Measles, my thoughts.

Warning, stop reading if you are easily offended.

Did you know that children do not receive their first MMR (Measles Mumps Rubella) vaccine until they're 15 months old?  This means that Claire has been unprotected against these diseases until now.  This is not by choice, it is not allowed to be given earlier.

When the ebola scare was going on I thought, if one of us caught Ebola, we would all die, due to my children sharing their germs with one another constantly, and I wouldn't have been able to do anything about it.

I can and do choose to protect my children against other preventable diseases.  But, as I learned yesterday, I wouldn't have been able to protect her up until 15 months old.  There is no choice to babies and toddlers up until that age.

I felt like it was my duty to get a whooping cough vaccine before having Luke and Claire, they're too little to protect themselves and it's usually the adult that spreads it to them, before they have a chance to be immunized.

I'm sure I won't change anyone's mind about vaccines.

In Hawaii and Polynesia the first birthday is a HUGE celebration, bigger than some high school graduation celebrations I've seen on the Mainland, this is b/c to make it to the first birthday was a huge celebration and used to be rare.  Children would often die before one.

I know this was common in most other places in the world.  A huge factor was diseases killed these little ones.

We have the chance to protect our littles from these diseases now with vaccines and I feel strongly that we need to protect them and all others who have poor immune systems.

My dad had cancer and a bone marrow transplant.  He had a compromised immune system for YEARS after the bone marrow transplant.  He COULDN'T be protected if he encountered one of these diseases.  Claire COULDN'T have been protected up until 15 months.

Do we really want to put all of these people, babies and toddlers at risk of illness and death from diseases that don't need to be around anymore?

Just food for thought.