Seperating MMR

[Peppermint]

A good friend is doing a delayed schedule and is trying to weigh the idea of breaking up the MMR (I told her of a pharmacy that will sell single doses of Mumps and Measles, but no rubella).

So- her question is "is there any real advantage to seperating these vaccines?" She is concerned about the idea that seperating them might make for simply having more additives injected into her child. Is that the case?

What would be advantages and disadvantages to seperating these vaccines?

TIA!

[Plummeting]

There are some additives, but since they're live virus vaccines, they don't contain the really nasty stuff like thimerosal and aluminum. I think it's much safer to separate them. Would you want your child to catch wild measles, mumps and rubella all at the same time? Probably not, so why would you want to purposely inject them all at the same time? Any time you expose someone to three pathogens, the likelihood of experiencing a severe reaction is going to increase, whether the doctors, pharmaceutical companies or government admit it. It's just common sense. I really don't think it can get much simpler than that.

Oh, and the only disadvantage I can see would be that her child would have to get more shots.

[mamakay]

I'd say skip the mumps component, too. I can see reasons behind getting the measles and rubella parts, but mumps is a really, really mild illness and that part of the vax isn't working, anyway.

As far as the "more shots" sucky parts goes, if you delay, I think you can get the shots in the arm when they're a bit older, which hurts less. Plus you could do just those two shots and then a titre check (and blood draws really don't hurt at all sometimes) and maybe those two would be enough.

[spero]

Ne'er mind.

[Peppermint]

Heidi- Hi my dear, yes, she knows .

(aka- it really is a "friend" and not me )