Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

killed' vaccines contain some fragments of DNA from the original bacterium. IF the vaccine contained a whole fragment of the particular allele for virulency - then naturally occuring 'wild type' species can incorporate this ...  This can occur with reasonable frequency - that's why the IM has such a bad reputation. (found this out AFTER my herd recovered).... And yes, I had the vet send samples (after I had done the preliminary evaluation)  to the state lab - Strep Equiss...

Consider this:

For years, I gave my stallions the EPM vaccine. Could not afford to give it to my mares/foals.  Had a horse come down with EPM - happened to be a stallion who'd been vaccinated for it for two years straight....  After treatment, I decided to do a titer on all my horses - every one showed EPM exposure (not surprising since 90% of horses in my state generally show exposure).. But the ONLY one that came down with the illness - was a vaccinated horse...

The big outbreak of neurologic herpes that hit a university herd last year. Read an article about it recently... Turns out that 39% of the fatalities were currently vaccinated for herpes I &II. This compares with the other 39% being totally unvaccinated (the other 22% had unknown vaccination status)..... hmmmm... same rate of fatality/illness - regardless of vaccination...

My daughter received the chicken pox vaccine. 6 months later she gets one of the worst cases of chicken pox that Vanderbilt had seen in decades. Guess the vaccine wasn't up to par?

For two years I received the flu vaccine. During these two years I also got the flu - so bad that I ended up in the hospital both times. Prior to this I had never had more than a '24 hour mild flu' - and in the 8 years since I quit being vaccinated - I haven't had the flu ONCE. Though my family/children have brought it home several times...

So as a biologist - these figures/experiences tell me that certain vaccinations for horses and humans for many (generally non-fatal) illnesses doesn't necessarily improve the individuals immunity and many of these vaccinations don't even have a DOCUMENTED 50-60% success rate (though we must wonder if the 40-50% of animals exposed in these studies - would've knocked the pathogen out naturally?). In fact, for the strangles - the IM vaccine MIGHT actually cause naturally occuring non-virulent streptococcus - to transform to virulent.....  Though OF COURSE they try to Drill it in to you in the pre-med courses that it's vaccination-vaccination-vaccination! This is what the manufacturers that fund the research want you to believe.

So unless the vaccine is against an illness with HIGH mortality (Encephalitis, Patomic, some influenzas, tetanus, rabies) - I don't waste my money anymore... Since MOST illnesses have less then 10% illness rates after exposure (most horses/humans fight the infection off asymptomatically) with less than 10% of the illnesses being fatal. Even West Nile has almost 0% fatality in the middle-east - with almost 100% exposure of both humans/animals during their early years. (SEEMS to be more fatal in first exposure for mature animals/human - had all my horse titered after going 2 years without further vaccination. They now have better immune response than they did when vaccinated. Most likely 'natural exposure' immunity)

- LP - Now only giving the '4-way' plus rabies ...