Welcome to Debate Club! Please be aware that this is a space for respectful debate, and that your ideas will be challenged here. Please remember to critique the argument, not the author.
Flu shots? For them or against ?
Replies
-
paperpudding wrote: »ronjsteele1 wrote: »paperpudding wrote: »I don't think any flu vaccines are live vaccines - curious as to where poster lives that she believes this is so.
Poster is also wrong about live vaccines spreading the disease: if that were so, vaccines that are live vaccines would result in outbreaks of the disease. The main live vaccines used in western world are measles, mumps, rubella varicella ( chicken pox)
Use of these has not resulted in more outbreaks of the disease - would be pointless vaccinating if that were so.
No. You are wrong. This is the FDA's drug insert for one of the chicken pox vaccines. See section 5.4. https://www.fda.gov/downloads/BiologicsBloodVaccines/Vaccines/ApprovedProducts/UCM142812.pdf
"Post-marketing experience suggests that transmission of vaccine virus may occur rarely between healthy vaccinees who develop a varicella-like rash and healthy susceptible contacts. Transmission of vaccine virus from a mother who did not develop a varicella-like rash to her newborn infant has been reported.
Due to the concern for transmission of vaccine virus, vaccine recipients should attempt to avoid whenever possible close association with susceptible high-risk individuals for up to six weeks following vaccination with VARIVAX."
I could go on and on but I will leave it at just this one. I challenge every person who is just fine with vaccines of any sort to get the ACTUAL vaccine insert from the manufacturer (not the "fact" sheet the doctor's office gives out). Take note of every vaccine (even "attenuated" which simply means "weakened" not "dead") that states there is at least some verifiable shedding of disease with every vaccine. Most of the inserts state to stay away from vulnerable populations for 4-6 weeks following vaccination. Guessing your doctor didn't tell you that when you went home to an immune compromised person ten minutes after getting any one of the vaccines available that is known to shed. But then, since the incidence is suppose to be "low" it really doesn't matter ---- until it's your immune compromised family member that gets it from you being vaxxed.
I work in the area of vaccination.
Yes there is an extremely low theoretical risk of transmisson of virus to severely immuno compromised people - that is not the same as live vaccines causing more outbreaks of the disease ,as was the original claim.
Severely immuno compromised people should not have live vaccines themselves - but their household contacts should.
The risk of the immuno compromised person catching the natural disease, especially if the household contacts are not vaccinated, is FAR more than the theoretical risk of vaccine shedding.
Vaccine shedding, on the extremely rare occasions it does occur, also results in a much milder case of the disease, than natural disease does.
Staying away from vulnerable persons if you get a rash from the vaccine (which most people dont) makes sense in terms of not visiting people in aged care homes, keeping away from chemotherapy patients etc - but doesnt make sense if you are going to have contact with the immuno suppressed person whether or not you are vaccinated - ie you live with them.
In that case the risk to the immuno suppressed person is greater if you are NOT vaccinated - for reasons explained above.
Please note - none of above applies to flu vaccine anyway - as it is not a live vaccine.
This,and especially the last sentence. The flu vaccine (for adults anyway)is not a live one.1 -
Nor for children - none of them in Australia are anyway.
i think the nasal spray one may have been (I guess a spray is not technically a flu shot - it was never used in Australia anyway.
and from what I can gather has been discontinued in countries that did use it now too.1 -
I don't personally get the flu shot. I don't see the point. It's like a game of Russian roulette but with a moving target. You don't know whether the 3 strains in the vaccine will be one of the half a million possible strains that come around that winter. Too the effectiveness is only 50% or so for the 3 strains it vaccinates against because flu mutates so fast. Every year I read of roughly same number of both vaccinated and unvaccinated people dying of the flu, so it doesn't seem worth the money to me. I am happy to take my chances.1
-
ronjsteele1 wrote: »paperpudding wrote: »I don't think any flu vaccines are live vaccines - curious as to where poster lives that she believes this is so.
Poster is also wrong about live vaccines spreading the disease: if that were so, vaccines that are live vaccines would result in outbreaks of the disease. The main live vaccines used in western world are measles, mumps, rubella varicella ( chicken pox)
Use of these has not resulted in more outbreaks of the disease - would be pointless vaccinating if that were so.
