Hunt for baby denied HBV shot

Aug 25 2008

Authorities in New South Wales, Australia, continue to search for a couple who have refused to have their newborn baby immunised against hepatitis B.

Both the police and welfare authorities have become involved after the couple from Croydon Park went into hiding with their newborn son.

A NSW Supreme Court order, applied for by the Department of Community Services (DoCS) which called for the baby to be vaccinated by Monday, will now be extended but the child's father has reportedly applied for an injunction against the court order and reportedly has the support of the anti-vaccination group the Australian Vaccination Network.

The parents apparently refused to have their newborn son vaccinated at Sydney's Royal Prince Alfred Hospital over fears that aluminium in the vaccine could cause their child neurological damage.

The issue is significant because the child's mother, who is from China, was diagnosed with hepatitis B several years ago and the baby is at risk of contracting the illness from his mother unless he is vaccinated soon.

The parents believe the hepatitis B vaccine will cause more harm than the disease but medical experts say a third of chronic hepatitis B carriers die young from cancer of the liver or cirrhosis of the liver and it is vital the baby is protected.

Long-term or chronic hepatitis B is an infection that lasts longer than 6 months and once the infection reaches the chronic stage, it may never completely disappear.

Only 5-10 percent of adults infected with HBV go on to develop chronic infection and are termed chronic carriers - two-thirds of whom do not themselves become sick or die of the virus; but they can transmit it to other people; one third develop chronic hepatitis B, a disease of the liver that can be very serious.

Chronic hepatitis B, if not treated causes a condition called cirrhosis, where the liver can no longer carry out its normal functions, it fails and a liver transplant is the only cure.

Chronic hepatitis B also can lead to a type of liver cancer known as hepatocellular carcinoma; about 15-25 percent of people with chronic hepatitis B die of liver disease.

HBV is a blood-borne virus and is transmitted from one person to another via blood and also semen and saliva, which contain small amounts of blood.

The virus can be transmitted through contact with the broken skin or a mucous membrane, in the mouth, genital organs, or rectum, of an uninfected person.

HBV infection is one of the most important causes of infectious hepatitis and half of all people infected with HBV have no symptoms.

Symptoms usually develop within 30-180 days of exposure to the virus and are similar to flu and include appetite loss, fatigue, nausea and vomiting, itching all over the body, pain over the liver, jaundice, urine which is dark in colour as in cola or tea and gray or clay coloured stools.

Those most at risk are people who have multiple sex partners, men who have sex with men, men or women who have sex with a person infected with HBV, people with other sexually transmitted diseases, those who inject drugs with shared needles, health care workers who are stuck with needles or other sharp instruments contaminated with infected blood, those who undergo dialysis for kidney disease, through transfusions of blood or blood products contaminated with infected blood and infants born to infected mothers.

Hepatitis B is the most common serious liver infection in the world affecting about 350 million people who are chronic carriers of HBV, of whom, more than 250,000 die from liver-related disease each year.

Critics say the baby is in danger of becoming a victim of the disease and is being sacrificed because of a misinformed notion about the dangers of immunisation.

The vaccine against the hepatitis B virus is safe and successfully prevents infection in people exposed to the virus and can be given as part of the normal vaccination series.

HBV infection is common in most areas of Africa, Southeast Asia, China and central Asia, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, the Pacific Islands, and the Amazon River basin of South America.