# What's the Straight Dope on Shingles Vaccination? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 25, 2013, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378 "2013-01-25T22:53:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2015, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/81 "2015-04-27T04:08:29Z")
that is what i’ve read in various places too. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/82 "2015-04-28T00:39:04Z")
So why only one dose per lifetime? Why not a booster every 10 or 15 or 20 years? ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/83 "2015-04-28T04:05:27Z")
Thanks for reanimating this zombie, TruCelt. I put a note on the computer desktop to phone the MD in the morning for an appointment. My brother had shingles last year. Horrible. I was going to get the shot but other stuff intervened and the plan evaporated. This time it won’t. IIRC, the shot would cost $90 Cdn in my part of the country. I’ll find out tomorrow. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/84 "2015-04-28T06:31:08Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > So why only one dose per lifetime? Why not a booster every 10 or 15 or 20 years? Boosters don’t seem to help any. > [@](#): > > Immunogenicity was evaluated using a VZV interferon-gamma enzyme-linked immunospot (ELISPOT) assay and a VZV glycoprotein enzyme-linked immunosorbent antibody (gpELISA) assay. > > The researchers found that immunogenicity increased significantly from baseline after the first vaccine, but there was no statistically significant increase after the second vaccine. From here: No Benefit to Zoster Booster Vaccine > **[No Benefit to Zoster Booster Vaccine](https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/760898)** > > A second vaccine against varicella zoster virus does not significantly boost immunogenicity. ETA: Note that the study only applies to healthy adults over 60. The article states that boosters might be helpful to those with a depressed immune system but that hasn’t been studied yet (as of the date of the article, which is 2012). ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/85 "2015-04-28T18:00:57Z")
> [@Kenm](#): > > IIRC, the shot would cost $90 Cdn in my part of the country. I’ll find out tomorrow. I was wrong. It’ll cost me $212 and some-odd cents. I made an appointment with my MD for tomorrow. He’ll write the prescription and I’ll return with the vaccine. If the pharmacist injects it, it’ll cost $20 more, but $6 Quarter Pounders aren’t for nought. I’ll have the doctor inject it. The MD’s receptionist told me the vaccine is time-sensitive; I must have it injected within a half-hour of obtaining it. But a drug store — I phoned to make sure it’s in stock — is next door to the doctor’s office. I then phoned a Walmart pharmacy for a price check. The druggist didn’t look it up but she said it’s more than $200. It wasn’t in stock anyway. ---
**Author:** ![purplehearingaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@purplehearingaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehearingaid)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/86 "2015-04-28T18:57:44Z")
I had clients that had shingles and I saw how pain they were so when I got old enough to get one I did and I am glad . ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/87 "2015-04-28T19:05:00Z")
> [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](#): > > … > > We don’t have unlimited health care dollars. We should put those dollars towards the most effective uses. As is sort of obvious, that only really applies if a wannabe vaccine receiver wants to use insurance to cover the vaccine cost, if the basic price of the vaccine is artificially subsidized in some way (e.g. the vaccines cost $500 to make and administer, but they only charge $400 because they get a check from the government for $100 for every one administered under some sort of welfare program), or if there is a serious scarcity of vaccines in the market. Other than that, I’m allowed to spend my hard-earned money however I want, right? If I want to walk into a pharmacy, wave a wad of cash, and announce, “Hey, any of you pharmacists interested in making money today? I would like to purchase a shingles vaccine!!111!!!one11! Come, make me your best offer.”, how is that unethical? Have I wasted someone else’s money? Have I denied the vaccine to starving elderly folks in rural Africa? After all, the vaccine is made by a for-profit private company who can just take my money and make more. Clearly it’s not unethical for me to spend my money in a way that others feel is wasteful, or else casinos, homeopathy, extra-large diet sodas, and special-edition DVD’s would all be illegal. ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/88 "2015-04-28T20:28:02Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > Clearly it’s not unethical for me to spend my money in a way that others feel is wasteful, or else casinos, homeopathy, extra-large diet sodas, and special-edition DVD’s would all be illegal. You’re correct, of course, but don’t kid yourself into thinking that there aren’t efforts afoot to outlaw (or keep illegal) all manner of behaviors that others think immoral, illegal, or somehow offensive. E.g. - consider all the legislation surrounding recreational drugs. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/89 "2015-04-29T01:52:54Z")
Why is shingles vaccine so og-awful expensive? Is regular chicken pox vaccine (that little kiddies get) similarly expensive? (ETA: It’s just a different dosage of the same stuff, n’est-ce pas?) When I got my shingles shot a few years ago, my HMO covered it fully. I didn’t even have a $0.01 co-pay. ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Spaulding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Miss\_Spaulding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Spaulding)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/90 "2015-04-29T02:47:46Z")
