In recent years the US has experienced pertussis (whooping cough) outbreaks and even epidemics in states across the nation. While the official advice of government, health care workers and vaccine makers has been a resounding, “go get vaccinated or re-vaccinated”, is that really the solution to this problem? Is that truly the best course of action for now and the future?
While Vermont has declared a state-wide emergency for a whooping cough epidemic, an examination of the data shows that most of those contracting whooping cough in Vermont and elsewhere have been fully vaccinated (60%-90% in most cases). In fact, people have been vaccinated 5 and 6 times and yet they still have contracted pertussis. This illustrates an important point about vaccines, namely that while they are touted to provide life long immunity, that is not the case in practice. Vaccine induced “immunity” wanes, sometimes very quickly, over time. Papers published in the medical literature show that the efficacy or effectiveness of pertussis vaccination wanes so rapidly that within a few years, as few as one in four 8-12 year olds will have any protection from the 5 doses of pertussis they have received in their life.1 Public health department’s answer: just get vaccinated more. But it is only natural to question the wisdom of obtaining only temporary “immunity’ from a vaccine while exposing recipients to more chemicals, more potential for autoimmune disease, more potential for brain inflammation, and more potential for other chronic health problems. Review our Catalogue of Science to learn more about some of the complications of vaccines.
What else is going on with these recent outbreaks and could vaccination actually be causing the outbreaks? First, let’s consider what pertussis vaccine does. In theory, it protects against a pathogen called b. pertussis which causes the symptoms of whooping cough. But there are other pathogens, very similar to b. pertussis but not covered by the pertussis vaccine, that can cause whooping cough. One of those pathogens is b. parapertussis. Scientists have found that mice injected with pertussis vaccine grow 40 times as much b. parapertussis in their lungs as they would absent the vaccine. The vaccine literally promotes this other cause of whooping cough.3 While health authorities and doctors decry the outbreaks of whooping cough, rarely do they actually verify which pathogen is responsible for the outbreak. The study in mice suggests the culprit may in fact be b. parapertussis, a pathogen against which the pertussis vaccine does nothing. Worse still, this is yet another example of the law of unintended consequences: by attempting to beat nature by vaccinating against pertussis, we may have actually encouraged the proliferation of another bug and by repeatedly vaccinating with pertussis vaccine we may only be making matters worse.
