What is mumps? “Mumps is a contagious disease that is caused by a virus. It typically starts with a few days of fever, headache, muscle aches, tiredness, and loss of appetite. Then most people will have swelling of their salivary glands. This is what causes the puffy cheeks and a tender, swollen jaw.” (cdcmumps).
How many cases of mumps are there each year in the US?
“From January 1 to January 25, 2020, 16 states* in the U.S. reported mumps infections in 70** people to CDC.” (cdc.gov)
“On June 5, 2020, the U.S Centers for Disease Control (CDC) published the details of a recent multistate outbreak of mumps in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR). The outbreak involved 62 cases linked to a single asymptomatic wedding attendee. Even though mumps is a vaccine-preventable disease, 41 of the individuals infected in the reported incident had been fully vaccinated according to the current guidelines. (ScientificAmerican)
What would the chances of getting mumps have been for 2019? There was 3,474 cases total in the US and 328,200,000 people. Your chances would have been 1 in 94,473 in 2019. In 2012 there were only 229 cases total and 313,900,000 people so your chances would have been 1 in 1,370,742 in 2012. Good to truly evaluate the real risk of getting the disease which is clearly low for mumps.
So clearly the MMR vaccine doesn’t always work. It is also good to weigh the potential risks from the MMR vaccine. I talked about that in my last post so if you already read the post on Measles this will be a repeat.
“Measles inclusion body encephalitis {4} (MIBE), pneumonitis {5} and death
as a direct consequence of disseminated measles vaccine virus infection have been reported in immunocompromised individuals inadvertently vaccinated with measles-containing vaccine.” (MMRinsert) So obviously immunocompromised people should not get this vaccine.
“There is a risk of fever and associated febrile seizure in the first 2 weeks following immunization with M-M-R II vaccine….Transient thrombocytopenia has been reported within 4-6 weeks following vaccination with measles, mumps and rubella vaccine.” (MMRinsert)
Here are some of the adverse effects reported after the vaccine:
- Atypical measles
- Fever
- Syncope, malaise
- Headache, irritability
- dizziness
- regional lymphadenopathy
- vomiting
- regional lymphadenopathy
- bronchial spasm
- otitis media
Other side effects include:
“Encephalitis; encephalopathy; measles inclusion body encephalitis (MIBE) subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE); Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS); acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM); transverse myelitis; febrile convulsions; afebrile convulsions or seizures; ataxia; polyneuritis; polyneuropathy; ocular palsies; paresthesia.” (MMRinsert)
Yikes ok well that shows that there is a risk you child could get measles, encephalitis, GBS (paralysis) and febrile convulsions. I mean these things sound pretty bad for side effects, is this worth it?
A big concern about this vaccine is that it is made with aborted fetal tissue!, “propagated in WI-38 human diploid lung fibroblasts.” This is also a live vaccine. “M-M-R II vaccine has not been evaluated for carcinogenic or mutagenic potential or impairment of fertility.” (MMRinsert)
These are some of the other ingredients in the MMR
I hope this gives you a little more incite about the Mumps part of the MMR. Next up is Rubella!
If you haven’t already checkout my post about Measles.