Flu Vaccine Faces “Skepticism” (The Bad Kind)
October 25th, 2009
|
| Share |
On a quick aside: It really makes my skin crawl when I hear the word “skepticism” associated with some kind of ridiculous belief. The empirical skepticism mentality is based on the idea that claims which lack good supporting evidence should be questioned but not that all things need to be endlessly questioned.
Via Eyewitness News, Memphis, TN:
Swine Flu Vaccine Faces Skepticism
MEMPHIS, TN – New polls show more than half of Americans say they won’t get vaccinated. This, despite the fact that the CDC says an unusually high number of children have died from it.
One reason for the skepticism is there’s a lot of information out there. You hear most doctors and the government saying you definitely should get the vaccine. Then, you have the opponents, everyone ranging from conspiracy theorists to health professionals with legitimate concerns. It’s hard to know what to believe.
Kristen Lewis works in the ICU at Baptist Memorial Hospital-DeSoto. She isn’t sure about the H1N1 vaccine, and she’s done her homework.
“I was scared because I’m a health care worker and I’m pregnant,” Lewis. “So that’s two out of the top three who should get it. I find articles that say ‘do it.’ Obviously the CDC, anything from the hospital, my doctor, they say definitely do it. But then you find other things out there, say Facebook, the Internet, whatever, tells you don’t do it, these bad things have happened.”
She’s confused and concerned and wonders if her young kids should get the vaccine too.
“I know they say to get it because they’re so little,” she said. “But because they’re little, it makes me hesitant to just give them something that’s new.”
Infectious disease expert Dr. Manoj Jain says not so fast. The H1N1 vaccine was developed the same way as the seasonal flu one. He wants to debunk the theory that it was rushed.
“In fact,” Dr. Jain said. “They’ve done more studies, more clinical trials on the H1N1 vaccine than they’ve done on the seasonal flu.”
He’s particularly worried about people like Kristen.
“We know pregnant women have a 7 to 9-fold greater risk of developing complications from the H1N1 virus if they become sick,” he said.
Here is the video of the news story
(note that you may have to watch an ad first before it plays the segment)
Well jeez, what a difficult this must be. On one side, you have scientists, doctors, every major national and international health administration in the world, including the WHO, the CDC and most other governmental health organizations, peer reviewed journals and mountains of scientific data and on the other you have… people who post stuff on Facebook, MySpace, Youtube and various websites. Who to trust???
Actually, this should illustrate a big problem that exists when it comes to convincing people to listen to science. Despite the fact that stuff that any idiot can post on Facebook or Myspace or Youtube has zero credibility, people tend to respond well to scary personal accounts of children dropping dead or people being debilitated by vaccines. These stories may not even be true, but they appeal to fear and can be very powerful. The anti-vaccine movement has mastered the use of a number of popular misconceptions and beliefs to push their nonsense on the population. They invoke everything from the idea that big bad corporations just want everyone to be sick to the notion that being “natural” is inherently more healthy. Other common appeals are that it if you’re not sure of the safety of something, inaction is always preferable to action.
In the case of influenza, and especially the N1H1 “swine flu” virus, the scientific data is clear. The vaccine is no different than any other annual flu shot and therefore is well proven to be safe and effective. This year, concern over the N1H1 strain has assured that plenty of doses were prepared well in advance, so there is no reason to forgo the inoculation over supply concerns. Thus far, the N1H1 strain appears to be only marginally stronger than most seasonal flus – it is not a super bug, but it is quite contagious and has already caused several major regional outbreaks. Each year the flu kills thousands, mostly the very young, very old and immune compromised, but even otherwise healthy individuals do succumb to it on occasion.
Yet we have the opportunity to stop this from happening, or at the very least, lessen the extent and magnitude of the outbreak. By getting vaccinated, you are removing yourself from the avaliable hosts that the virus can use to replicate and spread in the population. Those who work in the health-care industry or with the elderly and young children as well as those who may be at a higher risk of complications should always be vaccinated, and if you’re one of those groups and have not yet been vaccinated, do it now! However, in this case, with ample warning and plenty of vaccine doses to go around, we all should be getting a flu shot.
