Doctor Mihai Craiu draws attention that measles is not “a simple cold” and that it is not necessary for a child to make the disease for “better immunity”instead of the MMR vaccine. The well-known pediatrician reported a troubling personal incident on the Facebook page of the Virtual Children’s Hospital.
“Various excited voices have commented, in the spirit of long-held public positions, on the news that US government health authorities have changed the recommended childhood vaccination schedule. And they took further than the official announcement, the speculations about the futility of vaccination in children, using, among other things, the three “refrains” so often repeated:
1. «.disease X is a fad, being a simple cold »,
2. « when we were kids we all got disease X and nothing happened »,
3. « immunity for disease X is much better if you get the disease compared to immunity conferred by vaccination».
The pediatrician warns that there are many incorrect statements in the public space and in social media about infectious diseases and vaccination.
“Decisions regarding vaccination or its refusal should only be made by informed parents. Preferably from medical sources“, says the doctor, in the same post.
“Measles can cause fatal complications in some children”
Mihai Craiu reported a few tragic cases in which children diagnosed with measles died as a result of complications:
“Today only about measles or measles, as it is called in common speech, in Romania. Measles is not «just a cold ». Measles can cause fatal complications in some children. Even in those countries that have well-resourced medical systems!
I was recently reading a sad news story from Israel, where a previously healthy 11-month-old girl died of complications from measles despite highly sophisticated intensive care with ECMO life support. The Ministry of Health in Israel announces that this child was not vaccinated. And that this is the 12th death from complications of measles recorded in this country in recent times.
And in Canada, where at the end of last year there were more than 5000 cases of measles, only in 2025, deaths occurred. In Alberta, the death of an infant born prematurely was announced in October.”
“You can do after some years a deadly complication”
The doctor warns that, in the case of measles, complications can appear years after diagnosis:
“And if you didn’t immediately make complications at the time of the acute illness, you’re still not 100% that you’ve … escaped. Sometimes you can do it after some years a fatal complication, called PESS (Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis). I don’t want to argue with anyone but just to inform you that it is NOT measles «just a cold»! Many «lawyer» those of the anti-vaccination trend appeal to emotional accounts such as “I met a parent whose child had complications after vaccination, I heard that a child from the city … allegedly had severe complications after having a vaccine”.
“Damn dad, if you want to keep this little one, take him to the doctor”
The well-known pediatrician related an incident from three decades ago, which still troubles him today.
“Let me also appeal to your emotions by telling you a personal story. Not heard, read, etc. but personal. Qn 1995, when our son was born, my wife went to her grandfather. To show him the great-grandson. I even immortalized, in a photo, the emotion of the moment, with the 4 generations (my mother-in-law was also in the photo).
A single sentence was uttered by the visibly moved senior: «Dammit, father, if you want to keep this little one, take him to the doctor. To give him that injection which is called a vaccine». Then she fell silent and continued to cry, looking at her great-grandson. At first I did not understand the intensity of the emotion, but later, talking with my mother-in-law, I understood the reason for the sadness. The family’s only boy had died of complications from measles at the age of one..
“Let’s go to the cemetery in Slănic Prahova together”
Mihai Craiu added in the post on the page of the Virtual Children’s Hospital:
“For those who still believe that it is better to get sick, so that they have better immunity, I would like to ask them to go to the cemetery in Slănic Prahova together.
Let’s light a candle, quietly, and sit back in front of the cross on which Nicolae writes… 1933-1934. For me it really is personal. Two days ago I went to the cemetery and lit candles. For Nicolae, for great-grandfather and for mother Cristina”.
