WHOOPING COUGH VACCINE

Press, Volume LXXXI, Issue 24712, 1 November 1945, Page 4

WHOOPING COUGH VACCINE

* "NO UNANIMITY AS TO VALUE" (P.A.) WELLINGTON, October 31. Various controlled research experiments with different types of whooping cough vaccine had given discordant results, and there was at present no unanimity as to the value of vaccines as a protection against whooping cough, or in the degree of protection conferred, said the Minister cf Health (the Hon. A. H. Nordmeyer) in the House of Representatives to-day. For the;2 reasons the Department of Health aid not advocate the use of such vaccine, but carried out inoculations on request only. The Minister was replying to Mr W. T. Anderton (Government, Eden), who askcj the Minister whether he would take the necessary steps to prevent any further advertisements appearing in newspapers, periodicals or journals of any kind, extolling the virtues of the inoculation of children against whooping cough. Mr Anderton also asked the Minister whether he considered it would be wise to pause in the continuance of i such treatment, lest it become an established method which might take years to eradicate. Mr Anderson said the infectious diseases committee of the Medical Research Council in London had investigated this method of treatment, and had observed no difference ■in the incidence or severity of whooping cough between children inoculated and those not inoculated.

Mr Nordmeyer, in his, reply, said there was power under the Medical Advertisements Act to control misstatements in advertisements, but in the present /state of oar knowledge it was considered inadvisable to prohibit references to such vaccine.