measles-texas-20223264.php
According to the product's license, "The safety and effectiveness of GamaSTAN® S/D in the pediatric population have not been established." https://pdf.hres.ca/dpd_pm/00043801.PDF
As far as I can tell, GamaSTAN is the only measles antibody product licensed in the US.
So if, God forbid, any of those babies do not do well, will health officials blame the virus or the treatment?
Spot on Vinay. All I can say is that now that Weldon nomination for CDC director has been withdrawn, Vinay should absolutely be nominated. He would be the best thing ever for the CDC and reintroduce common sense into the place. How does one find out RFK Jr's email address at HHS to write in that suggestion?
For those of us who believe in evolution (sadly, most MDs just give lip-service to it), the various childhood diseases provide important cardiovascular and immunological benefits. For instance, this study publlished in a major cardiology journal has shown that people who get the real mumps or measles are later in life much more likely to survive a heart attack than those people who got vaccinated against these diseases.
Except for infants and children who are starving or who are grossly malnourished, the average first world country children should GET the real mumps or measles.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26122188/
The entire public perception about measles etc is created by media's fearmongering.
One death from measles gets more media coverage than 100,000 deaths from opioids or 100,000 deaths from medical/hospital errors.
The number one enemy of the public is the mainstream media. Until the media loses its hold over the people, little will change.
An interesting take. I had measles, mumps and chicken pox as a child. I did not have whooping cough as a child (and I can't remember whether I was immunized or not) but got it as an adult when almost all the students in my daughter's high school came down with whooping cough. Nobody suspected this because who would have guessed that all the 15,16 and 17 year old kids who had been immunized as children against pertussis would then get it as teenagers. In fact the Maryland Department of Health was so dumb they thought that I was the index case (only because the pulmonologist I went to see tested for antibodies, not that that was necessary for a diagnosis since the symptoms were really obvious). Likewise I didn't get Rubella as a child but when I was vaccinated for Rubella as a resident, 3 weeks later I woke up one morning and felt a massive lymph node in my neck and on examination and an enlarged spleen. At the time I'd completely forgotten that I had had the Rubella shot 3 weeks prior and only remembered this later. Biopsy of the lymph node (and at that time in the UK an enlarged lymph node in the neck was considered to be a lymphoma unless proven otherwise) revealed non-specific inflammation. Well lesson learned especially since the chances of my examining a pregnant woman in internal medicine/gastroenterology while suffering from Rubella (which would have been obvious) was close to zero.
When it comes to all things medical I rely on Vinay Prasad to help me understand things. When it comes to all things political and historical I rely on Victor Davis Hanson to help me understand things.
Fear based medicine and the politicalization of such has really left a bad taste for me personally. I learned a lot about my own fears and reactions during COVID’s early stages (now it’s just something we will deal with forever and future generations will make fun of us for the way we handled it…”remember those stupid cloth masks? What a bunch of losers those 2020’ers were!”). What I learned about fear is that people in power will knowingly use it against those who are afraid. The sad part is that the public health wolf cry has ruined the credibility they could have to really be helpful.
I had them both-- I am 84-- but since most American are obese or getting there and one third of kids are too they are all teeming with inflammation. This complicates everything that happens to them.
Completely agree! That’s been one of my points on this measles issue exactly. Those who are currently 65 and under are more likely to be vaccinated against measles. There is some discussion as to whether or not this conveys protection as good as actually having the disease and I don’t think it does. The incidence is so low however especially when compared to other countries (even first world countries). We Americans as a group are extremely unhealthy, ie inflammation at levels much higher than are health promoting are present. We have poor resistance/immune health overall, and since we are generally over fed yet undernourished, we cannot fight infection as your generation was able to fight. Babies are born to inflamed moms who aren’t healthy themselves. What kind of resistance will that convey to them? Add on our toxic world, C- section birth, and formula feeding, if a child has all of those strikes against him or her, they may not fare very well with a case of measles. It’s a mess that needs a multi pronged approach but this type of article from Slate fuels fear(which is its objective), and does nothing to help. Drugs are not the answer. We need to get back to basics and I am happy to see that many are working on this.
In addition I love Vinay’s no nonsense approach. Spot on as usual.
Love the close: "The greatest anti-vax tool ever created was allowing public health to be run by idiots."
Doesn’t hold back calling out stupid. We need to clone Vinay in medicine.
Spot on low wages and virtue signaling and I have an MPH
Dr. Vinay Prasad recommends injection of unvaccinated children with the MMR vaccine in areas where measles is prevalent. MMR vaccine is a product whose long term health effects have not been studied (beyond perhaps one month at most) so the safety of it can not be well characterized. I wonder how he gives informed consent in the absence of reliable safety data on MMR. I also wonder whether he can compare the relative benefits and risks of MMR vaccine to using Vitamin A supplementation, in the form of Cod liver oil or other high retinol preparations vis a vis MMR vaccination. I do not believe there are any good trials comparing these interventions as prophylaxis. The use of homeopathic Morbillinum or Pulsatilla is another historically well demonstrated prophylaxis which Dr. Prasad does not mention. There are no research studies proving its effectiveness, just hundreds of years of anecdotal evidence of success. Perhaps Dr. Prasad would like to steal a chapter from Mr. Kennedy's recommendation that "the decision to vaccinate is a personal one" and best made examining the pluses and minuses, with knowledge of alternative interventions, together win one's PCP.
