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Flu shots? For them or against ?

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  • billglitch
    billglitch Posts: 538 Member
    edited November 2016
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    the flu shot is just a guess as to the vaccine...no guarantees. I dont get them, never have and am not planning on it. Have not had the flu in over 30 years...I must be doing something right
  • MKEgal
    MKEgal Posts: 3,250 Member
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    Dnarules wrote:
    the shot is not 100% effective, but usually you will get a milder case in that situation. My daughter got the flu a few years back even though she had been vaccinated, but it was fairly mild.
    This was me last year. Got the shot first thing in September when it was available, and sometime in spring I got laid up with the flu for several days (missed several days of work, felt lousy for longer) to the point that I missed work & ended up seeing my doctor (who diagnosed flu & said other people who got the shot early were also getting it) BUT I didn't end up in the ER or ICU or morgue, which are all likely outcomes if I got the actual full-blown disease.
  • OneHundredToLose
    OneHundredToLose Posts: 8,534 Member
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    billglitch wrote: »
    the flu shot is just a guess as to the vaccine...no guarantees. I dont get them, never have and am not planning on it. Have not had the flu in over 30 years...I must be doing something right

    You're speaking from a position of ignorance. Please do some reading on how the flu shot works, what it protects against, and what it does not protect against before you speak authoritatively on the subject.
  • MKEgal
    MKEgal Posts: 3,250 Member
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    Fuzzipeg wrote:
    What is the medium the jab is cultured on? mostly egg white.
    So you get the kind that's not cultured in eggs.
    Next objection?

    .
    Fuzzipeg wrote:
    Many of this kind of intervention use mercury as a preservative? Can't they find anything better?
    If you get one that's a single-dose type, there's no preservative because there's no need for it.
    When using the multi-dose vials, the preservative is there to prevent people being infected with nasty things like fungus & bacteria. Thimerosol is not the bad form of mercury that builds up in the body & causes nerve problems.
    Most childhood vaccines don't use thimerosol any more anyway.
    Here are some informational pages:
    http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/thimerosal/index.html
    http://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/vaccine/thimerosal.htm
    http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6430a3.htm#Tab.
  • billglitch
    billglitch Posts: 538 Member
    edited November 2016
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    OneHundredToLose wrote: »
    billglitch wrote: »
    the flu shot is just a guess as to the vaccine...no guarantees. I dont get them, never have and am not planning on it. Have not had the flu in over 30 years...I must be doing something right

    You're speaking from a position of ignorance. Please do some reading on how the flu shot works, what it protects against, and what it does not protect against before you speak authoritatively on the subject.

    really? so they know exactly what strain is coming? NO they dont. Never said i was an authority...i gave my opinion and I thought thats what this was about. So take your arrogant crap and move on

  • MKEgal
    MKEgal Posts: 3,250 Member
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    CharlieBeansmomTracey wrote:
    the vaccine only covers like 4 strains and they are all the previous years strains. so anyone still can get the flu and pass it on to others.
    The scientists look at the strains which are circulating in areas where they're likely to come here next, and incorporate those into our vaccine.
    The number of strains varies by year, and yes, it's possible some unvaccinated traveler could bring any strain into the US (being a carrier while asymptomatic before developing the illness).
    I'd rather take my chances on blocking the most likely strains instead of being completely vulnerable.

    .
    it also takes the vaccine 2 weeks to become effective as well. so in those 2 weeks you can still get those strains.
    And if you never get vaccinated, you can always get those strains.
    What's your point? Get vaccinated as early as possible?

  • MKEgal
    MKEgal Posts: 3,250 Member
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    cqbkaju wrote:
    Lowering your immune system for a chance of immunity to the wrong strain just makes you more susceptible to other things while your body develops resistance to that strain.
    That's not how the immune system works. It doesn't focus all it has on one thing at a time.
    (Though if it's working on something serious, yes, its response to new challenges will be less / slower... a good reason to get immunized, teach it to recognize a disease instead of having to fight it with no preparation.)
    You're exposed to lots of allergens every day, possibly dozens depending on what's blooming or shedding or where you walk, etc.

