The world is changing its polio vaccine

[jmowreader]

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/04/17/474580802/new-polio-vaccine-rolled-out-in-massive-synchronized-worldwide-switch

The old polio vaccine inoculates against three strains of polio, which they call Type 1, Type 2 and Type 3. It uses live virus. The old vaccine has eradicated Type 2 polio from the wild, so the new one is made without Type 2 virus.

[JonathanRackham]

1. I didn't realize there was more than one strain of polio.

I remember standing in line as a kid in grade school getting immunized by the district nurse/doctor team from the school district.

[LonePirate]

2. Hmmm... Is this a wise decision?

Are there side effects by including the Type 2 vaccine so it is beneficial to remove it? Otherwise, why not keep it in case Type 2 re-emerges somehow.

[Ron Obvious]

3. I imagine that particular virus is extinct

Unless it escapes from the lab or is used in some sort of bio terror attack, it can't re-emerge.

[jmowreader]

5. They have some Type 2 virus in stock. The vaccine going to the general public doesn't contain it.

Polio is a live vaccine. Their fear is, if Region A vaccinates for Type 2 and Region B does not, an escape of Type 2 virus (from an accident, a terrorist attack or deliberate sabotage) from Region A could cause an outbreak of Type 2 polio in Region B.

If a Type 2 outbreak happens, they can go to the United States Army (who vaccinates against all sorts of weird shit...thanks to the Army I am immune to smallpox, bubonic plague, anthrax, cholera and rabies) and get all the Type 2 polio vaccine they need.

[LeftyMom]

6. Oral polio vaccine is used in populations that still have polio.

It's a more effective vaccine but it isn't totally inactivated like the injected version, so it can very rarely cause polio cases. That's why they give the oral vaccine in regions that still have polio cases and the injected version in areas without it (almost everywhere now except the really remote/wartorn parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan.)

So giving a vaccine with a minute but real chance of *causing* a disease that no longer exists in the wild is a real bad idea, which is why they had to take it out of the oral vaccine.

[KamaAina]

4. zOMFG! We're all gonna get teh autism!!!11!111!!!1!!