This is a dedicated site to Shingles. |
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Shingles vaccineIf there is one thing that can be said about the shingles vaccine, it has to be the fact that it is one of the most polarizing and debate provoking findings in the medical world, especially concerning the dermatology side of things. The first question that might come to mind is why would anyone try and find a vaccine for shingles. After all, herpes zoster or shingles disease is a rather harmless skin condition, one that lasts two to three weeks and then disappears, usually on its own. Well, there are two reasons why the shingles vaccine is considered a breakthrough in the medical world and actually important. First, it is not the shingles themselves that are treated by this vaccine, but rather the virus that is to blame for the herpes zoster. Yes, that is right, shingles is caused by a virus, which makes the shingles vaccine all that easier to synthesize. The shingles virus is called the varicella - zoster virus and it is a dangerous one. Not perilous in any form if it is limited to the skin area, causing both chicken pox in small children and shingles in adults, but if it enters the body, it can wreak havoc on an unprotected immune system. The second reason behind the creation of the shingles vaccine is that both herpes zoster and chicken leave physical marks on the skin of the sufferer. While that might not seem like a lot, there are people out there who would prefer to have their skin impeccable. For them, the shingles vaccine is an extra guarantee of that happening. Of course, keep in mind that if something leaves a mark on your skin, there is a high probability that it might have left something behind in your body, as well. Unfortunately, that has not been confirmed regarding the varicella - zoster virus. That does not make it untrue. It just makes it more dangerous. All this talk about the shingles vaccine and not one word about its composition. Well, if you have any sort of medical knowledge, you should already know what a vaccine usually contains. The shingles vaccine is not all that different. Essentially, just like any other vaccine, this one has a weakened form of the original troublemaker virus: the varicella - zoster virus. The question that you have to ask is why would anyone want to put the same virus that they are trying to annihilate back into their system? Because you have to. The concentration of the weakened virus is so small that it could not trigger more than an autoimmune response and not the disease itself. Besides, that is the point of the shingles vaccine: it tells your immune system that it has to produce antibodies to destroy the targeted varicella - zoster virus cells. As a result, both the cells that have originated from your body and the ones from the laboratory are completely wiped out, leaving you disease free. Now, like it has been stated above, the shingles vaccine has raised some questions and some suspicions. Some researchers believe that its rather low success rate is simply not worth the trouble. While it is true that only about 50% of the people whom have had it have become immune to shingles, that does not mean that anyone can predict whether you will be in that lucky half or not. The fact that it does not have the capacity of triggering the disease remains true, under any circumstances. Other scientists are convinced that the varicella - zoster virus must be destroyed completely and that the vaccine should not be used to eradicate shingles, but rather chicken pox. Very few children actually die of chicken pox nowadays, but, in the past, it was a common way to loosing young ones. While scientist and medical doctors argue about the theoretical problems that the shingles vaccine may pose, there are some practical issues to be taken into consideration when deciding for or against the tiny injection. Here are the categories of people that should not have the vaccine, all of them results of years of studies on real patients. Thus, if you have:
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