chickenpox parties – For decades, some parents tried to schedule chickenpox so children would get the infection “over and done with” in a controlled setting. With the varicella vaccine now widely available, the strategy has largely faded—despite the virus still being able to sprea
When Ciara DiVita thinks back on chickenpox, she doesn’t remember a medical chart or a textbook warning.. She remembers the itch—relentless, all-consuming.. She was 3 years old when she caught the virus. and her family made her wear oven mitts to stop her scratching.. She also remembers being taken to hang out with her cousin while her body was covered in blisters. with one goal in mind: deliberately infect the other child.
DiVita is now 30, and she says she was the second link in a chain her parents set in motion.. They took her to catch chickenpox from an infectious friend. imagining that. once she was contagious. the infection would pass along.. “I imagine the chain continued and my cousin gave it to someone else at a chickenpox play date,” she says.
Three decades have changed how families talk about chickenpox.. Most importantly. there’s a chickenpox vaccine—successful enough that children today are much less likely to encounter the virus at school or on the playground.. In temperate countries such as the UK and the US. the disease used to be widespread: around 90 percent of children caught chickenpox before adolescence.. In tropical countries, the average age of infection is higher.
The logic behind chickenpox parties was never about chickens.. It was about timing—and fear of what the infection can do later.. Chickenpox is caused by the varicella-zoster virus. and one theory for the name points to the French word for chickpea. “pois chiche. ” because the round bumps can resemble their size and shape.. Most cases in children are mild and self-limiting, but in adolescents and adults the infection can be far more dangerous.
Maureen Tierney. associate dean of clinical research and public health at Creighton University in Omaha. Nebraska. describes the original reasoning for the “get it over and done with” approach.. “You were trying to have your child get the disease when they were at the greatest chance of not having complications. ” she says. adding that generally speaking. the older the patient. the more severe the infection can become.
In children, that risk often feels distant. But Tierney says she has seen the danger in adults. “I had an otherwise healthy adult patient who died of chickenpox pneumonia when I was first practicing,” she says. “You never forget those scenarios.”
The virus moves fast. It spreads through respiratory droplets and contact with fluid from the blisters. If one child catches it in a setting where unvaccinated kids are close together—siblings and classmates are often next.
Before social media made trends easy to track, the strategy spread through communities: schoolyard chatter, church groups, pediatric waiting rooms.. Families swapped practical tips for the symptoms. including oatmeal baths and calamine lotion. and arranged get-togethers when a child was believed to be infectious—despite the practice never being an official medical recommendation.
Monica Abdelnour. a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Phoenix Children’s Hospital. says the appeal was rooted in a desire to control the experience.. “They thought. well. if it’s going to happen to my kid anyway. it might as well happen in a controlled environment. ” she says.. “The families were ready to encounter this infection, deal with it, and then move on.”
The problem is that chickenpox doesn’t just cause discomfort.. While most children recover within a week or two, about three in every 1,000 infected people develop severe complications.. Those can include pneumonia, serious bacterial skin infections, encephalitis—inflammation of the brain—or meningitis.
Today. with vaccination reducing exposure. chickenpox parties are widely viewed as a relic—something Gen X and millennial children were subjected to before vaccines became routine.. But even as the practice has faded, the virus hasn’t.. Varicella remains highly contagious. and for families without protection. the old chain still has a way of restarting—one itchy. blistered link at a time.
chickenpox vaccine varicella-zoster virus chickenpox parties infectious disease public health pediatric infections