[QUOTE=WhyNot]
Sure. I agree. There’s nothing magical about it. There are, however, quite a few antibodies to quite a few things that provide a natural immunization (not vaccination) to many viruses. Not every virus, and not *this *virus, but many. This passive immunity wears off as the baby drinks less breastmilk, but her active immune response takes over. This isn’t woo-woo stuff, this is all measured and well-documented.
I still don’t think that “weakened” is the proper term for a fully functioning and mature immune system, which most full-term newborns have.
Again, NONE of us have an immunity to this TB virus. Babies are not any more susceptible to getting it than you or I. We’re all at risk.
[/QUOTE]
WhyNot, I hate to disagree with you, because I am fully in favor of breast feeding, but newborns whether breastfed or not are at more risk from TB. And this may be because the body fights off TB with cell-mediated immunity, not antibodies. And the mother cannot transfer the whole apparatus of cell-mediated immunity (a large network of several kinds of white cells checking with eachother and responding via interleukins about a potential enemy) through her breast milk. It has to happen in the child’s body. That requires a mature immune system. Pardon me, but I have to disagree with you when you say that a child is born with a mature immune system. A child is born with an immature immune system, as it is with an immature brain, immature lungs, and immature gonads. It requires a great deal of help from many physiologic and natural sources (such as mother’s breast milk, but not only mother’s breast milk) to mature through natural and intended stages to the point where it can handle the immune challenges of a healthy adult.
The risk of becoming infected with TB is greatest for children under 2 years old. After two, they are relatively more immune until immunity decreases again for unknown reasons around age 12 – the age suggests the onset of puberty has something to do with it.
Also, newborns who become infected with TB are more susceptible than children of any other age to miliary TB, a dreaded complication in which the TB escapes all immune control and spreads to every organ. Death is not inevitable but is likely.
PS hijack – as long as I’m here, wanted to say I was reading a post of yours in Chowder’s thread on matriarchy – I hadn’t anything to add to the thread, which has gone dormant, so didn’t want to wake it up just to say “Wow, Whynot”, but I thought you spoke with such uncommon common sense and delectable perspective (as well as the only voice of experience in actual women-run groups) – was going to write you privately and say so, only here I can show the Dope how impressed I was.
