Comments on: Why I am Not Getting a Flu Shot This Year

By: Jasper Radics

Jasper Radics — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 05:42:07 +0000

By: Before You Take That Pill Top 10 Blog Posts for 2009 | Before You Take That Pill

Thu, 31 Dec 2009 23:02:54 +0000

[...] Why I am Not Getting a Flu Shot This Year. Because they don’t work? This one resulted in me having to publicly debate the head of infectious diseases from Emory. Yikes. [...]

By: AZ

AZ — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 02:50:52 +0000

What happened to the “Avian” bird flu issue? Must all be a government conspiracy to get our mind and pockets off the real problems that are besotting our country. LIKE THE DEVALUATION OF THE DOLLAR AND THE COUNTRY NEAR SEVERE INFLATION, AND POSSIBLE DEPRESSION! You will be buying your next flu shot with yen, and it will cost a lot more!

By: More On Flu Shots | Before You Take That Pill

More On Flu Shots | Before You Take That Pill — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 17:35:52 +0000

[...] at Emory and since I had been having an online schermish about the topic I offered “Why I Am Not Getting a Flu Shot This Year“. Well, flu shots are mandated for Emory Healthcare employees so I guess that raised some [...]

By: henry

henry — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 06:55:56 +0000

Michele,
It is always good to here from the voice of experience. There are many factors that contribute to chronic middle ear problems in young children. The factors you mentioned, plus genetics, exposure, and just plain bad luck all play a part. How quickly people forget that significant hearing loss from middle ear disease was once common. (It still is among the indigenous population in the subarctic and arctic regions.) It has become obvious that repeated courses of antibiotics are not a solution. For a select group of children with truly chronic problems, the “tubes” are a blessing. They buy the necessary time for a child to develop their own defenses and prevent significant misery.

By: henry

henry — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 06:42:39 +0000

I seem to be one of the few dissenters here. There is an underlying assumption in all the postings about both the HPV and the H1N1 vaccines that we are dealing with a homogeneous population. We forget that there are large numbers of disenfranchised Americans without access to “routine” health care (like pap smears). There are also large numbers of Americans who live in poverty and crowded living conditions. If one looks at the data from the H1N1, a not unsurprising finding leaps out. In large cities such as Boston, the poorer black and Hispanic communities have a much higher morbidity and mortality than average. Likewise, here in Washington State, we have seen a very high rate of severe illness from H1N1 among the native American population living on reservations. Among the pediatric population, we also see a disproportionate effect on children with chronic heart and lung problems and with neuromuscular conditions. Finally, there is a higher risk to pregnant women. While I do not endorse mandatory vaccination for all, I think it is very much a case of throwing out the baby with the bathwater to condemn these vaccines out of hand. It is one thing to disagree with the marketing and profiteering that has become the American way, quite another to disavow any benefits from the vaccines. After all, there is a reason that our infant mortality rate approaches that of a third world country.

By: Richard Van Slyke

Richard Van Slyke — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 04:17:58 +0000

I just tried to join the FB page “Protest Grady Hospital’s Death Sentence for Dialysis Patients”, but the link is not working.
I’m getting a message that “Face Book still has a few kinks to work out”.

By: Michele in Michigan

Michele in Michigan — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 19:07:22 +0000

Barbara, I’m a mom of a kids with ear tubes. Some kids get ear infections, not because they are exposed to a lot of outside bacteria, but because their eustachian tubes are more horizontal than slanted. They do not drain properly, and the moist environment encourages bacterial infections. Many kids grow out of this by age 5 or 6. As their face grows the eustachian tube slant and drain better.

Tubes have been very beneficial to my son. Before tubes mild hearing loss and as least one perforated ear drum. After tubes, no infections, good hearing. He also is a happier more comfortable guy.

By: daedalus2u

daedalus2u — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 12:43:58 +0000

I went to a talk by Paul Patterson

http://autism.mit.edu/patterson

where he talked about his research on immune system stimulation in utero on neurological development. He mentioned that sporadic schizophrenia is so strongly associated with exposure to flu in utero that if all flu in pregnant women was eliminated that the incidence of schizophrenia would go down by ~25%. He mentioned that at a conference (of immunologists? schizophrenia researchers? I don’t remember) someone asked about flu vaccinations for pregnant women and not one of the attendees would not do it because flu has such bad effects in utero. The in utero effects are mediated through the immune system, vaccination with non-pathogenic agents such as DNA causing the same effects.

I would get both flu shots for myself with no hesitation, but I am male. If my SO were pregnant, I would recommend that she get them too, but probably take a day off to minimize the stress surrounding it (stress acts as an adjuvant) and not take stuff to minimize the symptoms (i.e. Tylenol) because I suspect that some of the symptoms relate to physiology that is balancing adverse effects. If you suppress those symptoms the adverse effects which don’t have symptoms are not balanced. I know this sounds woo-like, but I don’t think it is.

By: henry

henry — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 07:11:46 +0000

How about the risk/benefit profile for children with conditions such as chronic lung disease?