I grew up in the '60s and caught absolutely nothing...

[MrScorpio]

Last edited Sun Feb 1, 2015, 01:37 AM - Edit history (1)

I was the beneficiary of a rigorous childhood vaccination program that was administered to me and my schoolmates in elementary school.

I remember the shots by air guns and needles and the oral doses that we all lined up in the school auditorium to recieve.

Although some of my school aged pals would come down with occasional cases of mumps or the measles, others and myself did not.

I've never had any childhood disease. I never knew of a case of a bad reaction from any vaccination either. I was quite willing to take that moment of pain from an airgun or a needle than to have to endure the illness from a disease.

Quite frankly until recently, until the advent of the anti-vax movement, I presumed that my experience at a young age would be consistent with kids today, recieving vaccinations of their own and also protecting them from the same diseases that I completely avoided.

I was wrong, obviously. I'm also incredulous that parents, who have for the most part also benefited from the same childhood vaccination program that protected them, would skip out on those protections for their own kids.

What the hell are these people thinking?

Vaccinations not only protect our kids and ourselves, they protect the community as a whole.

I still have the vaccination scar on my left arm and I wear it as a badge of honor. During my lifetime, I've seen the same mark on the arms of others who were around my age. I considered it mark of protection.

Before me, a lot of other kids didn't have the same form of protection as I, and sickness was quite common. But since the program we've gone a long time without the outbreaks of childhood diseases, that I thought could've been easily avoided.

But we're regressing in that arena, are we not?

Anti-vaxxers are a selfish, illinformed and dangerous lot who are not only putting themselves and their own children in jeopardy but the rest of us as well. Anti-vax philosophy has far ranging consequences beyond the people who've adopted it.

It's practically insane.

[oldandhappy]

1. agree!!

[elleng]

2. I grew up in the 40s/50s,

caught everything (but mumps,) and survived.

My younger brother caught everything including mumps, which he gave to my father, and they both survived.

[SusanCalvin]

49. I caught everything including mumps

But I would have been happy to have been vaccinated instead, had the vaccines existed then. I'm just lucky there were no complications.

I *was* vaccinated against polio, and am extremely grateful. And some other stuff I don't remember - I think vaccines against childhood diseases were just coming along during my childhood.

[Jim Beard]

68. Small pox is the other

small pox

[Sedona]

56. Who did you expose to "everything" that may not have survived?

[elleng]

57. There were no vaccinations at the time,

sorry. And I don't recall that any of my friends did not survive. Sorry to disappoint you, I grew up when I did.

[Sedona]

58. Not at all disappointed

but saying one survived an outbreak says nothing about the others who may have been infected. Maybe your friends who survived passed it on to others, we have no way of knowing.

Same hold true today with anti vaxxers. They have no way of knowing the havoc they spread bringing an unvaccinated kid to a theme park until it makes the news. My wingnut, anti government sister does it on a regular basis. I don't have anything to do with her since she exposed our elderly parents to whooping cough last year.

My apologies, no offense to you, I've always been taught in respect my elders.

[LeftishBrit]

71. I grew up in the 60s/70s...

did get mumps and chicken-pox, but was spared measles, polio, whooping cough, and many others.

Of course, a high proportion of people survived these diseases, but many didn't: the life expectancy for an American woman born in 1940 was 65 (already a great advance on earlier in the century); that for an American girl born nowadays is estimated as 81 - and quite a lot of the change is due to a much-decreased risk of dying in childhood. This is certainly not just due to vaccines, but they contribute.

Glad that you're here, in any case!

[elleng]

72. Thanks; me too!

Daughters, with their littleuns, now 27 and 30, and did I say Dad lived to 98? And HIS mother died at ?what age, when Dad was about 4, during the 'great' influenza epidemic, and HIS father raised the 5 'kids!' My father was the youngest.

[uppityperson]

3. I envied my younger sibs who got vaccinated rather than having to spend weeks suffering

like I did with hard measles, german measles, mumps.

[TheBlackAdder]

10. So true, and you know what? Folks who "didn't catch anything" should take an antibody test to see.

When I went back to college, at the ripe age of 50, I had to take an MMR shot or have a test performed to see if I had the antibodies. I don't remember being sick, but did recall my mother saying that when a neighborhood kid had the chicken pox, all the parents took their kids over there to get exposed to it, while still young.