Unfortunately, herd immunity does not work unless a substantial portion of the population is immunized and with upwards of 50% forgoing it, the flu should have no problem spreading like wildfire. A few loonies and quacks have done a great deal of damage already and fighting these bogus claims should be a very high priority for every skeptic and rationalist out there.
In an attempt to address this problem, I came up with a few concepts for vaccine awareness posters. Please let me know what you think but remember that these are only initial rough copies. If you have any ideas for posters, fliers of campaigns, please share! I based these at least partially on the kind of spirited and colorful patriotic posters from the Second World War and on older vaccine campaign posters. Constructive criticism, idea submissions or sharing your own ideas is welcome. Publicity campaigns for vaccination are no longer common as they were in the 1950’s, but it seems we may need them more than ever before.
(Click to Enlarge)
This entry was posted on Sunday, October 25th, 2009 at 8:19 pm and is filed under Bad Science, Culture, Good Science, Misc, Quackery, media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
View blog reactions
October 26th, 2009 at 12:03 am
They’re all good, but I think I like the “Don’t let your body become a flu factory” one. It’s clever and makes a good point. The last one is good too. They’re all good, actually.
Quote Comment
October 26th, 2009 at 5:14 am
The flu factory one is good. I like the second because it’s inspirational about the bigger effort, but I don’t know if it will work as well at getting people to actually get the vaccines. The first is really good, I think that is the best because you hear these idiots saying all the time “I didn’t vaccinate my kid and he’s just fine and perfectly healthy.”
Quote Comment
October 26th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
There is also a rational case that the flu vaccine isn’t very effective at saving lives.
The reasoning in that article is specific to flu and not to deadlier diseases.
Quote Comment
October 26th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
They’re very, very good, but I think you can make them better. The thing is, the most effective posters make their point at a glance.
The final “…probably.” on the first poster is very hard to see, especially from a distance. It might be better to leave it out altogether, lower the picture so the bullet chamber isn’t darkening the background behind the first “probably”, and just underline the first “probably” for emphasis.
The second poster would be better if the “You’re Next!” was lowered to below the gravestone, and the fine print replaced with “Help eradicate disease: Get vaccinated today!
The final two posters might be more effective if the small print was more concise. I can’t think of any more suggestions at the moment.
Quote Comment
October 26th, 2009 at 10:49 pm
So what if swine flu is no more dangerous than normal flu. Normal flu does kill people. I’d rather have vulnerable groups vaccinated with a slight risk of serious side effects being worthwhile so long as it’s less than the risk of serious complications from catching swine flu.
It’s really selfish and irresponsible to think ‘oh I’m healthy so flu doesn’t matter.’ It does bloody matter, you could carry some nasty virus and pass it on to someone who can’t fight it off. Being cavalier about an infectious disease with the power to kill vulnerable people is as anti-social as drink driving.
Quote Comment
October 27th, 2009 at 1:52 am
Good point on the issue of passing it on. I like the posters. the “Flu Factory” one is good, but as Brian-M says, it’s best to keep things as short as possible. Striking a balance between wordiness and getting the relevant information. The first one is good in the respect (it’s right to the point). The last one needs to be a little wordy to explain why that is the case, so maybe that would be better as a flyer than a poster. The second one could definitely be remade to be less wordy. I like the concept though.
DV82XL said:
Good point. I like the idea of driving home the idea that you are allowing the virus to spread by giving it your body to replicate. It’s horribly irresponsible because it’s like donating your cells to the virus to allow it to spread. That is a good way to frame it. It would be like knowingly leaving pools of stagnant water on your property when there is a malaria problem in the area, or even like turning on your lights during an air raid to let the enemy navigate the city easily and drop their bombs on target.
There was a World War II poster that had a guy driving in a car with an outline of hitler in the passenger seat and said “When you drive alone you’re driving with the Fuhrer.” It was saying not conserving gasoline helped the enemy. That comes to mind here. You’re walking around as a mobile flu factory. You don’t even care you’re making a donation toward letting the disease spread.
Quote Comment
October 27th, 2009 at 1:56 am
Oh, I forgot to mention. I got my flu shot. The clinic where I got it basically confirmed what is said here about the supply. If you’re young and healthy you might think you should hold off so those who need it more get first dibs on what is avaliable, but that is not necessary. There is plenty of supply this year and no danger of shortage, so no need to ration it.
