Vaccination and Chronic Disease
In my experience, chronic disease occurs more frequently in heavily vaccinated horses, and I believe I know why this happens. To understand why this occurs though, you must first understand how vaccinations work. The actual vaccine injected into the horse does not in and of itself provide protection from disease. This is very important to understand. It is the response of the individual horse's immune system to the vaccine that determines whether or not the horse will be protected.

The vaccine is an antigen designed to trigger a specific antibody reaction so that the next time the immune system "sees" this antigen it will react quickly to combat it. This sounds like a great plan and, with a good quality vaccine and a strong immune system, has the potential to work. The problem is that many diseases don't produce good antigens, so toxic substances called adjuvants must be added to the vaccine in order to trigger a reaction by the immune system. These adjuvants can take several forms, including toxic heavy metals like mercury, and can cause their own problems, sometimes quite serious. Also, the immunity following many vaccines is very short-lived, requiring injections to be given as often as every two months. Would you allow yourself to be vaccinated every two months?

Thanks for reading this preview! The remainder of this section in Holistic Horsekeeping offers a metaphor for how vaccines affect the immune system and a long-term case study that highlights both these effects and the effects of a holistic approach to immunity. This section also outlines the potential adverse effects of vaccination over long periods of time.