Sep 08 2009
Swine Flu Vaccine Fearmongering
Fear is a curious thing. It often bears no relation to the actual risk of what we fear. When swine flu first broke out in Mexico, people were understandably afraid. Travel was restricted, schools were closed, and so many people stayed home that the streets of Mexico City were empty. As the disease spread around the world, Egypt developed a paranoid fear of pigs and committed national pigicide. They ordered the slaughter of all 300,000 of their country’s innocent little porkers, ignoring the fact that the flu is spread person-to-person, not pig-to-person. Now that the disease has officially been labeled a pandemic, fears have switched from the real threat of the disease to an imagined danger from the vaccine.
Some people just plain hate the idea of vaccines – to the point that they are willing to spread old falsehoods, make up new lies, distort the results of studies, misrepresent statistics, and endanger our public health. There are websites like “Operation Fax to Stop the Vax” and even anti-swine-flu-vaccine rap videos. Press releases, e-mail campaigns, talk shows, and blogs are being used to stir up irrational fears. These people are irresponsible fearmongers. They are wrong, and they are dangerous.
Background
The 1918 flu. The flu epidemic of 1918 started as a mild disease in the spring, called the “3-day fever.” Most victims recovered in a few days; there were few deaths. Then in the fall, it turned into something far more severe. It was the same flu strain, but it had become more virulent. Some victims died within hours. Healthy young adults were as susceptible as children and the elderly. It affected remote villages as well as urban areas. It attacked 1/5 of the world’s population, ¼ of the US population, and killed 50 million people.
Wartime conditions may have favored the evolution of a more virulent strain. In peacetime, the sicker stay put and the mildly affected move around. In the trenches, the mildly affected stayed on duty and the sicker were sent on crowded trains to crowded field hospitals. Today, places with social upheaval might have similar effects favoring a virulent strain.
The 1976 swine flu. In February 1976 a strain of H1N1 influenza similar to the 1918 strain killed a soldier at Fort Dix. Officials feared a pandemic and over-reacted. In actuality, the H1N1 strain was limited to the Fort Dix area and quickly died out, and another related strain only persisted until March. Nevertheless, a swine flu vaccine was developed and was given to 48,000,000 Americans, 22% of the population. The vaccination program was stopped in December after 532 cases of paralysis from Guillain-Barré syndrome were linked to the vaccine and 25 people died. It had been a false alarm, and more people died of the vaccine than of the disease. The risk of getting Guillain-Barré from the vaccine was approximately 1 in 100,000.
The 2009 swine flu. Between April 15 and July 24, 2009, there were 43,771 confirmed and probable cases of H1N1 influenza (“swine flu”) in the US. There were 5011 hospitalizations and 302 deaths, 39% among those aged 25 to 49, in contrast to the usual flu where 90% of the deaths are in people over age 65. For comparison, the more common strains of flu have been killing around 36,000 people a year in the US. Swine flu has been declared a phase 6 pandemic by the World Health Organization: that is a measure of its spread, not of its severity.
What are the chances that the new swine flu will follow the course of the 1918 flu? We have no way of knowing. All we can do is hope for the best and prepare for the worst. In addition to the annual flu vaccine for the usual common strains, a specific vaccine for the H1N1 strain is being prepared and tested to see whether one or two shots will be needed to produce a satisfactory immune response. So we may be offered as many as 3 shots this year. Supplies will be limited, at least in the short run, so the CDC has announced these priorities:
- Pregnant women
- Household contacts and caregivers for children younger than 6 months of age
- Healthcare and emergency medical services personnel
- All people from 6 months through 24 years of age
- Persons aged 25 through 64 years who have health conditions associated with higher risk of medical complications from influenza.
What if it fizzles out like the swine flu of 1976? That’s already ruled out: the 1976 flu had fizzled by March; the new swine flu hasn’t shown any signs of fizzling yet. We will be monitoring numbers of cases and vaccine complications very carefully, assessing the risk/benefit ratio, and we’re not likely to repeat the mistakes of 1976.
The Lies and Distortions vs. the Facts
I can’t hope to address all the misinformation that is circulating, and even if I could, more new lies would come out by the time I finished writing. Here are some of the ones I have heard.
A correspondent in the Netherlands forwarded me an alarmist e-mail that is circulating in Europe.
Claim: It alleges that only one person has died of swine flu in the UK, and it questions whether he really had flu. It tells us “you are slated for vaccination against a disease which poses no credible threat whatsoever.”
Fact: As of August 27, the death toll in the UK was 66. As of Sept. 1, 2009, 2184 deaths had been reported worldwide. Most rational people would call that a credible threat.
Claim: Guillian-Barré Syndrome is a newly concocted name for a much more familiar condition: Polio.
Fact: Ridiculous! Polio is a distinct disease and its symptoms are very different from those of Guillain-Barré syndrome. A diagnosis of polio can be confirmed by finding the actual poliovirus particles in body secretions or cerebrospinal fluid. The last case of “wild polio” in the US occurred in 1979. Polio has been eradicated in most countries; Guillain-Barré still occurs regularly in every country.
Claim: Guillain-Barré is still being caused by flu vaccines. A study based on the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) found 54 cases of GBS reported after vaccination in the United States in 2004. 57% of these followed flu vaccines and the rest followed other vaccines.
Fact: The VAERS is a voluntary reporting system that accepts all reports of symptoms or illnesses that occurred after vaccination. It even accepted a fraudulent report claiming that a man had been turned into The Hulk by his influenza vaccine. To find out whether the VAERS reports mean anything, it is necessary to compare the incidence of the condition in those vaccinated to the incidence in the unvaccinated. Guillain-Barré syndrome affects 1 to 4 of every 100,000 people around the world every year, and the increased risk from vaccines is currently estimated at no more than 1 in a million.
Claim: It usually takes several years to test a drug and show that it is safe, but the swine flu vaccine is going to be fast-tracked for quick approval.
Fact: A new flu vaccine has to be developed every year to respond to the new strains that are constantly evolving. Time does not allow for the same kind of testing we require for approval of a new pharmaceutical. Time is even shorter for the swine flu this year. We have a lot of experience in producing new flu vaccines every year, and there is no reason to suspect that this year’s batches will be any more dangerous than usual. Because of fast-tracking, we will be monitoring very closely for side effects. We have a choice between fast-tracking and being prepared for a serious outbreak, or being slow and cautious and totally unprepared.
Claim: 4000 people were afflicted with Guillain-Barré Syndrome in 1976.
Fact: At least 1 in 100,000 people would have gotten Guillain-Barré syndrome anyway. The excess cases attributed to the vaccine were estimated at 532 (some sources say half of that number), and most of them recovered fully. 25 deaths were attributed to the vaccine.
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There are several websites where writers with a bad track record for scientific credibility (like Joseph Mercola and Gary Null) advocate vaccine refusal. The Health Freedom movement wants the government to forget about trying to protect the public and give us the freedom to harm ourselves by using untested, disproven, useless, or even dangerous treatments.
Claim: Legislation allows for you to be isolated or quarantined or “incarcerated in relocation centers” if you refuse vaccination during a declared Pandemic Emergency. This is a violation of human rights and of the Constitution.
Fact: If you have active TB, the government has not only the power but the responsibility to require treatment or quarantine so you don’t sit next to me on the bus and cough in my face. If you contract Ebola virus, I sure hope you will be quarantined to reduce the death toll. Quarantine is legal, is mandated by legislation, and is accepted by international law. Sometimes the duty to protect most of the people in a society temporarily trumps a few individual human rights. The government is not going to require quarantine unless there is a serious threat that demands action.
Claim: People should be allowed to “self-shield.” For self-shielding you go home lock the doors and stay there. Then you can try to further protect yourself with nano-silver, homeopathic remedies, cold packs, vitamins, flavonoids, zinc, astaxanthin, magnesium, and other stuff.
Fact: A self-imposed quarantine is better than nothing, but I question whether it would be effective in practice. The suggested (untested) remedies might conceivably keep people entertained so they are more willing to stay home.
Claim: The CDC and the American Academy of Neurologists have asked neurologists to be vigilant in looking for cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome in people who have been vaccinated. This is an admission that they know the vaccine will be dangerous.
Fact: They clearly said “they do not expect the 2009 H1N1 vaccine to increase the risk for the autoimmune disease” but since this is a concern with any pandemic vaccine, they will be on the alert. This is a good thing. If the incidence starts rising, they will know it earlier and be able to react more quickly than they did in 1976.
Claim: The threat of Guillain-Barré is a reason to reject vaccines.
Fact: No one understands what causes Guillain-Barré syndrome, but it can develop after an infection, surgery or vaccination. It is possible that people who develop GBS after vaccination might also have developed GBS after natural exposure to the disease. “From both the societal and individual perspectives, the risk of GBS after a flu shot pales in comparison to the risk of serious adverse events if infected with the influenza virus: 60 to 70 cases of GBS vs. 20,000 deaths from influenza. Keeping things on the same scale, people over 65 years of age can choose from a risk of 1 case of GBS per million people or 10,000 cases of hospitalization and 1500 deaths due to influenza.”
Claim: Joseph Mercola writes about “Squalene: The Swine Flu Vaccine’s Dirty Little Secret.” He has claimed that the vaccine adjuvant squalene is dangerous, that the Gulf War Syndrome was caused by the squalene in anthrax vaccines, that squalene is “good” or “bad depending on how it gets into your body: “Injection is an abnormal route of entry which incites your immune system to attack all the squalene in your body, not just the vaccine adjuvant.” And the only reason they put adjuvants in vaccines is to save money.
Fact: Squalene is found naturally in the human body. It is a precursor of cholesterol and other compounds necessary to human health. Squalene antibodies were found in Gulf War veterans; but the rate turned out to be no higher in those who had Gulf War Syndrome than in those who didn’t. Squalene antibodies were found at similar rates in people who had never been exposed to squalene in vaccines. The anthrax vaccine has been ruled out as a possible cause of Gulf War Syndrome. Anyway, it turns out there was no squalene in the anthrax vaccine!
American flu vaccines do not contain adjuvants, but maybe they should. Adjuvants enhance the body’s innate immune response to the antigens in vaccines, making vaccines more effective. And they allow for broader cross-reactivity against viral strains not included in the vaccine. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17931151?ordinalpos=33&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum Mercola says adjuvants are added just to increase profits, but the pharmaceutical and health industries could make far more money treating patients in an epidemic than they could ever make trying to prevent one.
There is a large body of data demonstrating the safety of squalene. Flu vaccines containing MF59, a squalene-based adjuvant, have been used in Europe for 10 years, with 22,000,000 doses given; and no serious adverse events have occurred, only mild local reactions. The vaccine does not raise the incidence or titers of anti-squalene antibodies. The World Health Organization (WHO) considers it safe. http://www.who.int/vaccine_safety/topics/adjuvants/squalene/questions_and_answers/en/index.html
Claim: Flu vaccines are not very effective and don’t protect everyone. The effectiveness is particularly low in the elderly.
Fact: This claim is true, BUT… In recent years, flu vaccines have been 75% effective in preventing hospitalizations for flu. 75% is way better than nothing. No vaccine is 100% effective. Flu vaccine is particularly problematic because of the constantly mutating strains of the virus. Nevertheless, the benefits of vaccines are clear. It is true that the elderly are not as well protected by the vaccine (efficacy rates have been estimated at 50% or less): that’s why it’s so important for younger people to be vaccinated, reducing the prevalence of the disease in the population and thereby reducing the likelihood of the elderly being exposed. In other words, don’t just get the flu shot for yourself, get it for Grandma.
Claim: Mercola says “Injecting organisms into your body to provoke immunity is contrary to nature.”
Fact: Nature kills people. Doing something contrary to nature is what medicine is all about. It’s a good thing.
Claim: “The potential for a weaponized vaccine to be the vector for a weaponized flu cannot be discounted.”
Fact: Most far-fetched conspiracy theories are wrong: I have no trouble discounting this one. The potential may be there, but the likelihood is homeopathic.
Claim: People should make their own decisions about their health care.
Fact: One of the basic principles of medical ethics is autonomy: patients have the right to accept or reject any treatment. Modern doctors try to involve the patient in the decision-making process, but most people are ill-equipped to make health decisions on their own without getting information and guidance from a health care professional. In a recent survey, 30 percent of Americans believed that there had been a case of smallpox in the United States in the past five years, and 63 percent thought there had been a case somewhere in the world in the past five years. http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/348/5/426 They didn’t know that the last case in the US occurred in 1949 and the last case in the world occurred in 1977 in Somalia. Twenty-five percent thought it was likely that they would die if they got the smallpox vaccine (the actual risk of death from the vaccine is 1 per million). People who are uninformed and scientifically illiterate are not capable of making rational decisions about health matters.