Quote Comment
October 27th, 2009 at 11:07 am
I got my H1N1 shot Saturday. A friend of mine downloaded the list of clinics with H1N1 vaccine from the Orange County (Florida) health department and called around until he found a clinic giving the H1N1 shots without restrictions. Monday, he called around again, everyone was out or only giving shots to at-risk groups.
Quote Comment
October 27th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
Of course, the topic isn’t quite as cut and dried as one might think. Naturally the crackpots with their colorful text are still crackpots, and advocate staying away from vaccines for the wrong reasons, but here is an interesting read from Robin Hansen:
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/10/flu-shot-doubts.html
Quote Comment
October 27th, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Got the swine flu two months ago – before the vaccine was available. Just my normal luck. Stayed home until I was symptom free. Oh well, I’m immune now.
Anecdote: I started taking the seasonal flu shot about 6 years ago. Prior to this, the flu loved to visit me every year. Since then, I’ve not had a flu. No reaction or pain to the shot. However, I got a tetanus shot last Friday and my arm is still sore!
Good posters, good comments, and a good idea. How about using a roulette wheel? Alternating “safe but feel like poop” with “dead kid or grandma” might be effective.
Quote Comment
October 27th, 2009 at 9:17 pm
yamahaeleven said:
True – things aren’t as clear as they should be for flu shots. Unfortunately, it’s the only game in town at this point. A repeat of the 1918 flu pandemic would be crippling on so many levels, that we are forced to go with a solution that is not 100% if only in the hope of limiting propagation.
It becomes more a case of civil defense at this point and less of a public health issue. People that get vaccinated are manning the ramparts, and yes a few may fall, but that is something that is unavoidable at this stage.
Quote Comment
October 28th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
DV82XL said:
Even forget the fact that it kills people, what about the idea that it’s not ethical to impose suffering on others? My elderly mother had a respiratory infection two years ago that developed to the point of pneumonia and despite the fact that it did not kill her, it came close enough to doing so to cause her and my family a lot of stress. She was in the hospital for five days and in a convalescent home for almost a month. She had to be on oxygen to make sure she could breathe alright. She was miserable and had to be on a lot of medication to stop painful coughing. She hated being in the home.
My brother and I had to go visit her frequently to keep her spirits up and help her recover and my sister had to fly in from New York to see her. It was a very stressful winter and we’re just happy by the end that she made a full recovery.
What kind of a sadistic bastard will write off causing that kind of pain and suffering to another person? Not even to consider the unnecessary stress that it causes the healthcare system and the bed it takes up etc etc.
In her case, it wasn’t influenza, but it just as easily could be influenza to cause someone that kind of suffering. It doesn’t even have to be an elderly person. Some healthy people still end up with a couple weeks of bad fever and aches from the flu. Is that meaningless? Lost work? Or lost school? Stress on the family and friends? Hospital stays?
Quote Comment
October 28th, 2009 at 1:03 pm
I’m not getting the vaccine. Not that I’m scared of getting it but it’s just inconvenient. I rarely get flu and don’t have much exposure anyways.
My sister has had her life affected by vaccines. She is unable to have children after a bad batch (not flu vaccine.. some hepatitis I think?) was supplied to doctors. (This has been confirmed medically). Yeah, it’s not a vaccines fault but rather the incorrect manufacturing, but bad things (rarely) do happen.
Quote Comment
October 29th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
yamahaeleven said:
There is of course room for legitimate questioning about the effectiveness of the vaccine and the impacts etc etc. Unfortunately the current enviornment makes this difficult because it will universally be taken out of context and used as “proof” of how bad the vaccines are.
It’s difficult to judge because each season is unique. There also needs to be consideration that those who have an extremely compromised immune system may not be protected by the vaccine because their bodies can’t produce enough antibodies even with vaccination. Herd immunity can help there, but we have not yet reached the numbers necessary for that to become a major factor.
Still, being immunized certainly would seem to be helpful on a speffic basis. I mean, I am immunized because I would not feel safe or comfortable visiting my grandmother or those who have compromised immune systems if I was not. That seems to be the best that the current data indicates.
