Convince me the chicken pox vaccine isn't stupid

[CairoCarol]

@amanset

To be honest, I didn’t know I could.

Oops, I guess I don’t know that either. I just assumed they could, but you know what they say about assume …
FWIW, my son is back at school now and now that it is over, it’s clear that his case was quite mild.

[Eva_Luna]

@DSeid

Implicit in mnemosyne’s post is an acknowledgement that what Zsofia heard (“I thought I remembered seeing something a while ago about a theory that adults being around low level chicken pox infections often (what with kids everywhere) actually kept their immune systems in practice and made it less likely for them to get shingles.”) is correct, and is the basis of that slight remaining concern I have. Exposure to other with natural disease (friends, our own children, etc) traditionally acted as a sort of environmental booster, keeping our own antibody level against the germ high, which helped keep it dormant within us. Aging pediatricians uncommonly get shingles because of that. There is concern that the lack of that environmental booster effect will cause more shingles (also referred to as “zoster”) in those who had natural disease at a younger age.

So Cazzle’s anecdotal observation may be spot on and is consistent with what I have seen: somewhat more shingles, albeit generally mild cases, in younger people who had had natural disease.

Yup. A sizable portion of adults with no clinical history of chickenpox actually had undiagnosed mild cases and are already immune. The question is whether it is worth it to test them and only vaccinate those without antibody levels, or to just vaccinate them on the basis of the lack of clinical history. I lean to the just vaccinate camp - worst case you might lower their risk of shingles some. IMHO.

:: bump ::

A blood test during my routine physical yesterday now reveals that if I was ever immune to chickenpox, I’m not anymore. I will go ahead and get immunized for chickenpox, but is is still possible that I did have a mild case of chickenpox that wasn’t sufficient to give me permanent immunity, and that therefore I am potentially vulnerable to shingles down the line?

[DSeid]

@Eva_Luna

… is is still possible that I did have a mild case of chickenpox that wasn’t sufficient to give me permanent immunity, and that therefore I am potentially vulnerable to shingles down the line?

I don’t know but I would doubt it. In any case the vaccine would help prevent that if so.

[Eva_Luna]

@DSeid

I don’t know but I would doubt it. In any case the vaccine would help prevent that if so.

:: sigh :: tell that to my middle school and high school classmate who I recently discovered is an antivaxer, and is now driving me bonkers on Facebook about the whole thing. In spite of the replies from 2 other friends who had chickenpox as adults, and another one who got a mild case from the vaccine as an adult, about how miserable and sick they were. Blech - I try to be civilized to my friends, but there may be limits.

When my internist called to give me the results today, he mentioned that he doesn’t even stock the vaccine, but that a lot of gynecologists apparently do (still waiting to hear back from mine - that would be easy, because I have an appointment with her soon already anyway). And apparently at least some Walgreens locations do, including one not far from my house.

I am still trying to kick a nasty cold, though, and don’t want to do it until I feel better - how probable is it that I would get a mild case from the vaccine? And if I did, how long would I probably be contagious?