Vaccinations, vaccinations, vaccinations

[MeSheLL]

Vaccinations, vaccinations, vaccinations.



Dog and cat owners have been told by veterinarians and pet health care providers for years that annual vaccinations for Rabies, Distemper, Parvovirus, Feline Leukemia and on and on...are required yearly. Annual vaccinations, also called annual boosters, have certainly played a major role in disease prevention in dogs and cats. Nevertheless, the question recently on the The entire veterinary staff is dedicated to the wellness of pets.mAll patients are examined prior to vaccinationsinds of dog and cat owners has been... Do these vaccines have to be given every year? And a second and equally important questions is... are we vaccinating dogs and cats too much? Are we actually causing harm by over-vaccinating our pets? Are our decisions relating to vaccine use being made based on scientific and statistical evidence? After reading this article on vaccinations in dogs and cats, you, as the pet's health care advocate, will be better equipped to answer the question: Vaccinations...Too Many, Too Often?

I put this article together in the hope that viewers, no matter what their stance is regarding the vaccination topic, will have a resource from which to assemble scientifically verifiable information for people and groups who truly have the most knowledge of the subject. Times are changing and vaccine protocols are changing. Do some pet owners fear vaccinating their pets because of unproved theories, anecdotal horror stories about vaccines causing widespread ill health among pets, or misinformation that starts as conjecture and gradually gains a life of its own and becomes a "fact" merely through repetition? The truth is that some dogs, cats, and humans do have severe and life-threatening complications from vaccine administration. The truth is, as well, that vaccines have prevented uncountable deaths over decades of use from diseases polio, small pox, whooping cough and rabies in humans. In dogs we rarely see a distemper case but I vividly recall 40 years ago watching helplessly while some wonderful dogs in my care died miserable deaths or had to be euthanized. Parvovirus is a deadly killer of dogs; the vaccine to help protect dogs from this disease are very effective and have prevented innumerable deaths. I rarely see cats with feline distemper (also called panleukopenia) these days thanks to some effective vaccines.

Are all vaccines safe all the time for every individual? Absolutely not... and neither are peanuts, sea food, or penicillin. Many materials, in individuals who are sensitized to them, do cause death, damage or chronic poor health if the sensitive individual continually is exposed to that product (antigen). House dust is a notorious allergy stimulating antigen, for example. So when someone speaks about vaccines being "the worst thing you can do to your pet", use some critical judgment to evaluate your response to such a pronouncement. It has a grain of truth IF your pet is allergic to anything in the vaccine dose including stabilizers, preservatives, or antibiotics. For that particular individual that is sensitized, the vaccine or products should not be used! However, just as there is no public outcry or need to totally stop the distribution and use of peanuts because some individuals may have a severe/life-threatening allergic reaction, vaccines for dogs, cats, humans and other animals should not be universally condemned just because in rare instances some individuals may have an unexpected adverse response.

The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), the American Association of Feline Practitioners (AAFP) and the American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) have updated vaccination data and suggested protocols. You can view these online and gain valuable, non-biased, scientifically established information regarding vaccines and vaccination protocols. Many veterinary medical colleges also have pet owner information relating to vaccination issue. One of the most thorough is available at the U. of California, Davis, College of Veterinary Medicine website.

After reading this article you will be better prepared to have a conversation with your veterinarian about the use of vaccines in your own dog or cat. Many veterinarians, for example, strongly believe that the Lyme Vaccine has prevented thousands of cases of Lyme Disease and has been a very effective and beneficial product. However, in certain geographical areas, Lyme Disease is very seldom seen... so possibly for dogs in that area, Lyme vaccination might not be a critical issue.

Vaccinations: Too Many, Too Often?
Nothing is sacred. Nothing stays the same. And so it is regarding the present state of affairs in the swirling waters of the pet vaccination world. There are a number ofBrowse the store for pet foods and supplies! questions that could and should be asked before you allow your dog or cat to be vaccinated. Unfortunately, the answers to your questions will probably be determined not by firmly set scientific standards or universally accepted protocols but rather by the judgment and biases of the person you ask! Therefore, educate yourself, ask your veterinarian about the pros and cons of any vaccine that may be recommended.

There are two major questions that beg for exact answers:
1.) Are multiple agent (multivalent ) vaccines "overloading" the pets immune system?
2.) Are "annual vaccinations" really necessary annually?

Not only are dog and cat owners beginning to ask about the safety and necessity of annual, multivalent vaccines for their pets but the entire veterinary profession is in a state of critical self-Vaccines for animals have been in use for decades.examination. From the highly technical research and development laboratories in the giant pharmaceutical corporations right down to the solo practitioner operating a mobile clinic, the veterinary health care providers are asking if the current suggested vaccine protocols are safe and effective.

In an attempt to gather research for this article and to help clear the waters of variable directives on the vaccination topic, my consensus is that nobody really knows how many or how often! So if the trained professionals disagree whether or not "Laddie" should get a seven-in-one vaccination, plus a Rabies inoculation, and this schedule should be repeated yearly, how are you as "Laddie's" owner to know what to do?

Let’s take a swim through these turbulent waters and try to make some sense of what is fact and what is conjecture. Discussing the first question of multivalent vaccines and whether or not they are "stressing the Immune System" we need to know a little about how an individual (human, dog, cat, mouse, etc) responds to a pathogen. A pathogen is any agent such as a virus or bacteria or poison that harms the individual. Every minute of every day all individuals are being silently attacked by pathogens from the air, food, water, and contents of our own intestinal tracts. The true miracle is that any of us survive at all!

