Measles incubation ending in Pinal County, vaccine education still a priority

It won’t be the last time Tom Schryer talks to the Pinal County Board of Supervisors about measles.

The director of the Public Health Services Department will be back before the board at their next regular meeting, but Wednesday he shared the bulk of the information about the recent measles outbreak in the county. His presentation included measles data and vaccination reports from some county schools.

The conversation was spurred by the diagnosis of measles in five Pinal County residents. Schryer said it is unlikely there will be any more cases stemming from an afflicted Kearny family. The incubation period ends Feb.  13, but he said it will be mid-March before the department considers the outbreak over.

He said if he had a do-over in the county’s response to the measles diagnosis, he would have had staff put up posters earlier in Kearny to alert the public.

Schryer, who has been very vocal about the need for measles vaccinations, also got personal in relating the history of battling the virus.

A child in his father’s family died from measles, he said. Most people born before 1957 were exposed to measles, according to the Center for Disease Control (CDC). A lot of older people can remember someone having complications from measles, he added.

Supervisor Todd House recalled having both measles and German measles (rubella) as a child.

The measles-mumps-rubella vaccine (MMR) was developed in the 1950s. Two doses are considered the best protection. Many people born after 1957, like Schryer, received only one vaccination and not the follow-up booster.

“I was born in 1966, so I only had one dose of MMR until I was in the military,” Schryer said. “A lot of people my age, in their 40s and 50s, are walking around with just one dose.”

There are about 125 new cases of measles nationwide.

Schryer said measles is “far more transmissible than Ebola ever would be.” He told the board if one person with measles walked into a room of 100 unvaccinated people, 90 of them would get the disease.

“It’s a miserable thing to undergo,” he said. “Not too many people forget having measles as a child.”

The CDC seemed to have licked the disease in the United States until about 15 years ago. A 1998 report by Andrew Wakefield, then a British surgeon, was published in the medical journal “The Lancet.” It claimed a link between the MMR vaccine and the development of autism.

In 2010, the British General Medical Council discredited Wakefield’s research and charged him with dishonesty. “The Lancet” recalled the article, calling it fraudulent. Wakefield later lost his medical license.

But the belief in a link to autism had already touched a chord among concerned parents and resulted in an anti-vaccine movement in Britain and the United States.

One of the concerns was the presence of thimerosal, a mercury-containing preservative used in vaccines. According to CDC, it was removed from measles vaccines in 2001, but with no corresponding change to the frequency rate of autism diagnoses in the nation.

Arizona law allows parents to opt out of vaccinations for their children. Schryer said those who did opt out did not have to deal with the consequences until the recent outbreaks. He said several parents who had decided against vaccinations for their children have since come in to have the shots. Adults, too, are coming in for doses.

A study from the Arizona Department of Health Services (ADHS) noted “Schools with high exemption rates were characterized by being predominantly white and higher income/middle class.

“Individuals who did exempt their children for personal beliefs were more likely to fear side effects of the vaccine and were less likely to trust their family doctor.”

In Pinal County the highest exemption rate is 17 percent at Legacy Traditional School in San Tan Valley, according to data from ADHS. The next highest was the LTS campus in Casa Grande with more than 12 percent opting out.

Schryer said it was not unusual for parents of charter school students to opt out because of a suspicion of the medical community and distrust of government.

However, at the LTS campus in Maricopa, last school year showed only a 1.8 percent exemption rate for the sixth grade. Pima Butte Elementary had the highest in the city, with 6.6 percent of sixth graders exempted from vaccines, according to the ADHS data.

Leading Edge Academy, a charter school, and Butterfield Elementary, a district school, both reported complete measles immunization coverage in sixth grade in 2013-14.

The ADHS study included a parent survey, with comments on why they chose or did not choose to vaccinate.

Representative comments from anti-vaccine parents include: “The pharmaceutical industry is corrupt and cannot be trusted. This is proven time and time again. What are parents to do when we cannot trust ADHS because ADHS relies so heavily on information they receive from the pharmaceutical industry?”

And: “I have two incredibly healthy, unvaccinated children and have zero doubts about this decision. The package insert warnings about seizures, death, etc., are enough for me to rely on nutrition and common sense to keep my precious babes healthy.”

Some parents saw some of the recommended vaccines as necessary but not all of them. Other parents were concerned about the number of shots their children were to receive in a short time span.

Pro-vaccine parents worried unvaccinated children would expose their children to measles and resulting side effects like encephalitis before they were old enough to be fully vaccinated.

“Parents who choose not to have their children immunized are endangering the health not only of their children but everyone,” one stated. “Diseases that were nearly wiped out are now returning at higher levels due to irrational fear.”