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Flu shots? For them or against ?
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janejellyroll wrote: »WYMANT0004 wrote: »...
You might think from all of the above that I get the flu shot but the truth is I do not. There is a long reason behind why but I will just do the TL;DR version here -- I have my personal reasons and they quite literally apply to only me. However, for every other recommended vaccine (and quite a few others to boot, perks of my job) I have taken stab after stab after stab. And I will continue to do so for the simple fact that vaccines save lives. Period. End of discussion. You simply cannot argue with the numbers
What that chart does NOT show is the instances of where there were little or no occurrences of something pre-vaccine era but many after. Are there any? And any suspected ties to vaccines? Just asking.
Err.
Why would a vaccine be developed and distributed if there were few or no occurrences of the disease the vaccine is supposed to prevent? I mean, there ARE vaccines developed for really nasty diseases that have a low incidence rate, but the vaccines are not distributed except to the few known to be at risk unless and until there's an outbreak. So, even if there's a bad reaction to the vaccine it'd be confined to those few.
Unless you're talking about vaccines spreading disease? There have been incidents where batches of vaccines were contaminated with other bugs, or used adjuvants that had not great side effects, or contained live and active virus rather than dead or live attenuated. One of the better known was an incident in the 50's where some batches of polio virus made by a particular company passed safety inspections but contained live virus (it was supposed to be dead). There were a couple of hundred cases of polio attributed to those faulty vaccines.
Oh, here's one that might be more what you mean: cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd-vac/rotavirus/vac-rotashield-historical.htm
An association of a particular vaccine and intussusception in infants under 1yr. Vaccine was pulled from production.
I was talking about any problems that may have been caused by vaccines. I don't want to mention any specific examples because then someone will accuse me of blaming vaccines when I'm not... I'm just curious. I know there's been speculation about vaccines over the long term causing other problems. Some say there's no proof of ties to vaccines. But if there are any issues that chart would not show them.
You say "some say" there is no proof of ties to vaccines. I suppose that means that others say there is proof of such a tie? What data are they referring to when they make that claim?
I'm asking someone who seemed to have a lot of answers and is up on the subject a question. "Some say" include some earlier in this thread and elsewhere. I'm not going to argue about it.
If I understand what you are asking - you want to know if any medical conditions have increased in incident rate since the development of vaccines (in general, and perhaps since specific ones were developed)? Sure. Vaccines allow more children to live past age five (early child mortality rates were absolutely devastating prior to the development of vaccines). Vaccines allow adults to live longer too, though the impact is not as astounding. That means more people make it to old age, so yes, since vaccines were developed we've seen more medical problems, especially those attributable to old age. Because we now live longer. Because of vaccines doing such a wonderful job of preventing early demise. No, vaccines don't cause these medical issues. Vaccines cause us to live long enough to see these medical issues happen.
Unless you are talking about autism. In that case know that Andrew Wakefield was a fraud whose work was thoroughly debunked, and we know from extensive research that vaccines most assuredly do not cause autism. The rate of autism spectrum disorders has risen due to better diagnostics, as well as a broader definition of the disorder. The rate is the same in the vaccinated as well as unvaccinated populations. Just because we don't know exactly why something happens doesn't mean vaccines caused it, no matter how much washed up playboy playmates want you to believe that.
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tlflag1620 wrote: »Gallowmere1984 wrote: »tlflag1620 wrote: »Haven't read all the replies yet but - I get a flu shot every year. Never had one before having kids (and never has the flu). Once I had children I started getting the yearly jab. Still have never had the flu. I might not die or develop serious complications from the flu (right now I'm young and healthy so low risk), but I have four children, two of whom are under six. They get the shot yearly, my husband does as well (military), so I do it for solidarity, to prevent spreading it to others both in and out of my household, and because I cannot afford to be deathly ill for two plus weeks! The only negative is that a day or two later I'll feel kind of punky. But that's a good sign - it means I'm having an immune response and the shot is doing what it's supposed to do! A heck of a lot better than actually getting sick.
Off to read the rest of the thread....
That's because I am quite convinced that public schools are a long term social experiment to see if people are stupid enough to set off another plague epidemic via children, because it's much easier than the effort ot expense of private education.
Pretty sure that no more efficient microbe incubators exist, outside of a contaminated AIDS ward.
