I took a hardline stand against mandatory vaccination for young girls when Texas Gov. Rick Perry decided he wanted to play doctor with every sixth grade girl in the state of Texas, because I did not and do not see a sufficient nexus between school and an STD to justify the requirement. At the same time, I indicated that I would probably have my own daughter vaccinated if I had one. Others, though, raised issues of long-term (or even short-term) health consequences. It now appears there may be a rare one.

Phil Tetlock and Barbara Mellers were in a race against time to save their 15-year-old daughter, Jenny. As I reported last summer, Jenny developed a degenerative muscle disease nearly two years ago, soon after being vaccinated against the cervical-cancer-causing HPV. She became nearly completely paralyzed, though her mind was perfectly intact and she could still enjoy her pet parakeet, Hannah Montana, and Twilight.

I've been E-mailing Phil regularly over the past year, and up until our last E-mail, one week ago, he had been holding out hope that they would be able to find a cure for his daughter—or to at least determine if the human papillomavirus vaccine called Gardasil had caused his daughter's illness, most likely a juvenile form of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (aka Lou Gehrig's disease). Sadly, the clock ran out last Sunday, and Jenny passed away.

Through their efforts to publicize Jenny's case on their blog, Jenny's parents have connected with two other sets of parents whose daughters developed what appears to be ALS after being injected with Gardasil. One was 22-year-old Whitney Baird, who died last August, just 13 months after receiving Gardasil. Another is Alicia Olund, a 12-year-old who began having trouble walking after getting her third shot last September. She now uses leg braces and a walker at home as her muscles continue to deteriorate. After ruling out other conditions, her specialists at the University of California-San Francisco Medical Center—who also treated Jenny—suspect that Alicia may have the same condition. "They don't know what she has," her mother, Barbara, tells me through tears, "but it's destroying her nerves and muscles, and none of the treatments they've given her are working. Before the vaccine, she was a perfectly healthy child, going for her brown belt in karate." (They're awaiting the results of the ALS test.)

Juvenile ALS is rare, with there being about 1 case for every 2 million teens. What’s more, there is no definitive link between the disease and Gardasil – but it appears suspicious that these three girls (among others) had the disease develop so soon after taking the HPV vaccine. The CDC is investigating to see if there is a link – and I now wonder if the risk of ALS outweighs the risk of cervical cancer. Frankly, I don’t know – but I do know the cancer can be treated and cured while the degenerative disease can’t be. What I do know is that I’m glad the Texas Legislature stepped in and ended Rick Perry’s foray into the unlicensed practice of medicine before even one girl could be endangered.

H/T Debbie Schlussel

Posted by: Greg at 12:25 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 533 words, total size 3 kb.