Mercola’s advice for preventing flu: Eliminate sugar and processed foods from your diet, take a high quality source of animal-based omega 3 fats like Krill Oil, exercise, optimize your vitamin D levels, get plenty of sleep, deal with stress, and wash your hands.
Fact: Washing your hands is a good idea.
Mercola claims: “Vitamin D deficiency is the likely cause of seasonal flu viruses.”
Fact: Now really! Vitamin D deficiency in a human body can no more “cause a virus” than it could “cause a cat.” Perhaps he meant vitamin D deficiency could predispose to infection, and there is some research to suggest that it might. Some have claimed that taking vitamin D supplements will prevent the flu, but there is no evidence to support that.
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Mercola’s claims and arguments were decisively eviscerated on Science-Based Medicine by Dr. Joseph Albietz. http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=851 Not only are Mercola’s assertions demonstrably false, but they reveal a profound misunderstanding of immunology. Unfortunately, he reaches a large audience of scientifically naïve people who believe his every word.
In response to Dr. Albietz’s article, there were some interesting comments from readers that further demonstrate the anti-vaccine mindset and the ability to distort information to promote a cause.
Claim: The government is going to mandate that everyone get the swine flu vaccine.
Fact: No such proposal has been made. The government couldn’t do it even if it tried, because there won’t be enough doses to go around. That’s why they’ve issued recommendations prioritizing who should get the vaccine first.
Claim: George Bush signed an agreement that if a pandemic emergency arose and the President declared a national state of emergency, control of the government would be passed to the United Nations. Blue-helmeted UN soldiers would run our country and the Constitution would be suspended.
Fact: It was simply an agreement to facilitate international cooperation, to share information and enhance collaboration in the event of an emergency. It says nothing about the UN at all, much less about relinquishing sovereignty to the UN or any other organization. The actual agreement can be read online: http://www.spp.gov/pdf/nap_flu07.pdf
The same person pointed out that shots hurt and that alone should tell you something. “Yet you are willing to trust these people with your lives to make a vaccine that the Creator never intended the human body should need, and let them inject it into your body? You people are scary or insane!”
No, it is the anti-vaccine zealots who are scary. They are not insane, just self-deluded and misguided. I hope the swine flu won’t develop into a reprise of 1918; but if it does, the false information these people are spreading could be responsible for a great deal of death and suffering. Freedom of speech is a good thing, but this kind of fearmongering is almost as bad as shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theater.
302 Responses to “Swine Flu Vaccine Fearmongering”
On this side of the pond the anti-fluvaccine propaganda machine has also been active. Antivaccine websites and forums are full of the same sort of nonsense you have seen in the USA, with dire warnings about squalene and “killer nerve diseases” wiping out the vaccinated population. The papers are full of stories how only half of doctors will accept the vaccine, a third of nurses and half of pregnant women. If those who need the vaccine the most say they will not have it, why should the rest of the population worry?
Another problem has been that the lull in cases has generated a sense of complacency, but this will probably change when the autumn/winter wave hits the UK, and people start to die in increasing numbers.
Regarding Guillain-Barre syndrome, you don’t mention that influenza is one of the well documented causes of this syndrome, and that by vaccinating widely, we would probably see a drop in the number of cases overall as compared to letting the flu just do its own thing. Already there have been cases described. One commenter on my blog(1) even tried to suggest that it was the Tamiflu that caused her husband’s GBS, rather than the flu which he had 10 days earlier.
GBS after seasonal flu vaccine occurs at a rate of 1-2 per million, which is within the background incidence range. There is no reason to believe that the current swine flu vaccine would cause GBS at rates similar to those seen in 1976 (1 per 100,000). However, one estimate suggests GBS incidence is 40-70 per million cases of clinical flu(2). A UK study showed the relative incidence of GBS within 90 days of flu vaccine to be only 0.76, whereas it was 7.35 within 90 days of clinical flu and 16.6 within 30 days of flu(3).
(1) http://layscience.net/node/625
(2) http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/594124
(3) http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/169/3/382
Claim: People should be allowed to “self-shield.” For self-shielding you go home lock the doors and stay there. Then you can try to further protect yourself with nano-silver, homeopathic remedies, cold packs, vitamins, flavonoids, zinc, astaxanthin, magnesium, and other stuff.
Fact: A self-imposed quarantine is better than nothing, but I question whether it would be effective in practice. The suggested (untested) remedies might conceivably keep people entertained so they are more willing to stay home.
I love the comment about the remedies keeping people entertained.
I find it puzzling that anyone would endorse “self-shielding” as a practical means of controlling a pandemic. Do they realize how long they’d have to isolate themselves? Have they *tried* living in a siege situation? What do they plan to do for food and other logistics? What is their plan if the whole region decides to batten down the hatches? Who do they expect will deliver the groceries? Run the garbage trucks? Staff the hospitals? Operate the power plants? Keep the sewage treatment plants going? Totally ignoring the fact that our already-fragile economy would collapse if everybody stayed home for a month, how do they expect to even survive in that situation?
Basically, like counting on herd immunity, self-shielding depends on the assumption that most folks won’t. They are expecting everybody else to put themselves at risk so they don’t have to. Selfish, stupid, and not even effective.
Thanks for this, and the other articles on swine flu. I’m sure I will be excerpting parts to send to friends and family.
Last year, my 12 yo daughter was given a nasal spray that contained an attenuated flu vaccine. Does anyone know whether this will be available for the swine flu? The opportunity to avoid needles makes it very attractive.
Yes, Dacks, FluMist will be available for H1N1 as well as the regular flu vaccine this year.
“The same person pointed out that shots hurt and that alone should tell you something.”
Oh wow. I can only imagine all the unnatural damages I’ve done to my body by all that running, biking and weight lifting. Those things feel terrible, so they must be bad for me, right?
“American flu vaccines do not contain adjuvants, but maybe they should.”
This is an absolute lie. ALL vaccines are adjuvanted in one way or another. The regular flu vaccine contains Triton X-100, a toxic chemical which is NOT recommended for human or animal testing.
No, Th1Th2, you’re the one who’s lying.
We went through this before. You haven’t provided any shred of evidence that Triton X-100 is an adjuvant.
Here’s for you qetzal. Is Tween found in vaccines an adjuvant? Do you know that Triton X-100 is an essential adjuvant in pesticides and herbicides?
As an agricultural adjuvant, Triton X-1000 is a surfactant helps the spray to spread evenly over plants, thus providing better coverage and more uniform application of the active ingredient to the target.
An application that has no relevance to its use in vaccines.
the bug guy,
Oh really? Do you want to rephrase your statement? Triton X-100 is not only an agricultural adjuvant but also an IMMUNOLOGIC ADJUVANT just like the Tween.
Comparison of new triton X-100- and tween-ether-treated split-treated vaccines in children.
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?&artid=273983
Th1Th2,
Did you know that Megan Fox is an adjuvant in fertility clinics?
Triton X-100 is a surfactant used to disrupt the virus and create a “split-virus” vaccine – the whole virus is not used, only part of it. It is not an adjuvant (which is something used to enhance the immune response to the vaccine).
There are several types of ingredients in vaccines:
The antigens themselves (such as inactivated viruses)
preservatives
stabilizers
adjuvants
and substances used in the manufacturing process and found in trace amounts in the end product.
The flu vaccines listed here by the CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/B/excipient-table-2.pdf
do not list any adjuvants.
@Steven Novella
Looking at that link you provided, I now understand where anti-vaxers get their “vaccines contain !” rants. Perhaps the CDC should indicate which substances are used during production, and which are actually present in the final product.
The bug guy,
If Triton X-100 is an agricultural adjuvant then why is it in vaccines? Because Triton X-100 is also an IMMUNOLOGIC ADJUVANT. Tween, like Triton X-100 is also found in pesticides and herbicides and also a major vaccine adjuvant.
Comparison of new triton X-100- and tween-ether-treated split-treated vaccines in children.
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?&artid=273983
I am not surprised many people don’t know this fact because why put something in vaccines that are NOT supposed to be used in human or animal testing anyway.
Steven,
You are misguided. Even thimerosal is considered an adjuvant. That is any substance that is added to preserve, stabilize, and enhance the immunogenicity of the vaccine is considered an adjuvant. Although vaccines are worthless to begin with, they are even more “crap” without the adjuvants.
Thank you, Harriet, for this review.
Th1Th2 – you are simply wrong. An adjuvant specifically enhances the immune response, reducing the amount of antigen needed. Look it up. Preservatives are preservatives, not adjuvants.
You are simply playing with the definition in order to argue that Harriet lied – very intellectually dishonest.
What was the point of that reference? It simply compared the two vaccines for antibody response.
Also – these substances are not added to vaccines. They are used in the manufacturing process and remain in trace amounts only.
But thanks for, once again, demonstrating the mind-numbing absurdity and intellectual dishonesty of the anti-vax position.
“It’s an adjuvant because I SAY SO!!! Nyaah!!”
Isn’t that basically what your argument boils down to, Th1Th2? A little weak, don’t you think? Perhaps you could dispense with the apparently confusing word “adjuvant” and just explain why you think it is bad that Triton X-100 is in vaccines? Or is the only reason because you found a scary word that you don’t understand and found that in an unrelated context, it can be applied to it?
(There’s DHMO in the vaccines too, don’t forget that.)
He’s been told that before. He considers our use of the word ‘adjuvant’ too narrow. He doesn’t believe the vaccine works anyway.
Steven,
Rule # 1. Not all antigens are immunogenes but ALL immunogenes are antigens. This is the MAIN reason all vaccines are adjuvanted to make these antigens become IMMUNOGENIC, otherwise, these antigens will be mediated at the cellular level that does not require antibody production.
You said,
“Also – these substances are not added to vaccines. They are used in the manufacturing process and remain in trace amounts only. ”
Clearly, an oxymoron. Care to revise your statement please.
Thimerosal is a very potent immunogen, autoimmunogen and teratogen as well. It’s more than a preservative.
Probably the same thing it tells us about childbirth.
You overshoot it.
Childbirth is a normal physiologic event as opposed to vaccination which is obviously a pathologic event.
Calli,
If you know what MSDS stands for then you should be able to know where to find Triton X-100. Don’t get lazy and read.
LOL @Th1Th2.
That reference is from 1981, says nothing about the use of Triton X-100 or Tween as an adjuvant, and says nothing about the ingredients of modern vaccines.
And I’ll overlook your use of the word “immunogene” and just assume that was a typo and you really meant immunogen. Doesn’t the definition of antigen mean it invokes an immune response (and therefore is an immunogen)?
hokieian,
Because you have no clue what adjuvants are?
Yes, an antigen can invoke an immune response (cell-mediated) but not antibody production (humor-mediated) unless they become IMMUNOGENIC.
Maybe we should start the rumor that the Obama administration, has a ‘secret plan’ to WITHHOLD the flu vaccine from people. Yeah, they want to keep it for themselves and protect only the ‘elite’ from the 2009 flu. I can see it now, Fox newscasters demanding “give us our vaccines now!”. Town hall meetings full of angry citizens screaming to be protected from the flu too! Start the emails flying now.
Th1Th2,
I challenge you to provide one single citation that specifically calls Triton X-100 an adjuvant in the context of a vaccine.
Herbicide references don’t count. References that talk about Triton in vaccines but don’t specifically call it an adjuvant don’t count. References to other adjuvants don’t count either.
While you’re working on that, here is a 2004 review on vaccine adjuvants. It contains an extensive discussion of all the major adjuvant groups. Yet there is no mention of Triton X-100.
Why not? Do you think the authors know less about adjuvants than you? Do you think they’d forget to include an adjuvant that (according to you) is essential for the flu vaccine? Did they omit it on purpose?
Or is it possible that you’re wrong?
Who says thimerosal is a teratogen? In this study, “systemically or topically applied thimerosal was found to have no teratogenic effect even when given in concentrations approaching the 50% lethal dose” http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1111489
Hehehe. Sorry. I’m still chuckling that Th1Th2 thinks thimerosal is an adjuvant. Bwahahahaha!
hokieian,
Th1Th2 may have propagated a typo from the Wikipedia article on Antigens:
Th1Th2, so you’re telling me something is only immunogenic if it induces a humoral response?
Harriet Hall,
So the rabbits said that thimerosal is safe?
This is the reason Modern Medicine is based on junk science. Enough said.
Todd W.,
Thimerosal induces TH2 responses via influencing cytokine secretion by human dendritic cells
….Mercury has been shown to induce a number of immunological and neurotoxic changes, including increased production of TH2 cytokines, increased levels of IgE, decreased activity of T cells and NK cell, suppression of IgG, production of autoantibodies to a variety of self-antigens (e.g., neural antigens), and apoptosis in microglia and astrocytes [1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 ]. The underlying mechanisms by which mercury induces autoimmunity and enhances allergic inflammation are not well understood.
Still chuckling?? LOL
hokeian,
This is easy-peasy, I just don’t know why at such basic concept it pains you to understand the difference between the two.
