Vaccine Tied to 'Superbug' Ear Infection

[Guest guest]

this is what we have been talking about - same

thing as with antibiotics - creates vacuum for another bacteria, etc.

" It is a strain of strep bacteria not included in

the pneumococcal vaccine " - a new vaccine coming right up!

ahhhhhhhh - an excuse to make more money......

" Some think Prevnar might be destined to be like

flu shots that must be periodically updated to

reflect new strains causing illness. But each

tweak requires new safety studies and more expense. "

Sheri

PS - reminder of 's post that I sent

out a few weeks ago (reprinted at the end here)

http://www.boston.com/yourlife/health/diseases/articles/2007/09/17/vaccine_tied_\

to_superbug_ear_infection/

Vaccine tied to 'superbug' ear infection

By Marilynn Marchione, AP Medical Writer | September 17, 2007

CHICAGO --A vaccine that has dramatically curbed

pneumonia and other serious illnesses in children

is also having an unfortunate effect: promoting

new superbugs that cause ear infections.

On Monday, doctors reported discovering the first

such germ that is resistant to all drugs approved

to treat childhood ear infections. Nine toddlers

in Rochester, N.Y., have had the bug and

researchers say it may be turning up elsewhere, too.

It is a strain of strep bacteria not included in

the pneumococcal vaccine, Wyeth's Prevnar, which

came on the market in 2000. It is recommended for children under age 2.

Doctors say parents should continue to have their

toddlers get the shots because the vaccine

prevents serious illness and even saves lives.

But the new resistant strep is a worry.

" The best way to prevent these resistant

infections from spreading is to be careful about

how we use antibiotics, " said Dr.

Whitney, chief of respiratory diseases at the

federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Avoiding antibiotics when they are not needed is

the best way to ensure they will work when they are, she said.

Prevnar prevents seven strains responsible for

most cases of pneumonia, meningitis and deadly

bloodstream infections. But dozens more strep

strains exist, and some have flourished and

become impervious to antibiotics since the

vaccine combats the more common strains.

If the new strains continue to spread, " it tells

us the vaccine is becoming less effective " and

needs to be revised, said Dr. Dennis Maki,

infectious diseases chief at the University of

Wisconsin-Madison Hospitals and Clinics.

Wyeth anticipated this and is testing a

second-generation vaccine. But it is at least two

years from reaching the market, and the new

strains could become a public health problem in

the meantime if they spread hard-to-treat

infections through day care centers and schools.

" I don't think the new strains are moving fast

enough to call it a race, but the fact is that

certain strains are increasing, " said

Paradiso, a scientist at Wyeth Vaccines, the

Collegeville, Pa., division that makes Prevnar.

" It is very worrying, " said Dr. Klugman, an

infectious diseases specialist at Emory

University. " With the eradication of all the

other types in the vaccine, this one is emerging. "

Several research teams reported on the situation

Monday at microbiologists meeting.

A different pneumonia vaccine has long been

available for adults but it doesn't work in

children, so Prevnar was hailed as a

breakthrough. It is used in dozens of countries

and had sales of more than $1.5 billion last

year. In the United States, it is given as four

shots between 2 months and 15 months.

Before the vaccine, many babies and toddlers

developed pneumonia, meningitis and serious blood

infections that led to hearing loss, brain damage

and even death. Drug-resistant ear infections also were a problem.

" Prevnar has done a remarkable job. Over the last

seven years, it's prevented thousands and

thousands of infections, " not just in vaccinated

kids but also in unvaccinated family members, said the CDC's Whitney.

But it is a unique vaccine because it covers only

seven of the 90-odd strains of the germ. By

contrast, measles is caused by one type of virus.

Booster shots are needed for chickenpox, mumps

and measles because immunity wanes, not because the germ changed.

Prevnar, however, is losing its punch because

strains not covered by the vaccine are filling

the biological niche that the vaccine strains

used to occupy, and they are causing disease.

One strain in particular, called 19A, is big

trouble. A new subtype of it caused ear

infections in the nine Rochester children, ages 6

months to 18 months, that were resistant to all

pediatric medications, said Dr.

Pichichero, a microbiologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center.

The children had been unsuccessfully treated with

two or more antibiotics, including high-dose

amoxicillin and multiple shots of another drug.

Many needed surgery to place ear tubes to drain

the infection, and some recovered only after

treatment with a newer, powerful antibiotic whose

safety in children has not been established.

Pichichero refused further comment because he has

submitted a report to a medical journal. His work

was paid for by antibiotic maker Abbott

Laboratories and the Thrasher Foundation, which

funds projects related to child health.

All 19A strep subtypes tend to be resistant to

some drugs and have been growing in prevalence:

--Scientists from a drug company and two labs

analyzed more than 21,000 bacterial samples from

around the nation and found 19A increasing. Among

children 2 and under, the portion of samples that

were this strain rose to 15 percent in 2005-2006,

from 4 percent in the previous three years.