No. You are wrong. This is the FDA's drug insert for one of the chicken pox vaccines. See section 5.4. https://www.fda.gov/downloads/BiologicsBloodVaccines/Vaccines/ApprovedProducts/UCM142812.pdf
"Post-marketing experience suggests that transmission of vaccine virus may occur rarely between healthy vaccinees who develop a varicella-like rash and healthy susceptible contacts. Transmission of vaccine virus from a mother who did not develop a varicella-like rash to her newborn infant has been reported.
Due to the concern for transmission of vaccine virus, vaccine recipients should attempt to avoid whenever possible close association with susceptible high-risk individuals for up to six weeks following vaccination with VARIVAX."
I could go on and on but I will leave it at just this one. I challenge every person who is just fine with vaccines of any sort to get the ACTUAL vaccine insert from the manufacturer (not the "fact" sheet the doctor's office gives out). Take note of every vaccine (even "attenuated" which simply means "weakened" not "dead") that states there is at least some verifiable shedding of disease with every vaccine. Most of the inserts state to stay away from vulnerable populations for 4-6 weeks following vaccination.
Let me guess, you dug this up on Naturalnews or WAPF or Mercola? The only common vaccines give that are live in the US is:
MMR
Varivax
Rotavirus vaccines
MMR - extremely rare chance that the rubella part can shed into breastmilk, but rubella is a mild disease.
Varivax - only shed if vaccineed person had vesicular rash, only 5 cases reported by CDC with 55million doses given
Rotavirus - only shed in fecal matter.
I'm guessing the pseudoscientific antivax websites that you frequent didn't tell you that.
Here is some reading for people who are truly interested:
http://insidevaccines.com/wordpress/2008/02/24/secondary-transmission-the-short-and-sweet-about-live-virus-vaccine-shedding/
https://www.verywell.com/live-vaccines-and-vaccine-shedding-2633700Guessing your doctor didn't tell you that when you went home to an immune compromised person ten minutes after getting any one of the vaccines available that is known to shed. But then, since the incidence is suppose to be "low" it really doesn't matter ---- until it's your immune compromised family member that gets it from you being vaxxed.
Let's see what real scientists, researchers, and doctors say about vaccines and immunocompromised:
https://medicine.stonybrookmedicine.edu/system/files/Vaccines in Immunocompromised patients - Pediatrics in Review-2010-In Brief-38-40.pdf
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24582311
1 -
I don't personally get the flu shot. I believe it is a choice each individual should make.1
-
I always got them them every year because I know the the protection is incremental. I'm all for being immune to as many of the strains of flu as possible. The ONE year I didn't get the flu shot I got the flu...not once, but TWICE. Now I live with someone with an autoimmune disease so longer optional, I have to get it to protect him from getting sick.4
-
I suppose that depends on what you are reading. At least in elderly populations, the death rate from influenza is far higher among unvaccinated people. Here's some reading, if you're interested. (There are summaries of other studies about 3/4 of the way down.)ladyannique2017 wrote: »Every year I read of roughly same number of both vaccinated and unvaccinated people dying of the flu, so it doesn't seem worth the money to me. I am happy to take my chances.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2728831/
As for the cost, I suppose that depends on where you live. Even in countries without free national health care, such as the US, flu vaccines are still very cheap or free. Not to mention, the cost of getting the flu is quite high, not only for the person who gets it, but potentially for others who are infected by that person.
2 -
I suppose that depends on what you are reading. At least in elderly populations, the death rate from influenza is far higher among unvaccinated people. Here's some reading, if you're interested. (There are summaries of other studies about 3/4 of the way down.)ladyannique2017 wrote: »Every year I read of roughly same number of both vaccinated and unvaccinated people dying of the flu, so it doesn't seem worth the money to me. I am happy to take my chances.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2728831/
As for the cost, I suppose that depends on where you live. Even in countries without free national health care, such as the US, flu vaccines are still very cheap or free. Not to mention, the cost of getting the flu is quite high, not only for the person who gets it, but potentially for others who are infected by that person.