Sure enough, when I got the lab results back, I had the antibodies for all three in my system and did not need an MMR shot.

I think that many folks who don't recall being sick, actually don't recall it. They might have had slight cases, or cases when they were very young. I bet most of the folks saying they grew up in the 50's and the 60's (as I did) were actually exposed and had mild reactions to it. If that's the case... good for you. But, others have severe reactions to it, up to and including death and disfigurement. So just rejoice that you dodged something worse.

But, get the test the next time you see your doctor, it costs $35 or so and would give you peace of mind.

[murielm99]

20. I had measles and chicken pox.

I don't remember mumps. But, like you, I had the antibodies tests. I had them before having children, in my thirties. I did not want to risk getting anything like that while I was pregnant, and endangering the fetus. I have fully immunity, according to the tests.

I did have the polio vaccinations, and smallpox, too.

I was born in 1948. I grew up with many children who suffered the after effects of polio, since they were born before the vaccine came into use. I would never have considered skipping any vaccinations for my children.

[FrodosPet]

28. I was vaccinated and still caught all those anyhow

My immune system was never my strong suit, so I don't even bother with flu shots anymore. Why go through all that when I am going to get the flu twice a year, with or without shots?

[MH1]

36. Odd situation.

Supposedly the flu shot does make the flu less severe, even if you still get it anyway. The flu virus adapts every year and scientists just try to predict it when they design the shot. Some years the prediction is close, some years not so much, but either way it supposedly at least reduces the severity of symptoms.

The other side of your statement is "why go through all that" (to get the shot). What is "all that"? Maybe I am lucky but it is extremely easy for me to get the shot, especially if I happen to be at the doctor's anyway at the right time of year. If not, then my company has a program where it is very easy for me to get it one day at the office. (I haven't had the flu in years, and I think the last time, I had missed my flu shot that year.)

It is unfortunate if the equation doesn't work for you. On the other hand, if you routinely get the flu and routinely just deal with it without severe symptoms (which is what your post sounds like to me), then I would say, on the contrary, you evidently have an excellent immune system. Why the flu shot seems to have no effect for you is a mystery, however.

[FrodosPet]

39. I don't like needles

And I rarely have had health insurance.

[MH1]

40. Health insurance, I understand.

It is stupid that one needs to have health insurance to get a flu shot, though. Hopefully one day our society will fix that.

On the other point: I hate needles too. I have to look away and the arm of the chair gets a death grip. But it is done in a second, literally, and the more recent ones I barely even felt. I rarely have any side effect of pain near the shot area afterward, and even when I do, it is no worse than if someone had punched me in the arm a little. (I do worse to myself nearly daily just be being clumsy.) When I have gotten the flu, it has affected me for days. So, simple calculation: a few seconds of discomfort, or days of feeling like crap? That's just me though. I realize it affects some people differently.

[Jim Beard]

67. You can get the shot at any drugstore

I know Walgreens for sure.

[GP6971]

52. Wow....I forgot about German measles

Shortly after I had the measles, the vaccine came out. I distinctly remember the polio vaccine.......literally sugar cubes with the medicine.

[MohRokTah]

4. I had Mumps, Measles, Rubella, and Chicken Pox as a kid.

The polio vaccine was early, but growing up in the sticks I didn't get the MMR vaccine until after I already had all three diseases.

My brother almost died from Chicken Pox.

A kid I grew up with ended up with brain damage from the measles.

[Siwsan]

5. Pre-military, I received only 2 - polio and small pox

I had measles, mumps and chicken pox and I realize I was very lucky because I sailed through all 3 with little discomfort.

I wish I could locate my shot record from my time in the Navy - damn, I got a whole lot of vaccinations, and to this day, I have YET to contract Yellow Fever! Which was a mandatory vaccination given to me before I left for ICELAND???

My only issue with vaccinations is my DEEP distrust of 'big pharma'. If they'd put that big RX advertising money into R&D, and remove what appears to be the gigantic profit at any risk margin, I'd have a little more confidence in their products.

