MMR

MMR - protect yourself, your family and the community around you

MMR is the vaccine which protects against potentially fatal childhood diseases measles, mumps and rubella.

Usually, it is administered by the practice nurse at your local surgery and is given as part of the programme of routine childhood immunisations. The first dose is given to a child at thirteen months old and a second dose is administered at three years and four months. After this a child is completely protected from the three fatal diseases.

It is not just children who can have the MMR vaccination. Anyone of any age who did not receive MMR is eligible to have the vaccination, free of charge. Your GP can check your patient records and let you know whether or not you should have MMR.

Very few children and adults are unable, for health reasons, to have MMR.  Only those with immunosuppressed diseases such as cancer cannot have the vaccination. This is why it is important that, those who are able to, have the MMR vaccination and help protect those few who cannot.

Currently in Herefordshire, uptake is about 80 per cent. NHS Herefordshire would like to raise that rate to 95 per cent.  If we could achieve this, it will help break the cycle of the transmission of measles, mumps and rubella. A good example of this is smallpox, where the vaccination programme has been successful and the disease no longer exists.

The 1998 study linking MMR to autism and bowel cancer has been discredited and its author, Dr Andrew Wakefield, has been struck off the medical register after being found guilty of serious professional misconduct.