Incredible but true: we have no TB vaccine

THERE are some things you always think you can rely on. In this part of the world, we presume when we wake up in the morning that we’ll have an electricity supply. However much of a political minefield water might have become, we still expect to see it when we turn on our taps. And when we have a baby – a genuinely terrifying experience, no matter how much it’s dressed up in soft pink and blue ribbons – we expect that the medical services will be on hand to support, protect and help us nurture our newborns.

So when that expectation isn’t met, new parents are left terrified, abandoned and – understandably – feeling betrayed.

Over the past few weeks, mothers presenting their newborn babies for the BCG – one of the blocks of the childhood immunisation programme and a drug that has effectively protected Irish children from TB since the start of the Fifties – have been told that there is no supply of the vaccine currently available in this country.

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Imagine that. There have been children born in Ireland in the last couple of months whose grandparents were inoculated against TB at birth and who have not received the same level of protection.

The problem, to be fair to the HSE, is not exclusively an Irish one.

Only one pharmaceutical company in Europe manufactures the BCG vaccine, and it has reportedly fallen behind in its supply of the vital vaccination to all its markets.

Why the company is suddenly failing to meet demand is not clear; and we can only trust that as a result of this crisis, its exclusive contract is reviewed.

But none of that changes the fact that thousands of babies have been left without protection from TB. It doesn’t change the reality that many more parents are feeling let down, vulnerable and terrified. That is scandalous.

As it happens, I didn’t receive the BCG as a child.

Due to a story of a supposed mishap with the drug involving a distant relative, my mother didn’t trust this particular element of the vaccination programme, and so none of her children received it. And we didn’t get TB.

But when I moved to London in the Nineties, there was an outbreak of the killer disease in the city and so, on the same day that my baby daughter unknowingly surrendered her tiny arm for immunisation, so did I.

And in time – possibly July, according to the HSE – all the babies currently left without the protection of the BCG will also receive their jab.

But the problem is that right now there are so many babies vulnerable to TB that if even one of them picks up the disease – a disease that is on the increase in the adult population – it could spread like wildfire.

When parents choose not to have their children immunised, they do so in the secure knowledge that the vast majority of the population is protected, and therefore outbreaks of disease are extremely rare.

It is no coincidence that the contagious disease that causes most damage in children and young adults – measles – is (unfortunately) the one with the lowest take-up rate of vaccination. didn’t catch TB, because when I was a child everyone else had had the BCG (and, in any event, at t hat t i me t he disease was extremely rare in Ireland). And as an adult, I have the protection of the vaccine. don’t wish to alarm parents who will already be worried enough about this almost incredible, and wholly unforeseen, failing in the health services.

But the reality is that we find ourselves now in a potentially dangerous public health crisis – and I, for one, can’t quite believe that nobody in a position of authority or control saw it coming.

We are used to stories of developing countries running out of medicines; we never imagine it could happen here.

Well, it has. And it is a scandalous disgrace. At a time when the whole country seems to be tying itself into knots over theoretical children, our real, actual children have been left unprotected and exposed to a serious health risk.

There are some things you always thought you could rely on: you were wrong.

That isn’t just disappointing: in this instance, it’s downright dangerous.