Th1Th2, you said that thimerosal was teratogenic. In the study I cited, thimerosal was not teratogenic. Can you cite a study showing that it is?
Do you realize the difference between elemental mercury, ethylmercury and methylmercury?
hokieian,
“Th1Th2, so you’re telling me something is only immunogenic if it induces a humoral response?”
For vaccines, the degree of immunogenicity is measured by the presence of neutralizing antibodies since vaccines are TH2-biased.
But there exist another form of immunity that does not require antibody production and will make all vaccines worthless. Do you know what it is? It’s easy.
Harriet Hall,
Are you asking me which of those Hgs are more potent and poisonous? Why not tell me if those Hgs are safe and beneficial to a living tissue? Do you take a regular and non-toxic dose of thimerosal everyday just like vitamins?
BTW, were the rabbits vaccinated with thimerosal?
Harriet Hall is my hero!
Th1Th2,
I’m still waiting for you to provide reference that specifically says Triton X-100 is a vaccine adjuvant. Not a herbicide adjuvant. Not an adjuvant general. A vaccine adjuvant.
Can you provide one? Can you explain why Triton X-100 isn’t listed in that extensive review I linked?
Th1Th2 said,
“Are you asking me which of those Hgs are more potent and poisonous?”
No, I’m asking you to cite evidence to support your claim that thimerosal is teratogenic. I wanted to make sure you knew which form of mercury was in thimerosal so you wouldn’t waste time citing irrelevant evidence for another form of mercury.
qetzal,
Just a preview.
“Adjuvants: Weaker antigens may be rendered more immunogenic by the addition of other chemicals. Such chemicals are known as adjuvants. There are many biological and chemical substances that have been used in experimental conditions. However, only Aluminum salts (alum) are approved for clinical human use and it is incorporated in DTP vaccine. Adjuvants used experimentally include mixtures of oil and detergents, with or without certain bacteria, most often BCG, or their components.”
http://pathmicro.med.sc.edu/pdfimm2002/02Immunization.pdf
Isn’t Triton X-100 a detergent?
Th1Th2′s reference says that “only Aluminum salts (alum) are approved for clinical human use.”
This is clearly false, since the adjuvant MF59 has been used in Europe for 10 years, as I referenced in my article.
BTW, who said that Thimerosal is NOT teratogenic in humans? The people way back from 1972 and 1975??
Th1Th2,
Please read carefully. I’m asking you for a reference that specifically calls Triton X-100 a vaccine adjuvant. It must mention Trion X-100 by name. Specifically. As an adjuvant. For a vaccine. (Trade name or generic name is, of course, acceptable.)
And in case I forgot to mention this, it should discuss Triton X-100 by name. (Specifically. As a vaccine adjuvant.)
Remember when you noted that not all antigens are immunogens? Similarly, not all detergents are adjuvants.
Just because some detergents (mixed with certain oils) can be adjuvants doesn’t prove that Triton X-100 (absent any oils) is an adjuvant. Agreed?
But I’ll tell you what. If, instead of a reference that mentions Triton by name (specifically), I’ll accept a reference that says “all detergents are vaccine adjuvants” or words to that effect.
Th1Th2,
Please read carefully. I am asking you for your evidence that thimerosal is a teratogen.
Harriet,
The link I quoted refers to alum-adjuvanted DTP vaccine. You should have finished reading the sentence first. Have you ever realized why Flu vaccines do not contain aluminum? It’s because instead of aluminum, flu shots contain another form of adjuvant and that is Triton X-100. MF59 is actually a mixture of different adjuvants including a nonionic detergent (Tween). Like Triton X-100 both detergents are know to exhibit enhanced immunogenicity in vaccines.
Comparison of new triton X-100- and tween-ether-treated split-treated vaccines in children.
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?&artid=273983
Th1Th2:
I know what a Material Safety Data Sheet is. It tells you how to safely handle substances, and what to do in the event of a leak, etc. It tells you nothing whatsoever about the pharmacological properties of the substance, however, which is not surprising, because the MSDSes are intended to help with industrial handling/processing of various materials, and not as some sort of replacement for the Physician’s Desk Reference or the United States Pharmacopeia.
I notice you still have not answered my question as to what exactly makes you think it is harmful to use Triton X-100 in the manufacture of vaccines, in the manner in which it actually is used. You’re still all hung up on inventing a new usage of “adjuvant”, as if this proves something. (Hint: it doesn’t.)
Oh, and from your reply to Harriet:
You are dodging the question. Do you think there is a difference in toxicity between methyl mercury and ethyl mercury? (Hint: there is.)
But to answer your question: yes, I take a regular and non-toxic dose of ethyl mercury (not brand-name thimerosal, necessarily) every day. Everyone does. It’s ubiquitous in the environment. (Obviously, some areas get more than others. Methyl mercury, the more hazardous mercury compound, is also present in the environment.) Consequently, our systems have evolved to cope with small amounts.
BTW, this is not something that has gone unstudied, so I really don’t understand why you would argue from ignorance on this one. Medical science has determined the half-life of ethyl mercury in both children and adults; it actually gets cleared out quite quickly. (Interestingly, children actually clear it faster than adults.)
Th1Th2,
(1) I can read. You quoted ““Adjuvants: Weaker antigens may be rendered more immunogenic by the addition of other chemicals. Such chemicals are known as adjuvants. There are many biological and chemical substances that have been used in experimental conditions. However, only Aluminum salts (alum) are approved for clinical human use and it is incorporated in DTP vaccine. Adjuvants used experimentally include mixtures of oil and detergents, with or without certain bacteria, most often BCG, or their components.” It is clear from the entire quote that he meant that alum is the only adjuvant approved for human use: that is not true.
(2) Steve Novella explained that surfactants are used to split the virus; they do not act as adjuvants. Please read again and try to understand.
(3) I am asking you, once more, for your evidence that thimerosal is a teratogen.
Th1Th2 wrote:
No. MF59 is not simply a mixture. It’s an emulsion. That makes a difference. It does contain Tween 80, but detergents are NOT known to enhance immunogenicity on their own.
For example, Herbert reported the following:
Read that slowly and carefully, Th1Th2. The water-in-oil emulsion worked great as an adjuvant. Neither the oil alone, nore the emulsifier (i.e. the detergent, which was Tween 80) had ANY adjuvant effect.
Did you get that? Tween 80, the same detergent found in MF59, was NOT AN ADJUVANT.
ThiTh2: “If Triton X-100 is an agricultural adjuvant then why is it in vaccines? Because Triton X-100 is also an IMMUNOLOGIC ADJUVANT. Tween, like Triton X-100 is also found in pesticides and herbicides and also a major vaccine adjuvant. ”
Because it is a useful surfactant in many different situations. The agricultural use of these materials is completely irrelevant to their use in vaccine preparation.
You are simply trying to pull a cheap “Its TEH TOXINZ” gambit by implying that they have insecticidal or herbicidal properties when they do not.
I’ve explained how it is used agriculturally and Steve Novella has explained how it is used in vaccine preparation. Please go back and read to see that these are completely different.
[...] and conspiracy crowds have been working overtime spreading misinformation about the H1N1 vaccine. Harriet Hall does an excellent job of taking down many of the false claims point by point. I have already written about the [...]
Maybe the problem that Th1Th2 is having with Triton X-100 is the name. I mean come on it sounds like a nuclear weapon, or a Marvel comics villain. Now, would you be having this argument if it was named Warm Fuzzy Puppy-100? I think not. Take note marketing departments everywhere.
So maybe we should rechristen MF59: Mom’s Favorite 59? Most Friendly 59? Mousey Fuzzy 59?
Harriet Hall,
Triton X-100, just like aluminum, is toxic to the human body. Triton X-100 is designed for research purposes only and NOT for human or veterinary testing per MSDS.
Thimerosal is a known MUTAGENIC per MSDS. Don’t wait for the government to tell you it is also TERATOGENIC ala Thalidomide. Anyway, your article was way back in 1972, 1975 and did not rule out teratogenicity in humans. And I called that quack.
Calli,
You guys should wake up and accept the fact that this discussion is mainly toxicological. There is no room for any nutritional value in vaccines whatsoever. Of course you know the MSDS but the problem is you don’t know how to apply it.
Also, your line of thought regarding the ubiquitousness of thimerosal is off. You see, not all substances that exist naturally is essential to the human body especially if you’re talking about toxic elements. Let me guess, you also take daily dose of formaldehyde. Only fools would consider them nutritious and essential that they allow themselves to be exposed. Think about that.
Th1Th2,
Still waiting for the reference showing that Triton X-100 is a vaccine adjuvant. I don’t expect to ever get it though.
I see you’ve also backed off your earlier claim that thimerosal is teratogenic. An honest person would admit they were mistaken on that, but not you. No, you jumped to that old standby, “You can’t prove it’s NOT teratogenic!”
If you were attempting to argue honestly, I’d defend your right to keep posting here. But you’re not. You’re being deliberately and knowingly dishonest, not to mention willfully stupid. I expect you’ll be joining pec very soon.
qetzal,
You said, “Neither the oil alone, nore the emulsifier (i.e. the detergent, which was Tween 80) had ANY adjuvant effect.”
False. The original statement from your link is this,
“Neither the oil, nor the emulsifier, nor the emulsion itself when injected at a separate site from the antigen, stimulated a response of this type.
The operational words there are ” stimulated a response of this type.” What type of response? That co-adjuvants (the oil, the emulsion or the emulsifier (Tween)) will NOT induce 500 times better immunogenicity of the antigen (OA) if they are injected separately. That means, adjuvants can exist alone or in combination with other adjuvants for more potent synergistic effect (water-in-oil emulsion). You might as well check the charts from your link you provided.
So the lesson from the story is, the more, the merrier. Here comes MF59.
We know the discussion is mainly toxicological. I’m not convinced that you do — you don’t seem to understand that “toxin” isn’t some kind of binary switch — either a substance is evil and horrible or it isn’t. It depends on the dose.
So you agree that I know what the MSDS is? Then you agree that it is utterly irrelevant to this discussion? Or are you just obfuscating the fact that you have absolutely no clue what you’re talking about?
(Note: you still haven’t said what bad things you think Triton X100 would do, as it is used in vaccine production. I think you are hoping we will focus on the definitions and fail to notice that you haven’t actually advanced any real argument here.)
Heh — it’s worse than you think, Th1Th2. My body MAKES formaldehyde! So does yours! If it instantly makes everything poison just by its mere existence at any quantity, then YOUR BODY IS KILLING YOU!!!! Eeek!
Seriously, the point you’re missing is that the dose makes the poison. Your body is adapted to deal with a lot of natural toxins. Ethyl mercury is definitely a toxin; that’s actually *why* it’s in vaccines. It’s an antimicrobial. But the tiny amounts in vaccines are easily handled by your body. Thus, you get a tiny amount of preservative that isn’t going to hurt you instead of getting, say, a particularly virulent strain of bacteria injected into your muscle.
You are correct that not all substances naturally existing are essential. However, you seem to be under the delusion that things are either “safe” or “toxic”. This is not true. Actually, all substances can fall into either category, depending on the circumstances, and in general, naturally-occurring levels are within our bodies’ ability to cope. My DHMO reference clearly missed you, so I’ll elaborate on it to illustrate my point.
DHMO, or dihydrogen monoxide, is a chemical often used to trap people into betraying their lack of understanding. I’m not gonna do that, though. I’m going to be perfectly serious here. It’s H2O — water. It is the second-most-essential substance for human life (behind gaseous oxygen, O2). If you do not get enough water, you die. It’s as simple as that.
But does this mean water is always safe? No. I’m not just talking about the stupid obvious stuff like drowning, or the fact that gaseous water (steam) will burn you. Less well known is water toxicity. If you drink too much water, you will develop water intoxication. Severe cases can lead to brain damage or even death. A notorious recent case was a woman who enrolled in a radio station’s “Hold Your Wee for A Wii” promotion, in which contestants were encouraged to drink lots of water and not go to the bathroom. Whoever held their urine the longest while drinking the requisite amount of water (to be fair), would win a brand-new Nintendo Wii. The woman thought this was a great idea; she wasn’t able to afford nice presents for her kids, and this would be a way to possibly get them a nice gift. Something special. She was well on her way to winning when she suddenly collapsed. She died the same day of water intoxication, which had caused irreversible and lethal damage to her brain.
This is rare. Drinking water is normally extremely safe. It takes serious effort to consume enough water for it to become toxic. But become toxic it does. Even oxygen causes damage — one of the big ironies of life as an obligate anaerobe is that our cells spend a lot of effort just cleaning up the damage that oxygen does to them. And although it’s rare, one of the rarely-mentioned risks of vitamin megadosing is the fact that it can kill.