Through eons of evolutionary trial and error, those species who best defended against pathogens were able to produce similar offspring who were also immune competent; that is, they were able to fend off those harmful invaders. So we can safely state that, in general, most individuals alive today have healthy Immune Systems, otherwise all those nasty pathogens would have their way with us in short order! But some experts believe the overall state of health in many of the earth's creatures is declining, and that vaccinations are actually contributing to the demise of our immune systems. Read Dr. Dunn's article in the October, 2006, Dog World Magazine about "Does Stress Harm The Immune System".

The Immune System ... everybody throws this term around with reckless abandon and often the term is totally misunderstood. Here is what you really need to know about The Immune System if you are to have any calm water to swim through in this sea of controversy surrounding vaccination protocols:

The Immune System is really a general term for all of the body's pathogen defense mechanisms. The Immune System is not a single, discrete system, after all. There are a multitude of biochemical and anatomical factors that make up The Immune System but only three aspects that we will refer to in this article. These three active barriers to disease that play a major role in vaccination-induced immunity are the following:

1.) MUCOSAL IMMUNITY ... takes place in the thin mucous lining of the mammary, respiratory, urinary, and digestive tracts. This important barrier to disease often is the first line of defense against viruses and bacteria and the ammunition used against invaders is called "secretary IgA" antibody. This complex protein molecule in mucous binds up invaders and prevents their entrance into the body. Vaccine technology has taken advantage of this line of defense through the implementation of intranasal and oral vaccines. Much more emphasis will be placed on MUCOSAL IMMUNITY in the future since there is increasing evidence that human and animal populations are experiencing a measurable decline in IgA immune proteins. Just what is triggering the decline in IgA levels and what role vaccinations may play in this scheme is as yet unknown.

2.) CELL-MEDIATED IMMUNITY ... this refers to individual body cells that have learned by past experience (exposure to a pathogen) what foreign invaders look like and recognizes the invaders whenever they show up again! So when a cell is exposed to an invader such as Parvovirus, the cell recognizes the virus as an invader and mounts a response by manufacturing immune proteins to destroy the virus. If the strength and numbers of the virus attacking the cell do not kill the cell, the cell is now educated as to what Parvoviruses look like and the cell becomes better equipped to defend itself from future Parvovirus attacks. Natural exposure as well as vaccine products which "look like" a natural pathogen but don't present a threat to the cell can induce the cell to remember what the foreign invaders look like. A healthy cell is then prepared to fend off future attacks. (That's the object of a vaccine... to trick the cell with non-harmful antigens into making immune proteins against a similar looking dangerous pathogen.)

There are lots of body cells whose main job is to fight off disease. Plus, every cell in the body that has a special function... let's say a liver cell that has to store glycogen, make cholesterol, convert protein into Vaccinations for dogs and cats have prevented uncountable incidences of disease.building material, plus regulate numerous other chemical reactions...still has the ability to recognize an invader and fight for its life! For the most part, specialized white blood cells play a major role in CELL-MEDIATED IMMUNITY.

3.) HUMORAL IMMUNITY ... works from the body's fluid sources, the blood and lymph. This is where we test for a dog or cat's immune levels (called antibody titers) so that we can get an estimate of how well the body can recognize an invader. If the body has had a previous encounter with a pathogen, just like with CELL-MEDIATED IMMUNITY, the body makes "Opposite Invaders" to circulate in body fluids. The "Opposite Invaders" are called antibodies. These molecules attach to or otherwise disable invaders and prevent them from doing harm to the body. And just like with CELL-MEDIATED IMMUNITY, it is safer for the body to learn to recognize an invader from a crippled or fake invader than to risk learning from an actual natural attack.

There are many other ways a "home-body" wards off disease, but these three major Immune System divisions working together carry the brunt of responsibility for defense against pathogens. Remember that there are no simple blood tests for CELL-MEDIATED IMMUNITY, it can be assessed but it is difficult and expensive to measure.

And each individual is unique as to how tough this line of defense is. HUMORAL IMMUNITY, however, can be measured by checking the levels of circulating "Opposite Invaders" that we call antibodies. Our ability to say that a dog or cat is protected from a disease based solely upon checking for high antibody titers is precarious ... but, from a practical standpoint, it's all we've got! It is very important to keep in mind that we can only assume what titer levels are protective and what levels are not. Antibody titer tests are not absolutely predictive of the individual's ability to fend off disease but rather simply indicate the strength of the immune system's memory of previous exposure to a specific pathogen. So if your dog has a high titer to the Rabies virus...does that mean that if exposed to the virus the dog will absolutely not get the disease? No one can say absolutely not...we can only say probably not.

"A BOOSTER SHOT"...what does that mean? When an animal or human is vaccinated they generally will develop a response to the vaccine by increasing their level of protective defense immunity. This level may be high, low, or none. Usually there is a measurable response indicating some protection. If a second vaccine for the same disease is given at a later time...this second vaccine will BOOST the protective levels of immunity that were induced by the first vaccine. So, whether the vaccine is for Rabies or Parvovirus or Feline Leukemia, it might be called a "BOOSTER SHOT" if it is given sometime after an original vaccination.