Recently, my son’s daycare updated their vaccination records, and we realized that we only had two of his required Hepatitis B vaccinations on record. I had to go to the hospital where he was born and inquire with medical records to see if he received this vaccination at birth. While I thought the HepB vaccination at birth was standard, there is some question about whether our birth hospital actually performed it. We’ll see when the records come in the mail.
We also faced having to switch pediatricians lately due to an insurance change, so I explained the situation to our new pediatrician, a grandfatherly gentleman who was nice enough to sit with us and talk about our son for a length of time defying the normal HMO visit. “I wouldn’t worry about that shot immediately,” he said, “unless your son is planning to get a tattoo soon.”
Among parents who question the standard vaccination schedule, the Hepatitis B vaccine at birth is a frequently discussed topic. I see it pop up often on Mommy chat boards. Most parents don’t really see the urgency of innoculating a newborn against a disease that is primarily transmitted through sexual contact or injection.
Joseph Albietz explains the rationale behind the US HepB vaccination schedule in a November post on Science Based Medicine. This is a concise article that clarifies the public health strategy behind the decision to vaccinate infants at birth. I read the post with great interest, but it was only my recent investigation into my own son’s HepB records that reminded to post the article here today.
To sum it up, vaccinating only a high risk population was a strategy that was tried in the US and then abandoned as not effective enough. Given that the HepB vaccine is incredibly safe, the morbidity and mortality of HepB is substantial, and that the number of cases of HepB has been dramatically reduced using the current strategy–”from 10.7/100,000 in 1983 to 2.1 per 100,000 in 2004. (25,916 total cases down to 6212 cases)”–it makes sense to vaccinate against this disease at birth. There is also the issue that although children make up a small portion of those infected, they tend to become lifelong carriers more often than infected adults.
One of the questions many parents ask (and the question Albietz is responding to in this post) is about the US vaccination strategy verses other countries, specificially those in Northern Europe. Those countries have such a low incidence of the disease that a prevention strategy like that of the US is not cost effective.
Very interesting reading. I hope you will click over and enjoy the entire post.