Encourage child infections to boost adult immunity?

[zico]

I hasten to point out that my thread title is not my idea, but - incredibly - from the May 13th JCVI minutes about pros and cons of vaccinating children.

Here's the quote from the minutes.

There is an argument for allowing the virus to circulate amongst children which could provide broader immunity to the children and boost immunity in adults

This sounds an incredible idea to put forward - encouraging infection of children to protect adults.
Also, what is the actual argument about how this could even work? I genuinely can't see it, especially as the minutes also say

vaccinating adults will lead to lower community transmission and lower risk of transmission to children

So why not vice versa?

From the minutes, another argument against child vaccination is -

All adults will be vaccinated and there is a low risk of child-to-child transmissions. Staff and parents will be protected.

It's simply wrong to say that all adults will be vaccinated, because we know take-up will be well short of 100% of adults. All the other statements in the above quote have unsurprisingly (to me anyway) turned out to be wrong.

From media reports, I'd thought the JCVI were excluding all factors other than health risk/benefits to children, and that was why children weren't recommended to be vaccinated - but the minutes show they were considering other factors. [/quote]

The meeting was held in May, but the minutes were only released yesterday, after a long delay.

If you're interested, and to see full context of the above quote, minutes can be found in the link below, my extract is under point 26.


https://app.box.com/s/iddfb4ppwkmtjusir ... 8925577089

[gryffron]

This sounds an incredible idea to put forward - encouraging infection of children to protect adults.

On the contrary. It’s perfectly sensible for experts to consider all options before making their decisions. I’d be disgusted if they did not at least discuss every vaguely plausible idea.

Gryff

[zico]

This sounds an incredible idea to put forward - encouraging infection of children to protect adults.

On the contrary. It’s perfectly sensible for experts to consider all options before making their decisions. I’d be disgusted if they did not at least discuss every vaguely plausible idea.

Gryff

The fact that they've included this in the final minutes means that there were at least some members of the committee who thought this was a reasonable argument against child vaccination. As you say, I'd expect them to consider a wider range of options, but there would have been a lot of these where it was clearly not a sensible argument, which is why there aren't far more arguments in the minutes. That's the point of a committee - to sift through the chaff, and report on the relevant arguments with some merit.

Also, how is it even "vaguely plausible"? Can you see a way in which allowing wider circulation of the virus amongst children actually helps adults, which is the argument being made here?

[Alaric]

Also, how is it even "vaguely plausible"? Can you see a way in which allowing wider circulation of the virus amongst children actually helps adults, which is the argument being made here?

There's the long standing premise that catching certain diseases as children protects those same children when they become adults. Is that the thinking they are using?

Something not being highlighted in the headline figures of cases is the split between adults and children,

[Lootman]

The fact that they've included this in the final minutes means that there were at least some members of the committee who thought this was a reasonable argument against child vaccination.

But was it presented as an argument for never vaccinating children?

Or as an argument for something we could do whilst vaccinating children as well?

In other words, until all children have been vaccinated, it may do little harm to not actively prevent infections in schools. Because very few children get seriously sick anyway, and catching the infection does help build community immunity.

[Lanark]

There is an argument for...

Does not mean that anyone thinks it was a GOOD argument, a lot of dumb ideas have been floating around and the committee no doubt has to formulate responses to them all.

In the past, some parents participated in “chickenpox parties” to intentionally expose their unvaccinated children to a child with chickenpox in hopes that they would get the disease. That seemed like a great idea until some of the children started dying.

[GrahamPlatt]

American data:



Image above is from here:

https://statman459090445.wordpress.com/ ... -pandemic/

Edit: interesting spelling of lightning!

[onthemove]

There is an argument for...

Does not mean that anyone thinks it was a GOOD argument, a lot of dumb ideas have been floating around and the committee no doubt has to formulate responses to them all.

In the past, some parents participated in “chickenpox parties” to intentionally expose their unvaccinated children to a child with chickenpox in hopes that they would get the disease. That seemed like a great idea until some of the children started dying.