There have been people who died by overdosing on vitamins. It’s rare; your body is pretty good at handling excess vitamins, so usually you’ll just pee out whatever you don’t need. You have to be really committed to megadoses to actually do yourself serious harm. Lesser harm can be done, though; did you know that the amount of vitamin A in Airborne is technically toxic? Smaller amounts are find and dandy, and indeed essential. But if you take the amount recommended on the Airbone package, you will nudge yourself over the dose generally recognized as safe. This is probably not going to be a serious problem; this amount is only likely to aggravate bone density, and even then mainly only when taken by women of childbearing age (particularly those who are pregnant, who are more sensitive to vitamin A).
Noble gasses may be the only elements which are truly nontoxic (though excessive quantities will still cause harm by other means, mostly by displacing the things we need, such as oxygen — a pure argon atmosphere is certainly lethal), largely because they’re so unreactive. (It’s their defining characteristic, really.) So just because something is toxic at really high doses really doesn’t tell you anything useful, except that maybe you want to be careful around large amounts of the stuff. (Which gets us back to the basic point of the MSDS. You probably don’t want to eat a pound of Triton X-100, for instance, but that doesn’t mean it’s dangerous to use in vaccine manufacture, especially when only trace amounts remain in the finished product.)
I’ve rambled on a lot here, so I’ll sum it up:
Anything can be a toxin; the real question is whether or not it is safe at a particular dose and via a particular route of administration. The evidence collected by the FDA for licensure of vaccines indicates that it is safe as used in vaccine manufacture, does not act as an adjuvant, and indeed given that it is removed during manufacture, the amounts remaining in the finished product are too small to have any effect whatsoever.
Do you have any evidence to the contrary?
qetzal,
NO, because you cannot extrapolate animal testing to humans. My premise was, thimerosal is TERATOGENIC in humans, not in rabbits, understood? Also, the only attempt that was able to study teratogenicity in humans was unsuccessful because the fetus died of dose-related toxicity from thimerosal. So again, the lesson from this story is, if it is a rabbit, then it is not human.
Clarification: Vitamin A overdose can aggravate bone density *problems*. So it’ll increase your risk of later developing osteoporosis.
Calli,
You are an absolute quack. Where did you learn that superstitious belief that humans make formaldehyde. First, humans DO NOT synthesize formaldehyde. Second, the presence of endogenous formaldehyde in your body is a result of metabolism from exposure to exogenous formaldehyde. Since formaldehyde is a toxic element, they are further broken down into a lesser toxin until they are completely eliminated from the body.
Please get your facts straight!
Th1Th2,
I have asked you several times for evidence that thimerosal is a teratogen in humans. Is your last comment an admission that you have no evidence? I would be interested in learning more about that “only attempt to study teratogenicity” that you mention where “the fetus” died (a study with only one subject?!). Can you provide a reference?
@Th1Th2
Yep, still chuckling. The study you cited indicated that thimerosal increased Th2, but decreased Th1. It mentioned nothing of thimerosal being an adjuvant.
Adjuvant: a substance added to a vaccine to increase the immune response to the antigen in the vaccine.
Preservative: a substance added to a vaccine to prevent the growth of microbial contaminants.
Thimerosal is used to prevent the growth of bacteria and fungi (i.e., microbial contaminants). Thimerosal is not added to increase the immune response to the antigen in the vaccine. Ergo, thimerosal is a preservative, not an adjuvant.
Feel free to provide a citation to a study that shows that thimerosal increases the immune response to the antigen in the vaccine. However, given your unwillingness to provide citations for anything else requested of you, I won’t hold my breath.
Todd W.,
In case you don’t know, adjuvants are designed to enhance the Th2-stimulating function of vaccines. If Th2 is induced then physiologically the Th1 is inhibited. Even intrinsic cytokines are considered adjuvants also.
Wow, humans do make formaldehyde. That happens to be the reason that methanol is toxic, the enzyme in the liver that metabolizes ethanol to acetaldehyde tuns methanol to formaldehyde. The treatment for methanol poisoning is to give ethanol to saturate the liver enzyme and reduce the damage from the formaldehyde.
Formaldehyde is made under other circumstances too. Here is a paper talking about the oxidative demethylation of DNA which produces … formaldehyde as a product.
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=12486230
Physiology is a lot more complicated than “toxins bad”.
daedalus2u,
You are talking about the toxicokinetic degradation of methanol into formaldehyde. In short, the body has to be exposed first to methanol or exogenous formaldehyde to bring about such detoxification. Ergo, formaldehyde is a toxic by-product of metabolism from exogenous sources. The body does not produce intrinsic formaldehyde, remember that.
Detoxification of formaldehyde is a physiologic event because it is TOXIC to humans! You guys are hilarious. LOL
DNA methylation is a normal process. That is how DNA is epigenetically programmed. Demethylation of DNA is also a normal process. That process generates formaldehyde. That formaldehyde is toxic, so physiology has enzymes and systems to detoxify it.
Here is a paper that shows formaldehyde as an intermediate in metabolism from other normal physiological starting materials.
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=11231903
That formaldehyde is intrinsic to other metabolic processes. Nothing exogenous is required. The quantity of formaldehyde used in vaccines is tiny compared to the quantities physiology makes all on its own. If you knew or understood physiology you would know that, and not just repeat the anti-vax mantra of “toxins bad”.
OK, I need clarification.
The risk of GBS in the general pop is around 1 to 4 in 100,000. The risk seems to increase when exposed to the flu virus (makes sense). The 1976 vax had a GBS rate of 1 in 100,000…but we know that there was an increase in the syndrome caused by the vaccine? The deaths attributed to the vax was complications from GBS? “More people died from the vax than the flu” Anti-vaxers will be all over this. They’ll wonder what the difference is between the old vax and this new vax. Is it not the vax to worry about but the fact that more people are dying from the flu? The risk of death from the vaccine won’t be less but the risk of death from the flu is greater? I’m sharing this article with others but they will have these questions and I want to be able to answer them.
Thank you!
Erin
@Erin
The anti-vaxers have already been all over the 1976 flu bit. Joe Albietz wrote an article on here last week or the week before that spoke more directly to the swine flu issue.
@Erin
Actually, let me clarify, Dr. Albietz wrote two articles dealing with influenza. The most recent, “An Influenza Primer”, was on the 4th. Very good article that clears up some of the questions that may arise, in addition to what Dr. Hall has answered here. He also addressed the fears of squalene in an earlier post (Aug. 28?) that would also be relevant. Good reading all around.
If you click on his name over at the right-hand side, you’ll be taken to his bio, where you will also find a link to his recent posts.
Th1Th2,
I have asked you several times for evidence that thimerosal is a teratogen in humans. Is your last comment an admission that you have no evidence? I would be interested in learning more about that “only attempt to study teratogenicity” that you mention where “the fetus” died (a study with only one subject?!). Can you provide a reference?
I found my answer in the comments section of “An Influenza Primer”. DeeTee has written a good article regarding GBS. I will be pointing many to that article as well as this one.
Thank you!
Erin
Trying again: Th1Th2,
I have asked you several times for evidence that thimerosal is a teratogen in humans. Is your last comment an admission that you have no evidence? I would be interested in learning more about that “only attempt to study teratogenicity” that you mention where “the fetus” died (a study with only one subject?!). Can you provide a reference?
Th1Th2 wrote:
Been there, did that. Go back to the link in my comment from 09 Sep 2009 at 12:51 am, pull up the full text pdf, and go to Figure 4. Herbert compared antibody response to ovalbumin in simple physiological saline solution, or with Arlacel A (the oil component of their emulsion), or with Tween 80 (emulsifier component of their emulsion; also a component of MF59).
There was NO SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCE between antibody titers for the three different groups. Tween 80 by itself had no statistical effect on antibody titer compared to saline. In other words, it was NOT AN ADJUVANT.
Not in that study, at least. Of course, you are welcome to link a study that shows that Tween 80 (or Triton X-100) is an adjuvant BY ITSELF. (That is, not as a component of an oil emulsion.) But it seems you can’t.
Your intellectual dishonesty is really on display here, isn’t it?
I see you learned some big words, Th1Th2. Daedalus has already explained why you’re wrong about formaldehyde. Did you go google “formaldehyde made by body” and stop at the first hit in order to find your devastating counter-argument to my point? Pity you didn’t read a few more links, or you wouldn’t have been embarrassed by Daedalus.
You still haven’t said what bad things Triton X-100 does as used in vaccine manufacture. I’m now pretty well convinced you don’t know. “Huge amounts can kill you” is not a good way to make me scared of vaccines. Just sayin’.
BTW, although you do like to make up your own definitions, “quack” is an odd name to call me. The word normally means a fake medical practitioner, or a real one who peddles fake treatments. I’m a software engineer. I don’t practice medicine, real or fake, beyond your basic first-responder mommy stuff. Band-aids and cold packs; that kind of thing. Not much room for quackery there. I do however like to have actual facts upon which to base my decisions. Maybe that bothers you?
qetzal,
In reference to OA, Tween 80 alone, take note, is NOT an effective adjuvant nor the oil or the saline when injected separately from the antigen. But when these adjuvants are combined to form water-in-oil emulsion it induces 500 times better immunogenicity in the vaccines.
So are you saying that an adjuvant composition (water-in-oil emulsion) does not contain another form of adjuvant?
Think of adjuvants like a bottle of food seasoning. It is a blend of different spices that enhances food flavor.
daedalus2u,
You should understand that the formation of formaldehyde from DNA demethylation is not a physiologic need at cellular level. It is a WASTE PRODUCT. Its presence in the system only shows the pathway to detoxification. So are you also saying that since the body produces urine, it’s OK to inject it back to the system? WTH!
Again, you have not proven that formaldehyde is produced intrinsically by cells and NOT a product of metabolism.
A poison is a poison no matter how small.
Th1Th2,
False analogy: Adjuvants are nothing like a bottle of food seasoning.
And you still haven’t offered any evidence that thimerosal is a human teratogen. Are you admitting there isn’t any?
Harriet,
Are you saying that thimerosal is NOT teratogenic in HUMANS? Show me the evidence that it is not and I will show you otherwise.
Jeez, can’t you do your own homework occasionally? You expect us to just [i]take your word[/i] that thimerosal is teratogenic in the amounts used in vaccines?
Here’s the closest you ever got in this thread:
So, you’ve actually conceded that evidence suggesting it wasn’t teratogenic was submitted. You disliked the fact that it was old, and didn’t conclusively prove a negative (which, by the way, is logically impossible anyway). You “called that quack”.
Nice way to back up your argument.
Your precious MSDS, BTW, which again is pertinent for industrial or lab exposure, says this about Thimerosal:
“Potential Chronic Health Effects:
CARCINOGENIC EFFECTS: Not available.
MUTAGENIC EFFECTS: Mutagenic for mammalian somatic cells.
TERATOGENIC EFFECTS: Not available.
DEVELOPMENTAL TOXICITY: Not available.”
Doesn’t exactly sound like an open-and-shut case to me. Besides, the MSDS isn’t a scientific document. Its function isn’t to provide data that can be extrapolated into other settings. Its sole purpose is to help people handle it safely in the lab or factory.
I’m not saying it’s totally safe. It obviously isn’t. It wouldn’t work as an antimicrobial if it were totally safe. What I’m saying is that you’ve given no reason whatsoever to be concerned about its presence in vaccines.
Calli,
There is no such thing as “totally safe” as you stated. Since the meaning of safe per se is the absence of harm, injuries, side-effects or contraindications. It is better for you to just say thimerosal is LESS TOXIC if you mean that it is not totally safe. Agree?
@ Harriet Hall
Maternal-fetal Toxicology: A Clinician’s Guide By Gideon Koren
http://books.google.com/books?id=Dmzfmf5081QC&pg=PA127&dq=mercury+teratogen&lr=&as_brr=3#v=onepage&q=mercury%20teratogen&f=false
Once absorbed practically all mercury compounds are teratogenetic
————————————————————
Catalog of teratogenic agents By Thomas H. Shepard, Ronald J. Lemire
http://books.google.com/books?id=vBIl2OA6BK8C&pg=PA391&dq=merthiolate+teratogen&lr=&as_brr=3#v=onepage&q=merthiolate%20teratogen&f=false
The RR for congenital abnormalities among 56 children whose mothers used this antiseptic [thimerisol] topically during the 1st 4 months was 2.69
—————————————————————————-
And in the rat and rabbit studies, the thimerisol just killed without producing deformities
Hello?
You misunderstand me. My point is that it’s meaningless to divide substances into “safe “and “not safe” categories, since pretty much everything is unsafe at some point. More important is whether or not they are safe in specific real-world situations.
The evidence indicates that thimerosal is not toxic in the doses used in vaccines. It *is* toxic in larger doses. That I can agree upon.