Thank you for the study. First it was a comparison of overall death rates among the elderly and didn't actually measure who died of the flu, but rather who died period of anything at all. A death rate of +4.6% among unvaccinated elderly with a margin of error that goes from 0.7% to 8.9% is not what I would consider to be far higher. Also they listed six limitations of the study one of which is they only tracked Kaiser flu shots and don't know if anyone who died but was logged as unvaccinated had actually got a flu shot elsewhere. Another limitation is that many elderly who know they are at deaths door for other health conditions will skip a flu shot because what's the point when you're dying anyway? The other limitations of the study are equally serious as well and would also affect the results. It's a nice study but they didn't measure people dying of the flu, the data is so limited and the differences so small, I'm just not convinced.
Not sure what you mean by the cost of the flu. If I get it, I see a Dr and get some antivirals and stay home until well. The cost of that even if I got the flu once every five years (highly unlikely) is still cheaper than a flu shot every year especially considering that the flu shot is not a guarantee against the flu and you can still catch it anyway.
It's an individual choice to get it or not.1 -
I do not have statistics but in Australia I would not be at all surprised if the number of vaccinated people dying of flu is greater than number of unvaccinated ones.
But consider this more carefully - these deaths are only counting people who died of flu. Not those who didnt get the flu because they were vaccinated.
And the vaccinated vs unvaccinated group is not the same - ie is not an 'all things being equal' comparison
The govt here supplies free flu vaccine to the following groups- Aboriginal people over 15, everyone over 65, pregnant women, medically at risk groups (people with asthma, diabetes, cardiac conditions etc)
By far the biggest uptake is in the last 2 groups - medically at risk and over 65's.
Of course if they get the flu anyway ( and remember ,the death from flu stats are not including those whom the vaccine prevented from getting the disease) they are far more likely to die of it than under 65's and people without medical risk factors. That is common sense.
One thing I do know though - as part of my job is doing infectious disease notifications:
By far the biggest group who got influenza (and recovered) were young healthy people - precisely because they are the group least likely to get vaccinated4 -
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.
Yup, haven't had a flu shot since I was in the military and had no choice. After getting the shot was the sickest I've ever been from the flu. Haven't had the shot or sickness since.
I do take Vitamin D. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4463890/1 -
The summaries I was talking about are here: "Voordouw et al. (6) found that flu shots reduce winter deaths by 50%, on average; and in a more recent study, Nichol et al. (19) reported a 48% reduction in all-cause mortality among the elderly during flu season." Obviously, this is just one article. If studies of different population groups would be helpful, I'd be glad to post them.ladyannique2017 wrote: »Thank you for the study. First it was a comparison of overall death rates among the elderly and didn't actually measure who died of the flu, but rather who died period of anything at all. A death rate of +4.6% among unvaccinated elderly with a margin of error that goes from 0.7% to 8.9% is not what I would consider to be far higher. Also they listed six limitations of the study one of which is they only tracked Kaiser flu shots and don't know if anyone who died but was logged as unvaccinated had actually got a flu shot elsewhere. Another limitation is that many elderly who know they are at deaths door for other health conditions will skip a flu shot because what's the point when you're dying anyway? The other limitations of the study are equally serious as well and would also affect the results. It's a nice study but they didn't measure people dying of the flu, the data is so limited and the differences so small, I'm just not convinced.
I'm glad that the flu is never severe or costly for you, but for others it's often miserable and expensive. Sometimes worse. People who are employed have to miss work, which results in expenses to them and/or to their employers. Other people may have additional medical expenses. Also, have a look at what people posted earlier, about constantly throwing up and praying for death.Not sure what you mean by the cost of the flu. If I get it, I see a Dr and get some antivirals and stay home until well. The cost of that even if I got the flu once every five years (highly unlikely) is still cheaper than a flu shot every year especially considering that the flu shot is not a guarantee against the flu and you can still catch it anyway.
