Question for those who are pro vaccination

Hashem_Yaazor

Fri, May 14 2010, 11:18 am

Chayalle wrote:

Quote:

It's kind of a catch-22 though.
Babies have natural immunity from their mothers for a certain time period (via pregnancy and/or nursing) if their mothers have natural immunity. So if you don't eradicate a disease completely, babies are more at risk if their mother is vaccinated than if their mother had natural immunity.

could you please explain this? Not sure I understand. Are you saying if a baby is being breastfeed the baby won't contract a contagious disease that is going around?

Partially.
A baby may or may not contract a contagious disease going around (breastfed or not!), and even if he does, antibodies from the mother will be passed to him if he's breastfeeding, so he may either not get sick or the severity will be much less, and not really all that dangerous. (BTW, a study was recently published about rotavirus in breastfed babies. Fascinating read if you're interested.)
But the other point was through PREGNANCY a baby is transmitted antibodies. The natural immunity a mother has for chicken pox, for example, can protect her baby for 4-6 months (it's still slightly possible to contract it, but the severity will be much less)...but if she was vaccinated instead, she doesn't have natural immunity, and her baby doesn't have that protection.