@ Harriet Hall
Maternal-fetal Toxicology: A Clinician’s Guide By Gideon Koren
Once absorbed practically all mercury compounds are teratogenetic
————————————————————
Catalog of teratogenic agents By Thomas H. Shepard, Ronald J. Lemire
The RR for congenital abnormalities among 56 children whose mothers used this antiseptic [thimerisol] topically during the 1st 4 months was 2.69
—————————————————————————-
And in the rat and rabbit studies, the thimerisol just killed without producing deformities
Th1Th2 said, “Are you saying that thimerosal is NOT teratogenic in HUMANS? Show me the evidence that it is not and I will show you otherwise.”
No, that’s not the way it works. You made a claim and it is up to you to support it. I did not claim that thimerosal is NOT teratogenic in humans. I asked you for evidence that it WAS.
@Sid
Two points: the word “practically”, meaning many but not all; second, the dose makes the poison. One molecule of botulinin will not kill you, but several micrograms might.
Th1Th2, there is an inherent need to demethylate DNA. When cells do that they produce formaldehyde. They produce formaldehyde as part of their need to demethylate DNA. What kind of gyrations are you trying to go through to deny that?
@Harriet
———————————————————————————
In recent years, flu vaccines have been 75% effective in preventing hospitalizations for flu
———————————————————————————-
What are you using for evidence here?
daedalus2u,
Formaldehyde is NOT an inherent nor a physiologic need. It is a toxic WASTE by-product of demethylation, exposure to methyl carbons, methanol toxicity and exogenous formaldehyde obviously. Are you trying to say that formaldehyde is essential to human survival, where did you learn that? Like I said, there is an inherent need to urinate but it does not mean you have to drink your own urine back let alone inject it to your system. Your argument does not make any sense at all.
Formaldehyde most certainly is an inherent part of physiology. If your body couldn’t produce formaldehyde as a part of demethylating DNA, it couldn’t survive. There are other pathways that necessarily make formaldehyde as part of normal physiology.
Physiology isn’t as simple and as black and white, as good and bad, as toxic and non-toxic as your fantasies tell you. Physiology is more complicated than the cartoon image you have of it.
Who is talking about injecting urine? What is the major component in urine? Water. What is the major component in IV fluids? Guess what, it is also water. OH NOZ! Urine and IV fluids are mostly the same! The woman mentioned above who died of water intoxication probably would have lived if she had cut it with urine (which contains sodium).
Give it up, you are out of your league with people who have forgotten more physiology than you will ever know.
daedalus2u,
You are clearly obfuscated by your own statements. There is a big difference between a physiologic need and a physiologic WASTE product. You have also given me some weak and faulty analogies.
Demethylation, just like respiration and urination, is a physiologic need just as formaldehyde, CO2 and urine are physiologic by-products of those processes, respectively. You see, you are like a toxicologist pretending to be a nutritionist who teaches the benefits of poisons and toxic substances in the health of a person. That is insanity. Let me guess, the next silly analogy you will employ is the benefits of eating fecal matter.
Put it this way, good health is a physiologic need while vaccination is a physiologic threat.
Sid Offit,
I’m not sure where I got the 75% figure, but it may have been from this website, http://www.cdc.gov/FLU/PROFESSIONALS/VACCINATION/effectivenessqa.htm
and if it was, I may have misread what was only a theoretical example. If that’s what happened, I apologize. The actual percentage is not quite that high but is up to 70%.
The website says:
“Among elderly persons not living in nursing homes or similar long-term care facilities, influenza vaccine has been reported to be 30%-70% effective in preventing hospitalization for pneumonia and influenza.”
” influenza vaccines can be expected to reduce laboratory-confirmed influenza by approximately 70% to 90% in healthy adults <65 years of age. Several studies have also found reductions in febrile illness, influenza-related work absenteeism, antibiotic use, and doctor visits.”
“the vaccine may be only 30%-40% effective against influenza-related respiratory illness among nursing home residents. However, even in this group of frail elderly, the vaccine still provides substantial protection against more severe outcomes, such as influenza-related hospitalization (effectiveness of 50-60%) and deaths (80%).”
Th1Th2:
http://ai.psur.cornell.edu/PesticideGlossary.aspx
Adjuvant: “An ingredient that improves the properties of a pesticide formulation. Includes wetting agents, spreaders, emulsifiers, dispersing agents, foam suppressants, penetrants, and correctives. ”
What is an “adjuvant” in one circumstance may not be an adjuvant in another. Just because Triton X-100 is a surfactant used in agriculture to enhance absorption of an herbicide doesn’t mean it can’t also be a good lab detergent for cleaning glassware … or that those same properties can’t be used to rupture cell membranes or disrupt virus particles.
Dish soap or vinegar can be used as an “adjuvant” for the herbicide glyphosate (common trademark “Roundup”. Does that make them evil? Does that mean they have no other uses?
“The potential may be there, but the likelihood is homeopathic.”
I love that line…I’m going to start using it !
@Th1Th2
Please point out where anyone has said that formaldehyde is nutritious. daedalus2u and Calli Arcale were responding to your earlier claim about formaldehyde. To whit:
They pointed out that the human body does, in fact, produce formaldehyde. You are the only one trying to put words into people’s mouths (or keyboards, as it were) by making it seem like they are saying that the human body needs formaldehyde.
I think the important point is that the human body produces, and gets rid of, significantly more formaldehyde on a daily basis than you would find in all vaccines together. The body has the mechanisms to handle it and get rid of it without it causing toxic reactions.
Here’s a question for you. If formaldehyde is toxic in any amount, please provide a study that shows the toxic effects of formaldehyde in a typical vaccine load in humans.
Th1Th2,
After first denying the body produced formaldehyde, you now seem to be arguing that because it happens to be a metabolic byproduct of metabolism, that it must be inherently harmful.
Formaldehyde may be “toxic”, yes, but only when there is enough of it (40% formaldehyde = formalin). Getting 0.5ml of a vaccine with 0.004% formaldehyde is a drop in the ocean compared to what is naturally produced by the body.
Sid Offit:
I would not be at all surprised if sufficient doses of mercury-containing compounds were teratogenic. An awful lot of things are. The question is, how much does it take before it becomes teratogenic?
Acetominophen is effective and pretty darned safe (for most people) as a pain reliever and fever reducer. Until you get up to about 15 tablets in an adult, and then it causes kidney failure. It’s really important to know the dose, because most things (even tremendously lethal poisons, like botulin) are harmless at some level.
Th1Th2:
You are quite correct that formaldehyde is a byproduct of vital metabolic processes, and that it therefore needs to be disposed of. For this reason, the human body has developed quite robust mechanisms for doing so. This is why it’s ludicrous to be scared of the miniscule amount of formaldehyde found in some vaccines — your body won’t even notice it. In fact, this is part of the reason such substances are chosen — your body can cope with them just fine.
I do notice that while you assert daedalus’ analogies are “weak and faulty”, you do not attempt to support this assertion. You’re very good at asserting things. You’ve asserted a lot in this thread. But not once have you ever supported your assertions. Methinks you don’t actually have any support from them.
TsuDhoNimh,
Triton X-100 is for research purposes only and is NOT intended for human or animal testing.
I’d like to hear from the many vaccine apologists here aka pro-toxins have to say about this.
Th1Th2, your unsupported assertions are becoming tiresome.
Triton X-100 has been used for a long time to prepare a split virion influenza vaccine and has been found safe. See:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WBS-45FCC9J-T&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1007384960&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=46c5a6ef07906a7141479014adbcc511
You never did respond to my request for your evidence that thimerosal was teratogenic in humans. Does your non-response constitute an admission that you were wrong?
Harriet,
You don’t call something safe when you meant LESS TOXIC. Like what I have been saying, SAFE is the absence of harm, injuries, side-effects or contraindications. From the link you provided, it states:
“Among the local reactions observed, mild pain, redness, or induration at the injection site were the most frequently reported. Fever (38·0 to 38·5°C) was noted in five adults or elderly subjects (1%), and in two children (5%).”
Do you know that the reactogenicity of adjuvants is measured on the development of feverishness and pain at the injection site?
About the thimerosal, someone has already given you a link that proves thimerosal is in fact, teratogenic.
Thimerosal Merthiolate
The relative risk for congenital anomalies among 56 children whose mothers used this antiseptic topically during the first 4 months was 2. 69 (p;0.05) (Heinonen et al., 1977)
http://books.google.com/books?id=vBIl2OA6BK8C&pg=PA391&dq=merthiolate+teratogen&lr=&as_brr=3#v=onepage&q=merthiolate%20teratogen&f=false
I know what you mean by vaccine safety. For as long as the vaccine or its toxic components will not kill the host at a sub-lethal dose then it is considered SAFE. Ridiculous!
Attn: Moderators,
Missing posts. Where are they? Thanks.
Harriet,
TRITON® X-100 Detergent
Cat. No. 648462
Each product is intended to be used for research purposes only. It is not to be used for drug or diagnostic purposes, nor is it intended for human use. EMD Chemicals products may not be resold, modified for resale, or used to manufacture commercial products without written approval of EMD Chemicals.
A Brand of EMD Chemicals Inc., an affiliate of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany
http://www.calbiochem.com
FOR RESEARCH USE ONLY. NOT FOR HUMAN OR DIAGNOSTIC USE.
http://www.emdbiosciences.com/Products/pds.asp?catno=648462&print=1
The MSDS even states this about Triton X-100:
SKIN CONTACT: REMOVE CONTAMINATED CLOTHING. WASH SKIN WITH SOAP AND WATER. OBTAIN MEDICAL ATTENTION IF IRRITATION PERSISTS. WASH CLOTHING BEFORE REUSE.
http://www.carolina.com/text/teacherresources/MSDS/jtt7332.pdf
Have you ever heard a doctor discuss this before obtaining an informed consent from the patient?
I guess not.
Harriet, (this is a repost)
You don’t call something safe when you meant LESS TOXIC. Like what I have been saying, SAFE is the absence of harm, injuries, side-effects or contraindications. From the link you provided, it states:
“Among the local reactions observed, mild pain, redness, or induration at the injection site were the most frequently reported. Fever (38·0 to 38·5°C) was noted in five adults or elderly subjects (1%), and in two children (5%).”
Do you know that the reactogenicity of adjuvants is measured by the development of feverishness and pain at the injection site?
About the thimerosal, someone has already given you a link that proves thimerosal is in fact, teratogenic.
Thimerosal Merthiolate
The relative risk for congenital anomalies among 56 children whose mothers used this antiseptic topically during the first 4 months was 2. 69 (p;0.05) (Heinonen et al., 1977)
http://books.google.com/books?id=vBIl2OA6BK8C&pg=PA391&dq=merthiolate+teratogen&lr=&as_brr=3#v=onepage&q=merthiolate%20teratogen&f=false
I know what you mean by vaccine safety. For as long as the vaccine or its toxic components will not kill the host at a sub-lethal dose then it is considered SAFE.
“Like what I have been saying, SAFE is the absence of harm, injuries, side-effects or contraindications.”
An entirely useless definition. By this standard, nothing is safe. I’m sure you typed on a keyboard to write your post. That carries a risk of repetitive stress injury. And you breathe the air, which carries a risk of radon exposure. And you walk down the street, which carries a risk of getting hit by a car.
You don’t apply the standard you claim to any other aspect of your life, so why try and apply it to vaccines?
The only rational way to view safety is whether the benefits are sufficient to outweigh the risks. And by this standard, vaccines most definitely are safe.
Scott,
According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, food, air and water are among man’s PHYSIOLOGIC NEEDS. Without them, man cannot survive since they are inherent part of all living things. Safety concerns only apply once they become toxic or polluted. Vaccines, however, do NOT belong to this category since they are made from toxins, viruses, bacteria and toxic substances let alone biologically modified and chemically denatured. They are inherently unsafe. They are just being modified to become less toxic.
Ergo, it is not wise to compare a physiologic need to something which is not.
Our spam filter has been a bit over-enthusiastic. Please do not take it personally, folks. We release comments as soon as we can.
That’s really not any sort of argument, Th1Th2. Unless you mean to claim that nothing which isn’t a biological imperative can be permitted to carry any risk, in which case you can’t justify writing your post, owning a computer, or even sitting in a chair.
@Th1Th2
At what point do food and water become toxic (without being polluted)?
Scott,
Good health does not carry any risk.
Todd W.,
“At what point do food and water become toxic (without being polluted)?”
Simply add Triton X-100.
That is a truly ridiculous statement. There is NOTHING that any person has ever done that does not carry some risk. It’s all a matter of degree.
What constitutes “good health”? Are you implying that those who have contracted swine flu were not healthy before? Several pregnant women have died from swine flu, what evidence do you have that they were not healthy?
Or are you one of those folks that does not believe in viruses? Which is one way to blame influenza victims because they did not follow what you would require to get “good health.”
@Th1Th2
hahahahaha! Sorry. Ahem. Exercise is considered part of good health, no? It most certainly carries risk – muscle tear, tendonitis, cardiovascular injuries, etc.