[bhikkhu]

6. I grew up in the 60's-70's, and got only chickenpox.

I missed a week of school, which was the only time I was ever really sick. I got all my vaccinations, as did everyone I knew; no kids I knew ever got seriously ill. The worst thing I got after chickenpox was a case of pneumonia in my thirties, when I missed one day of work to go to the hospital and get antibiotics.

Too many people my age may have had the same advantages and experience, and never really learned how fortunate we are. Most of human history is pocked by endemic disease and devastated by plagues...until we learned how to fight them with vaccines and science.

[TexasTowelie]

19. The best thing about getting chickenpox when I was in my third grade

is that my brother in seventh grade and my sister in tenth grade caught it after me. It kind of makes up for some of the things they passed along to me.

[MADem]

7. People in the sixties--and earlier--were given fewer vaccinations.

The whole "shot protocol" has gotten more rigorous down the years. Now they give people "boosters" when it used to be One and Done.

I think the basic immunizations are a good idea. People who don't want the add-ons, at least straightaway, can space those out down the road, but the measles/mumps/rubella one is a no-brainer. Chickenpox, too (that's a new one--relatively speaking).

Here's a vaccination history schedule list--it's interesting reading:

http://vec.chop.edu/service/vaccine-education-center/vaccine-schedule/history-of-vaccine-schedule.html

The whole anti-vax movement is being discredited by this measles outbreak--it's, in a backhanded way, fortunate that it's measles, and not, say, POLIO, going around (though there is a resurgence of an odd paralyzing flu recently--they don't know if it's temporary or permanent, it's apparently a cousin to polio). People do die of measles, but it's fortunately a rare occurrence.

[Bluenorthwest]

43. Netherlands 92/93...Polio outbreak. Did not really change the religious minds of the communities

there that refuse vaccinations....71 cases, previously in 1978 there were 80 cases and that outbreak spread to the US and Canada. Same religious communities in 1999/2000 had measles outbreak with 3,300 cases, 3 deaths. 2004/05 it was rubella, 387 Dutch cases, 309 Canadian....
http://justthevax.blogspot.com/2013/06/meanwhile-measles-break-out-in-dutch.html

What history tells us is that outbreaks do not instruct those who are functioning from dogma, religious or secular in nature.

[MADem]

60. Yeah, and the ones who do take the lesson often don't survive it...~! nt

[Kablooie]

8. I really liked the measles vaccine in grammar school.

It was a pink liquid pumped into a sugar cube.

I never had measles or mumps as a result.

[uppityperson]

18. That was the polio vaccine, not measles or mumps but polio.

They were so mean, didn't let us take more than 1 sugar cube.

[Kablooie]

22. And I never had polio either.

Now if they could only come up with a deviate septum vaccine I'd be all set.

[mountain grammy]

9. My sons were born in 68 and 71

both had chickenpox and mumps. I think the vaccine came out right after they had the mumps. My daughter was born in 88. She been immunized against everything possible.

I grew up in the 50's and knew people who got polio. My mom couldn't get that vaccine into us soon enough. She was terrified of polio.

[Major Hogwash]

11. The anti-vax crowd is made up of spineless religious fanatics who think the fed government is evil.

Last edited Sun Feb 1, 2015, 03:57 AM - Edit history (1)

They are about the most whacked-out group you've ever seen.
They think that the federal government is trying to take over control of their children through the use of vaccinations.

I don't know how such odd anti-scientific bullshit got started like that, but it is everywhere on cable tv.
Toss in a bit of hatred for Obama, distrust of the federal government, and then mention some metaphorical phrase out of 1 of the chapters from Revelations, and viola . . there you have the anti-vax sentiment, all wrapped up and ready to start foaming at the mouth!

Some of the tv evangelists are preaching against getting children vaccinated.
They should be taken off of cable tv, but cable tv is immune to stopping weirdo types from preaching fire and brimstone/anti-science/anti-vax convoluted, conflated horseshit polluting the airwaves.

[ND-Dem]

30. The biggest concentration of 'anti-vaxxers' is in Marin County California. White, upper income,

highly educated, and not religious. And Democratic.

Just to destroy your stereotypes.

