Vaccine Deep Dive
Ced and Ed are due for vaccines so we did a deep dive into the literature. Plus, our Youtube channel!
DISCLAIMER: This is NOT medical advice. We are sharing our review of scientific literature as well as our personal choices. Please consult a licensed heath care professional for your pet’s specific situation.
Vaccines have become such a sensitive subject it’s hard to have a rational discussion about them. Questioning vaccines often gets one immediately labeled an anti-vaxxer or anti-science. But what is science if not the continuous questioning of the world around us? We believe our dear readers are smart enough to have nuanced discussions so we feel confident going down this rabbit hole, albeit still carefully. As always, our intention is to reflect the literature and rationality as acutely as possible.
Before we go, on a small announcement:
We are going to be posting more regularly on Youtube! Expect slower, easy to follow tutorials on how to make food for your dog at home (with simple ingredients).
Creating for Youtube is still brand new to us so expect the channel to evolve over time. We welcome your feedback and special requests for recipes.
Here’s the first video and written recipe:
A wonderful invention
There’s no doubt in our minds that vaccines are incredible inventions that save lives. According to the WHO, over 150 million lives were spared over the past 50 years alone, with 101 million of those being infants. Smallpox is estimated to have killed over 500 million people in the centuries before it was eradicated in the 1980s. There are few, if any, medical breakthroughs that have spared more lives, save antibiotics.
Unlike antibiotics, which was an accidental discovery in a lab, inoculation for smallpox started with healers and mothers in Europe before it was accepted in the medical community. Variolation, as it was called, was practiced in Asia, Africa and the Middle east for centuries. By the late 16th century, the practice was widespread in China. Powdered smallpox scabs were administered to healthy people. After exposure, patients would develop a mild case of smallpox and then be immune to it. Though the technique had a mortality rate of 1-2%, this was far lower than the 20 - 30% mortality rate of the full-blown disease.
Variolation faced skepticism and fear by European religious leaders and governments. England and The American colonies had legal restrictions on smallpox innoculation as it sometimes caused outbreaks. It wasn’t until the early 18th century when Lady Mary Mantagu, an English aristocrat, had both of her children inoculated that opinions changed. Lady Montagu learned of variolation in Constantinople, where her husband Edward Wortley Montagu served as an ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. The immunity that her kids gained sparked the interest of the British Royal Family which led to scientific experiments, and subsequently the development of vaccines.
From saving lives to reducing illness
However, at some point during the proliferation of vaccines the end goal changed from reducing mortality to reducing illness. Now a number of illnesses with very low mortality rates are also subject to vaccination. For example, chickenpox has a mortality rate of about 1 in 100,000 cases for children and about 1 in 10,000 for adults. Yet chickenpox vaccination is required in all 50 U.S. states to go to school.
For dogs, a similar scenario exists. The core vaccines, especially for puppies, reduce mortality. Parvo, Distemper, Adenovirus and Rabies are very deadly. However, Canine Influenza, Bordetella, Coronavirus and Parainfluenza all have low to very low mortality, particularly in healthy adult dogs. Yet, Bordetella and other non-core vaccines are often required for doggy day care or indoor socializing.
Side effects of vaccines
As vaccine technology improved, the risks drastically lowered. Vaccine safety is now better than it’s ever been. Yet this does not mean that the risk is zero. According to manufacturers’ warnings, the Bordetella vaccine can cause coughing, fever, malaise and injection site reactions. In rare instances dogs may have life threatening anaphylactic reactions to vaccines.
According to a cohort study on over 1 million dogs, 1 in every 262 experienced vaccine-associated adverse events (VAAEs). There are also multiple incidences of contamination in vaccines, several of which have led to deaths. Failure points in the supply chain include manufacturing issues, storage and transportation failures as well as contaminated ingredients.
When the risk / reward ratio changes the mortality rate from 20-30% to 1-2% as was the case for smallpox variolation, the calculus is clear. But for illnesses that are rarely fatal the calculus is really fuzzy.
Immunity lasts a long time
According to a number of studies, immunity for core vaccines lasts for far longer than the booster schedule. In a controlled trial, vaccine survival for rabies was 80% after 6 years and 7 months, 50% after 7 years and 1 month, and 20% after 8 years compared to 100% mortality for control.
For Parvovirus, a small study showed that after 5 years no vaccinated dogs became overtly sick. Similarly, a small study on distemper showed that after three years no vaccinated dogs became sick while all three control dogs got very sick. One of the control dogs died while the second was euthanized.
Ced and Ed vaccination plan
Despite recommendations for Bordatella and Canine influenza from the vet, this year Edith is only going to receive her rabies booster while Cedric will skip any vaccines (he’s had all the core ones). Because they are both healthy dogs we will likely delay core boosters by a year and immunize against rabies at 4 years rather than 3. This is also because rabies is very rare where we live. If we were in an endemic part of the world, or lived in a rural area with more wild animals we would likely boost rabies more frequently.
That’s all for this week.
All the best,
Joelle and The Precious Creatures Team