The Flu and Flu Shotts

Careful, Dos. Went through this recently and eventually they put Mom in the Memory Unit. From there, it goes downhill very quickly.

Be ready, and be strong.

 

I worked for pharma for 35 years. They DO NOT want or even like being in the flu vaccine business--they are required to do so by government. If the maker comes up with a vaccine for an important disease, they then can trade off, and hand their vaccine making business to another maker. Example--In 1982, Merck was allowed to discontinue their Fluax product, as they released their first hep-b vaccine (Heptavax). Then GSK or other was assigned the flu vaccine responsibility. So, stop suspecting pharma for all your evils. Picture your world without them--you would be dancing around sick beds, with maracas, feathers, and sprinkling goober dust around the bedridden ill patients bed, wearing a bulls head for effect.......<grin>....maybe you do anyway????

 

Why the current media hype about getting your flu shot - read the last paragraph to understand the media hype
CDC — INFLUENZA DEATHS: REQUEST FOR CORRECTION (RFC)

US data on influenza deaths are false and misleading. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) acknowledges a difference between flu death and flu associated death yet uses the terms interchangeably. Additionally, there are significant statistical incompatibilities between official estimates and national vital statistics data. Compounding these problems is a marketing of fear—a CDC communications strategy in which medical experts "predict dire outcomes" during flu seasons.

https://aspe.hhs.gov/cdc-—-influenza-deaths-request-correction-rfc

 

I had the flu when I was in high school... I died

 

only a third of the flu shots actually prevented the flu this year meaning the flu shot was extremely ineffective. not only that but the certain strain they call H1N1 I believe which is the part that makes people very sick was not prevented at all from this years flu shot. I never get a flu shot and never get the flu but I exercise 6 days per week im not as jacked as jersey shred machine but i am in good fitness and I think this helps prevent getting the flu more than a flu shot.

 

Are you in a "better place"?? How is the surf there??

 

Nope-it doesn't. Inhale the bug in you, and you will get sick.

 

I am a physician (MD, MPH, trained in internal medicine, pediatrics and gastroenterology) and I, as well as every one of my colleagues, would recommend that people get their flu shot. Some people believe that the shot makes them sick, but what they are experiencing is a viral-like immunologic reaction to the antigenic proteins in the shot itself. This may be slightly unpleasant for a couple days, but is NOTHING compared to actually getting the flu.

The concept of herd immunity is also critical and has not been mentioned here yet. Vaccines only work to prevent illness from spreading through a population if enough people get them. This is why we have been seeing outbreaks of rare illness (measles, mumps, etc...) start to re-emerge in the wake of the anti-vaxxer BS.

The 600+ bed tertiary care hospital that I trained at requires that all employees get their flu shot (save for a very narrow number of medical or religious exclusions). If you don't, you are not allowed to work. This is done to protect vulnerable patients, but it is also a testament to the solid evidence / data / science (whatever word scares you the least) behind the vaccine. The hospital would not do this if the shot really made people sick, as they could not afford to lose their workforce.

 

O Barry, are you trying to take a swipe at Santeria? Is nothing sacred to you?

 

Yeah dude that crap will fark you up. Just get the shot and be done with it.

Got a respiratory infection somehow, didn't get the flu tho. Going to see the good Doc and grab some killer antibiotics and yummy cough sizzrup with codeine.

 

(Oh you worked for pharma and therefore...)required by the government and PAID by the government. There is a lot of money going back to the flu vaccine manufacture. If you say or think otherwise you are quite mistaken.

 

Yes- but they LOSE money on vaccines--always has been that way. They have to accept RETURNS once the season is over. then they have to pay back to the government the value of the returns (unused vaccine doses). It is you that is mistaken--stick to the arenas you know about; I will stick to mine.

 

I love Chupacabras!!!

 

Barry, I live in PR, we don't vote, thankfully.
Go get your shot, trust the mercury, aluminum, and formaldehyde. They'll keep you healthy.
Call it a garbage site because you don't like to read alternatives to THE MEDICAL PROFESSION. After all, doctors are "practicing" medicine. You're the guinea pig. How about the CDC- is that zero science?

"Not only does this influenza strain produce a more intense and deadly flu, the flu vaccine is less effective against it. This Centers for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) article discusses a study published in The Lancet spanning 11 years that demonstrates H3N2 is more resistant to the flu vaccine. … the flu vaccine demonstrates only a 33% vaccine effective (VE) rate with the average H3N2 strain… To make matters worse, this year’s flu vaccine isn’t even close to the average 33% VE rate of prior years. This year’s vaccine is performing at approximately a 10% VE rate.

 

I kno

I know you live in PR--been there done that.
As for the vaccine--you are allowing ONE area of healthcare needing to improve, to cloud your vision of medicine. Those that rely on science KNOW the vaccine this year is falling way short for H3N2, but, that is NOT her only strain. That being said, it does need to improve
The alternatives to medicine, i.e. homeopathy, chiropracty, acupuncture, and others...are witchcraft, nothing else. They are supported by ignorance in scientific knowledge, especially so in Americans who detest the sciences (as you sound to do) because it is too much work to understand it.
BTW, mercury has not been in childhood vaccines for years--it was called thiomerosal, long gone even though it provided no problem to patients.
Have fun with your witches brew........I will stick with the sciences.....

 

i had tuberculosis as a kid. not that weak azz atypical kind. full blown TB. they removed lymph nodes an scraped some bone from my jaw.

true story. what y'all got on that?

 

I am not a supporter of the flu shot, never had one; but, to answer your question...anecdotal data and statistical data are not the same thing.

 

Sorry Kyle but that did little to answer my question. I never said they are the same thing and as far as I can tell, if I got my shot this year, statistically I wasn’t much better off. Not sure of your point. I’ll take my anecdotal evidence considering I’m the “healthy” one who manages to stay clear of it year in and year out while those who fret over it end up in the hospital.

 

Lunger