Either way, lets be clear here: what applies to the flu vaccine (or may apply to it) does not mean anything for vaccines in general. The flu vaccine has some issues in that it only protects from one strain of the flu and that the disease it protects from is not usually fatal anyway. It also may not be as close to 100% effective as other vaccines tend to be. This however does not in any way diminish the importance of vaccines like tetanus or polio – which nobody can reasonably dispute the effectiveness of.
Kurt said:
Any technology will occasionally fail, but that does not mean that it is acceptable when it does. I sincerely hope that this incident resulted in heads rolling at the vaccine production company and whoever was in charge of quality control should have been promptly fired.
Quote Comment
November 6th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Have you read the package insert for the H1N1 vaccine?
If you not you can look it up on the FDA web..
it clearly states halfway down..that testing has not been proven on pregnant women…..
and it says children above age 4…which means all these infants getting it..are TOO YOUNG.
I have a friend who’s doc urged her to get it..since she’s pregnant.
It also contains 25 mcg of mercury…need I say more??
Quote Comment
November 6th, 2009 at 6:11 pm
Chris said:
Yes you do, like what are your qualifications such that you imagine you can hold an opinion on this subject and that anyone else should care what you think. In other words: you arrogate yourself the right to second guess a licensed, practicing physician based on nothing other than your belief that you know more about this subject than he does, and then you expect the rest of us to accept this on your say-so.
You’re going to have to do better than that.
Quote Comment
November 6th, 2009 at 7:17 pm
Chris said:
It contains zero mercury. It contains a compound which has a mercury atom as part of the molecule and which clears the body rapidly. It’s been used since the 1930’s and is a safe, proven agent used to inhibit microbial growth.
The compound is C9H9HgNaO2S. Most of it clears the body in that form. Some of it breaks down to methyl mercury which does not bioacumulate and also leaves the body in a few days at the most.
The total elemental mercury in a vaccine dose is signifficantly less than the amount of mercury already present in the average human body. The average person has several hundred micrograms of mercury in their body at any time. To some extent having mercury in the body is unavoidable, because it is a naturally occurring element, but the single largest source for mercury is coal combustion. It accounts for more than half of the enviornmental mercury that ends up in the human body.
Quote Comment
November 7th, 2009 at 4:38 am
Hey, it’s me, the paranoid freak from many posts back. I’ve been hearing reports of a pneumonic plague being released to depopulate the world. They’re planning to give us mandatory vaccines, US666 & EU666 they’re called.
I can’t stand this anymore. We’re doomed.
Quote Comment
November 7th, 2009 at 4:44 am
Anonymous said:
Go take your meds son, and go get some sleep. I also suspect you need to get laid.
Quote Comment
November 9th, 2009 at 12:28 am
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeKb710KikM
Bill Maher is a pretty smart guy, and I really don’t trust (R) Bill Frist, so I think I’ll skip out on this vaccine.
Quote Comment
November 9th, 2009 at 12:35 am
Quote Comment
November 9th, 2009 at 1:40 am
Bruce said:
Yeah, because, you know, Bill Frist is like, the only person encouraging vaccination. It’s not like there are any scientists or doctors who also say you should get vaccinated. Nope, just his word.
Oh wait… no…
Quote Comment
November 11th, 2009 at 9:55 pm
DV82XL said:
Read this. http://baltimorechronicle.com/2009/111109Lendman.shtml
You might think I’m just some crazy, but what the hell do you call that? If you can truly read that and brush it off as crazy then you’re the one that’s insane.
Quote Comment
November 11th, 2009 at 10:41 pm
Anonymous said:
When I read something like that, the first thing I do is see if I can find any conformation. You see anybody can write anything, in and of itself seeing something in print doesn’t give a story any weight. The Ukraine has had about 200 or so deaths attributed to the flu, which considering that the country is still a post-communist mess, and is dirt poor, is not so bad. Also the epidemic there has broken.
This information was culled from legitimate news sources, not rubbish of the sort you linked to.
Now if you want to think that somebody is depopulating the world, or any other paranoid fantasy along the same lines, that is your affair, but do not expect to be taken seriously when you post this deluded nonsense to a skeptic’s webpage.
Quote Comment
November 12th, 2009 at 12:09 am
DV82XL said:
But what about the Joseph Moshe incident? And the Pneumonic Plague drills in Illinois? You’ve shown me nothing against these, just called me crazy once again.