Did I miss something? Yes, putting large groups of people in a confined space (dorms, workplaces, barracks, prisons, and, yes, school, both public and private) means viruses will be spread more readily (that's why people get sick more often in the cold months - not that the cold weather has an effect, but people tend to congregate indoors together and spread their germs). So yes, having two school aged children means more germs get brought home. But no one in my house has ever had the flu (we all get vaccinated every October). Really my kids are pretty healthy (knock on wood). They get colds from time to time, sure. The older two have only had a handful of ear infections between them, the younger two have never had ear infections (yet), none of them have had strep throat (I used to get that like clockwork every year as a child).... We did have the norovirus sweep through the house last year, but there is no vax for that (and fortunately it is short lived and only 4/6 of us got hit hard, me and my at-the-time three year old seem to be resistant against that particular nasty). All in all we don't get sick much, and it's rare for us to need medical attention when we do get sick.
Anywho... I guess I'm not understanding your comment. I get vax for the flu each year (and stay utd on other vax) to protect my children and my community, as well as myself. Before I had kids being out of commission for a couple weeks wouldn't have been such a big issue. With four kids to take care of I can't take the chance <shrug>. Not sure what that has to do with public school....
Interestingly, temperature does have an impact on the flu. In temperate zones, the flu is more likely in cooler temps. Humidity plays a role as well.0 -
angelexperiment wrote: »Nope not since about 2005 when I saw they did not work, and made you sicker than if you got it and how sick it made children. Interesting but since then I've been sick 3 times. And these days they are putting more and mor things in there and it's killing people or injuring them. I'll deal with a cold or flu. People fighting cancer especially should not take the flu shot. Or while under chemo. I've seen that first hand and it tells you if you are immuno suppressed you should not take the flu shot. But it's pushed a lot every where you go or while you are pregnant.
What a huge steaming pile of horse manure. Everything you posted is factually incorrect. Care to post any reputable research to prove any of this pseudoscientific babble? You clearly have no idea what you are talking about and are just regurgitating what you read from some antivax loon.
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tlflag1620 wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »WYMANT0004 wrote: »...
You might think from all of the above that I get the flu shot but the truth is I do not. There is a long reason behind why but I will just do the TL;DR version here -- I have my personal reasons and they quite literally apply to only me. However, for every other recommended vaccine (and quite a few others to boot, perks of my job) I have taken stab after stab after stab. And I will continue to do so for the simple fact that vaccines save lives. Period. End of discussion. You simply cannot argue with the numbers
What that chart does NOT show is the instances of where there were little or no occurrences of something pre-vaccine era but many after. Are there any? And any suspected ties to vaccines? Just asking.
Err.
Why would a vaccine be developed and distributed if there were few or no occurrences of the disease the vaccine is supposed to prevent? I mean, there ARE vaccines developed for really nasty diseases that have a low incidence rate, but the vaccines are not distributed except to the few known to be at risk unless and until there's an outbreak. So, even if there's a bad reaction to the vaccine it'd be confined to those few.
Unless you're talking about vaccines spreading disease? There have been incidents where batches of vaccines were contaminated with other bugs, or used adjuvants that had not great side effects, or contained live and active virus rather than dead or live attenuated. One of the better known was an incident in the 50's where some batches of polio virus made by a particular company passed safety inspections but contained live virus (it was supposed to be dead). There were a couple of hundred cases of polio attributed to those faulty vaccines.
Oh, here's one that might be more what you mean: cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd-vac/rotavirus/vac-rotashield-historical.htm
An association of a particular vaccine and intussusception in infants under 1yr. Vaccine was pulled from production.
I was talking about any problems that may have been caused by vaccines. I don't want to mention any specific examples because then someone will accuse me of blaming vaccines when I'm not... I'm just curious. I know there's been speculation about vaccines over the long term causing other problems. Some say there's no proof of ties to vaccines. But if there are any issues that chart would not show them.
You say "some say" there is no proof of ties to vaccines. I suppose that means that others say there is proof of such a tie? What data are they referring to when they make that claim?
I'm asking someone who seemed to have a lot of answers and is up on the subject a question. "Some say" include some earlier in this thread and elsewhere. I'm not going to argue about it.
If I understand what you are asking - you want to know if any medical conditions have increased in incident rate since the development of vaccines (in general, and perhaps since specific ones were developed)? Sure. Vaccines allow more children to live past age five (early child mortality rates were absolutely devastating prior to the development of vaccines). Vaccines allow adults to live longer too, though the impact is not as astounding. That means more people make it to old age, so yes, since vaccines were developed we've seen more medical problems, especially those attributable to old age. Because we now live longer. Because of vaccines doing such a wonderful job of preventing early demise. No, vaccines don't cause these medical issues. Vaccines cause us to live long enough to see these medical issues happen.