--A British lab tracking respiratory infections

in U.S. kids found that the 19A strain accounted

for 40 percent of drug-resistant cases.

--University of Iowa researchers found 19A

accounted for 35 percent of penicillin-resistant

infections in 2004-05, compared with less than 2

percent the year before the new vaccine came out.

Because these bacteria easily swap gene

components to become even more hardy, " new types

may emerge that can both escape containment by

vaccine and spread throughout the world, " Dr.

Musher of Baylor College of Medicine wrote

in the New England Journal of Medicine last year.

Some think Prevnar might be destined to be like

flu shots that must be periodically updated to

reflect new strains causing illness. But each

tweak requires new safety studies and more expense.

Wyeth expects to finish testing its updated

vaccine next year and to seek federal approval in

early 2009. Review can take a year or more, Paradiso said.

British-based GlaxoKline has a similar

vaccine in final-phase testing that targets 10

strains common in Europe and other regions.

© Copyright 2007 Associated Press. All rights

reserved. This material may not be published,

broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

*********

I have uploaded to my webpages - address for these letters is in 2 files

http://www.wellwithin1.com/HIBPneu1993-2006LettersA.pdf

http://www.wellwithin1.com/HIBPneu1993-2006LettersB.pdf

.............Sheri

***************

New Zealand must cancel the implementation of Prevnar, TODAY

documenting HIB, then Prevnar now MRSA

Brilliant ! And so tragic!

Started with HIB vaccine and then Prevnar, now we have MRSA

Just what many of us have been saying all along

-nature abhors a vacuum. Suppress one and another will arise.

Sheri

********

From: " " <butler@...>

Forward this where you like.

A couple of weeks ago, Ninetonoon did a programme

about how wonderful Prevnar is, and how lots of

countries are using it, and that’s why we should too.

Well, take your pick. Wednesday’s issue of JAMA

details that this time, the bug might have bit

them right back on the backside. Use Prevnar, get

a new MRSA = dead children. This is what the

public gets, when they sit back and trust the

medical profession, and when the questions they

ask, do not get answered in any meaningful way.

(see letter to Dr Marc Lipsitch ­ the answers

were unsatisfactory and I’ve not pdf’d them)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/16/AR2007101601392_\

pf.html

In the new study, Fridkin and his colleagues

analyzed data collected in California, Colorado,

Connecticut, Georgia, land, Minnesota, New

York, Oregon and Tennessee, identifying 5,287

cases of invasive MRSA infection and 988 deaths

in 2005. The researchers calculated that MRSA was

striking 31.8 out of every 100,000 Americans,

which translates to 94,360 cases and 18,650

deaths nationwide. In comparison, complications

from the AIDS virus killed about 12,500 Americans in 2005.

In the second paper, E. Pichichero and

Janet R. Casey of the University of Rochester in

New York documented the emergence of an

antibiotic-resistant strain of another bacterium

known as Streptococcus pneumoniae, which causes

common ear infections. Although all 11 children

identified in the Rochester area with the microbe

so far were successfully treated, five required

an antibiotic approved only for adults, and one

child was left with permanent hearing loss.

The researchers attributed the emergence of the

strain to a combination of the overuse of

antibiotics and the introduction of a vaccine

that protects against the infection.

" The use of the vaccine created an ecological

vacuum, and that combined with excessive use of

antibiotics to create this new superbug, " Pichichero said.

So will Pete Hodgson let New Zealand parents

welcome this new ecological niche into New

Zealand, and act all surprised when in a few

years, kiddies drop dead because they can’t be treated?

You all realise, of course, that this was started

by the use of the Hib vaccine.

I attach for you a pdf containing a letter sent

by me to Bill Birch in 1993, and USA’s foremost

expert on this topic, Marc Lipsitch in April

2006, with an extract from the infectious disease

journal, and the revelant IAS waves newsletter giving Bill Birch’s reply.

NOTE FROM SHERI

[i have uploaded to my webpages - address for these letters is in 2 files

http://www.wellwithin1.com/HIBPneu1993-2006LettersA.pdf

http://www.wellwithin1.com/HIBPneu1993-2006LettersB.pdf

OR

http://www.nccn.net/~wwithin/HIBPneu1993-2006LettersA.pdf

http://www.nccn.net/~wwithin/HIBPneu1993-2006LettersB.pdf

It was a very large PDF file, so split

into 2 so it will be easier if you are on dial up

- still slow but better.............Sheri]

It is with no satisfaction that I send this.

This does nothing other than confirm my long held

convictions that what I said in 1993 was correct,

and that while many of us could see it coming,

mere mothers and Dr Tony were considered luddites.

All I can say is God help the children in the future.