How's the Flu Hitting You?

"Peter Duniho" wrote in message
...
"Dave Stadt" wrote in message
y.com...
I'm with Jay on this. There have been numerous news reports that have
stated the flu shots being given do not prevent the A/Fujian strain
which
is
the one causing the problems.

You are "with Jay" in claiming that all of the news reports are false?
Funny. There haven't been any well-researched news reports saying that
the
vaccine does not prevent the dominant strain for this season.

Jim's comments are exactly right, at least according to all of the news
reports. The current vaccine includes three strains of flu, none of which
turned out to be the dominant one this season. However, they are similar
enough that health officials expect *some* protective effect from the
vaccine. No, it won't be 80-90%. But they are expecting as much as 50%
protection, even among those infected with the A/Fujian strain, due to the
similarities.

The vaccine does not need to include the *exact* strain for there to be a
protective effect in some percentage of individuals. For that matter,
having the exact strain does not guarantee a protective effect. It's just
that the percentage is higher when the vaccine is the same strain.

It's the same story every year. The shots
only work on the virus strains that were around last flu season and
don't
work on any new strains that have mutated and spread this year.

The same story? Yeah, right. The flu vaccine is just a big scam. You
caught 'em with their pants down. Maybe you should get to the Wall Street
Journal or New York Times with this breaking news.

Seriously though, you don't appear to be getting it. The shots work to
varying degrees depending on the individual and depending on how closely
the
virus strain in question matches the strains found in the vaccine. It's
not
a binary either/or thing. For many people, this year's flu shot will
prevent them from being infected with this year's dominant flu strain (as
well as any number of others).

Sorry, I forgot...what does this have to do with flying?

Pete


So you are saying they don't know how effective this years vaccine will be
against the new strains if it will be effective at all. You use a lot of
wishy washy words like if, some, suspect, varying degrees and depending to
describe what you think is an effective vaccine. Sounds pretty much the
same as what I have been hearing, it isn't the right stuff and it isn't
working very well plus their might not be enough of it.

It all seems pretty binary to me. Either the vaccine prevents the flu for a
high percentage of people or not. From what I have heard and based the
number of people getting sick it looks mostly like a _not_ situation. On
top of all that, if the shortage plays out it makes the effectiveness that
much less. All in all not poster material for the medical or pharmaceutical
industries. Then again we aren't yet in a 1918 situation although I have
not heard that such a situation could be prevented with current practices.

OBTW...I'm going flying the 17th at 10:35 eastern if the weather is good and
I don't catch the flu.