Unless you are talking about autism. In that case know that Andrew Wakefield was a fraud whose work was thoroughly debunked, and we know from extensive research that vaccines most assuredly do not cause autism. The rate of autism spectrum disorders has risen due to better diagnostics, as well as a broader definition of the disorder. The rate is the same in the vaccinated as well as unvaccinated populations. Just because we don't know exactly why something happens doesn't mean vaccines caused it, no matter how much washed up playboy playmates want you to believe that.
Your first paragraph basically backs what is on the chart. The second parahraph is more the kind of thing I was wondering about. Snarky remarks are unnecessary.1 -
In general these discussions boil down to:
A. I get my information from doctors and peer reviewed science. People who have studied medical stuff say to do X, so I do X.
B. I saw something on a blog with "healthy and clean" in the title/a celebrity said/my facebook friends think X. People I know on social media must be right. There was a meme. I swear.
c. Meh. I read some of the science, but this has not personally affected me yet, so I don't get off of my *kitten* and do anything. Maybe when I'm in a higher risk group I'll get vaccinated.
Sometimes you can turn a C into an A, sometimes you can turn a B into a C, but any attempts to turn a B into an A lead straight to the flaming.
I am glad these discussions keep happening, because more people should realize that "some guy said" isn't the same as "scientific research."16 -
I'd like to offer something different. About two months ago, my otherwise extremely fit and active, spry mother in her 70's was discovered to have a mass in her kidney. It was cancer. It was huge.
She was sent to a specialized hospital because removal of her kidney was so risky with the size of the mass. As they removed her kidney and the 17 centimeters of cancer within it, they discovered it had pressed up onto her spleen and pancreas due to it's size. Her spleen tore and she started bleeding out. They were prepared for this, gave her transfusions and removed the spleen. Just in time.
This was 3 weeks ago. She had 17 immunizations last week because her immune system will never be the same. Aside from a new flu, pneumonia and shingles, she needed every last booster. Every last thing she'd been vaccinated against since she could be vaccinated, and those new vaccinations won't work nearly as well as they should, because her immune system is now screwed. A fever is a medical emergency. Influenza (ya know, the flu) will likely be a fatal event. She has a bottle of meds she will carry for life in case she feels like she has a cold. Anti-vaxxers and their little petri dish children are now a constant threat of death for her. Herd immunity is real. Anti-vax "do your research" consists of Mommy Blogs and youtube videos and a lot of garbage. Andrew Wakefield is a proven fraud.
One of you refusing your flu shot based on anecdotal or blog nonsense can likely kill my mother, who has kept herself in shape and still chooses to work, because of your "feelings" and lack of knowledge. This isn't funny. There are people in the third world dying of preventable diseases. Same here in the first world because of stupidity and first world privilege. She lived through polio in her childhood, and some dummy refusing a flu shot is now a threat to her life.
I hate the world.25 -
Of course. I have a baby with a weak immune system. Adults who are around children or have children in public school who refuse to vaccinate are being negligent. Herd immunity is very real and it protects those children/elderly with weak immune systems.
I'm so sorry. You have a child who is immune compromised and our "plug our ears and sing lalalalalla" society is endangering them.6 -
I've never thought about getting one myself but my 6 year old had a letter through inviting him to go for the nasal spray one, I did some research and it even says on the box that it isn't proven to stop influenza which to me rings alarm bells as to why they'd give it.0
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Nothing for me to debate on the matter. had it this year 'cos free at work. I work with the elderly. Haven't had flu since i can remember. didn't do me any harm so just go with the flow. given up worrying about efeects and is it or is it not ok. I had more stuff injected into me in the Gulf War and seem to be ok from that.1
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Oh God. Could we PLEASE petition for a norovirus vaccine?!?!?! I and my entire family would be first in line every year! Never fails - January through March, my daughters and I get it, and usually one of us winds up in the ER because I am worried about one of my kiddos dehydrating. Definitely not the best way to lose 7-12 lbs.10 -
I'm against them for me personally because the one year I got a flu shot, I got the worst case of flu I've probably ever had about a week after getting the shot. I rarely ever get sick, but I sure did that year. Maybe it was just a coincidence, but I've never gotten one again since.