> [@Satchmo](#): > > My doctor has recently advised me to get a vaccination against Shingles. I’m 55, male, white and don’t have any family history, (though I understand it’s a viral condition, not hereditary.) I had chicken pox when I was very young. My doctor’s concern is the neural damage that it often causes and I usually take my doctor’s advice. The downside is that it’s rather expensive and not covered by my employer’s health insurance, so I’d be five or six hundred dollars out of pocket. I’m unsure if it’s worth that to me. I think this has a factual answer. How likely is my contracting this, are there any potential side effects of the vaccine, how likely is the nerve damage if I do get the virus? > > MODs, if you decide this needs to go into IMHO, that’s fine with me and I apologize for starting in the wrong forum. I have looked on WebMD but don’t understand a lot of what I found there. > Thanks! Forgo the vaccine. It’s unnecessary. And IF by some chance you were to get Shingles, it would be from catching the virus from another person who has had the vaccine and is ‘shedding’ the virus, which can last up to a few weeks after vaccination. And I would also consider why the vaccine is so expensive. …Why? It’s just a simple injection (of junk, yes, but just injection). The expense alone would rub me the wrong way and I would forgo it altogether for that reason, let alone the dangers of the vaccine itself. ---
**Author:** ![Alley\_Dweller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alley_dweller/32/430_2.png) [@Alley\_Dweller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alley_Dweller)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/91 "2015-04-29T02:49:09Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Why is shingles vaccine so og-awful expensive? > > Is regular chicken pox vaccine (that little kiddies get) similarly expensive? > (ETA: It’s just a different dosage of the same stuff, n’est-ce pas?) > > When I got my shingles shot a few years ago, my HMO covered it fully. > I didn’t even have a $0.01 co-pay. [In the US, at Walgreens](http://www.walgreens.com/topic/pharmacy/healthcare-clinic/price-menu.jsp), chickenpox is $145.99 per dose, 2 doses are needed. Shingles is $234.99 per dose, one dose is needed. ---
**Author:** ![Alley\_Dweller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alley_dweller/32/430_2.png) [@Alley\_Dweller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alley_Dweller)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/92 "2015-04-29T03:21:02Z")
> [@Miss\_Spaulding](#): > > Forgo the vaccine. It’s unnecessary. And IF by some chance you were to get Shingles, it would be from catching the virus from another person who has had the vaccine and is ‘shedding’ the virus, which can last up to a few weeks after vaccination. OK. I’ll bite. The vaccine was licensed in 2006. Since the only way to catch shingles is to get it from a person who is “shedding” the virus after an injection of the vaccine, you are saying that shingles did not exist before 2006? They invented a vaccine to prevent a disease that did not exist? And they deviously made the vaccine cause other people to get the disease? And even if we did accept your premise that the only way to catch shingles was from another person who had the vaccine, why wouldn’t we want to protect ourselves against that? ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Spaulding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Miss\_Spaulding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Spaulding)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/93 "2015-04-29T03:44:00Z")
> [@Alley\_Dweller](#): > > OK. I’ll bite. > > The vaccine was licensed in 2006. Since the **only way** to catch shingles is to get it from a person who is “shedding” the virus after an injection of the vaccine, you are saying that shingles did not exist before 2006? They invented a vaccine to prevent a disease that did not exist? And they deviously made the vaccine cause other people to get the disease? > > And even if we did accept your premise that the **only** way to catch shingles was from another person who had the vaccine, why wouldn’t we want to protect ourselves against that? Wrong. I never stated that vaccine shedding was the only way to catch Shingles, if I made it sound that way I’m sorry. But people DO catch it that way and more often than you know. So, _for me personally_, I view the vaccine as a joke. …Actually, I view all vaccines as a joke. …Yeah, I’m one of _those_ people. 😉 So why don’t we just end this now? Lol. Because we won’t agree on anything. 🙂 My first post to the OP is truly in earnest, not to start a debate or anything. Where I’m firm in my controversial beliefs, I’m not a confrontational, argumentative person. I can respect opposing views. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/94 "2015-04-29T12:33:32Z")
> [@Miss\_Spaulding](#): > > Wrong. I never stated that vaccine shedding was the only way to catch Shingles, if I made it sound that way I’m sorry. But people DO catch it that way and more often than you know. So, _for me personally_, I view the vaccine as a joke. …Actually, I view all vaccines as a joke. …Yeah, I’m one of _those_ people. 😉 > > So why don’t we just end this now? Lol. Because we won’t agree on anything. 