I'm curious what criteria you are using to dismiss "a lot of" ideas as "dumb"?

I mean, is a "dumb" idea inherently "dumb" when it is created, and therefore a negative reflection on the individual who was "dumb" enough to come up with the idea?

Or are all ideas born equal and then only become "dumb" after evaluation?
But if this latter case then it would seem a bit nonsensical to suggest "a lot of dumb ideas have been floating around and the committee no doubt has to formulate responses to them all". Surely all ideas are good until they are evaluated - they aren't floating around as "dumb" ideas.

So I just wonder what your criteria is for dismissing the ideas as "dumb" - it seems as though you think there are such criteria, and that if people had used your criteria upfront, they could have saved the committee the hassle of having to evaluate these "dumb" ideas and formulate a response.

It's not completely clear from your post, but reading between the lines, I get an inkling your criteria might be to ask - does it involve deliberate infection? - and if the answer is yes, then the conclusion is automatically "dumb" (?)

Just out of curiosity...

How would you assess the idea of preventing cancer by deliberately giving babies a drink laced with a cocktail of microbes to make up for the lack of real world encounters with such things due to our cleaner modern lifestyles and over use of sanitisers and cleaning, etc?

" ... For full leukaemia to occur, another biological event must take place and this involves the immune system. “For an immune system to work properly, it needs to be confronted by an infection in the first year of life,” says Greaves. Without that confrontation with an infection, the system is left unprimed and will not work properly.” .... “The disease [Acute lymphoblastic leukaemia] needs two hits to get going,” Greaves explains. “The second comes from the chronic inflammation set off by an unprimed immune system.” .... “And it would not just help prevent them getting childhood leukaemia. Cases of conditions such as type 1 diabetes and allergies are also rising in the west and have also been linked to our failure to expose babies to bacteria to prime children’s immune systems. ... " https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... st-disease "

I also wonder what you make of the following ...

"The spontaneous healing of cancer is a phenomenon that has been observed for hundreds and thousands of years and after having been the subject of many controversies, it is now accepted as an indisputable fact. A review of past reports demonstrates that regression is usually associated with acute infections, fever, and immunostimulation.
(...)
Acute infections are beneficial in the prevention and regression of tumors. In conclusion, childhood febrile infections can prevent cancer in adulthood. Asepsis, fever control, surgery, and immunosuppressive therapies are known to have an inverse relation to cancer regression, while acute infection, fever, and cancer vaccines by the virtue of immunostimulation induce regression of cancer even in the most advanced stage of disease and prove that cancer is not an irreversible process without a cure."

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3312698/ "

Similarly ...

"... One of the earliest examples of virus-orchestrated SR [spontaneous remission] was reported in 1896 when influenza cured a patient of leukaemia (Fig. 1) [21]. Measles-induced remission of Burkitt's and Hodgkin lymphoma [22,23] and several similar cases were reported subsequently [24]. SR after viral infections thus paved the way for the development of a new mode of cancer treatment- cancer virotherapy. Initially (between 1950–60), wild-type viruses were used to induce the remission, which worked successfully in some cases ... " https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8271173/

I can't help feel that the past 18 months could turn out to be a scientific gold mine. It will be interesting to see if there is any uptick in the number of cases of cancer in the short to medium term.

I mean, if (as seems to be suggested) infection can play a role in combatting cancer, then it may be plausible that a number of very early stage cancers that might have ordinarily been reversed before they got a foothold, or became noticeable, thanks to colds and flus and other infections, might now have had the opportunity to take hold over the past 18 months due to general infections having been greatly suppressed by our response to coronavirus.

It'll be interesting to see if an unintended side effect of reduced infections cause by lockdowns, mask wearing, social distancing, etc, turns out be an increase in cancer cases.

