In The Ladies' Room With Dr. Donnica

Topic: “World Meningitis Day: Have Your Children Been Vaccinated for Meningitis B?” Guests: Patti Wukovits and Alicia Stillman For more information: www.MeningitisBActionProject.org We’ve heard a lot about the measles outbreak recently. This is a travesty on so many levels because measles is a highly contagious but vaccine preventable illnesses that was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000. Today, in support of World Meningitis Day, we’re going to talk about another vaccine preventable illness starting with M: meningitis. Our guests are both meningitis B advocates for the worst possible reason: they each lost a teenaged daughter to the disease, before a meningitis B vaccine was available in the US. While the meningitis conjugated vaccines have been available for 4 other strains of meningitis since 2005 (Menactra ®  and Menveo ® ), the first meningitis vaccine was available since 1978. The meningitis B vaccine, however, only became available in the US in late 2014 (Bexsero ®  and Trumenba ® ).