However, shingles, which is a painful recurrence of chickenpox, mostly in adults, has become an epidemic that is directly related to the vaccine. Shingles is far more serious and life-threatening than chicken pox. The bottom line is that billions of dollars are spent on vaccinating children to reduce the rate of a relatively mild childhood disease only to make them more susceptible to the same virus as adults causing serious illness (more medical bills) and even death. Big Pharma wins at both ends of the cycle. –GEG

When I was a child, nearly everybody became ill with chickenpox.  Like nearly all kids, when I became ill with it, I stayed home from school about a week and fully recovered.

All that changed in 1995, when the FDA licensed and approved the live attenuated chickenpox (varicella) vaccine in persons aged >12 months.  After the vaccine began to be used by most children, the incidence of chickenpox rapidly declined.  However, due to continual outbreaks of chickenpox, a second dose of the chickenpox vaccine was added to the childhood immunization schedule in 2006.