Marek's Dz is typically a disease of young chickens around 4 months old. It is also called range paralysis, which describes how it looks. The birds get an inflammation of the nerves and can no longer walk. Some get over it, some don't. Those that do will likely be carriers. Marek's vaccine is typically the only vaccine that is recommended for ALL chickens. You can breed for resistance to the disease, but bear in mind that it takes work and you will lose a fair number of birds in your early years. You also won't make a lot of friends if you sell chicks that are unvaccinated and forget to warn people of that fact and the sold chicks eventually get the disease.
The vaccine is injected in the back of the neck at 1 day of age. You can purchase the vaccine online from places like Jeffers livestock. It is about $10 for a 1000 dose bottle. Unfortunately, it has to be used within an hour of opening, so for me I am sometimes paying $10 to vaccinate 2 or 3 chicks. If you are not familiar with giving vaccines to your pets, horse or other livestock you may want to have your vet or another poultry person do the vaccine. Word of warning, unless your vet is a specific poultry vet, he/she will not have the vaccine on hand and will probably not know where to buy it. If you are going to have the vet do it, I would call and discuss it well beforehand so the vet or you can order the vaccine.
If you are interested in the vaccines recommended for poultry I suggest you check out the APA site.
www.amerpoultryassn.com They have a section on health that is very good for info on vaccines.
Those who live in the SF bay area can contact me. I have most of the recommended vaccines on hand and we can maybe coordinate vaccininations.
