It is an incredible shame that doctors are urging parents to do the exact opposite of what will protect their precious newborn from pertussis exposure.
Since the parents and the doctor are primarily interested in protecting their newborn baby from exposure to pertussis, according to the science, allowing anyone contact with the baby who has been recently vaccinated with TDaP is contraindicated. That is the science. Here are 2 studies every doctor should respect AND READ, because they are published in well respected journals.
Regarding Bordetella pertussis, Stanley Plotkin wrote: “we are far from a full understanding of the organism, the disease, the correlates of protection…immunity after vaccination is more or less transient. Therefore, it is not surprising that control of pertussis is relatively poor…The result is the continued circulation of the bacterium in family contacts, regardless of their vaccination history, resulting in exposure of vulnerable newborns.”
Plotkin, Stanley A. “The Importance of Persistence.” Advances in Pediatrics., U.S. National Library of Medicine, 1 Dec. 2016, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5106615/.
Even more importantly, the following study, funded by the FDA presents facts in direct opposition to the recent advertisements seen on television by GSK.
The title of this paper makes the conclusion abundantly clear: “Acellular pertussis vaccines protect against disease but fail to prevent infection and transmission on a human primate model.”
Warfel, Jason M., et al. “Acellular Pertussis Vaccines Protect against Disease but Fail to Prevent Infection and Transmission in a Nonhuman Primate Model.” PNAS, National Academy of Sciences, 14 Jan. 2014, www.pnas.org/content/111/2/787
For those of us who are not experienced in analysis the details of scientific papers, Del Bigtree from ICAN, Informed Choice Action Network, has long experience as a medical journalist. This 4 minute video explains the details found by Dr Jason Warfel and his team in their study of pertussis transmission in animal primates. [Edited 2020: the original video in which Del describes the baboon study and it’s important has been removed by YouTube along with the entire Highwire channel. I found a clip (below) from another episode where Del Bigtree explains clearly how the pertussis vaccine does not stop transmission and could be the culprit in spreading whooping cough to the vulnerable. The abstract of Dr Warfel’s study here.]
For more information on vaccines, I have prepared a “Table of Contents” page for new parents, or anyone interested in vaccine safety, and protecting their precious baby from infectious illness.
Author: Becky Hastings, wife, mother, grandmother, passionate follower of Jesus and truth. As a breastfeeding counselor for over 23 years Becky is devoted to helping parents make wise decisions for the long-term health and wellbeing of their babies. As a member of a Vaccine Safety Education Coalition, Becky writes and speaks on the topic of vaccine safety.