Quote Comment
November 12th, 2009 at 12:23 am
I am not going to continue to enable your delusions by engaging with you – therefore my suggestion to you is to put your head between your legs and kiss your ass goodby
Quote Comment
November 12th, 2009 at 12:56 am
Anonymous said:
Okay, look, I wouldn’t bring this up here, except it seems to have done no good at all. I tried to tell you that the best thing you could do (and really the only thing) was to find a professional councilor to talk to on a regular basis – like not a single emergency thing – and to, with the help of said professional(s) come up with some kind of plan for getting things together using whatever is deemed necessary to deal with this. That may include cognitive behavioral therapy, regular group therapy, medication, talk sessions, coping skills etc etc.
If you want to deal with things that is the only way to do it. Find a competition professional and have them provide the appropriate measures are. (Not just one time either.. like an ongoing support thing).
You can get this kind of help by going to your general care physician and asking them to refer you. If you don’t have a general care physician, you can go to a school councilor or a community health clinic or a social service agency or any number of other places. If worst comes to worst, you can even go to the police department, because police are actually fairly well experienced with dealing with social and health issues in the coarse of their work and if you can’t find anyone else to refer you to anything, the police probably know of whatever social services are available in the area. Of course, a hospital likely also has some programs for non-emergency social stuff.
So there ya go.
A doctor, school councilor, hospital, police department, local social service organization or possibly even something like the YMCA… All of the above can refer you to someone.
If you’re not going to do that, then there’s nothing I or anyone else can do for you.
Quote Comment
November 12th, 2009 at 1:25 am
drbuzz0 said:
You make it seem like the best thing I can do is find help to ignore something so messed up. Do you not care that this is happening?
Quote Comment
November 16th, 2009 at 3:06 am
DV82XL said:
So you’re just going to deny the evidence?
Quote Comment
November 16th, 2009 at 11:51 am
There is a tremendous amount of evidence that something bad is going to happen. Why won’t you listen?
Quote Comment
November 26th, 2009 at 1:51 am
if the H1N1 vaccines are so important that the President encourages everyone to get it, the why does he not vaccinate his own children? c’mon, you need a challenge.
Quote Comment
November 26th, 2009 at 1:56 am
tenred said:
Do you have any evidence that he doesn’t?
Quote Comment
November 26th, 2009 at 2:19 am
yes, he was asked by a reporter if he had and he said that they had not received it because they were not of high risk, i will try to find the video for it and send you the link but you guys will probably just say the video was fabricated or altered, and btw tell me your thoughts on Operation Northwoods from the 1960’s, Nebechanezzer too refused to see and acknowledge the writing on the wall
Quote Comment
November 26th, 2009 at 2:32 am
So he said that “everyone” should get vaccinated and then said his children were not vaccinated because they were not “high risk.” Forgoing the vaccination on those grounds, if there is any possibility of a shortage and given that they’re fairly isolated anyway, is not entirely invalid. Assuming, you could cite both those quotes (which you can’t)
Operation Northwoods? It was proposed. It never happened. It was a dumb idea, way over the top, would have likely ended up in a backlash and therefore was rejected outright.
The government has also entertained proposals for a bomb that makes soldiers gay and so horny that they can’t keep their hands off eachother. In other words: not every proposal floated by someone in the Pentagon is to be taken seriously.
What the hell writing on what wall? Loonies have been claiming that the Soviets were putting chemicals in our water since the 1940’s or that the Freemasons were trying to take over the world since the 1800’s. There’s no more truth to modern bull than there was when back then. 50 years ago there were conspiracy theorists claiming that Hitler was alive and breeding a race of supermen in South America and that AT&T and Western Union were run by the Freemasons and they were trying to control the world’s communications. People claimed that JP Morgan was the antichrist.
There’s no difference. Just a lot of loony and baseless theories. History has proven that again and again.
Nebuchadnezzar? Fairly successful, I’d say. Except he went mad, likely from Syphilis. I don’t have to worry about that now, because unlike in his time, we know what causes syphilis and have ways of protecting ourselves from it, and in the event that it is transmitted, it responds to antibiotics. It isn’t that common anymore, anyway, thanks to antibiotic treatment. (oh yeah.. problem solved by science)
Quote Comment