Chickenpox: To vaccinate or not?

As more states consider requiring schoolchildren to have chickenpox vaccinations, new research finds that the shot’s effectiveness declines significantly after the first year. But vaccinated children who do contract chickenpox tend to have milder cases of the viral infection.

Read the study in the Feb. 18 Journal of the American Medical Association.

And in this coming Sunday’s Spokesman-Review, look for my story on a 10-year-old boy whose chickenpox turned into necrotizing fasciitis, also known as “flesh-eating disease.” Chickenpox complications are rare, but can be grave.