[Major Hogwash]

31. Nope, the highest percentage live in Tarrant County, Texas.

Last edited Sun Feb 1, 2015, 08:45 PM - Edit history (1)

And many are Kenneth Copeland Believer's Voice of Victory followers.

Just to set the record straight.

[ND-Dem]

32. Well, let's see.

1. Oregon has the highest percent of unvaccinated kindergarteners (per CDC) = 7%

Texas, OTOH, has only 1.9% of kindergarteners unvaccinated.

http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2014/10/oregon_has_highest_rate_of_unv.html


2. Alaska has the lowest overall vaccination rate, 59%

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/27/californias-epidemic-of-vaccine-denial-mapped/


3. 7. 8% of Marin County kindergarteners have a 'personal belief exemption,' the highest opt-out rate in the Bay Area, and one of the highest in the state.

http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2013/08/21/marin-vaccinations


4. In 2000, the Texas County with the lowest vaccination coverage was El Paso. Tarrant Co. was in the top 2 for total coverage, surpassed only by Travis Co. The populations with the lowest coverage in Tarrant County are black and Hispanic.

https://www.dshs.state.tx.us/immunize/coverage/tis.shtm


5. Immunization coverage of first graders in Tarrant County 2000-2001 ranged from 88.8% (for Haemophilus influenzae type B vaccine) to 97.4% (MMR vaccine)

http://www.tarrantcounty.com/ehealth/lib/ehealth/Maternal_child.pdf


6. Kenneth Copeland's Church has 1,500 members. Tarrant County has nearly 2 million people.

[Bluenorthwest]

44. The role of religious leaders in promoting acceptance of vaccination within a minority group:

a qualitative study.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3668146/

2014:
T"he outbreak of measles in Chilliwack has drawn attention to its source at Mount Cheam Christian School, and to religious groups that reject or discourage vaccination. While it's tempting to enjoy simple, moralistic disapproval of "anti-vaxxers," the issue is more complex than it seems. Not only religious fundamentalists are involved. The problem has existed in British Columbia, and worldwide, for years.

The Fraser Valley Dutch Reformed community is no stranger to outbreaks like the current one. In 1978, a visitor from the Netherlands brought B.C.'s first case of polio in many years; other Reformed communities in Alberta and Ontario also suffered polio cases."
http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2014/03/17/Vaccination-Issues/

Dutch Reformed likely at heart of mumps outbreak
"A retired physician in Chilliwack vividly remembers the conservative Christian mushroom farmer who came to him in 1978 severely ill with polio, which was starting to paralyze his body.

The B.C. polio victim was a member of an arch-conservative arm of the Dutch Reformed church, which held it goes against God's will to accept vaccinations for polio or other infectious diseases, Dr. R. W. Van der Flier said in an interview.

The B.C. mushroom farmer had caught the polio virus from a visitor from the Netherlands who was a member of the same traditionalist Protestant Reformed denomination, which was at the time the focus of a severe polio outbreak in Holland."
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=65d245df-6bf6-4ac8-8978-89382fc4f040

This is a worldwide, very serious issue.

[ND-Dem]

46. According to CDC poverty is a bigger one.

I think you and lots of posters here are confusing two groups.

One is 'anti-vaxxers,' people who deliberately decline to have their children vaccinated for a variety of reasons: religious, ideological, etc.

Another is people who don't get their children vaccinated because they're poor, uneducated, drug addicted, etc. a/o lead disrupted lives outside the mainstream. Those people aren't declining to have their children vaccinated on any grounds of principle and can't be called 'anti-vaxxers,' and they're the larger group.

The first group tends to be relatively well off to very well off. The second is part of the bottom 10% and includes the children of the unemployed, homeless and criminal.

[freshwest]

12. This explains our pro-federal government, authoritarian leanings! We hate liberty and freedom!

We took it for granted that the success of liberal programs needed no advertisement. This ludicrous outbreak of preventable disease may end up educating a lot of people who got their diplomas at Infowars, Glenn Beck and Youtube universities...

[Thinkingabout]

13. It isn't only getting measles, mumps and chicken pox, sometimes there are other problems which

can occur also. Remember a guy who had chicken pox and list his vision, not a good result. Not to mention the possibility of shingles in later life.