    .
    The flu isn't like measles or polio.
    You'll live if you catch the flu and your quality of life will not be impacted for the long-term.
    Maybe if you are elderly, etc. it is more dangerous to catch the flu, but I am talking about myself now.
    Probably. Maybe not.
    Part of what made the 1918 pandemic (which hit 1/3 of the population of the planet and killed more than 2.5%, compared to less than 0.1% in a normal pre-vaccine flu season) so dangerous is that it killed otherwise healthy people in the prime of life.

    "age-specific death rates in the 1918 pandemic exhibited a distinct pattern that has not been documented before or since:
    a "W-shaped" curve, similar to the familiar U-shaped curve but with the addition of a third (middle) distinct peak of deaths in young adults ≈20–40 years of age.
    Influenza and pneumonia death rates for those 15–34 years of age in 1918–1919, for example, were >20 times higher than in previous years.
    Overall, nearly half of the influenza-related deaths in the 1918 pandemic were in young adults 20–40 years of age, a phenomenon unique to that pandemic year.
    The 1918 pandemic is also unique among influenza pandemics in that absolute risk of influenza death was higher in those <65 years of age than in those >65; persons <65 years of age accounted for >99% of all excess influenza-related deaths in 1918–1919."

    http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/05-0979_article
  • MKEgal
    MKEgal Posts: 3,250 Member
    edited November 2016
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    nvmomketo wrote:
    A girlfriend of mine had the chickenpox vaccine because she had never had it and wanted to be protected while trying to conceive. Within days she coincidentally developed chickenpox, with spots all over even though she does not believe she was exposed to it anywhere. The doctor adamantly argued that she contracted it before the shot. Coincidence.
    The doctor was uninformed, which is scary.

    I, too, developed a (fairly mild) case of chickenpox from being vaccinated, also as an adult. Spots here & there all over, very itchy, but nothing like the pictures in medical books of those poor unvaccinated children who are just covered in pox. :(
    Both the NP who originally saw me at the campus health clinic & the medical director (MD) she called in to confirm her diagnosis (because it is quite rare) were amazed.
  • nvmomketo
    nvmomketo Posts: 12,019 Member
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    MKEgal wrote: »
    nvmomketo wrote:
    A girlfriend of mine had the chickenpox vaccine because she had never had it and wanted to be protected while trying to conceive. Within days she coincidentally developed chickenpox, with spots all over even though she does not believe she was exposed to it anywhere. The doctor adamantly argued that she contracted it before the shot. Coincidence.
    The doctor was uninformed, which is scary.

    I, too, developed a (fairly mild) case of chickenpox from being vaccinated, also as an adult. Spots here & there all over, very itchy, but nothing like the pictures in medical books of those poor unvaccinated children who are just covered in pox. :(
    Both the NP who originally saw me at the campus health clinic & the medical director (MD) she called in to confirm her diagnosis (because it is quite rare) were amazed.

    I really wonder about chicken pox and the effectiveness of vaccinating. Since it stays in the body I think it might just be best to avoid it. This is coming from someone who had (diagnosed) chicken pox three times as a child and has had shingles once.
  • gillie80
    gillie80 Posts: 214 Member
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    as another immunosupressed buddy i get one every year. have luckily only had the flu a few times in my adolescent years, but if i got it now i'm pretty screwed. need to make my appointment soon for this years jag.
  • one1fast68
    one1fast68 Posts: 51 Member
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    I see a lot of posts about how many people die each year of the flu and how much lower your risk is of getting GBS...I personally have never known anyone that has died of the flu or know anyone that has told me they lost someone to flu. I do have a friend that lost his brother to GBS though. I'm just curious, because I see a lot of the statistics on the news - has anyone here known someone personally that has died of the flu?
  • RoteBook
    RoteBook Posts: 171 Member
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    one1fast68 wrote: »
    I see a lot of posts about how many people die each year of the flu and how much lower your risk is of getting GBS...I personally have never known anyone that has died of the flu or know anyone that has told me they lost someone to flu. I do have a friend that lost his brother to GBS though. I'm just curious, because I see a lot of the statistics on the news - has anyone here known someone personally that has died of the flu?

    My grandmother died of pneumonia secondary to flu, and my husband's grandfather died from the flu. I've met one person with GBS, and she contracted it after having the flu.
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