Antibiotics can make whooping cough worse.

[Momtezuma Tuatara]

Does this tell you semething? As in perhaps you shouldn't use antibiotics in pertussis?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/q...048&query_hl=7

Children who received an antibiotic had a duration of cough 6 to 11 days longer and spasmodic cough 4 to 13 days longer than untreated patients.

At pediatrics site itself it said this:

It has been reported that erythromycin reduces the severity and duration of disease when started early.8 We used a stringent definition of antibiotic treatment and a duration of treatment of 7 days based on the observation that this course of therapy is comparable to 14 days.18 Although this study was not designed specifically for estimating antibiotic clinical efficacy, antibiotic treatment was found to be a marker of severe disease, a finding that is similar to the results of previous studies.10 Despite recommendations that treatment be started early for improving the clinical course of the disease, most trials on the efficacy of antibiotics in patients with pertussis have focused on the eradication of B pertussis rather than on the duration of symptoms.19 This issue probably deserves more attention in future studies.

Do you reckon that's a euphemism for " Oh no, antibiotics don'g work..."

and

"Lets make some more money studying it" ????



Have I missed something here?

Oh, and the other thing this study suggests is that although you can get pertussis if you are vaccinated, you will get it for a shorter period.

[Annabel_the_Sheep]

If I am not mistaken, one of the serious possible complications of pertussis is pneumonia. Could they be researching antibiotics to prevent that? Just a thought...

[wednesday]

Thanks for posting that! There was a link on that page to the full article. I thought this statement near the end of the article was very interesting:

Besides the typical symptoms, complications and hospitalizations were rare in our cohort. Although this finding probably reflects the selection of patients for participation in the trial, a study conducted in the United Kingdom also suggests that the disease is much less severe than suggested by textbook descriptions or parents’ fears.

[Electra375]

Having had pertusis and never being actually diagnosed with it by a doctor, I never had antibiotics given. I did have codine cough syrups though.
If antibiotics are given as a standard course of treatment, then the bacteria become resistant and ineffective. If they are given to prevent pneumonia the same will occur and then there will resistant pneumonia -- talk about a disasterous effect!!!

[Plummeting]

I noticed that the full report stated in several places that pertussis was underreported in vaccinated individuals. They claim it's because it's less severe in vaxed people, but I'd bet it has a lot more to do with the fact that doctors won't call it WC if you've been vaxed. Also, if the culture comes up negative, as they showed it often does, the docs will say it's not WC.

[Plummeting]

I forgot to say that I also noticed that there were just as many, actually more, but not enough more to be significant, hospitalizations among the two groups of children vaccinated against pertussis. So even their claim that vaccinated kids get less severe illness seems questionable to me. Anyway, so what if your child gets a little sicker for a little longer? I'm not saying I would want my DD to ever be sick longer than necessary at all! I'm just saying that if I have to choose between injecting her full of chemicals known to cause cancer and taking a chance that she might have a cough for a few days longer than the vaccinated kid with little chance of anything more serious, the choice seems obvious.

[mamakay]

RESULTS: The analysis was conducted on 788 laboratory-confirmed cases of pertussis. The median duration of cough in DT recipients varied from 52 to 61 days across the 3 stages, whereas the median duration of cough in DTaP recipients varied from 29 to 39 days. The median duration of spasmodic cough varied from 20 to 45 days in DT recipients and from 14 to 29 days in DTaP recipients. The results of the analysis of variance models showed that vaccination against pertussis reduced the length of cough from 3 to 10 days and the length of spasmodic cough from 4 to 8 days.

Woo hoo! A whopping 3 or 4 days difference!

Conclusions. Duration of cough can be greatly influenced by vaccination status

Okey dokey.

The proportion of cases observed from July to September, the period in which maximum incidence usually occurs, varied from 28.7% among the DT recipients to 33.8% among the DTaP SB recipients, with no significant differences (P = .714).

Now, I might be misreading that...probably am...how do you interpret that?

During the whole study period, the hospitalization rate, which also includes visits to the emergency department, was 1.8%. A total of 11 hospitalizations and 3 emergency department visits were reported: 3 hospitalizations and 2 emergency department visits among the DT recipients, 4 hospitalizations and 1 emergency department visit among the DTaP SB recipients, and 4 hospitalizations among the DTaP CB recipients. The length of hospitalization ranged from 2 to 10 days. Of the 14 hospitalizations and visits, 8 were reported for children <36 months of age. There was no difference in the number of hospitalizations and visits by vaccine group.

Surprise, surprise.

Although previous works have reported on the clinical characteristics of pertussis at various ages, little research has compared the symptoms in vaccinated children with those in unvaccinated children.

