[village-discuss] Vaccine Debate

[Bruce Gould]

If you were involved in the whole vaccine debate  –

 

Frontline aired an hour show on the debate last night. If this is a topic that interests you, you need to watch it:

 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/view/?utm_campaign=homepage&utm_medium=topnav&utm_source=topnav

 

 

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[jeff derbyshire]

Thanks Bruce. This was very informative. I've gone years without a
flu shot. After watching the show, I feel that missing the flu shot
is low risk. Polio / Whooping Cough sounds devastating. Vaccines
seem necessary. As the Narration unfolded, I felt less and less
resonate with the anti-vaccination mother from Ashland Oregon.

This is another discussion, but for population slimming perhaps they
could put vaccinations on a 30 yr hiatus?

[Bruce Gould]

If we stop vaccinating for things like whooping cough, tetanus, diphtheria,
etc, we'll definitely have some population slimming!

Not getting a flu vaccine is low risk, but we just don't know when the
seasonal flu will turn deadly. In the 60's there was a flu epidemic that
killed a million people worldwide, the same for the 50's, and in 1918 FIFTY
MILLION people died. It's a crapshoot - most of the time the flu is just a
bad cold, but every so often it's a killer. And, as the documentary showed,
there a vulnerable people in the population and if you get the flu you're
not very helpful for these folks. Getting people to adopt this point of view
is difficult, since most people are just focused on the fact that they don't
like shots, or some such ridiculous thing.

These days people think they can protect themselves by eating organic
broccoli and doing yoga, or some such thing. But many viruses are simply
much, much stronger than you are. Human beings are not at the top of the
food chain. If it's a contest between the polio vaccine and an unvaccinated
human, bet on the virus.

>>Thanks Bruce. This was very informative. I've gone years without a
>>flu shot. After watching the show, I feel that missing the flu shot
>>is low risk. Polio / Whooping Cough sounds devastating. Vaccines
>>seem necessary. As the Narration unfolded, I felt less and less
>>resonate with the anti-vaccination mother from Ashland Oregon.

>>This is another discussion, but for population slimming perhaps they
>>could put vaccinations on a 30 yr hiatus?

[Ora Uzel]

I don't know if this has been put out there yet on the vaccine debate, but Michael Specter is a big proponent of vaccines.  There's numerous videos out there where you can see him talk about this in the perspective of the larger issue of what he calls "denialism."

http://www.michaelspecter.com/

Ted Talk: http://www.ted.com/talks/michael_specter_the_danger_of_science_denial.html

Please do not take this as me endorsing his ideas.  I'm just sharing information and links.  I don't involve myself in debates on vaccinations.

[Kathleen Ellis]

Well, I associate flu vaccines with all other pharmaceutical agents - I
avoid them if I feel I don't really need them and I tend to use them only
if I have to (and if I can afford them). I got pneumonia over the winter
and yeah, I took my antibiotics.

Unfortunately the industry has a bad track record - in the past, they've
created problems for which they then offer high-priced and risky
solutions. They've knowingly pushed bad product on people and conned
doctors into helping them. Sure, there's a small chance the stuff in that
shot (and I don't mind shots) might prevent me and millions from death,
but then again it might be the next Thallidomide disaster.

Every time you're told to get a flu shot, you are also it can make you
feel sick for days after you get it.

Then there's the iffiness of the flu vaccine's efficacy.
told that it might not work with this year's flu - you could get a flu
that isn't prevented by the vaccine you're getting. That's a problem other
vaccines don't have - I'm glad my mom got me stuck for MMR back in the day
and if I had a child I'd get them their shots too.

I'm not saying I'm right - I'm just saying I'm not getting the damn flu
shot and not because I do yoga and eat organic broccoli. Or well, not JUST
because of those things. The pharmaceutical industry has been a disaster
for public trust in science.

I'll watch the Frontline episode when I get a free hour, though - I love
Frontline.

-K

--
"Utopia is a matter of innermost urgency."
- Slavoj Zizek
"Life is short and truth works far and long; let us speak the truth."
- Arthur Schopenhauer

[jeff derbyshire]

>
> Every time you're told to get a flu shot, you are also it can make you feel
> sick for days after you get it.
>

[JD] No surprise here, the flu is in the flu shot :) A mild version
of that year's strain anyway, or last years depending on your
injector.

[Bruce Gould]

Kathleen says "The pharmaceutical industry has been a disaster for public
trust in science."

But the VACCINE industry has saved untold people from death and crippling
diseases; smallpox, for example, used to be the scourge of the world
(probably 50% of the native population in America died from smallpox before
the settlers got to them with guns...) and is now eradicated completely, due
to a worldwide vaccination and quarantine program.

We all know how Big Pharma pushes drugs on us, but the trick is to make the
proper distinctions - vaccines are watched very closely. I haven't seen a
reason yet to believe that the CDC has been captured by the pharmaceutical
industry.

As Kathleen points out, many people feel sick for a day or two after getting
a vaccine. As Frontline points out, this is EXPECTED. Most of these cases
are due to a mild allergic reaction - vaccines often contain egg proteins.
Feeling like crap for a day is far, far safer than actually getting the flu.

[Bruce Gould]

Oh yeah, one more thing:

 

This entire debate isn’t about anything having to do with data, statistics, medicine, or science – in my quirky personal opinion. It has to do with the vague feeling many folks have that sticking a stainless steel needle in your arm and injecting yourself with a fluid manufactured in a factory is somehow…well, unspiritual, as well as the feeling that if you just think the right thoughts and create your own reality you can fend off any threat. We’re potentially invulnerable!! Wouldn’t it be more desirable to make yourself perfectly healthy just by eating right and focusing on your chakras, rather than accepting a product from industry?

 

I would like to suggest  that sticking a stainless steel needle in your arm and injecting yourself with a fluid manufactured in a factory is precisely  the spiritual thing to do. Mother Nature gave you something She didn’t give viruses: an enormous prefrontal cortex, the use of which has taken us from making sharp rocks to understanding how the human immune system works. You can’t get more spiritual than that.

 

 

 

 

[John Stoner]

I think the right frame to think of this is interspecies warfare.
Vaccines are weapons. Arguably, they're a component of a species-wide
immune system, that we are building and adapting over time, and
refining the process in second order ways. That's being done within an
industry that's had other problems.

Viruses are serious organisms, but don't fuck with tool-users.