(Cavet: I guess on the flip side, with covid now in the mix, the total number of infections even with lockdowns, etc, might still be as high as before - I mean, lockdowns might have reduced previous infection types - less colds, flu, etc - , but at the same time, covid has added a new infection into the mix, so I don't know whether total overall infections have reduced, or increased over the past 18 months. Either way, it'll be interesting to see if the rate of cancer cases changes accordingly)

[dealtn]

Also, how is it even "vaguely plausible"? Can you see a way in which allowing wider circulation of the virus amongst children actually helps adults, which is the argument being made here?

If adult vaccination protection is known to wane, and become progressively less effective, and if stronger immunity arises from natural infection than it does through vaccination, and if children are known to be unlikely to suffer relatively as a group, then an argument can be made it is best to "encourage" (your word not the committee's, who use "allow") speedier transmission across the sub set of the population known as children, at the time of greatest vaccination protection of adults, and particularly so in the summer months when it is felt Covid generally is less problematic. The alternative of waiting for adult vaccination effectiveness to wane, and for winter conditions, and greater numbers of children transmitting infections potentially at that time is worse (for society, and adults).

[GrahamPlatt]

and if stronger immunity arises from natural infection than it does through vaccination

It doesn’t. Immunity from vaccination is “stronger” than from the disease itself. I’d give you a link but frankly can’t be bothered to search it out, sorry. Moreover, this “waning” of immunity is only in the antibody sense. Which is just as well, because if it didn’t, and the immunity from every infection you ever got persisted at the original level, your blood would soon be as thick as porridge (not a good thing). But the underlying immunity at the cellular level (memory cells) means that you will mount a response to infection far quicker than had never been exposed/immunised. So the fall in antibody levels is not so worrisome as all that.

[onthemove]

and if stronger immunity arises from natural infection than it does through vaccination

It doesn’t. Immunity from vaccination is “stronger” than from the disease itself.

Are you sure?

" Which protects you more against Covid – vaccination or prior infection?
David Spiegelhalter and Anthony Masters
For the Delta variant at least, the latest analysis suggests they are roughly equivalent ... Between mid-May and mid-August 2021, when the Delta variant reigned supreme, full vaccination reduced the risk of testing positive by 64-70%. Past infection without vaccination had a similar effect (65-77%)." https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... -infection

It would seem that against the strain for which the vaccine was developed, the vaccine will give stronger protection. But that protection would appear (not unsurprisingly) more specific for that strain; it isn't as good as prior infection against new strains.

Again this is probably not surprising - the vaccines just target a portion of the virus; when you actually get the virus, your immune system is exposed to the whole virus structure, so can create a broader range of antibodies and T cells to attack more of the structure.

[9873210]

Vaccination Offers Higher Protection than Previous COVID-19 Infection

But really the answer is we don't know for sure. Any framework for decisions needs to be able to deal with an enormous amount of uncertainty. People keep reciting hypotheses as if they were facts.

[jfgw]

Vaccination Offers Higher Protection than Previous COVID-19 Infection

That article relates to reinfection, not first infection; the title is misleading.

It does also state that vaccinations reduce hospitalisations but it does not make a comparison with prior infection.


Julian F. G. W.

[GrahamPlatt]

It does also state that vaccinations reduce hospitalisations but it does not make a comparison with prior infection.

Erm? I just don’t know where to start in answering that.

[servodude]

It does also state that vaccinations reduce hospitalisations but it does not make a comparison with prior infection.

Erm? I just don’t know where to start in answering that.

I'm not sure what's being meant either

But here's another study from the CDC that might be less niche
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/ ... mm7044e1_w

The summary of which:

What is already known about this topic?

Previous infection with SARS-CoV-2 or COVID-19 vaccination can provide immunity and protection against subsequent SARS-CoV-2 infection and illness.

What is added by this report?

Among COVID-19–like illness hospitalizations among adults aged ≥18 years whose previous infection or vaccination occurred 90–179 days earlier, the adjusted odds of laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 among unvaccinated adults with previous SARS-CoV-2 infection were 5.49-fold higher than the odds among fully vaccinated recipients of an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine who had no previous documented infection (95% confidence interval = 2.75–10.99).

