Flue Season is here- I opt out of flue shots.

[Tony_Scarpelli]

Try to get at least 15 minutes a day of direct sunlight more if possible. For some of us that gets difficult. Sol or room on our homes are more than just fancy rooms they can be a real contribution to health.



http://www.nvic.org/Vaccine-Memorial.aspx

 

[Jim Logajan]

Already got my flu shot for the season. Inoculation has been around over 300 years.

According to "The Epic History of Biology" by Anthony Serafini:

"Science would not be able to take even the most meager steps toward controlling smallpox until 1701, when the Italian physician Giacomo Pylarini single-handedly invented the field of immunology by inoculating several children in Constantinople with a primitive vaccine against smallpox; historians differ about the true success of his project.

By 1717, the wealthy English letter writer and amateur naturalist Lady Mary Wortley Montagu had introduced the practice of inoculation to England from Turkey, even venturing to have her own children vaccinated."
...
"In any event, a few years later, the American physician Zabdiel Boylston introduced a version of Pylarini's vaccine to America while the ravaging contagion was tearing into the city of Boston. So far as historians can tell, the results appear to have been favorable."

 

[Jim Logajan]

But hospitals can make you sick, and sitting around with a bunch of people waiting for a shot is pretty much a guarantee that you're sitting around with at least some that already have the flu.

A hospital is not the usual place to get a flu shot. There should be pharmacies in your area where you can get them.

 

[Jim Logajan]

Welp, those are certainly some mainstream, well known websites...

Proof positive that any whackjob can create a website...
:lol:

Not the best reasoning to discount their content. The problem I see with them is that none of the information presented in them is relevant to whether this season's flu shot is safe or effective.

Specifically, even if the Merck vaccine fraud is true, it would be no more relevant to the current flu shots than a single case of fraud X in field of human endeavor Y proving anything about field Y.

And unless the flu shots used a live virus, the article mentioning live polio vaccines causing polio isn't relevant either.

The statistical arguments that point out that polio was declining anyway so the vaccine might not have nothing to do with further decline appear to be restatements of the rule that correlation does not prove causation. The same principle, ironically, would indicate that the polio stats say nothing about the safety and efficacy of the current flu shots. One has to look at the underlying molecular biology and what is known about the immune system and see if the claims makes sense or not.

The science, as best I can tell, seems to point to vaccination as effective and generally safe. On balance the stats indicate one is better off getting vaccinated than not.

 

[Jim Logajan]

"Manufacturers have projected that they will produce between 135 million and 139 million doses of influenza vaccine for use in the United States during the 2013-2014 influenza season. An estimated 30 million to 32 million of these doses will be quadrivalent flu vaccine. The rest will be trivalent flu vaccine."


Does anyone know which flu vaccine they got? Do we have a choice, or is it pot luck?

According to http://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/vaccine/general.htm :

"For 2013-2014, all live attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV), the nasal spray vaccine, is quadrivalent."

So all the quadrivalent is administered as a nasal spray. If you got a shot, then you got trivalent. The CDC link provides more details on the differences.

 

[Jim Logajan]

Am I wrong that vaccinations can never do harm?

You are wrong to say they can do no good.

Am I wrong that vaccinations are not always 100% effective nor 50% effective?

You are wrong to say the effectiveness is 0% or near zero.

Am I wrong that FDA cannot be completely trusted to deliver drugs that do not harm us?
Am I wrong that the drug companies influence over FDA is too strong and not health for America?
Am I wrong that many drugs get through FDA that cause more harm than good?
Am I wrong that a drug not need be better than less risky alternatives to be approved and accepted by FDA?

I personally think the FDA should either be abolished or changed so that it only regulates safety, not efficacy, of food and drugs. But none of your rhetorical FDA questions seem to have anything to do with vaccination per se.

Am I wrong that a drug need be no more effective than white apple vinegar is to reduce high blood sugar to be approved as an expensive potentially dangerous drug?
Am I wrong that we do not know all the ramifications on every system in the body or interactions between chemicals on every drug released into the system?

You don't even know the ramifications of the foods you eat. I bet you still eat, though. How do you decide which foods to eat?

Am I wrong that simple things like good nutrician, exercise and sunlight daily and normal sleep have more to do with your good health and resistance to most of these maladies than vaccinations based on the efficacy studies of these same vaccinations?

Yes, VERY wrong. Half of the deaths during 1918 influenza pandemic occurred in the healthiest age group - 20 to 40 years of age (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza_pandemic) The 1918 pandemic killed between 20 and 100 million people worldwide.

Am I wrong that money corrupts? Am I wrong that we are talking about enough money that it corrupts almost absolutely?
Am I wrong that Drug companies commission and pay for studies on their proposed drugs and then do not submit those studies that do not support their application for approval to FDA?

You are wrong to assume that a yes answer to these rhetorical questions prove anything useful.

Am I wrong that there is an industry of research facilities setup to work out studies that will give only the most positive results on outcomes paid for by those companies, which are submitted to FDA for approvals?

Which facility is this?

Am I wrong that there are billions of dollars thrown around in this mostly government funded mandate?

What mandate are you talking about? I was not aware anyone was forced to get a flu shot.

Am I wrong that Richard Rumsfeld was chief counsel for Monsanto and later became asst director of FDA and largely stopped government efforts to label genetically altered foods?

Am I wrong to not worry about genetically altered foods because humans have been genetically altering foods for thousands of years before Rumsfeld was born?

How does a lawyer have the expert knowledge to run FDA?

The FDA is a regulatory agency, so legal expertise is a requirement. If they could find someone who also had scientific training that would of course be helpful.

Am I wrong that there could be other "most important" motives to support a US capacity to do chemical and biological (warfare) research which is otherwise outlawed by international conventions?

I don't understand this rhetorical question. Please rephrase.