Mail Order Chicken Pox!

[IDrinkaRum]

Instead of vaccinating their children, parents are willing to pay as much as $50 to have people mail them chicken pox infected items so their own children will get chicken pox

There was also a FB page which has since been closed down.

Now, my mom did admit that when I was like 2, she'd have me play with other children who were infected, but I never caught chicken pox. My immune system must have been that good. Instead, I got it at age 13 from my 8 year old sister. She caught it from a kid in her class at school. Then since we were in the same house, coming in to contact with each other, I caught it. But because I was older, I got it worse than her. (I had the pox in my hair). Also, my temperature was so high 2 days before I came down with chicken pox, I actually had to have an EKG because my heart was beating erratically.

But these parents ... they're just ... gah ... I think I my brain exploded.

[bara]

I had chicken pox at a young age... didnt bother me much except kept me out of school and I was covering in that pink calamine lotion.

But if it werent for vaccinations then things like polio would still be around. (it still is, but very rare in the US at least)

Of course having been in the Army and deployed to Iraq, ive gotten all sorts of vaccinations and they have never hurt me. Small pox was a pain to keep clean in the freaking desert, but it cleared up just fine and in good time.

[Greenday]

I had chicken pox at a young age... didnt bother me much except kept me out of school and I was covering in that pink calamine lotion.

Of course having been in the Army and deployed to Iraq, ive gotten all sorts of vaccinations and they have never hurt me. Small pox was a pain to keep clean in the freaking desert, but it cleared up just fine and in good time.

Psh, I scratched mine off. I was only 3.

Even as a civilian I had to get about 9 shots to come out here. Speaking of, I have to get the flu shot soon. My small pox one didn't get TOO gross, thank God. Anthrax hurt like hell.

Kids are lucky these days if they can get the chicken pox shot. Such an annoying disease.

[Panacea]

Aaaauggghhh!!!

These people make me CRAZY!!!!!

Aside from the fact that vaccines are safe and there is NO credible scientific evidence to the contrary, this is so wrong on so many levels.

1. First of all, vaccination is much milder than full blown chicken pox, which makes kids miserable, socks on the hands, insanely high fevers, nausea, vomiting and all the other joys of having a sick child. And kids still can DIE from chicken pox (though it is rare).

2. These people are essentially asking strangers to mail them a bio weapon for a price. If the letter gets wet, the virus can wick through the paper onto the hands of an unsuspecting postal worker. Chicken pox can be very dangerous in the adult, and causes miscarriages in pregnant women.

3. The whole thing is a colossal scam. The virus usually dies within hours left to the open air. I can just see this on Judge Judy: "Judge, I paid $50 bucks for an infected toy to give my kid chicken pox, and he never got sick!"

Stupid, stupid, stupid!!!!

[anakhouri]

And Judge Judy would say, "AND YOU'RE AN IDIOT!" >bangs gavel<

I had chicken pox when I was 6. It was horrible, I had a really bad case. I still have scars from where I scratched (and I have had shingles as an adult). No way did I want Khan to have to go through that. He's been vaccinated.

[fireheart17]

I'm guessing that this is the new trend. First it was "pox parties" and now this.

I think I just picked it up from preschool

[bara]

Psh, I scratched mine off. I was only 3.

Even as a civilian I had to get about 9 shots to come out here. Speaking of, I have Anthrax hurt like hell.

A lot of people had a knot in thier arm and said it hurt, mine swelled a bit but never hurt or burned at all like other peoples'said they did.

[LadyBarbossa]

Also they're not even thinking about what OTHER germs might be on the toy/lollipop/Q-tip *gag* It mostly infuriates me that this is passing through the postal system and possibly infecting unsuspecting adults. I got the pox when I was six, a mild case (my sister was on tenterhooks, I was the flower girl in her wedding and she was hoping and praying all the marks would be gone by the big day )

So then when my nephew got it when he was 5 and I was 13, we didn't worry because I'd already had them. Yeah . . . two weeks later and I could clear out the Dr's office just by walking in and letting the other patients see me. You literally couldn't see clear, bare, pock-free skin on me almost anywhere. Doc said if I get it again I could be hospitalized. I've since gotten the shot, since it was required for some classes I took, but there's still no telling for sure if I could get the virus again.

[tropicsgoddess]

I had chicken pox when I was 5, my kid sis at 2 and baby sis at 7 years old. It's annoying with the itching and being covered in calamine lotion but if and when I have kids, they'll get the vaccine. I heard that the older you are (especially for men) it's worse for you to have chicken pox.

[Gravekeeper]

I don't recall if I ever had it or not, but I do recall getting a shot that gave me a knot in my arm for a while when I was really young. So I'm assuming I was vaccinated. I think I would recall the misery otherwise.

That said, why are vaccines bad again? Seems like every new vaccine now comes with a "zomigawd it turned my child disabled!" story from some lunatic and/or politician.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Well, with the chicken pox vaccine, it's not that the vaccine itself is bad. It's that it confers a potentially faulty immunity.

The way I understand it is this: if you get actual chicken pox when you are small, your risk of complications is pretty low. The older you get, the more dangerous it becomes (my 17 year old high school boyfriend got it and I don't think I've ever seen a kid so sick in my entire life. ) and the greater risk of complications.

The vaccine danger is that the immunity from the vaccine is less likely to completely immunize you as well as actually catching the disease when you're a little kid would. So it may be wearing off just about the time it becomes dangerous for you to contract chicken pox, thus putting you at a much higher risk of complications from the disease than you normally would have had without the vaccine.

I should probably make it clear that I in no way condone someone stupid enough to order a box of disease to inflict on their kid.

[Eisa]

What the fuck? How is that in any way a good idea?

I had chicken pox when I was...5 or 6, I think? It was awful. I still have a chicken pox scar in the middle of my forehead, actually. My little sister got it from me, and she had it in her mouth, and I think down her throat, as well. -can't remember- I just know she had it worse. It's absolutely MISERABLE.

[Mongo Skruddgemire]

Being 40 I honestly do not know if I was immunized for it and it just failed, or if I just caught it on my own at the age of 7.

But in my case there were no Pox Parties or none of that nonsense. I just caught it from someone else who had it at school and was the resident plague rat.

But as much as I don't agree with the idea of the Pox Parties, back before the vaccine was readily available there was a logic behind it. Children who have it, rarely get it again in their lives, and as children they get a much milder set of symptoms.

We may not agree, but there was sound reasoning behind them.

This is just wrong though. At best you either got scammed for shilling out $50 for someone's dirty sock, or screwed when the virus dies in transit. At worse, you could infect someone who handles the mail, anyone he/she comes in contact with, or any of the other mail that was placed near it. And since as adults this shit can really fuck us up...you're really making things worse.

Personally this already falls under the laws governing the transit of mail through the post office system. This is an unregistered and improperly secured biological agent. They need to find these people and arrest them and charge them for the crime that they have committed.

[DrFaroohk]

So exactly how bad is CP for an adult? I've never had it, but I got two kids who could get it at any time

[Kaylyn]

From what I gathered via a quick google search, it's because the older you get, the less robust your immune system is, thus the more stress it will put on an adult immune system.