[SheilaT]

14. Because I grew up in the era before

most vaccinations, I just took it for granted that we'd get these diseases. It wasn't at all scary, even if it wasn't much fun.

My sons are old enough that they had chicken pox. My oldest actually got Fifth Disease, but neither of them got any other of the "childhood diseases".

[Barack_America]

17. Fifth's disease is still out there, and most kids still get it.

Perhaps you are confusing it with something else?

[SheilaT]

25. I don't think so.

I did not think it was at all common, and I don't know anyone else who ever got it. Not my second child, not me or any of my siblings or any of my friends. In fact, when I mention it, no one (other than you here on DU) has ever heard of it.

[msanthrope]

34. My daughter had fifths....it's not uncommon, but usually so mild it goes

un or misdiagnosed.

[phylny]

37. Our youngest daughter had it when she was little

and it was no picnic. That was back in the early 90s. A child I see for early intervention just had it a few months ago. It's still around, you are right.

[msanthrope]

51. Mine got it after my dumbass former mother-in-law INSISTED on not washing her hands

before holding my daughter. As I was bedridden at the time, my idiot ex-husband gladly handed my daughter over when they were two floors away from me.

Dumbass called us two days after her visit to us--she was in the hospital with joint swelling. Sure enough, my daughter started the rash shortly thereafter. After that, my ex finally got on board with germ theory.

[Nay]

63. My 7-yr-old grandson had Fifth Disease last year. There's no vaccine, and

it is a very mild disease.

I was born in 1951 and had measles and chickenpox. I knew kids who lost their hearing or had some brain damage.
The MINUTE the polio vaccine came out, our elementary school nurse gave out the sugar cubes -- I don't remember any weird parents who didn't want their kids to be vaccinated. My Spanish teacher was a young woman who had been stricken with polio and had to drag herself around on two crutches (she was lucky--most people were either dead or in iron lungs). No one wanted that for their children, but of course, back then, most people were smart enough to believe the science.

I also have had the smallpox vaccine.

[uppityperson]

21. Fifths is highly contagious but usually minimal symptoms and no vx

Most people got Fifth's but didn't know it because it is so mild.

My parents were very scared of measles since it is a deadly disease. I wish I'd missed chicken pox and the follow up shingles.

[SheilaT]

41. At the risk of being picky,

it's Fifth Disease, not Fifths.

In any case, it's interesting that various people here are chiming in about having it or their kid having it, as any time I bring it up in conversation, I don't think I've ever met anyone who even knew what it was.

[uppityperson]

48. You are right, Fifth Disease but hey, internet writing and all. Grammar sucks too. The only reason I

know is from working in clinics, family medicine and pediatrics and having it pass through the community. It was interesting, being the phone triage nurse for a multi-doctor family medicine clinic. I got to know what was happening in the community and missed that after I left.

Because Fifth Disease (which I shorten to Fifths in my writing and that took even longer to write) is so mild, typically, and so very contagious, most people have had it and don't know since they didn't notice. I learned about it when Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease came through the community (in a "well, it's not Fifth Disease, looks like h,f&m" discussion). There is another odd one that is contagious with typically minor symptoms but can be very painful that most people have never heard of

[SheilaT]

61. How interesting.

When my oldest son got it, it seemed to be a fluke, although obviously he'd been around someone with it. None of the other kids he was around during the contagious period seemed to get it, although as has been pointed out it is often so mild that it's missed. Although how anyone could miss the rash and the fever escapes me.

[Barack_America]

59. I'm Midwestern, everything has to belong to someone.

The "Fifth" moniker in all is a bit outdated, it's caused by Parvovirus, if that sounds more familiar.

[uppityperson]

66. huh, I didn't know it was a parvo virus, usually see it aserythema infectiosum

Another "huh?" type name. Thanks for the info.

