Who Dies from Chicken Pox?

Chicken pox is supposed to be a mild disease, right?

A rite of passage for kids?

“My life changed forever on June 30, 1988, when I had to stand by helplessly as an infectious disease claimed the life of my oldest child, Christopher Aaron Chinnes, at the age of 12.”

Rebecca Cole on Chickenpox Claimed the Life of My Son Christopher

Sure, a deadly rite of passage that we had to hope that our kids got through unscathed…

Who Dies from Chicken Pox?

Believe it or not, some folks continue to think that chicken pox was never deadly, even as kids continue to die from this now vaccine-preventable disease.

Remember, the chicken pox vaccine was added to the vaccine schedule way back in 1996, after being licensed in 1995.

Tragically, there are plenty of stories and case reports that prove them wrong:

• a previously healthy, unvaccinated 23-month-old boy developed chicken pox and died three weeks later after developing sepsis, possible viral meningoencephalitis, bacterial endocarditis, and heart failure. (1996)
• a previously healthy, unvaccinated 21-month old developed chicken pox and died four days later because of hemorrhagic complications (1997)
• an unvaccinated 5-year-old boy with asthma was treated with one dose of prednisone at home for an asthma attack while recovering from chicken pox and died the next day (1997)
• a healthy, unvaccinated 6-year-old boy developed chicken pox, was hospitalized three days later, and died the next day (1998)
• an 8-year-old being treated for leukemia developed chicken pox and died two weeks later (1998)
• an unvaccinated 9-year-old girl was exposed to an unvaccinated children with chicken pox in after-school child care and school, developed chicken pox and died three days later with secondary cellulitis and sepsis. (2002)
• a previously healthy, unvaccinated 11-year-old girl developed septic shock and died soon after being admitted to a Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. (2002)
• an unvaccinated 12-year-old boy was exposed to an unvaccinated classmate with chickenpox, developed chicken pox two weeks later, was admitted to the hospital after three days because of trouble breathing, and died on his second hospital day after suffering a cardiopulmonary arrest. (2003)
• an unvaccinated 10-year-old girl developed chicken pox, with worsening 10 days later, including ataxia and mental status changes. After being hospitalized for three days, she began to have seizures  and was declared brain dead the next day. (2004)
• an unvaccinated 14-month-old girl developed chicken pox and worsened over the next three to five days. She eventually developed septic shock, was treated in an ER, and died within one hour of being transferred to a children’s hospital for further care. (2004)
• a previously healthy, unvaccinated 15-year-old developed chicken pox, was admitted to the hospital three days later in septic shock, and died three weeks later. (2009)
• a partially vaccinated 4-year-old girl who was being treated for acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) was exposed to a cousin with chicken pox and later developed multi-organ failure and died (2012)

Chicken pox has always been a deadly disease.

“In the prevaccine era, approximately 11,000 persons with varicella required hospitalization each year. Hospitalization rates were approximately 2 to 3 per 1,000 cases among healthy children and 8 per 1,000 cases among adults. Death occurred in approximately 1 in 60,000 cases. From 1990 through 1996, an average of 103 deaths from varicella were reported each year. Most deaths occur in immunocompetent children and adults”

Epidemiology and Prevention of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases

Although chicken pox is definitely riskier if you are older and have pre-existing medical problems, as you can see from these kids who died, many were otherwise healthy and many were very young.

And almost all were unvaccinated, even though a safe and effective chicken pox vaccine could have prevented these deaths and probably the exposures that led to the deaths of the high risk kids being treated for cancer.

More on Chicken Pox Deaths

• Chickenpox Claimed the Life of My Son Christopher
• Once a Childhood Rite of Passage, Chickenpox is Vaccine Preventable
• Stroke: An underappreciated complication of chickenpox that we should never see
• Five Varicella Deaths That Could Have Been Prevented
• Michigan Child’s Death Caused by Chickenpox
• Real-life accounts of people who have suffered or died from vaccine-preventable diseases
• MMWR – Notes from the Field: Varicella-Associated Death of a Vaccinated Child with Leukemia — California, 2012
• MMWR – Varicella Death of an Unvaccinated, Previously Healthy Adolescent — Ohio, 2009
• MMWR – Varicella-Related Deaths — United States, January 2003–June 2004
• MMWR – Varicella-Related Deaths — United States, 2002
• Indiana Girl Dies of Varicella
• MMWR – Varicella-Related Deaths — Florida, 1998
• MMWR – Varicella-Related Deaths Among Children — United States, 1997
• MMWR – Varicella-Related Deaths Among Adults — United States, 1997
• CDC – Monitoring the Impact of Varicella Vaccination
• Chickenpox can kill – it’s a myth to believe otherwise
• Parents put immunocompromised child at risk by not vaccinating sibling
• What’s the Big Deal About the Chickenpox?
• Chicken pox vaccination policy in the UK – did it cost Elana’s life?
• A Recent Case Report Highlights Why Skipping the Chickenpox Vaccine is a Bad Idea
• Orgies of Death – The Dangerous Tradition of Pox Parties and Measles Teas
• Meryl Dorey mocking death: claims chicken pox was never considered deadly
• The Chicken Pox Story
• Do Vaccines Cause Disseminated Varicella Infection?
• Epidemiology and Prevention of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases – 13th Edition (2015)