Lots of things are a matter of individual choice, but it doesn't mean that every choice is equally good. I truly hope you don't get seriously ill or die from the flu, and that you don't infect someone else so that they get seriously ill or die. If you are able to get a flu vaccine and prevent those bad things from happening, I hope you will do it. That's why I'm posting this.It's an individual choice to get it or not.
3 -
kshama2001 wrote: »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.
Yup, haven't had a flu shot since I was in the military and had no choice. After getting the shot was the sickest I've ever been from the flu. Haven't had the shot or sickness since.
I do take Vitamin D. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4463890/
Some claim with Vitamin D levels in the 75-100 range reduces premature death from most all causes. Of course it needs to be taken with Vitamin K2 to reduce the risk of calcium build up in the heart valves and arteries.0 -
I'd love for this thread to die already.
The anti-vaxxers in this thread are still anti-vaxxers and pro-vaxxers are still pro-vaxxers. There's no point in this thread continuing because we're all going in increasingly frustrating circles.
I'm all for a debate but this is doing my head in now lol
Me too. Yet again,I wish there were a. "Unfollow" option for threads.
3 -
Take them off your notification list and then just dont click into them if you are not interested in the topic?3
-
I am interested but as Megan points out,it seems to be going round in circles. Still,I've learned a lot from it
I can't remove specific threads from my notifications by the way - all I can do is in subscribe from all notifications concerning the forums which I don't want to do. But fair point- no one is forcing me to come back to this thread1 -
comptonelizabeth wrote: »I am interested but as Megan points out,it seems to be going round in circles. Still,I've learned a lot from it
I can't remove specific threads from my notifications by the way - all I can do is in subscribe from all notifications concerning the forums which I don't want to do. But fair point- no one is forcing me to come back to this thread
I've found it is easier to unsubscribe from all new posts in threads where I've commented and instead just bookmark the threads I want to follow. I can then go to my bookmarks and see when there are new posts in those threads. If I want to stop following that thread, I remove it from bookmarks.1 -
Yeah,I really shouid do that !midwesterner85 wrote: »comptonelizabeth wrote: »I am interested but as Megan points out,it seems to be going round in circles. Still,I've learned a lot from it
I can't remove specific threads from my notifications by the way - all I can do is in subscribe from all notifications concerning the forums which I don't want to do. But fair point- no one is forcing me to come back to this thread
I've found it is easier to unsubscribe from all new posts in threads where I've commented and instead just bookmark the threads I want to follow. I can then go to my bookmarks and see when there are new posts in those threads. If I want to stop following that thread, I remove it from bookmarks.
1 -
historyofvaccines.org/content/articles/viruses-and-evolution
I found this article helpful in understanding why/how flu vaccinations work/do not work.
There are many more links on the left side of the page that are vaccination related.
This stemmed from my interest in preventing/recovering from cancer.
Vaccinations over the past couple 100 years have been a net plus for mankind even though they have limitations that need to be understood.0 -
i am all for them but they seem to give me a nasty rash everytime so i havent gotten one in a long time.1
-
-
I've observed that people who get them always get horribly sick a few times a year, usually with some type of disgusting flu like bug. So I'm not sure I understand the point of it. It's not guaranteed anyway, because you can get sick if it ends up being a different strain than what you were immunized against.
I've never gotten one and never will. I haven't been sick with anything more than a cold in over 10 years. *knock on wood2 -
LesbianBicycle wrote: »I've observed that people who get them always get horribly sick a few times a year, usually with some type of disgusting flu like bug. So I'm not sure I understand the point of it. It's not guaranteed anyway, because you can get sick if it ends up being a different strain than what you were immunized against.
I've never gotten one and never will. I haven't been sick with anything more than a cold in over 10 years. *knock on wood
I get a flu shot every year, in part because it makes sense with my work. I rarely get a cold. I usually get a cold only when I travel overseas. The so called "airplane cold". I get no other "bugs". I'm rarely sick at all.
5 -
LesbianBicycle wrote: »I've observed that people who get them always get horribly sick a few times a year, usually with some type of disgusting flu like bug. So I'm not sure I understand the point of it. It's not guaranteed anyway, because you can get sick if it ends up being a different strain than what you were immunized against.