“good health does not carry any risk”? what does that mean? as one of my partners says, “you’re always well until the day you get sick.”
Th1Th2 said,
“About the thimerosal, someone has already given you a link that proves thimerosal is in fact, teratogenic.”
I asked you. Why didn’t you just post that information instead of waiting for someone else to do it?
I acknowledge that thimerosal was shown to be teratogenic in that one study. I question whether we can trust the results of a single study that apparently was never replicated or confirmed. Neither the MSDS nor the “pregnancy category” ratings nor the WHO evaluation concluded that it was teratogenic. So there is certainly room for doubt.
Giving it the benefit of the doubt, if topical thimerosal applied as merthiolate was teratogenic in the doses absorbed, that doesn’t mean that the tiny amounts in vaccine can cause any harm. The poison is in the dose.
Your straw man definition of vaccine safety is ludicrous. Minor local reactions are a side effect of most vaccines and are a small price to pay. There is no such thing as “perfect” safety. It is safer to vaccinate than not to vaccinate.
I hate to interrupt such a scintillating exchange, but here’s an interesting piece on the current swine flu situation
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/bmj.b3471?ijkey=tKcb8W6KUoHXzPC&keytype=ref
Dr. Hall’s review of the 1918 flu ignores recent research showing that the vast majority of mortality was caused by secondary bacterial infections. Where’s the sense of urgency in stockpiling antibiotics?
“The majority of deaths in the 1918–1919 influenza pandemic likely resulted directly from secondary bacterial pneumonia caused by common upper respiratory–tract bacteria. If severe pandemic influenza is largely a problem of viral-bacterial copathogenesis, pandemic planning needs to go beyond addressing the viral cause alone (e.g., influenza vaccines and antiviral drugs).”
Morens DM, Taubenberger JK, Fauci AS. Predominant Role of Bacterial Pneumonia as a Cause of Death in Pandemic Influenza: Implications for Pandemic Influenza Preparedness. The Journal of Infectious Diseases 2008; 198:962–70
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdf/10.1086/591708
An editorial commentary on the above article states:
“The majority of pandemic preparation has centered around prevention or treatment of the virus itself by developing vaccines against pandemic candidates and stockpiling antiviral drugs. Little to no attention has been paid to prevention and treatment of potential bacterial superinfections, which, as Morens et al. remind us, have historically caused the great majority of deaths during pandemics.”
McCullers, JA. Planning for an Influenza Pandemic: Thinking beyond the Virus. JID 2008:198 (1 October)
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdf/10.1086/592165
Also see:
Brundage JF, Shanks GD. Deaths from bacterial pneumonia
during 1918–19 influenza pandemic. Emerg Infect Dis. 2008 Aug
And please, let’s stop with the misleading VAERS “incredible hulk” cherry picking. According to the VAERS website “The majority of VAERS reports are sent in by vaccine manufacturers (42%) and health care providers (30%). The remaining reports are obtained from state immunization programs (12%), vaccine recipients (or their parent/guardians, 7%) and other sources (9%).
Th1Th2 said vaccines are “inherently unsafe.”
I say influenza is inherently more unsafe.
Th1Th2,
Despite your info on Triton X-100, it HAS been used to prepare vaccines and 22,000,000 doses have been given over 10 years with no side effects except for local reactions.
Todd W., (repost)
“At what point do food and water become toxic (without being polluted)?”
Simply add Triton X-100.
Chris,
“Are you implying that those who have contracted swine flu were not healthy before?Several pregnant women have died from swine flu, what evidence do you have that they were not healthy?”
Yes. Some of them have pre-existing chronic diseases. Although swine flu is benign and self-limiting, death cases are mainly iatrogenic—meaning when a person becomes a patient in the hospital in the hands of allopathic doctors.
“Or are you one of those folks that does not believe in viruses? Which is one way to blame influenza victims because they did not follow what you would require to get “good health.””
Vaccination is the antagonist of good health. It is NOT a physiologic need but a physiologic threat.
Peter Lipson,
“you’re always well until the day you get sick.”
True. Just like the newborns, they are always well, healthy and NON-DISEASED until the day they were vaccinated. Oh actually within the first 12 hours of life since the first disease they will be exposed to is Hepatitis B.
Good grief, Th1Th2.
You’re confusing the regular legal boilerplate that the manufacture probably puts on all of their lab grade chemicals as an indication that the chemical itself is for laboratory use only?
Try looking at sheets from other companies and you won’t always find that language.
@Th1Th2
Wouldn’t the addition of Triton X-100, under your definitions, be polluting it? So, I’ll ask again, since you did not answer my question: At what point to food and water become toxic, without being polluted?
Todd W.,
*I thought someone said that Triton X-100 is safe.*
Just wondering when Th1Th2 would be deemed a ‘troll’ by the moderators of this blog? What is the cutoff point?
tmac57,
Character assassination is not my forte. Could you teach me how, otherwise, try to get hold of yourself.
Just a friendly reminder.
Th1Th2 said,
“Vaccination is the antagonist of good health.”
I thought vaccine-preventable diseases were the antagonists of good health.
“Vaccines are inherently unsafe.”
Catching vaccine-preventable diseases is inherently unsafer.
Chris said “Several pregnant women have died from swine flu, what evidence do you have that they were not healthy?” This NY Times article states that 3 pregnant women in the US have died as a result of swine flu. One had asthma, any info on the health of the other two? Also, Dr. Anne Shuchat of the CDC states that few of the 20 confirmed US swine flu cases in pregnant women have resulted in severe complications.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E05EEDA133FF930A25756C0A96F9C8B63
Here’s an interesting piece on the current swine flu situation
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/bmj.b3471?ijkey=tKcb8W6KUoHXzPC&keytype=ref
Dr. Hall’s review of the 1918 flu ignores recent research showing that the vast majority of mortality was caused by secondary bacterial infections. Where’s the sense of urgency in stockpiling antibiotics?
“The majority of deaths in the 1918–1919 influenza pandemic likely resulted directly from secondary bacterial pneumonia caused by common upper respiratory–tract bacteria. If severe pandemic influenza is largely a problem of viral-bacterial copathogenesis, pandemic planning needs to go beyond addressing the viral cause alone (e.g., influenza vaccines and antiviral drugs).”
Morens DM, Taubenberger JK, Fauci AS. Predominant Role of Bacterial Pneumonia as a Cause of Death in Pandemic Influenza: Implications for Pandemic Influenza Preparedness. The Journal of Infectious Diseases 2008; 198:962–70
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdf/10.1086/591708
An editorial commentary on the above article states:
“The majority of pandemic preparation has centered around prevention or treatment of the virus itself by developing vaccines against pandemic candidates and stockpiling antiviral drugs. Little to no attention has been paid to prevention and treatment of potential bacterial superinfections, which, as Morens et al. remind us, have historically caused the great majority of deaths during pandemics.”
McCullers, JA. Planning for an Influenza Pandemic: Thinking beyond the Virus. JID 2008:198 (1 October)
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdf/10.1086/592165
Also see:
Brundage JF, Shanks GD. Deaths from bacterial pneumonia
during 1918–19 influenza pandemic. Emerg Infect Dis. 2008 Aug
And please, let’s stop with the misleading VAERS “incredible hulk” cherry picking. According to the VAERS website “The majority of VAERS reports are sent in by vaccine manufacturers (42%) and health care providers (30%). The remaining reports are obtained from state immunization programs (12%), vaccine recipients (or their parent/guardians, 7%) and other sources (9%).
Good grief, Th1Th2. You took the legal boilerplate about “for laboratory use only” that the manufacturer put at the top of the MSDS as part of the data? That is probably at the top of every labortory grade chemcial the company produces.
Like looking at sheets from other companies. I bet you won’t find them all saying that.
That is one or three of the cases, what about the other, which is at least a dozen? I found this article:
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=104180 … where is says even healthy pregnant women have been hit hard by the swine flu:
Asthma is fairly common. So does this mean everyone with asthma is not in good health? Even when it is well controlled?
Obviously this means that those with asthma should be first in line for a vaccine, like others with health issues.
Many health issues are genetic. These include immune disorders, heart conditions, cystic fibrosis and others. Even if those are well controlled, are these people not in good health? Does Mercola’s magic suggestions do anything to make these people in good health without modern medicine.
My son stays healthy as long as he takes his daily medication, and gets his annual flu shot. Seeing how Th1Th2 avoids answering questions, and has been shown to not understand the stuff he posts — I would much rather put my son’s health in the hands of real medicine than the likes of Mercola and his followers. Especially those that warn against ingredients like squalene… which our body produces because it is an essential part of our metabolism!
wales,
You misstated what she actually said. So, a few out of 20 had severe complications. At least 3 out of 20? Care to extrapolate if we don’t vaccinate?
Now you are trying to say that those that died did so because they didn’t get antibiotics?
Weing: Regarding the reduction of swine flu mortality via antibiotic treatment, read the articles yourself. Morens et al, p. 968 “The issue of the pathogenesis of fatal influenza-associated pneumonia remains important; the fact that even severe, virus-induced tissue damage is normally followed by rapid and extensive repair suggests that early and aggressive treatment, including antibiotics and intensive care, could save most patients and also underscores the importance of prevention and prophylaxis.”
Regarding your claim that I misquoted the NY Times article: “The agency knows of 20 confirmed or probable swine flu infections in pregnant Americans, and ”a few have had severe complications,” said Dr. Anne Schuchat, the interim deputy director for public health.”
Wales,
1. I’m asking about the current cases.
2. Thanks for providing the proper quotation.
wales,
I don’t understand what point you’re trying to make. Do you realize that “a few” out of 20 means at least 10% of pregnant women with H1N1 2009 had severe complications. If 3 died, that’s a 15% fatality rate for that group.
You citing those numbers as if they show that swine flu in pregnant women isn’t a big deal! Those are enormous rates, regardless of whether there were contributing factors like asthma.
I certainly hope I’m misunderstanding you. Otherwise, what the bleep is wrong with you?
Todd W.,
“hahahahaha! Sorry. Ahem. Exercise is considered part of good health, no? It most certainly carries risk – muscle tear, tendonitis, cardiovascular injuries, etc.”
Your argument is illogical and fallacious. It’s the exercise that carries the risk. Newborns obviously don’t require exercise and yet they remain healthy and non-diseased until the time they were vaccinated since vaccines negate good health. Exercise is also important for the obese, patients who underwent surgery and rehab, etc. but don’t tell me they were healthy and vital to begin with.
You are wrong. It’s life/living that carries the risk. Once you’re dead, you never get sick.
And it appears that you don’t know anything about babies either.
Harriet,
“I say influenza is inherently more unsafe.”
How about vaccine-induced influenza, vaccine-induced parotitis, VAPP, vaccine-induced otitis media, vaccine-induced GBS, vaccine-induced meningitis, vaccine-induced warts etc. ? Yes, from I/OPV to Gardasil, you will find all the diseases in vaccines?
Weing,
“You are wrong. It’s life/living that carries the risk. Once you’re dead, you never get sick.”
No, it’s the unhealthy living and lifestyle that carries the risk.
“And it appears that you don’t know anything about babies either.”
Of course I do. They are intentionally being exposed to at least 13 diseases by the time they reached first year of life.
the bug guy,
“Good grief, Th1Th2. You took the legal boilerplate about “for laboratory use only” that the manufacturer put at the top of the MSDS as part of the data? That is probably at the top of every labortory grade chemcial the company produces.
Like looking at sheets from other companies. I bet you won’t find them all saying that.”
———————————————————————————
Either you don’t know what Skull and Crossbones stands for or you simply don’t trust MSDS. Which is which?
Wow, you really don’t know anything about babies and actual exposure to infectious agents in the real world. You probably think babies are completely immobile until they are over a year old, and that they cannot use their hands to grasp things to bring to their mouth (hint: keeping a child strapped to a carrier and not allowing them to use their arms before they are a year old is not a good thing… they actually have to move in order to develop!).
Th1Th2: you are either trolling or seriously confused. Do you really want to claim that exercise is IN GENERAL A BAD THING?
Can you cite one single actual case of “vaccine-induced influenza” caused by the current flu vaccines WHICH CONTAIN NO ACTUAL VIRUS PARTICLES?
Are you a germ theory denier after all?
(I seem to have a comment in moderation for some random reason, so a shorter version)… but he must be a germ theory denier if he thinks the only diseases babies are exposed to come from vaccines!
nitpicking,
You must be dyslexic. I did not say exercise is a bad thing in general.
Since when did vaccines become placebos?