I'm not at all against them in general, not against them being offered, not against other people getting them if they so choose. I'm not an anti-vaxxer and have no tinfoil hat theories about them.
It's a coincidence. The shot cannot give you the flu. It's not a live virus in the shot.6 -
I usually get one every fall. I haven't had a bad cold or flu the years I've done it. The only reason I don't get them is because I absolutely hate needles and I wimp out occasionally. I seriously have to pump myself up to go in and have it done. I am always glad once I've done it. I've never had a bad reaction other than a little headache from the shots.1
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I think it's benefitu speciality if healthcare covers it1
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Agreed0
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angelexperiment wrote: »Nope not since about 2005 when I saw they did not work, and made you sicker than if you got it and how sick it made children. Interesting but since then I've been sick 3 times. And these days they are putting more and mor things in there and it's killing people or injuring them. I'll deal with a cold or flu. People fighting cancer especially should not take the flu shot. Or while under chemo. I've seen that first hand and it tells you if you are immuno suppressed you should not take the flu shot. But it's pushed a lot every where you go or while you are pregnant.
Very Immuno suppressed people, eg those undergoing chemotherapy, should not have certain vaccines - live vaccines like MMR, varicella.
They can have flu vaccine.
I work in field of vaccination.
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paperpudding wrote: »angelexperiment wrote: »Nope not since about 2005 when I saw they did not work, and made you sicker than if you got it and how sick it made children. Interesting but since then I've been sick 3 times. And these days they are putting more and mor things in there and it's killing people or injuring them. I'll deal with a cold or flu. People fighting cancer especially should not take the flu shot. Or while under chemo. I've seen that first hand and it tells you if you are immuno suppressed you should not take the flu shot. But it's pushed a lot every where you go or while you are pregnant.
Very Immuno suppressed people, eg those undergoing chemotherapy, should not have certain vaccines - live vaccines like MMR, varicella.
They can have flu vaccine.
I work in field of vaccination.
So you're big Big Pharma! I was wondering. I thought you'd be less.... puddingy.11 -
paperpudding is a misnomer of a user name - is an alias for Pharmapudding.
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jagodfrey08 wrote: »Oh God. Could we PLEASE petition for a norovirus vaccine?!?!?! I and my entire family would be first in line every year! Never fails - January through March, my daughters and I get it, and usually one of us winds up in the ER because I am worried about one of my kiddos dehydrating. Definitely not the best way to lose 7-12 lbs.
OH GOD NOROVIRUS. I had it in March this year. I got so dehydrated that I was lying on the bathroom floor, hallucinating about a TV show (anyone see Marcella on ITV? It was that.)
To the thread - yes I get the shot, I'm asthmatic. I also would not like to infect the very young and frail elderly family members I have, not to mention the people I mix with every day.6 -
What that chart does NOT show is the instances of where there were little or no occurrences of something pre-vaccine era but many after. Are there any? And any suspected ties to vaccines? Just asking.I'm asking someone who seemed to have a lot of answers and is up on the subject a question. "Some say" include some earlier in this thread and elsewhere. I'm not going to argue about it.Your first paragraph basically backs what is on the chart. The second parahraph is more the kind of thing I was wondering about. Snarky remarks are unnecessary.
My apologies for the tardy reply Wanzik, I do not log on over the weekend.
So, to answer your question as you refer to autism. As the other poster stated, the claim is absolutely bogus. Andrew Wakefield lied, plain and simple. His study was retracted and his medical license was pulled. Unfortunately his lies were picked up by some high profile people and their popularity spread the lie further.
The fact of the matter with autism is that 1) diagnosis has gotten better and 2) what constitutes placement on the ASD scale has gotten broader. Neither of these has to do with vaccinations though and there are many hundreds of studies that confirm there is no link between the two other than that of spurious correlation.
And spurious correlations can be found to pair up the oddest things...
To be fair, the 1918 flu was what is thought to have been a sudden genetic shift in the virus. A similar occurrence today would not be prevented by the flu vaccine unless it were specifically manufactured to combat that strain. In which case, there would have to be initial isolated outbreaks AND there would have to be a decision to protect against that strain.
Otherwise, we'd have an outbreak, initial high mortality, an emergency production of targeted flu vaccine and an amelioration of that year's outbreak if the vaccine were manufactured quickly enough to matter.