I've never gotten one and never will. I haven't been sick with anything more than a cold in over 10 years. *knock on wood
I get flu shots each year and it has been decades since I've gotten the flu. I've known the type and source of each illness I've had for many years. I've had water-borne infections and genetic, but not a cold or flu.4 -
LesbianBicycle wrote: »I've observed that people who get them always get horribly sick a few times a year, usually with some type of disgusting flu like bug. So I'm not sure I understand the point of it. It's not guaranteed anyway, because you can get sick if it ends up being a different strain than what you were immunized against.
I've never gotten one and never will. I haven't been sick with anything more than a cold in over 10 years. *knock on wood
I've gotten them every year for over a decade now. I'm rarely sick and haven't had the flu once in all that time.
Basing decisions like this on personal observations can lead to faulty decisions. Even *if* everyone you knew that was vaccinated (are you surveying everyone you meet on their vaccination status, btw?) always got ill a few times a year with a "flu like bug," that doesn't invalidate actual data on the subject which certainly doesn't show that the flu vaccine causes everyone who gets it to get ill a few times a year.4 -
I get flu shots and never get horribly sick like that.LesbianBicycle wrote: »I've observed that people who get them always get horribly sick a few times a year, usually with some type of disgusting flu like bug.
3 -
I have gone through long periods of routinely getting the flu shot and long periods of not getting the flu shot, and to the best of my knowledge have never had the flu. This would be why n=1 or other personal observations are not a good way to make this kind of decision.
I also don't keep a vaccination record for every person I know, so determining who got the flu and who was vaccinated would be impossible for me.
And as has been stated multiple times, most people who don't go to the doctor when they are sick but self-diagnose with the flu actually have a bad cold. Which has nothing to do with the flu shot. People like to say they have the flu because it makes you sound more sympathetic, unlike the rest of the weaklings who get wimpy little colds.
3 -
A close relative of mine became hospitalized after being given a flu shot. That one shot cost her hundreds of dollars and repeat visits to the doctor. She also contracted a second illness when she received treatment at the hospital. Thankfully she recovered. She has been well ever since she stopped accepting the yearly flu shot. This is the main reason I refuse to get any flu shot myself.3
-
A close relative of mine became hospitalized after being given a flu shot. That one shot cost her hundreds of dollars and repeat visits to the doctor. She also contracted a second illness when she received treatment at the hospital. Thankfully she recovered. She has been well ever since she stopped accepting the yearly flu shot. This is the main reason I refuse to get any flu shot myself.
You dont say what she was hospitalised with.
Of course some people will be hospitilised after having flu shots - they co incidentally have a heart attack or whatever soon afterwards.
Like some people are hospitilised after having a roast dinner or logging into facebook or anything.
That wouldnt make me say that is why I refuse have roast dinners now
(silly example, I know, but I think illustrates the point)
In my many years of vaccinating literally thousands of people, none have been hospitilised as a direct result of flu vaccine
6 -
TeacupsAndToning wrote: »Noooooo! This thread was dead for months and I was hoping it would stay dead.
Me too. This is just not part of my reality.1 -
My whole family had the flu a few years back, and my oldest was hospitalised with pneumonia. Every year I don't have one, i end up with the flu. I decided to get it this year, because I simply do not have time for that kind of hassle. I have four school-aged children, so without it I'm a sitting duck.3
This discussion has been closed.
Categories
- All Categories
- 1.4M Health, Wellness and Goals
- 393.6K Introduce Yourself
- 43.8K Getting Started
- 260.3K Health and Weight Loss
- 176K Food and Nutrition
- 47.5K Recipes
- 232.6K Fitness and Exercise
- 431 Sleep, Mindfulness and Overall Wellness
- 6.5K Goal: Maintaining Weight
- 8.6K Goal: Gaining Weight and Body Building
- 153K Motivation and Support
- 8K Challenges
- 1.3K Debate Club
- 96.3K Chit-Chat
- 2.5K Fun and Games
- 3.8K MyFitnessPal Information
- 24 News and Announcements
- 1.1K Feature Suggestions and Ideas
- 2.6K MyFitnessPal Tech Support Questions