By Judith Tan

CHILD specialists are urging parents to have their infants immunised with the new MMR vaccine which will guard against measles, mumps, German measles (rubella) and chicken pox (varicella).

The Singapore Paediatric Society (SPS) wants to talk to the Health Ministry (MOH) about including the vaccine in the National Immunisation Programme.

The society's vice-president, Associate Professor Anne Goh, said the number of patients infected with chicken pox remains high.

There were 30,548 cases in 2007, the highest rate of any infectious disease that year, while last year saw 27,200 people infected.

Despite the numbers, however, doctors, from this year, need no longer report chicken pox cases to the ministry, as a spokesman has said 'the risk to public health is... low and there has been no need for public health intervention'.

It has also been reported that a small but growing number of parents have chosen not to have their children vaccinated because of fears stemming from a controversial English study which suggested the MMR component of the vaccine could trigger autism.

Others worry that the viruses in the medicine will lower their children's immune systems.

They would rather the children catch the diseases naturally and develop immunity on their own.

But during a media briefing yesterday, Prof Goh warned that serious complications can arise from chicken pox, particularly later in life.

'It can result in encephalitis which causes the brain to swell and affects the central nervous system. Chicken pox is not as benign as many think,' she said.

'Combining the chicken pox vaccine with the MMR vaccine would be convenient, there would be fewer injections and this would promote compliance as mothers do not have to return several times to immunise their children.'

Prof Goh added that the new combination vaccine has gone through 10 years of clinical trials, most recently in Singapore, and has been proven to be safe.

The 2007 clinical study here involved 300 babies, aged between nine and 12 months, at five SingHealth polyclinics.

Dr Paul Goh, director of SingHealth Polyclinic-Tampines and one of the researchers involved in the study, said: 'The results of this study showed that early vaccination with two doses of MMR vaccine was as well-tolerated and at least as effective as two doses of separate MMR and chicken pox vaccines in healthy children given at nine and 12 months of age.'

But Dr Chan Poh Chong, who heads the division of ambulatory and adolescent paediatrics at the University Children's Medical Institute, said that while the results seemed promising, 'it would be good also to do another study to compare the antibodies produced in children who were given the doses at nine months versus 12 months, as well as 12 months versus 15 months'.

'When children are given live vaccines younger, the antibodies produced may not be enough to last long term,' he said.

Meanwhile, SPS hopes to use the polyclinic study to push its point when it speaks to the MOH, although no date has been set for a meeting.

The drug's makers say MMR vaccine costs between $120 and $140 and is available from SingHealth clinics.

juditht@sph.com.sg

This article was first published in The Straits Times.