A mother whose child died aged six from a brain inflammation caused by measles hopes sharing her story will encourage parents to “vaccinate more”.

It comes as the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) warned of measles outbreaks in parts of London.

Gemma Larkman-Jones wants more parents to consider having their children vaccinated sooner.

Prof Dame Jenny Harries, UKHSA chief executive, warned that measles is spreading among unvaccinated communities, and added that a “national call to action” is needed across the country.

Vaccination rates across the UK have been dropping, but there are particular concerns in parts of the capital as well as in some areas of the West Midlands.

  • Wanderer@lemm.ee
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    5 months ago

    Sometimes I think about how years ago parents would lie over their children’s beds crying. Praying for a miracle because that is all that can save their child now is the work of God. They have see this before, heard the stories. Seen the other children die just recently. They know the pain, they know what is coming. They have done all they can. They sent for the doctor who said he won’t be coming back as he has other patients to attend to, ones that might live. Yes they do what they can but it is all for nothing. They bury their child and go back home.

    They sit there unable to cry anymore, the silence is broken from a cough in the younger child’s room. They then pray to God that this is just a cold. God doesn’t listen, God doesn’t bring miracles. But man does. One day the work of God comes in the hands of the many and changes the suffering forever.

    Sometimes I wonder what those people would say to us. I bet they would hate us for not taking something they would give their lives for.

    • Blue@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      You would be surprised to know that some people today unironically believe that the germ theory is a hoax, and yes it’s the demographic you are suspecting.

    • Jakdracula@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Which god? There’s so many, how do you keep them all straight. Apollo? Zeus? It’s Ra, isn’t it? I bet you’re talking about Ra!

      • Wanderer@lemm.ee
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        5 months ago

        I’m sure people prayed to them all.

        I’m sure none answered.

        Man answered, just too late for millions.

      • doctordevice@lemm.ee
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        5 months ago

        You’re being downvoted but I agree. None of this has anything to do with religion. A weird fiction that invokes “[the Christian] God provided the vaccine” is irrelevant and disrespectful to the humans that worked hard to create a vaccine.

        It’s a pretty bad idea in general to bring up a supposedly omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent “God” in the context of children dying of diseases anyway. What kind of God would allow children to die of cancer? Or any number of other currently incurable diseases?

        • Aussiemandeus@aussie.zone
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          5 months ago

          I think they’re saying they prayed to their “god” and from their perspective “their god” delivered through science.

          Not that god actually did anything

          • Wanderer@lemm.ee
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            5 months ago

            I actually meant it more like humans hold the power of a God in their hands. Something that could only have been seen as magical, as fairytale, as something humans do not have at their disposal. It only exists out there to beings that are not our own. That’s who people pray to because it is beyond man’s powers, children were beyond saving.

            I didn’t mean it as the work of God for I’m an atheist. I meant it like they prayed to a God and got ignored. But through science we created Godlike powers.

            I would say antibiotics and vaccines are literal God powers. Not from God but if you went back 100 years with that power people would think you a God.

        • Rukmer@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          Anti vaccine rhetoric has an extremely high correlation to religious people. The commentor was speculating about how these people in the past would have felt about the anti vaccine people today. It’s a valid question. People back then didn’t have access to information or access to much real hope; it’s not surprising they were religious.