Measles in the Brady Bunch era (circa 1970):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5289k-dbOMY
I love that video! Thanks for sharing it! My how times have changed…and not for the better in many respects.
Measles has not changed. So what did?
The TV/media was more independent then. Now it is effectively a marketing arm of the pharma/vaccine industry.
Legacy media is all about creating fear. Agreed.
I do think people’s immune systems are not as robust as they used to be.
I recognize that you've been a reasoned voice in the hellstorm that is medicine and public health, and I applaud you for dedicating yourself to honoring science and humans alike, seeking the truth, and educating in effective ways. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news that you've got an area to investigate that will leave you deeply disturbed. But as a truth-seeker, you know that the truth is better than being a mouthpiece for an establishment that doesn't have your values in mind. Here's why recommending the MMR vaccine is bad science:
1. There was fraud and corruption with MMR vaccine trials and approval process. Pharma whistleblowers filed suit. Trials didn’t use true placebo controls. Adverse reactions were only tracked for 6 weeks. High rates of reactions were reported.
2. Before the vaccine was introduced, getting measles was an expected and typically uneventful occurrence among children with adequate nutrition.
3. As always, natural immunity is superior to vaccination.
4. Research shows the importance of an adequate dose of Vitamin A for managing measles. Vitamin A has been “recommended for decades” by the WHO to manage measles.
5. Measles complications and deaths “radically diminish” with proper nutrition. The measles vaccine causes harm.
6. In 2014, “measles outbreaks in highly vaccinated societies occurs primarily among… [the] vaccinated.” Serious vaccine reactions continue to be reported.
7. In 2019, “government research confirms measles outbreaks are transmitted by the vaccinated.”
8. In 2023, measles case was vaccine-induced. [Suzanne Burdick PhD]
9. “No proof MMR vaccine is safer than measles, mumps or rubella infection, physician group says.”
10. MMR vaccines provoked seizures in children. [Karl Kanthak]
11. “As of May 2019, VAERS recorded 93,929 adverse reactions to the MMR vaccine, including 1,810 disabilities and 463 deaths…. a Harvard Medical School study found that fewer than 1% of vaccine adverse events are ever reported.”
12. “Measles vaccine likely caused death of four infants in Nepal, authorities say.”
13. "Before the measles vaccine was developed, the annual death toll from measles in the U.S. was 450 to 500." In 2016, more than 20,000 children died. Major causes of death included cancer, drug overdose, heart disease, and chronic respiratory disease.
More details and sources: https://birdseyeviewperspective.substack.com/publish/post/158410319
I understand VP is mad with public health, but his theory that the incompetence is related to lower wages and that higher paid physicians (not doctors) are better is as bad as they come. Surgeons do an important job that generally does not require top intelligence; they are doers, not thinkers and I would not want them to run public health and the health system in general. Who else should not run PH? Cardiologists, the ones that think Framingham is great science, that want all humans (soon the unborns?) to be on statins, that want to stent coronaries from people with stable angina even though science says otherwise? Urologists that still think PSA screening/biopsies saves lives and does little harm? Radiolologists (do I really have to explain?)? I rest my case although I could go on and on (including, yes, oncology).
May I present another way to look at this?
There are many avenues with which to attack our dismal healthcare system. For today’s post, he picked MPH’s , possibly because they’re the ones in these articles making the ridiculous recommendations for adults to get MMR boosters. Tomorrow it may be another subset of healthcare. There are plenty of bad health ideas, lacking in scientific rigor, circulating in our legacy media and online forums. I wouldn’t get too caught up in the fact that he didn’t outline problems in other areas, of which there are many, and my guess is that he would agree with you on that point.
Maybe, but he still is besides the point. He should ask of himself what he asks of other: rigorousness. Again, it is not by giving higher salaries to MPHs and people in PH in general that we will get better results. North America (same here in Canada) has by far the highest paid physicians, but I would argue that does not translate into better physicians. Medical students are mostly exam performance machines, and they are told throughout their formation that they have intelligence by far superior to other the rest of us: nothing to develop humility and autocriticism. Do not expect other results from people that basically are asked to learn tons of algorithms, not to understand and develop their critical thinking. And thus we are leading the world in overdiagnosis and overtreatment. Same problem with Veterinary medicine, my field, by the way.
Exactly. See my reply to Vallliek above. Why do we seem to be only a small minority of Prasad's readers?
