OK tough guys, no Flu shot for you!

Sure - you guys gonna ask?

And - you gonna ask the whole woprld, or just the two countries - and one wabbit - you happen to be peed off with at present?

And I was most certainly laughing at your post, Cjhsa - because it was hilarious.

You didn't offer aid to Florida either.

Florida is beyond help.

There was absolutely nothing funny about my post(s), but I knew you'd take them that way. I actually find it sad to see someone find humor in a potential health disaster. The U.S. has provided more aid around the world in the last 50 years than all other countries combined. The thought of you helping us makes you laugh. Funny, bunny.

Come on Cj - you are peed with me because I did once what you do all the time - when you intrude constantly into threads with your gun obsession. Think about it. Hard. Very hard - you MIGHT learn something. But then - I have little evidence you ever read anyone's posts, as you prove constantly when you continue to parrot misinformation about - guess what - gun laws.

If the USA really needs our help, they can ask - and, just as when you have fires and such, I am sure if we can help, we will.

What is funny is you - and your ridiculous comments - not the US's health needs - if they have any that can be assisted by a less wealthy country - which means the rest of the world.

Flu vaccines are made in yearly batches. Each batch is formulated differently in order to target the particular strains present in an area that season. The strains historically present in Australia (and France and Germany BTW) are different from the strains generally found in the USA.
You guys get texan and bolivian flu. We get beijing and singapore flu.

So cjhsa, if you want you can have our left of vaccine, but it won't protect you from the flu you actually get over there.

You got that right.



Lighten up CJ. Theeeeeeeeeeeeeeee sun'll come out, tomorrow...

No.

I tend not to catch the flu.

Let me see...in 1918 40 million people died in the big flu epidemic...40 million!!

Couldn't stop me from getting it. Ever since my daughter was diagnosed with diabetes at age 5 (she's now 17), she and everyone else in our family has received a flu shot every year. Doctor's orders. If she were to get the flu, it could be deadly. She and many others have been hospitalized in intensive care during flu season before. Many have died.

People seem to forget that getting a flu shot isn't only for their own protection, but also for those around them who are at high risk of DYING from complications of the flu.

Persons at high risk of dying of complications of the flu are young babies and young children (even normally healthy ones), pregnant women, the elderly, and those who have comprimised immune systems caused by any variety of reasons, those who have heart problems, diabetes, or other chronic conditions, people who have been hospitalized during the previous year. Anyone who is in close contact with any of these people should be vaccinated against the flu. Think of those you care about - Parents, grandparents, children, friends...

You can't get the flu from the flu shot. It contains killed virus:

What are the risks from getting a flu shot?
The viruses in the flu shot are killed (inactivated), so you cannot get the flu from a flu shot. The risk of a flu shot causing serious harm, or death, is extremely small. However, a vaccine, like any medicine, may rarely cause serious problems, such as severe allergic reactions. Almost all people who get influenza vaccine have no serious problems from it.
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/flushot.htm

The nasal spray flu vaccine is a bit different but isn't appropriate for everyone:
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/nasalspray.htm

Wellllllllllll.

Ex bacteriology grad speaking, though I don't remember all that much, heh.

I have just recently started with the flu shots. I am at borderline age, not yet officially, in flu regime, old, and do have asthma, though not horribly.
So I am betwixt on this one, although they say there will be something like 5/8ths of what was available last year, hmmm, that doesn't sound like automatic panic.

Re immunity, I have been there and done that and it is true I get many less colds and flus. But I was in deep doo doo sometime in the late eighties when I got it.

I note Adrian's point, re diff mixes for different areas.

I also wonder about the slamdown of the British manufacturer... re the situation that made them call a halt - whether that was piffle or serious.

Also, I do remember reading that last year's shots didn't protect against Whatever, and know there are some serious flu concerns around the corner, re... the birds to humans thing. But... not immediate concerns.

Some magazine, years ago now, had a coherent explanation of the implications of the development of flus in China.. Something - there was - re the juxtaposition of swine and birds and humans in the countryside. I don't know if that made actual sense or was an artifact of prejudicial thinking.
(Think that was in an old Atlantic or Harper's, betting Atlantic.)

panzade...

My great-uncle and my father-in-law were both long term victims of that 1918 flu epidemic. Both of them caught that flu and subsequently developed Parkinson's Disease...a possible complication of the flu. It eventually killed them both.

Killer Flu Recreated in the Lab
BBC News October 6, 2004
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3719990.stm

...Scientists believe the 1918 virus leapt to humans by mutating from bird flu, possibly after passing through pigs, which are able to harbour both human and avian viruses and thus allow them to swap genes as the viruses reproduce.

For that reason, experts are deeply concerned that the avian flu that has broken out in poultry flocks in parts of south-east Asia may acquire genes that will make it highly infectious as well as lethal for humans...



"The lesson is not to be complacent about anything to do with flu."
Professor John Oxford

Yes, but leap not proven yet. There is one case I read about this week, but provenance rather sketchy.

I think it would be rather sad if fear of bird flu created a run on this present ordinary vaccine, which many seniors and some others do need, and which would not protect against so called bird flu.

Let me just go ahead and guess that this is what happens.

So why is it that there are only two factories providing flu shots, anyways? Is there not a market for this stuff? Are the prices not profitable enough?

For all of you wanting to give your body "practice," I think that's exactly what the shot does. It exposes you to the flu in such a small dose that it builds up a resistance (Am I right docs?) without severe symptoms.

Hopefully, I will be one of the people getting a shot because I have asthama.

You know, people used to die from the flu all the time. Now, thankfully, we Americans tend to live much longer.

I wondered that.

I once had a flu shot, and that year got the flu very badly twice. Now I don't bother. Thanks to vitamin C tablets I've been able to avoid it for several years.

BINGO!

This is why I will get a flu shot if there are any available (there are elderly folks here who will obviously be in line in front of me) - to protect my parents.