CANINE MEASLES VACCINE AND DNA

Katie Edwards, AKC Judge, Breeder of Merit

I wonder if I'm the only one who remembers veterinarians giving a vaccine called the "measles" vaccine to dogs?

Many decades ago (mid to late 60's I think) I was the kennel girl at a well known Great Dane kennel. We took a litter in for vaccination at our regular vet we'd been dealing with for years. The vet blithely told us that he would be adding the "new measles" vaccine to the normal vaccine protocol. We didn't think anything of it at the time even though we had never heard of a dog with measles - and after all - the vet recommended it right?

No thought was given back then to a vet simply swallowing whatever that pharmaceutical salesman said on his monthly visit. Until I actually helped manage a vet clinic years later I didn't realize that this was the norm for a busy vet practice. The pups produced that year were either kept or sold as usual and we didn't think anything of it.

A couple years later a previously healthy litter under 8 weeks old out of a seemingly healthy bitch, suddenly broke out in spots all over their bodies. The spots would scab up and the pups would suddenly stop thriving.

We spent countless hours ferrying pups to the vet for tests. The vets looked at all possibilities and did all available tests but were mystified what the cause could be. And then another litter with the same symptoms came after the first. There were more countless hours applying various salves and medications to these poor pups so the vets could see if anything worked. During one of these salve sessions my boss mentioned off hand that if she didn't know better she would swear the spots looked like measles.

That statement couldn't be more prophetic than if a light bulb had appeared over her head when she said it. We had to go back into several years of vet records to pinpoint it BUT, the pups with this skin outbreak came ONLY OUT OF THE BITCHES THAT RECEIVED THE "NEW MEASLES" VACCINE WHEN THEY WERE PUPS.

I'm sure this will be challenged by people more educated in the medical field than I, but my guess is this vaccine came out of a laboratory, not from other dogs, with pharmaceutical companies seeing dollar signs. The vaccine quietly went away and now few people in dogs even know about it or remember it.

I have three daughters and when the new ii Gardasil (HPV) vaccine came out with several states saying they would push for mandatory vaccination of girls as young as 12, I remembered these poor pups and all they went through so long ago.

I and many other parents steadfastly refused Gardasil. A vaccine such as the polio vaccine with a proven multigenerational history of wiping out a debilitating disease is one thing but Big Pharma popping up with a vaccine that is so new that its effects on future generations could not possibly be known is a scary proposition. Realize that each new item developed by pharmaceutical companies can mean, not millions, but billions of dollars to the industry and the temptation to have it approved without actually knowing the long term effects can be alluring.

Am I anti-vaccine? Absolutely not. The veterinarians I deal with today do not blindly accept whatever they are told. They ask for studies, test results and statistics for new things that come out - kudos for them. After all they are the ones the patients come back to for answers aren't they?

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Editor’s note: If you’ve seen the incredible sculpture of the Great Dane head at the Nationals, this talented lady is the artist. See more at their website: http://www.lauradogreatdanes.com

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