ETA, I had an odd probably virus in my 30's, sounds like may have been this, or something similar. Knees to feet, elbows to hands, very sorry for a week. I was living in bush in AK, unable to get to a doctor, later my Dr said probably some virus.

http://www.cdc.gov/parvovirusB19/fifth-disease.html
[div class="excerpt"You may also have painful or swollen joints
People with fifth disease can also develop pain and swelling in their joints (polyarthropathy syndrome). This is more common in adults, especially women. Some adults with fifth disease may only have painful joints, usually in the hands, feet, or knees, but no other symptoms. The joint pain usually lasts 1 to 3 weeks, but it can last for months or longer. It usually goes away without any long-term problems

[Lugnut]

15. I was born in 1945.

The only vaccine I ever got before 1955 was for smallpox. In 1951 when I was in first grade I caught everything....mumps, measles and chicken pox. I had pneumonia along with the measles and I was pretty darn sick. I'm grateful for the vaccines that were available for my kids.

[Jim Beard]

65. 1947 here

and my mother took all of her kids as they got to the age of 5 or 6 to visit kids who had meseals, mumps and chicken pox. I got the all except the mumps. Should have french kissed the cousin I was exposed to because I finally got the mumps at 16.

Some of the unvaccinated could be getting these childhood diseases when they are older adults and take the disease home to their newborn child.

[jtuck004]

16. "I'm also incredulous that parents, who have..." < That thought...

Not just with vaccinations, but the people from the 1920s made a grievous error in not setting aside a part of each day to teach people why we invest in ourselves and what life might be like if we give more help to rentiers and bank$ters instead of working people, as is the current strategy. Now the people walk away from the very things that made them safe and prosperous.

People forgot how good they were for each other.

[Stargazer09]

23. My young kids willingly go for vaccinations now

With me, they've watched every episode of Animal Planet's "Monsters Inside Me" on iTunes. They are fascinated by the parasites and strange diseases featured on the show, and when I explained that shots help protect them from diseases that could make them very sick, they decided that vaccinations are a good thing.

I hope I've innoculated them against stupidity along the way.

[azurnoir]

24. I was born in 1956 and had mumps Measles (both kinds) and chicken pox

and I remember German (Rubella) measles party's where when one girl came down with them all of Mom's friends relatives neighbors, whatever who had daughters who had not yet had them would bring their girls to be exposed and hopefully have the disease before they reached child bearing age, even back then the effects of a mild disease on an unborn fetus were well known

[pnwmom]

26. I grew up a few years before you. My sister and my mother's cousin both died from the old DPT shot.

Another cousin had permanent neurological damage.

Unfortunately, the old whole-cell DPT shot DID carry a risk of encephalitis, and it took the safe vaccine movement to get the government to fund research for a safer vaccine, which finally became available in the 1980's.

So if people wonder how the vaccine safety movement began, it wasn't actually with the (discredited) concerns raised by Andrew Wakefield about the measles vaccine. It was about real problems with the DPT vaccine -- real problems that have been eliminated with the substitution of the split-cell vaccine.

I believe in vaccines. I had most childhood diseases because the vaccines weren't available then -- and I missed a couple months of kindergarten and it wasn't fun. But I remember lining up to get the polio vaccine, and I had the DPT vaccine, too, till my fever got too high. (They stop if your temp is over 105.)

And when I had my children, they were fully vaccinated, until they also had severe reactions to the old DPT, and the doctor stopped that shot. By the time my granddaughter was born, she got the safe dpt vaccine, and I had the new, safe adult version of the vaccine to protect her.

So I'm not anti-vaccine. I'm pro-vaccine and pro-vaccine safety. And I think that is where the vast majority of people can come together.

[ladyVet]

35. Right. Vacinations are good, but you've got to keep on the government's ass.

Safety and knowledge rule. Made up shit from book that contradicts itself and can't be proven to contain any real truth? Fuck that.

All three of my children missed the chicken pox vaccine, and caught the disease, but if it had been around I would have made sure they got it to avoid the shingles possibility. My mother has had shingles twice (once right beside her eye), my father had it last year, and now it seems my youngest sister has it. All three have compromised immune systems, but still who would want to risk getting shingles? It hurts, and can cause other issues.

[pnwmom]

45. I tried to get the shingles vaccine this year because my sister has had it twice

and I don't want it! But they said I was too young without a doctor's recommendation. But after seeing what my sister went through, I want to get the vaccine as soon as I can.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

27. "What the hell are these people thinking?"