Actually, major antigenic shifts in flu have happened three times since 1918, the most recent being the 2009 shift. In these cases there have been huge efforts to generate a vaccine against the now variant and often it is effective. And in each case, the antigenically shifted virus became the new global strain, and so each yearly vaccine batch is then against the new strain.
Flu biology really is an interesting thing to study if you are boredFatChristie93 wrote: »I've never thought about getting one myself but my 6 year old had a letter through inviting him to go for the nasal spray one, I did some research and it even says on the box that it isn't proven to stop influenza which to me rings alarm bells as to why they'd give it.
Just because you wear a seatbelt does not guarantee you will never die if you are in a car crash, but you still wear your seatbelt right? Just because you use a condom does not guarantee you will not get pregnant, but I am going to guess you will advocate your child practice safe sex correct?. It is a matter of statistics; there is always a chance you will not respond to the vaccine. Or that you will encounter one of the odd strains that flux about and are not covered by the vaccine. So, is it better to receive the vaccine and have 99.95% odds of being protected against the flu or is it better to not get the vaccine at all and have high odds of getting the flu?18 -
WYMANT0004 wrote: »What that chart does NOT show is the instances of where there were little or no occurrences of something pre-vaccine era but many after. Are there any? And any suspected ties to vaccines? Just asking.I'm asking someone who seemed to have a lot of answers and is up on the subject a question. "Some say" include some earlier in this thread and elsewhere. I'm not going to argue about it.Your first paragraph basically backs what is on the chart. The second parahraph is more the kind of thing I was wondering about. Snarky remarks are unnecessary.
My apologies for the tardy reply Wanzik, I do not log on over the weekend.
So, to answer your question as you refer to autism. As the other poster stated, the claim is absolutely bogus. Andrew Wakefield lied, plain and simple. His study was retracted and his medical license was pulled. Unfortunately his lies were picked up by some high profile people and their popularity spread the lie further.
The fact of the matter with autism is that 1) diagnosis has gotten better and 2) what constitutes placement on the ASD scale has gotten broader. Neither of these has to do with vaccinations though and there are many hundreds of studies that confirm there is no link between the two other than that of spurious correlation.
And spurious correlations can be found to pair up the oddest things...To be fair, the 1918 flu was what is thought to have been a sudden genetic shift in the virus. A similar occurrence today would not be prevented by the flu vaccine unless it were specifically manufactured to combat that strain. In which case, there would have to be initial isolated outbreaks AND there would have to be a decision to protect against that strain.
Otherwise, we'd have an outbreak, initial high mortality, an emergency production of targeted flu vaccine and an amelioration of that year's outbreak if the vaccine were manufactured quickly enough to matter.
Actually, major antigenic shifts in flu have happened three times since 1918, the most recent being the 2009 shift. In these cases there have been huge efforts to generate a vaccine against the now variant and often it is effective. And in each case, the antigenically shifted virus became the new global strain, and so each yearly vaccine batch is then against the new strain.
Flu biology really is an interesting thing to study if you are boredFatChristie93 wrote: »I've never thought about getting one myself but my 6 year old had a letter through inviting him to go for the nasal spray one, I did some research and it even says on the box that it isn't proven to stop influenza which to me rings alarm bells as to why they'd give it.
Just because you wear a seatbelt does not guarantee you will never die if you are in a car crash, but you still wear your seatbelt right? Just because you use a condom does not guarantee you will not get pregnant, but I am going to guess you will advocate your child practice safe sex correct?. It is a matter of statistics; there is always a chance you will not respond to the vaccine. Or that you will encounter one of the odd strains that flux about and are not covered by the vaccine. So, is it better to receive the vaccine and have 99.95% odds of being protected against the flu or is it better to not get the vaccine at all and have high odds of getting the flu?
Yes, I know. And every time there were isolated cases identified early on, and a decision made to produce vaccine against that particular strain. As I said, those are the conditions necessary for a flu vaccine to make a difference against a 1918-like occurrence.
The 2009 outbreak had the potential to be nearly as bad as the 1918 outbreak. It was fortunate that the strain was not nearly as incapacitating or as lethal. Certainly the vaccine was not produced and widely distributed in time to head off the pandemic, and as part of a research consortium that studied that particular flu vaccine's efficacy in various populations from 2009-2014, I can tell you that the vaccine produced in 2009 was not very effectual.
This is not to knock the 2009 vaccine - when you're having to develop and produce new vaccine that late in the season you take what you can get even if it just rises above minimum efficacy standards.2
This discussion has been closed.
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