What are the implications for public health practice?

All eligible persons should be vaccinated against COVID-19 as soon as possible, including unvaccinated persons previously infected with SARS-CoV-2.

So make of that what one might

On the OP topic: we know that people can become infected when vaccinated and spread the virus but with much less risk to their health than doing so when unvaccinated.

So if you want kids to spread this to keep exercising the "collective immune system" it would make sense to give them a safe/approved vaccine before letting them off on their way. I'd you want them to spread it, stop isolation protocols or tracing of kids' contacts by all means, but protect them as best you can with a vaccine

-sd

[ursaminortaur]

Vaccination Offers Higher Protection than Previous COVID-19 Infection

That article relates to reinfection, not first infection; the title is misleading.

It does also state that vaccinations reduce hospitalisations but it does not make a comparison with prior infection.


Julian F. G. W.

Since natural infection produces anti-bodies against a large number of different proteins in the virus whereas the current vaccines are all just targeting the spike protein natural infection should provide greater protection.

See my previous post

https://www.lemonfool.co.uk/viewtopic.p ... 86#p452986

[ursaminortaur]

There is an argument for...

Does not mean that anyone thinks it was a GOOD argument, a lot of dumb ideas have been floating around and the committee no doubt has to formulate responses to them all.

In the past, some parents participated in “chickenpox parties” to intentionally expose their unvaccinated children to a child with chickenpox in hopes that they would get the disease. That seemed like a great idea until some of the children started dying.

Letting their children become infected with chickenpox at an early age had two benefits

1) The disease was usually more serious in adults than children (something shared with Covid)
and
2) Infection at an early age seems to provide pretty close to lifetrime protection from chickenpox (albeit with a slight risk of developing shingles later in life).

For Covid there doesn't seem to be any evidence for lifetime protection either in adults or children from being infected. Hence Covid parties would not seem to have the same lifetime benefits.

[dealtn]

Does not mean that anyone thinks it was a GOOD argument, a lot of dumb ideas have been floating around and the committee no doubt has to formulate responses to them all.

In the past, some parents participated in “chickenpox parties” to intentionally expose their unvaccinated children to a child with chickenpox in hopes that they would get the disease. That seemed like a great idea until some of the children started dying.

Letting their children become infected with chickenpox at an early age had two benefits

1) The disease was usually more serious in adults than children (something shared with Covid)
and
2) Infection at an early age seems to provide pretty close to lifetrime protection from chickenpox (albeit with a slight risk of developing shingles later in life).

For Covid there doesn't seem to be any evidence for lifetime protection either in adults or children from being infected. Hence Covid parties would not seem to have the same lifetime benefits.

I would imagine it is much easier to find evidence of lifetime protection in an illness that has been around for a long time than one that is reasonably new though.

[ursaminortaur]

Letting their children become infected with chickenpox at an early age had two benefits

1) The disease was usually more serious in adults than children (something shared with Covid)
and
2) Infection at an early age seems to provide pretty close to lifetrime protection from chickenpox (albeit with a slight risk of developing shingles later in life).

For Covid there doesn't seem to be any evidence for lifetime protection either in adults or children from being infected. Hence Covid parties would not seem to have the same lifetime benefits.

I would imagine it is much easier to find evidence of lifetime protection in an illness that has been around for a long time than one that is reasonably new though.

True enough but there seems to be evidence of people becoming re-infected both after catching covid and after being vaccinated which wouldn't be happening if there was lifetime protection.

[servodude]

I would imagine it is much easier to find evidence of lifetime protection in an illness that has been around for a long time than one that is reasonably new though.

True enough but there seems to be evidence of people becoming re-infected both after catching covid and after being vaccinated which wouldn't be happening if there was lifetime protection.

Indeed. Certainly enough evidence to suggest that intentionally catching it now to save the bother later might be an ill-advised gamble

-sd