🙂 My first post to the OP is truly in earnest, not to start a debate or anything. Where I’m firm in my controversial beliefs, I’m not a confrontational, argumentative person. I can respect opposing views. Oh, no, I don’t think so. See the masthead? “Fighting Ignorance” is kind of our thing here. I’m perfectly willing to keep things polite and have a discussion here, but I will not allow ignorance - particularly ignorance which has the effect of causing people pain, suffering, blindness and death - to stand unchallenged. This isn’t something you can Lol away. I will also state here that I’m only half talking to you. I don’t much care if I persuade you, personally, to change your views. But I know there are other antivaxxers (I assume that’s what you mean by “those people”) who are reading along, and THEY deserve accurate information as much as anyone else. So, that being said, not a single person has gotten sick from viral shedding from the shingles vaccine. Not one in the history of recorded medicine. Yes, people with pregnant family members are advised by some doctors to stay away from them after they get shingles vaccine, out of an abundance of caution. We also tell pregnant women not to drink a drop of alcohol, while we know darn well that the chance of a single glass of wine in the third trimester is absolutely not going to harm a fetus. No one wants to risk even the slightest harm to a pregnant woman or her fetus. The CDC does NOT recommend that recently vaccinated for shingles people avoid pregnant women, in fact. That’s an individual doctor’s recommendation out of an overabundance of caution, because again, _not a single person_ has gotten chicken pox from a shingles vaccine. In a very small number of people virus from the vaccine can be collected from non-injection site lesions. (And when I say very small, I mean that I can find confirmation of 2 people, ever - [those two people came from a preapproval clinical trial by the makers of ZOSTAVAX](http://www.merck.com/product/usa/pi_circulars/z/zostavax/zostavax_pi2.pdf)) This is indeed evidence of “viral shedding” in those two people. But…so what? The presence of shedding does not indicated the potential for transmission, and no one got chicken pox from them. If you get a rash after a shingles shot, then cover the rash, by all means, until it’s gone. But know that you’re doing so because you’re being exceedingly careful and prudent, not because anyone has ever gotten chicken pox from it. Want to know what \*often \*spreads chicken pox from viral shedding? Shingles. If you have shingles, and you’re around an unvaccinated person who has never had chicken pox, your shingles rash can shed virus and give them chicken pox, and eventually shingles. Real shingles rashes shed virus in copious amounts, and HAVE been seen to cause disease transmission, unlike vaccine related rashes. If you are truly interested in preventing viral shedding, you should be encouraging people to get vaccinated so they don’t experience viral shedding from the natural disease. Because that actually does give people chicken pox. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 12:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/95 "2015-04-29T12:41:46Z")
> [@Miss\_Spaulding](#): > > Wrong. I never stated that vaccine shedding was the only way to catch Shingles, if I made it sound that way I’m sorry. But people DO catch it that way and more often than you know. [Untrue](http://www.immunize.org/catg.d/p4221.pdf). Shingles vaccine uses an attenuated (weakened) form of varicella-zoster virus, and in very rare cases that virus has been passed on to others. But no one has gotten shingles as a result - at most, you’d get chickenpox, not shingles. Shingles is a consequence of reactivation of “natural” dormant chickenpox virus, not of catching it from other people. > [@](#): > > So, _for me personally_, I view the vaccine as a joke. …Actually, I view all vaccines as a joke. …Yeah, I’m one of _those_ people. 😉 Try obtaining vaccine information from [reliable](http://vec.chop.edu/service/vaccine-education-center/) [sources](http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/). Otherwise, the joke is on _you_. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/96 "2015-04-29T12:48:44Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Shingles vaccine uses an attenuated (weakened) form of varicella-zoster virus, and in very rare cases that virus has been passed on to others. Have you been able to find any case studies on that? I haven’t. I’ve been looking for a while, and I just can’t find a single one. I suppose I should probably hedge my bets as a debate tactic, but really…I can’t find _any_. Which leads me to believe it’s not “very rare”, it just hasn’t happened. Until proven otherwise, of course. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/97 "2015-04-29T12:50:43Z")
:smack: And yes, I didn’t catch that she’s proposing you can catch shingles from the shingles vaccine shedding. I thought she at least knew enough to know that the approved antivax scare tactic is that shingles vaccine shedding causes rampant _chicken pox_ infections in the unvaccinated. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/98 "2015-04-29T23:09:24Z")
There is no argument with determined ignorance and no point in even attempting to reason with it. Even leaving shingles aside, you have to be my age to recall the ravages of childhood illnesses, but the anti-vaxxers are ignorant of this history. Maybe it is evolution in action. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/99 "2015-04-29T23:49:25Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > There is no argument with determined ignorance and no point in even attempting to reason with it. I don’t believe that. I used to be an anti-vaxxer. Besides, the title of the thread \*is \*“What’s the Straight Dope on Shingles Vaccination?”. So as I said, I may not convince our green friend of anything, but sooner or later, this will be someone’s google result. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2015, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378/100 "2015-04-30T00:50:33Z")
I was vaccinated a couple of hours ago. I gather from the info that came with the vaccine that it won’t be effective for three weeks. It’s a Merck product and came in two small bottles, the contents of which were mixed together in the syringe, then in me. I hope Merck didn’t package epoxy by mistake. 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-straight-dope-on-shingles-vaccination/648378.md?page=6)