<jumping up and down raising my hand.> I know! I know!

"Government BAD."















That's it.

(You expected something deeper?)

[chillfactor]

29. I am old...

my parents were very responsible...one of my sisters and I caught chicken pox but we were born before the vaccine was available...my younger sister never did have chicken pox.....she was the lucky one....

[quaker bill]

33. I grew up in the late 50s and early 60s- and caught almost everything

Measles - twice (both varieties)
Mumps - twice (both sides)
Chicken pox - once
Pneumonia - once

Vaccines came along - my kids caught none.

[etherealtruth]

38. Born in 1962

I had chicken pox ... nothing else

[99Forever]

42. Well put, MrScorpio.

[phantom power]

47. vaccines have become a victim of their own success

A generation or two has grown up never knowing how dangerous these diseases are. So some of them become deluded about the true nature of the risk/tradeoff matrix, which is overwhelmingly in favor of vaccinations.

[Liberal_in_LA]

50. my mom took us religiously for our vaccinations. prior generation had lived

Thru the.polio years. Science is your friend

[madville]

53. It's a perfect recipe for outbreaks

All these non-vaccinated people and then potential hosts carrying these diseases in across the borders from countries were they are common occurrences.

[WolverineDG]

54. I supposedly had German Measles when I was a baby

& my mother was pregnant with my younger brother. Probably was brought home by my older brother from school, so he & I got shipped off to relatives. I got chicken pox in 1st grade (no vaccine at the time), the mumps in 2nd grade. I remember getting a polio vaccine & another immunization that was done at school, but I can't remember what it was for. And of course, I had the small pox vaccine, which my mother insisted be given to my brother & I on our backs, so when schools did a check for that vaccine, we had to go the nurse's office instead of rolling up our sleeves.

It scares the crap out of me that people aren't getting their kids vaccinated anymore. Personally, I feel if a parent wants to space them out like they were given when I was a kid, I'm fine with that. But to not vaccinate at all? Pure insanity & selfishness.

[markpkessinger]

55. The only one I caught was chickenpox . . .

I was born in 1961. And there was no chickenpox vaccine available in the U.S. until 1995.

Vaccines are arguably one of, if not the, single biggest advances in human health. The ant-vax hysteria baffles me.

[Blue_In_AK]

62. I had measles, mumps, chicken pox,

and might have gotten polio, too, if I hadn't been given the trial vaccine immediately after I was exposed (this was around 1952 or '53). I would have been happy to have missed them all. The only vaccination I got when I was really young was for smallpox. My doctor put it on my back so that it wouldn't show if I were wearing a dress with straps when I got older. Funny how I remember that.

We had a mass vaccination here in Alaska back in the late '70s for whooping cough or diphtheria, I can't remember which. There was a big outbreak here and they tried to vaccinate everyone, kids and adults. I remember long, long lines at the high school.

Ed. It was diphtheria in 1975. They immunized 180,000 people, which was quite a few for Alaska at the time.

[WinkyDink]

64. Born 1949; had all the vaccinations; caught measles, mumps, and chicken pox.

[GreyGhost47]

69. Grew up in the 50s & 60s

My Mom made sure I got all my shots. It was just DPT and Smallpox until the mid 50's and then
the polio vaccine came out she made sure we got those - all three shots. The oral polio vaccine
came out in 1962 and I got all three sugar cubes. The measles vaccine was given at school
a year or so later and she signed me up for that. A trip overseas meant another smallpox
vaccination and some other boosters. Everyone I knew got their shots at school or from
their doctor or at the health department. We all had scars from our smallpox vaccinations
and most of us were thrilled there was a polio vaccine because we didn't want to end up
in crutches. I don't recall anyone bringing a note from home excusing them from getting their
shots.

[Rhiannon12866]

70. Years ago, it used to be that children got vaccinations in the upper arm

I remember that my grandmother had a fairly deep and noticeable one. When I was small - and I was also born in the '50s - they apparently offered to give them in a less noticeable spot - my mother said that because I was a girl, she had them give me mine on my leg. And I remember getting inoculations at school, as well.

Welcome to DU, GreyGhost47!