[Wylie's Mom]

Autoimmunity and the Inflammatory Response to Vaccines

Disease micro-organisms are often cultured on animal tissue including embryonic chickens or cow fetuses. When a vaccine is manufactured, it’s impossible to divide the wanted virus from the unwanted animal tissue, so it all gets ground up together and injected into your dog’s body.

If a dog eats animal flesh or an egg, it's digested (broken down) into simpler amino acids before entering the bloodstream. The digestive process in most cases changes protein molecules so they don’t trigger an immune reaction.

When foreign animal protein is injected undigested, directly into the bloodstream, it immediately circulates throughout the body. When the body detects the presence of these foreign proteins, an immune response is triggered. Killer T cells are then sent out to consume the cells containing the foreign proteins and protein fragments.

Immunologist Tetyana Obukhanych PhD explains: “I believe that the exposure to yeast, egg, animal, or human proteins in the context of immunogenic (antibody producing) stimuli has the potential to result in sensitization to these proteins or even to break human immunologic tolerance to “self.” The latter is especially relevant to infants, since their immune system is only starting to make the distinction between “self” and “foreign.” Setting this distinction the wrong way from the start, in my view, is likely to pave the road to allergic or autoimmune manifestations."

Immune Suppression

The immune system is a finite resource and can only be stretched so far - so it is safest to avoid giving multiple antigens in one vaccine (Moore et al, JAVMA, 2005).

The Canine Adenovirus-2 (CAV-2) vaccine has been shown to cause immunosuppression in puppies for ten days after vaccination (Phillips et al, Can J Vet Res 1989), and the Parvovirus and Distemper vaccines have shown similar results.

When vaccines are given in a combination shot, then the immunosuppression is compounded. Veterinary vaccines normally contain anywhere from three (Distemper-Adenovirus-Parvovirus) to seven components. Other vaccines like rabies, Lyme, leptospirosis or bordetella may also be given at the same time, resulting in even further immunosuppression.

Dr HH Fudenberg, a world renowned immunologist with hundreds of publications to his credit, comments

“One vaccine decreases cell-mediated immunity by 50%, two vaccines by 70%…all triple vaccines (Distemper-Adenovirus-Parvovirus) markedly impair cell-mediated immunity, which predisposes to recurrent viral infections, especially otitis media, as well as yeast and fungi infections.”

Similar results were also seen in the 2005 Purdue study referenced earlier. They found that the risk of reactions increased by 27 percent for each additional vaccine given per office visit in dogs under 22 pounds, and by 12 percent in dogs over 22 pounds.

Clearly, vaccination presents risks along with any benefits. In the next section, we’ll take a look at why dogs are over-vaccinated.

Why Dogs Are Over-Vaccinated

Revaccination Schedules

As we’ve learned, when animals (and humans) are exposed to disease naturally, the immune system is capable of creating a lifetime of protection by filing that information away in memory cells. It's very likely that vaccines offer the same duration of immunity.

But long term studies are expensive, so the vaccine manufacturers originally tested their products for only a few months and subsequently guaranteed their product to last a year.

Vets followed the vaccine label and began vaccinating annually, even though there was no science showing that vaccines needed to be given more than once or that vaccines provided a duration of immunity that was different than that from natural exposure to the disease. Vets also found that tying vaccines into annual visits got pet owners back into the clinic more often for annual checkups, and vets soon became comfortable with that schedule.

In the late 1970's immunologist Dr Ronald Schultz PhD Dipl ACVIM began research to show just how long those vaccines would actually last. The bulk of his testing was done on the core vaccines: Distemper, Adenovirus and Parvovirus (DAP). Dr Schultz knew that the body had "memory cells" that were capable of detecting and deactivating infectious disease for life and he wanted to find out if vaccines were capable of stimulating those memory cells.

Over the next few decades, Dr Schultz tested over 1,000 dogs and tested every major brand of vaccine. He measured their immunity based on serology (measuring the amount of circulating antibodies), as well as challenge (exposing the dog to the actual virus, as would happen outside the lab).

Here are the results of his research:

Duration of Immunity for Core Vaccines

DISTEMPER

The Distemper vaccine for the Rockborn strain provides at least 7 years of protection while the Onderstepoort Strain provides at least 5 years of protection (this duration was shown with challenge studies; serology shows immunity lasts at least 9 to 15 years.

ADENOVIRUS

The Adenovirus vaccine provides at least 7 years of protection by challenge and at least 9 years of protection with serology.

PARVOVIRUS

The Parvovirus vaccine provides at least 7 years of protection by challenge and serology.

Dr Schultz's work clearly shows that vaccines last much longer than vets originally thought when they began vaccinating yearly. It's important to note that the above durations aren't necessarily how long the vaccines last, but rather the duration of the studies. Like natural infection, Dr Schtulz’s research shows that vaccines are extremely likely to provide many years, if not a lifetime, of protection.

In the next section, we'll take a look at how Dr Schultz’s work influenced today’s revaccination schedules.

Canine Vaccination Guidelines

In 2003, the American Animal Hospital Association Canine Vaccine Task Force evaluated the data from Dr Schultz’s challenge and serological studies and, while noting that the core vaccines had a minimum duration of immunity of at least seven years, compromised in 2003 with the statement that “revaccination every 3 years is considered protective.”

Task force member Dr Richard Ford, Professor of Medicine, North Carolina State University, said that the decision to recommend a three year revaccination schedule for core vaccines was a compromise.

“It’s completely arbitrary…,” he said. “I will say there is no science behind the three-year recommendation…”

Vets were comfortable with annual vaccination and many veterinary clinics relied on the income that annual vaccination generated, so getting them to move away from annual vaccination was proving difficult.

After the 2003 task force however, all of the major veterinary vaccine manufacturers completed their own studies showing a minimum three year duration of immunity on the core vaccines (Distemper, Adenovirus and Parvovirus). So now vets could feel even more comfortable giving vaccines every three years or more, instead of annually.

Dr Schultz continued with his work and by 2006, had performed seven additional studies on over 1,000 dogs and repeated the same results, effectively showing that 95 to 98% of the dogs were protected for much longer than three years and most likely for life.

The Canine Vaccine Guidelines were updated again in February 2007 to update new information about Parvovirus and Distemper vaccination. Nearly thirty years after Dr Schultz’s initial research, the AAHA changed their revaccination recommendations for core vaccines to “revaccination every 3 years or more is considered protective.”

In the meantime, research was increasingly showing the deleterious effects of vaccines and this didn't escape the AAHA’s notice. In 2011, the AAHA updated their Canine Vaccination Guidelines once more. They advised that:

“Among healthy dogs, all commercially available [core] vaccines are expected to induce a sustained protective immune response lasting at least 5 yr. thereafter”

Back in 2003, the AAHA Task Force advised vets of the following in regard to their 3 year recommendation:

“This is supported by a growing body of veterinary information and well-developed epidemiological vigilance in human medicine that indicates immunity induced by vaccination is extremely long lasting and, in most cases, lifelong.”

While Dr Schultz’s work provides overwhelming evidence that the core vaccines can protect for at least seven years, and likely a lifetime, the veterinary associations have been slow to change their revaccination recommendations.

In the next section, we’ll learn how individual vets are responding to Dr Schultz’s work.