Children adopted from countries such as Russia, China, and Guatemala may not be protected against polio, measles, or other diseases despite records indicating they have been immunized, according to a report in the May issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.
According to the report, U.S. families have adopted almost 250,000 foreign-born children in the past 15 years. Many of those children were living in orphanages or other institutional settings with few resources and are likely to have incomplete immunization records or none at all.
When valid written records do exist, the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Disease advises that they could be considered as evidence of previous vaccination. However, there are reasons to suspect that the records may not accurately reflect immunity, including "documentation inaccuracies, lack of vaccine potency and impaired immune response, possibly due to stress or malnutrition."
Most of the adopted children came from Russia (41.7 percent), China (20.9 percent) or Guatemala (15.7 percent). The report found that children from China were less likely to have immunity than those from Russia. The report authors say the value of immunization records may be limited because records are falsified, entries are inaccurate, and the vaccines aren't potent enough.
Revaccination may be a cost-effective option for parents whose children do not show immunity, the authors say.
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