The leaders get an idea in their head and anyone who doesn't want to play along gets replaced. Are they dumb? People in science have to have some smarts, I've seen the gaslighting, everyone believing their own bs, it's hard to find a job in science.
Extremely inflammatory and misleading post. This statement reads as particularly ridiculous: "The lesson that public health seems unwilling to learn is you have to pick your battles and focus on the interventions with the greatest risk/ benefit ratio." Prioritization is central to the public health ethos. Any public health expert would tell you the priority is to reach unvaccinated children in outbreak areas. CDC providing guidance to older adults who may be concerned about their vaccination status and that is not important to you personally is not cause for vitriol. Dr. Schaffner went out of his way to say this is not urgent or the priority. No one is saying this should be an area to invest resources. It's simply some information for those who want it.
Most of the public health community do this work because protecting health and alleviating suffering is core to their values, not because they're "the dumbest people in the country." It's bizarre that an MD would not understand that. Many people in public health are MDs as well, and I know the people in this field to be extremely bright, highly educated, values-driven, and well paid by the way. A lot of them are reeling from suddenly losing their jobs and the irreparable damage done to decades of work. Why pile on with the useless outrage (which could be much better targeted to the weak vaccination recommendations from HHS leadership) instead of focusing on actual policy and implementation work to control the outbreaks?
Yes people in public health are MDs but unfortunately the last 5 years have shown that public health officials (except in Florida) have been a complete and utter disaster and the CDC is a complete disgrace whose reputation in in the toilet. The whole childhood vaccination schedule needs to be revisited, and vaccines have to be administered with informed consent. Not biased information from a family physician pressuring parents (and it is really hard not to cave) but completely open and frank information detailing the benefits and potential risks (and there are always risks no matter how "safe" a product may be).
But as we saw during the pandemic these bright values driven individuals did not follow evidence based medicine. They went political and they went anti-anti-vax. That approach hurt public health. Speaking as an MD MPH
I read Prasad's book, Malignant. I found it to be a profound indictment of the oncological/academic-medical-industrial complex. And the abysmal quality of clinical studies that guide oncological practice. Which robs us of money better spent elsewhere.
Subsequently, I read or heard Prasad saying that oncologists ignore him.
OK, so tell me this Vinay. Are highly paid (!) oncologists idiots? Why don't you heap such contempt, scorn, derision, and venom on them? And other highly paid specialists like orthopedic surgeons doing BSBM (bullshit based medicine) and PBM (profit-based medicine). I agree with Vallliek about PH people. Not rocket surgeons, perhaps. Often misguided perhaps. But not idiots. And not "on the take" to use Jerome Kassirer's title about clinical, not public health, practitioners.
Vinay is an MPH as well…
Thanks, I did not know that. Does that mean he thinks oncologists are not idiots? What's your pount?
Or your point?
I used to trust PH to a certain degree but covid blew all that away.
I was trained in chem/biochem/micro and so I went back and took online immunology lectures and within a few months I realised the atrocious failure of PH officials to do their jobs.
When the cure is worse than the disease.
Alleviate pain, sure, but not at any cost.
Pain alleviation has become a Medical Industrial Complex religion and has grown way beyond its britches.
Choose should always come first, not coercion, and certainly not mandates.
I don't understand why you claim it's "important". Measles stopped being a deadly disease in the West before the vax came about. Everyone my age had it. Catching measles is a social immune synchroniser. Catching it is overwhelmingly a good thing.
The old medical textbooks described measles as primarily infecting children age 3-15. It was considered a childhood illness, not an infantile one. Before the vaccine was introduced, newborns were already protected at birth for up to 3 years from maternally conferred antibodies -- and this was in the 1950's, when few mothers breastfed.
We're now on our second or even third generation of infants born to women who never had measles, whose mothers and grandmothers didn't have measles. What used to be 3 years of immunity is now only around 3 months, according to a 2018 Canadian review: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29398276/
So, yes, it is now worrying when infants are exposed. Not to knock vaccines, but it's ironic that the measles vaccine seems to have shifted the risk of disease severity and complications to a population that was rarely if ever at any risk before the vaccine was introduced.
On the other hand, that Canadian study shows that newborns are still born with a protective level of measles antibodies. So it is very troubling that in the recent Texas outbreak, when infants at Lubbock's University Medical Center Children's Hospital were exposed to measles in hospital, medical staff gave 3-day-old babies injections of measles immunoglobulin. https://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local/article/newborn-babies-exposed-measles-texas-20223264.php
According to the product's license, "The safety and effectiveness of GamaSTAN® S/D in the pediatric population have not been established." https://pdf.hres.ca/dpd_pm/00043801.PDF
As far as I can tell, GamaSTAN is the only measles antibody product licensed in the US.
So if, God forbid, any of those babies do not do well, will health officials blame the virus or the treatment?
A problem caused by the obsession with vaccination itself.
The cure was worse than the disease.
We are transforming society into weaklings entirely reliant on the Medical Industrial Complex for its mere existence.