Listen to what the CDC says about the Flu:
“Be Aware of Common Flu Symptoms
Influenza usually starts suddenly and may include the following symptoms:
* Fever (usually high)
* Headache
* Tiredness (can be extreme)
* Cough
* Sore throat
* Runny or stuffy nose
* Body aches
* Diarrhea and vomiting (more common among children than adults)”
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/symptoms.htm
Now if you open a vaccine package insert you will find this:
ADVERSE REACTIONS
“Fever, malaise, myalgia, and other systemic symptoms can occur following vaccination and most often affect persons who have had no prior exposure to the influenza virus antigens in the vaccine (eg, young children).
Respiratory, Thoracic and Mediastinal Disorders: Dyspnea, pharyngitis, rhinitis
General Disorders and Administration Site Conditions: Fever, pain, pruritis, asthenia/fatigue, pain in extremities, chest pain”
https://www.vaccineshoppe.com/image.cfm?doc_id=10205&image_type=product_pdf
Again, when did vaccines become placebos?
weing: I don’t have enough information about the current H1N1 mortality rate to know if/when the deceased received antibiotics. Do you?
Qetzal: “Because only a small proportion of persons with respiratory illness are tested for novel H1N1, at this time, confirmed and probable case counts represent a significant underestimation of the true number of novel H1N1 flu cases in the U.S., so the true benefit of reporting these numbers to track the course of the epidemic is questionable. In addition, because of the extensive spread of novel H1N1 flu within the United States, it has become extremely resource-intensive for states to count individual cases.”
http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/reportingqa.htm
It appears that we don’t have accurate and timely data regarding laboratory confirmed cases of H1N1. Without this data we don’t know how many pregnant women have contracted H1N1 and what the CFR might be for pregnant women. If you have more detailed information please share it. My point is that because cases are vastly underreported the mortality rate you cite is overstated.
@Th1Th2
Why don’t you want to answer my question? You said earlier that
So, I want to know, without being polluted (and that’s according to whatever definition you use to consider it polluted, which I assume is adding anything to it), at what point does food become toxic?
[facepalm]
Th1Th2, if you’re trying to be funny, you’re doing a good job.
Yes, I do have good confidence in the MSDS, but then, I also understand it.
Do you want something scary? Look up the MSDS for capsaicin, something that we not only eat, but breed peppers to contain more of it.
Routes of Entry: Inhalation. Ingestion.
Toxicity to Animals:
Acute oral toxicity (LD50): 47.2 mg/kg [Mouse (CAS no. 404-86-4)].
Acute dermal toxicity (LD50): >512 mg/kg [Mouse].
Chronic Effects on Humans: MUTAGENIC EFFECTS: Mutagenic for bacteria and/or yeast.
Other Toxic Effects on Humans: Hazardous in case of skin contact (irritant, sensitizer), of ingestion, of inhalation (lung
irritant, lung sensitizer).
Special Remarks on Toxicity to Animals: LD50 [Rat] – Route: Intraperitoneal; Dose: 9500 ug/kg
Mmm, I loves my hot sauces…
The entry read:
Thimerosal Merthiolate
The relative risk for congenital anomalies among 56 children whose mothers used this antiseptic topically during the first 4 months was 2.69 (p;0.05) (Heinonen et al., 1977). Gasset et. al (1975) gave intraperitoneal injections 1.0 ml of a 0.2% solution to rats on the 6-18th days of pregnacy and found no adverse reproductive effects. At dose level 2.0% there were increased fetal deaths.
Gasset, A.R.; Motokazu, I.; Ishii, Y. and Ramer, R.M.: Teratogenesis of ophthalmic drugs II teratogenicities and tissue accumulation of thimerosal. Arch. Opthalmol 93: 52-55, 1975.
Heinonen, O.P.; Slone, D. and Shapiro, S.: Birth Defects and Drugs in pregnancy. John Wright Publishing Sciences Group, Inc., Littleton, Mass. 1977.
I couldn’t get to the original article by Heinonen, but I found that it’s being cited quite a lot. And this review appears proeminently when searching on scholar.google.com
Geier, D.A.; Sykes, L.K. and Geier M.R.: A review of Thimerosal (Merthiolate) and its ethylmercury breakdown product: specific historical considerations regarding safety and effectiveness. Journal of Toxicology and environmental health. Part B. Critical Review: 10(8):575-96, 2007.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18049924
O noticed, however, that the doses the article cited seemed quite higher than found on vaccines. And quite speculatory…
Not surprising when I googled the authors… though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Geier (The Author of the review is his son, David Geier)
wales,
I didn’t think you did. Based on the ICUs I have worked in I doubt that they didn’t receive antibiotics. What could that mean? Another beautiful theory ruined by ugly reality? You admit you don’t have enough data but appear to be willing to sacrifice others as you are certain the cases are vastly under-reported and the mortality overstated. Define vastly. What is the magnitude of overstatement?
Todd W.,
Someone also said that formaldehyde is naturally occurring in the environment and that everyone is exposed through air inhalation and some FOODS and products. So there goes my answer.
the bug guy,
I don’t think babies can eat chili peppers. Scary? Yes
@Th1Th2
You’ve sufficiently proven to me that you are incapable of answering a question.
Todd W.,
No. You just don’t know how to ask a question properly. Enough said.
nitpicking,
“Can you cite one single actual case of “vaccine-induced influenza” caused by the current flu vaccines WHICH CONTAIN NO ACTUAL VIRUS PARTICLES?”
————————————————————————————-
AFLURIA®
Influenza Virus Vaccine
Suspension for Intramuscular Injection
ADVERSE REACTIONS
General disorders and administration site conditions
Influenza-like illness (e.g., pyrexia, chills, headache, malaise, myalgia),
http://www.afluria.com/docs/pi.pdf
Ayayayaaayyyy…..Now tell me, is there a reason as to why someone shouldn’t be getting polio, warts, otitis media, measles, pertussis etc. in the flu shot? Hmmm…there must be something in the flu shot that causes the flu-like symptoms.
What’s in your vaccine?
@Th1Th2
Reading comprehension doesn’t seem to be your strong suit. When asked for a single case, you provide the package insert. The package insert is not a case. Further, the adverse reactions listed in a package insert must include any reported adverse events, even if a causal connection has not been shown.
So, the package insert for a flu vaccine would include not only AEs that have a causal connection, but also symptoms reported by people who received the vaccine and contracted a different strain of influenza or who were already infected before they received the vaccine.
Th1Th2,
Thanks for missing the point about capsaicin.
I should thank you. I have a presentation to make next month and now I’m going to add some information on reading and understanding an msds.
weing: “significant underestimation” is the CDC’s phrase, why don’t you ask them? Your “doubts” about treatment received do not provide factual information. Your attempt to assign nefarious “sacrificial” motives to my comments are laughable.
@wales
While I agree that there should be effort to ensure adequate supplies of antibiotics to treat secondary infections, would it not be better to have the main focus on prevention?
If an individual contacted the manufacturer and reported that their vaccine turned them into the incredible hulk, as silly as it may seem, they are required by law to report it. So, I’m not sure what your point was there.
@Th1Th2
(reposting) You were asked to cite a case of an individual contracting influenza from the vaccine. Instead, you cite the package insert. The package insert lists all adverse events that were reported to the manufacturer, whether there is a causal relationship or not. An individual could very easily contract a different strain of influenza shortly after being vaccinated and report the flu symptoms. The package insert, therefore, cannot be used as evidence of a causal relationship.
What you would need to do is cite a case where an individual was vaccinated for the flu, developed flu symptoms within a short period after getting the shot, and the strain that was isolated from the individual matched the strain that was in the vaccine.
wales,
Is “vast” also the word they used? I used the term doubt for that very reason. You however have no doubts about vastness and significant underestimations. What kind of a person laughs at the death of others?
How about the MSDS for this hazardous material?
alpha-D-glucopyranosyl-beta-D-fructofuranoside
http://grice.cofc.edu/pdf/MSDS/Rm205/Plante/SUCROSE.pdf
Oral rat LD50: 29700 mg/kg
Intraperitoneal Mouse LD50: 14000 MG/KG
CHRONIC EXPOSURE – TERATOGEN
Species: Rat Dose: 1548 GM/KG
Route of Application: Oral
Exposure Time: (21D PRE/1-22D PREG)
Result: Specific Developmental Abnormalities: Central nervous system.
Wow, it actually is a teratogen! Look at how they say to dispose of it.
APPROPRIATE METHOD OF DISPOSAL OF SUBSTANCE OR PREPARATION
Contact a licensed professional waste disposal service to dispose of this material. Dissolve or mix the material with a combustible solvent and burn in a chemical incinerator equipped with an afterburner and scrubber. Observe all federal, state, and local environmental regulations.
weing: Your accusations are laughable. Who is laughing about death? Get your facts straight. As for semantics, vast v. significant, what’s the difference? According to Webster’s – Significant: of a noticeably or measurably large amount; Vast: very great in size. If you have nothing more substantive to say and cannot stay on topic let’s bid each other adieu for now.
Todd W: My point is at least 84% of VAERS reports are from reputable sources. Cherry picking the same old “incredible hulk” anecdote is tiresome and misleading.
Actually, Th1Th2 does have a point in that you can indeed get flu-like symptoms as a result of getting a flu shot. This is not the same thing as getting the flu, of course. Flu-like symptoms are associated with lots of things.
In particular, they’re associated with the action of your immune system. In fact, most of the flu’s symptoms come not from the virus directly damaging your body but from your immune system fighting it. Fever, malaise, achiness…. Anything that triggers your immune system can trigger these symptoms. Obviously, that include vaccines, since triggering an immune response is the whole point of the exercise. (Less clear, at least to me, is whether the severity of symptoms correlate to successful seroconversion.)
The difference is that the flu-like symptoms triggered by the vaccine will be vastly milder than those triggered by actual influenza, will not last very long, and will not be contagious.
@wales
The point of the “incredible hulk” bit is merely to illustrate what the VAERS page states quite plainly: it is a voluntary reporting system, and the events listed should not be taken at face value as having been caused by the potentially offending product. In other words, anything that is reported on there is unreliable without further investigation to establish causality.
daedalus2u,
That’s why people should avoid the use of table sugars as much as possible. So what’s your point?
Todd W.,
1. I think you have to explain first why a vaccinated individual should not manifest any flu-like symptoms after a flu shot which according to you, “CONTAIN(s) NO ACTUAL VIRUS PARTICLES”?
2. Since you deny “vaccine-induced influenza”, tell me why do you think flu shots are just placebos?
3. What is the difference between an “antigen” and an “influenza virus antigen” in the vaccine or you really don’t know what they are?
Have you ever heard of vaccine-induced swine flu? It will come pretty soon don’t worry.
I couldn’t help laughing when I saw this guy freaking out about Triton X-100. He obviously has the notion that because it is used in laboratories, it is some horribly dangerous substance.
The reality is that the reason it is used in research is that it is a remarkably gentle detergent–much milder than the ones routinely used in things like toothpaste, cosmetics, and dishwashing liquids. Researchers like it because (at high concentrations) it can dissolve membranes without denaturing (screwing up the shape of) proteins.
Todd W said: “While I agree that there should be effort to ensure adequate supplies of antibiotics to treat secondary infections, would it not be better to have the main focus on prevention?”
If by prevention you mean vaccines, 1) we don’t have them yet and 2) not all countries will receive an adequate supply when we do.
@Th1Th2
1. Show me where I said that the vaccine contains no actual virus particles. Methinks you have me confused with someone else.
2. Show me where I stated that I think flu shots are just placebos.
3. According to the CDC, “the ‘flu shot’ is an inactivated vaccine (containing killed virus)”. That means that the virus cannot spread or replicate and cannot cause “the flu”. Contrast this with OPV, which utilizes the live virus and which has that chance (though small) that the recipient can actually develop polio.
Now that you, hopefully, understand the difference between a live virus and a dead one, answer the question that was posed to you: provide a citation of an individual contracting influenza from the vaccine.
Th1Th2, If you knew anything about the immune system and disease, you would know that “flu-like symptoms” come from immune system activation, not from an infection with a virus. An antigen that has no capacity to be infective can still cause “flu-like symptoms” because it stimulates the immune system. There is no chance of “catching the flu” from something that causes “flu-like symptoms”, unless that something contains viable flu virus, which killed vaccines do not.
“Flu-like symptoms” are a generic way of describing certain groups of symptoms because they mimic the symptoms that one gets when one has the flu. Here are 141 conditions that cause “flu-like symptoms”.
http://www.wrongdiagnosis.com/symptoms/flu_like_symptoms/causes.htm
Some of them are not even infections, such as metal fume fever.
wales,
Significant means greater than expected by chance alone. Vast, I have no idea how you quantify that. Your attempts at obfuscation are obvious.
daedalus2u,
Killed, inactivated or attenuated vaccines are designed in a way to mitigate the symptoms of the disease. They are not placebos, they contain the pathognomonic evidence of the disease. People who experienced adverse reactions to the vaccine are actually manifesting sub-clinical form of the disease let alone some are asymptomatic (asymptomatic infection). In short, vaccines are made to transmute an infectious disease to become a NON-INFECTIOUS DISEASE. So how many more symptoms would it manifest if it were live vaccines?