Well, that's what you get for messing with perfection. If it ain't broke, yk?...
(ETA: Not comparing the vaxed against the unvaxed has worked quite well for the vax industry)

To date, many surveillance systems have relied on the culture of B pertussis for qualifying a laboratory-confirmed case. However, when conducting surveillance, case definitions that include culture as the only criterion for laboratory confirmation may result in more severe cases being selected, especially among unvaccinated individuals

[Momtezuma Tuatara]

Originally Posted by Annabel_the_Sheep

If I am not mistaken, one of the serious possible complications of pertussis is pneumonia. Could they be researching antibiotics to prevent that? Just a thought...

The point is, Annabel, they said that the antibiotics made it worse.

Therefore whether you look at pneumonia or not, why use antibiotics if it makes the patient worse?

Oh yes Wednesday, that UK study was great. It can be found here:

http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/conte...l/310/6975/299

[Moya]

Originally Posted by mamakay

The proportion of cases observed from July to September, the period in which maximum incidence usually occurs, varied from 28.7% among the DT recipients to 33.8% among the DTaP SB recipients, with no significant differences (P = .714).

Now, I might be misreading that...probably am...how do you interpret that?

If "proportion of cases" refers to cases of pertussis... then in reference to suseptibility to pertussis disease there is no statistical difference between people who were vaccinated with the pertussis vaccine (DTaP) and those who were vaccinated with a placebo (DT). The pertussis vaccine has zero efficacy. That's how I interpret it.

[mamakay]

Originally Posted by Moya

If "proportion of cases" refers to cases of pertussis... then in reference to suseptibility to pertussis disease there is no statistical difference between people who were vaccinated with the pertussis vaccine (DTaP) and those who were vaccinated with a placebo (DT). The pertussis vaccine has zero efficacy. That's how I interpret it.

Yep. That's what I was thinking, too. I tried to think of how maybe it was saying something different, but nothing else made sense, really.
So, the vax...with all the seizures it causes, aluminum it contains, immune system skewing from Th1 to Th2, leaving room for anaphylaxis and cancer...all it does is shorten the duration of the illness by a few days.
Absolutely un-freakin' real.
(I'm still wondering if maybe we're misreading that, somehow, though).

[Plummeting]

I noticed that and thought I was misreading it as well, but it even says, "with no significant differences", so I can't see how we could be misreading it.

[mamakay]

Originally Posted by Richelle

I noticed that and thought I was misreading it as well, but it even says, "with no significant differences", so I can't see how we could be misreading it.

Maybe one of our resident experts will help us out....
(please?)

[mamakay]

Originally Posted by MT

The point is, Annabel, they said that the antibiotics made it worse.

So what I want to know is....why?
Anyone have any theories?
All I can think of is that maybe microfloral bacteria the antibiotics wipe out might help heal the damage done to the respiratory tract somehow....

[Momtezuma Tuatara]

So why does everyone think they are misreading it?

It's pretty simply.

You are not misreading anything.

Isn't it funny that they can condition us so well that we don't believe what we see with our eyes.

It...

doesn't...

work.

I guess they just hoped you wouldn't see that.

[Momtezuma Tuatara]

Why do you need to know why? do you think they've thought about it? I have ideas, but they would just be possible biochemical speculation and don't change the fact that the antibiotics make is worse. Simple solution, don't use them.

[mamakay]

Originally Posted by Momtezuma Tuatara

Why do you need to know why? do you think they've thought about it? I have ideas, but they would just be possible biochemical speculation and don't change the fact that the antibiotics make is worse. Simple solution, don't use them.

I'm just curious because I'm just curious!
It's so sad that a bunch of moms with no medical training are the only ones really trying to see WTH is going on.
So what's your theory, MT? I know it might or might not be right, but I'm in brainstorming mode.

[dingogirl]

There were more than 18,000 cases of whooping cough last year, which represented a 40-year high. And while many consider whooping cough a glorified cold, the illness develops into pneumonia in about half the cases, Orenstein says.

http://tinyurl.com/exj63

Half? I don't believe it.

[CallMeIshmael]

The proportion of cases observed from July to September, the period in which maximum incidence usually occurs, varied from 28.7% among the DT recipients to 33.8% among the DTaP SB recipients, with no significant differences (P = .714).

Here, the authors of the study are looking at when cases of pertussis occurred. They found that among both vaxed and unvaxed, ~1/3 of the cases occured during "high season" (July to September) and the remainder of the cases occurred throughout the rest of the year. This tells you nothing about the efficacy of the vaccine.

[~member~]

Originally Posted by mamakay

So what I want to know is....why?
Anyone have any theories?
All I can think of is that maybe microfloral bacteria the antibiotics wipe out might help heal the damage done to the respiratory tract somehow....

Antibiotics compromise the already compromised immune system, therefore making it more susceptable to pneumonia.

[CallMeIshmael]

You'll notice that the authors are careful to state that abx are merely a "marker" for more serious cases of WC -- meaning they're only describing an association, not establishing causation.

In other words, the abx could truly be making things worse, or they could simply be being given to folks who have more severe cases to begin with. Or both, of course!