Answer this, can a flu shot cause warts?
Awwwww….Daedalus….that’s what I was just going to write. No fair, you beat me to it.
I’m new to this website and am just curious….is it always this wacky or has this post elicited an unusual amount of responses?
“3. What is the difference between an “antigen” and an “influenza virus antigen” in the vaccine or you really don’t know what they are?”
This question is like asking what is the difference between a tree and an elm tree. “Influenza virus antigen” is simply referring to a more specific antigen. All influenza virus antigens are antigens, but not all antigens are influenza virus antigens.
An antigen is a substance that can prompt generation of antibodies and cause an immune response. Mostly this refers to proteins and polysaccharides, but lipids and nucleic acids can be antigenic under the appropriate circumstances.
From my understanding, the influenza virus proteins neuraminidase and hemagluttinin are the major antigens within the influenza virus vaccine. I would be happy to detail their roles in viral pathogenesis and why they are appropriate targets for vaccines.
What’s the pathognomonic evidence of the flu after vaccination?
weing,
When you get the shot, you get all these:
1. Each 0.5 mL dose contains 15 mcg of influenza virus hemagglutinin (HA)
from each of the three strains: A/Brisbane/59/2007, IVR-148 (H1N1), A/
Uruguay/716/2007, NYMC X-175C (H3N2), (an A/Brisbane/10/2007-like strain),
and B/Brisbane/60/2008. (3, 11)
http://www.afluria.com/docs/pi.pdf
2. Each 0.2 mL dose contains 106.5-7.5 FFU (fluorescent focus units) of live attenuated influenza
virus reassortants of each of the three strains for the 2009-2010 season: A/South Dakota/6/2007
(H1N1) (an A/Brisbane/59/2007-like), A/Uruguay/716/2007 (H3N2) (an A/Brisbane/10/2007-like), and B/Brisbane/60/2008. (3)
http://www.medimmune.com/pdf/products/flumist_pi.pdf
PLUS the symptoms of the disease:
General disorders and administration site conditions
Influenza-like illness (e.g., pyrexia, chills, headache, malaise, myalgia),
http://www.afluria.com/docs/pi.pdf
ADVERSE REACTIONS
“Fever, malaise, myalgia, and other systemic symptoms can occur following vaccination and most often affect persons who have had no prior exposure to the influenza virus antigens in the vaccine (eg, young children).
Respiratory, Thoracic and Mediastinal Disorders: Dyspnea, pharyngitis, rhinitis
General Disorders and Administration Site Conditions: Fever, pain, pruritis, asthenia/fatigue, pain in extremities, chest pain”
https://www.vaccineshoppe.com/image.cfm?doc_id=10205&image_type=product_pdf
Don’t tell me this is polio, or hepatitis or measles, or whatever.
Th1Th2, no, an infection requires replicating microorganisms by definition, either viruses or bacteria or other organisms. Symptoms produced by non-replicating antigens are not “infections” of any sort.
No, a flu shot can’t cause warts. Warts are caused by a different virus.
Todd W.,
1 & 2. My apologies. It wasn’t you who said that, it was “nitpicking”. No wonder he/she never showed up.
3. Let me enlighten you for awhile. In the case of killed vaccines, replication is obviously irrelevant. But what determines the symptomatology in post-vaccinated individual is the amount of antigen load in the killed vaccine. This is the reason adjuvants are added to the vaccine to lessen the amount of antigen load while enhancing immunogenicity. It will only lessen the symptoms of the disease. Understood?
Do you know that measles virus vaccines are considered effective if the injected virus replicates in the body?
Th1Th2 asked “Answer this, can a flu shot cause warts?”
!? Where did that come from?
No, it can’t cause warts, or influenza either.
Harriet,
Try to read my previous posts.
Since you answered, could you enlighten us as to why flu shots cannot possibly cause warts?
weing: are you quoting the “dictionary of weing”? Since when is quoting Webster’s Dictionary obfuscating? You’ll have to speak to Mr. Webster about those obfuscating definitions. Too hilarious.
wales,
So you stop reading when you get to the definition you want? That explains a lot. Try reading all that Mr. Webster says about a word and its uses. You just may learn something.
weing: No, I stop when I get to the accurate definition. Good thing you’re not an english teacher. I suppose one could debate about which meaning the CDC intends, but since the context in which the CDC is using the word is with regard to the number of cases underestimated it seems obvious that the correct definition is “noticeably or measurably large amount”, example given by Webster’s “a significant number of layoffs”. The context of case underestimation has nothing to do with the concept of “chance” as in the Webster’s example “a statistically significant correlation”, it has to do with estimating an amount. Enough english lessons for today.
So, that’s how you delude yourself. You know what they are thinking.
I get it. To you, significant means vast and at least 3 out of 20 pregnant women with the flu dying is not significant.
“Since you answered, could you enlighten us as to why flu shots cannot possibly cause warts?”
Because warts are caused by the human papilloma virus (HPV) not the influenza virus.
“This is the reason adjuvants are added to the vaccine to lessen the amount of antigen load while enhancing immunogenicity. It will only lessen the symptoms of the disease.”
You are not talking about symptoms of the disease. Individuals who get the flu vaccine develop a general immune response in response to the vaccine, which is some cases exhibits similar symptoms to flu infection, including fever and body aches. But this doesn’t mean that they develop the actual disease itself.
“Do you know that measles virus vaccines are considered effective if the injected virus replicates in the body?”
Yes, as is the attenuated polio vaccine. The reason for this is that it allows for a different kind of immunity. This allows the vaccine to induce not just a humoral, or antibody response, but also a cellular immunity as well that can then not only prevent entry of viruses into cells, but also prevent future replication of the virus upon exposure. By giving a weaker form of the disease that is not virulent and does not induce symptoms, it enables protective immunity against the normal form of the disease. Ask Edward Jenner who discovered that milk maids who had cowpox never developed smallpox and his inoculation of people with cowpox prevented smallpox.
@Th1Th2
I see you still have not produced a citation of an individual being infected with the influenza virus after receiving the vaccine. Remember, such a citation would show that the individual received the vaccine, developed symptoms of influenza, was diagnosed with the flu, had a live, virulent virus isolated from a blood sample and had that virus match the strain used in the vaccine.
Th1Th2 said,
“Try to read my previous posts.”
I have tried, but it is painful to read ignorance coated with arrogance.
“Since you answered, could you enlighten us as to why flu shots cannot possibly cause warts?”
q.e.d.
Archangl508 and Harriet,
1. Do you mean to say that these INFLUENZA VIRAL STRAINS in the vaccine cannot cause warts?
A/Brisbane/59/2007, IVR-148 (H1N1), A/
Uruguay/716/2007, NYMC X-175C (H3N2), (an A/Brisbane/10/2007-like strain), and B/Brisbane/60/2008
http://www.afluria.com/docs/pi.pdf
2. And EXPOSURE to these strains also cannot cause influenza?
These strains are for real, so get serious with your answers please. Stop arguing like they don’t exist in the vaccine amid the evidence of flu-like symptoms post-vaccination.
Archangl508,
1. “Individuals who get the flu vaccine develop a general immune response in response to the vaccine, ”
So what’s in the vaccine that is capable of developing a general immune response in the body?
2. “By giving a weaker form of the disease that is not virulent and does not induce symptoms, it enables protective immunity against the normal form of the disease.”
Vaccine-induced disease, that’s what you mean right? So your logic says, that you are going to inoculate a child with live MV who, in the first place, has never been exposed to natural MV. Nice way to becoming DISEASED but as you said, it’s just a “weaker form of the disease” and still protected? What??? You mean VIOLATED?
Protection is RESISTANCE. Vaccines are not vitamins for children. Don’t be confused.
[...] Swine Flu Vaccine Fearmongering [...]
“So what’s in the vaccine that is capable of developing a general immune response in the body?”
I am sorry to tell you this, but you have amply demonstrated here that you are totally incapable of understanding the explanation to this question. So, it would be a complete waste of time. Enjoy your ignorance and arrogance.
weing,
No wonder most of these vaccine apologists deny the existence of any pathologic agents in the vaccines and always enjoy claiming “no causal relationship” myth.
(Hint: Read the package insert)
Th1Th2,
I read the package insert. It says nothing about subjects getting influenza or warts. And those of us who understand the science know it is impossible for them to get either from the vaccine.
Weing: You are amusing. First you speculate that I believe I am omniscient then in your next post you make assumptions about my thought processes.
Weing said: “At least 3 out of 20 pregnant women dying from flu.” The numbers from the early May, 2009 NY Times are outdated as the CDC estimates that between April and June at least 1 million people in the US contracted H1N1.
From the CDC website: “Individual case counts were used in the early stages of the outbreak to track the spread of disease. As novel H1N1 flu became more widespread, individual case counts became an increasingly inaccurate representation of the true burden of disease. This is because many people likely became mildly ill with novel H1N1 flu and never sought treatment; many people may have sought and received treatment but were never officially tested or diagnosed; and as the outbreak intensified, in some cases, testing was limited to only hospitalized patients. That means that the official case count represented only a fraction of the true burden of novel H1N1 flu illness in the United States. “ Only a fraction of the true burden of illness. Hmmm.
http://www.cdc.gov/H1N1FLU/surveillanceqa.htm
The same CDC page states “it is estimated that more than one million people became ill with novel H1N1 flu between April and June 2009 in the United States.” This estimate is based upon modeling, not confirmed cases. Weing, do you have any updated and more accurate data for us? Care to estimate how many people have become infected since June and how many pregnant women?
Here’s one way to guesstimate the H1N1 pregnancy mortality rate between April and June using the CDC’s estimate of 1 million cases. Since about 4 million children are born each year in the US, there must be 4 million pregnant women at any given time. That equates to 1.33% of the US population of 300 million (I am using round numbers here). Let’s extrapolate: pregnant women make up 1.33% of the US population. 1.33% of the CDC’s estimated 1 million H1N1 cases equates to a guesstimate of 13,300 cases in pregnant women between April and June. Admittedly a guesstimate, but then again the CDC’s 1 million estimate is itself based on modeling. Anyone with a more recent and accurate H1N1 mortality rate for pregnant women between April and June could likely calculate a more accurate case fatality rate than 3 out of 20. I do not have that information, do you?
Someone posted here that a dozen US pregnant women have died to date. That would result in a CFR guesstimate of 0.09% (12 out of 13,300 cases). One could make the argument that a higher percentage of pregnant women contract H1N1 due to immune supression in pregnancy, in which case this CFR guesstimate would be an overstatement.
Weing: You are amusing. First you speculate that I believe I am omniscient then in your next post you make assumptions about my thought processes.
Weing said: “At least 3 out of 20 pregnant women dying from flu.” The numbers from the early May, 2009 NY Times are outdated as the CDC estimates that between April and June at least 1 million people in the US contracted H1N1.
From the CDC website: “Individual case counts were used in the early stages of the outbreak to track the spread of disease. As novel H1N1 flu became more widespread, individual case counts became an increasingly inaccurate representation of the true burden of disease. This is because many people likely became mildly ill with novel H1N1 flu and never sought treatment; many people may have sought and received treatment but were never officially tested or diagnosed; and as the outbreak intensified, in some cases, testing was limited to only hospitalized patients. That means that the official case count represented only a fraction of the true burden of novel H1N1 flu illness in the United States. “ Only a fraction of the true burden of illness. Hmmm.
http://www.cdc.gov/H1N1FLU/surveillanceqa.htm
The same CDC page states “it is estimated that more than one million people became ill with novel H1N1 flu between April and June 2009 in the United States.” This estimate is based upon modeling, not confirmed cases. Weing, do you have any updated and more accurate data for us? Care to estimate how many people have become infected since June and how many pregnant women?
Here’s one way to guesstimate the US H1N1 pregnancy mortality rate between April and June using the CDC’s estimated case count of 1 million. Since about 4 million children are born each year in the US, there must be 4 million pregnant women at any given time. That equates to 1.33% of the US population of 300 million (I am using round numbers here). Let’s extrapolate: pregnant women make up 1.33% of the US population. 1.33% of the CDC’s estimated 1 million H1N1 cases equates to a guesstimate of 13,300 cases in pregnant women between April and June. Admittedly a guesstimate, but then again the CDC’s 1 million estimate is itself based on modeling. Anyone with a more recent and accurate H1N1 mortality rate for pregnant women between April and June could likely calculate a more accurate case fatality rate than 3 out of 20. I do not have that information, do you?
Someone posted here that a dozen US pregnant women have died to date. That would result in a CFR guesstimate of 0.09% (12 out of 13,300 cases). One could make the argument that a higher percentage of pregnant women contract H1N1 due to immune supression in pregnancy, in which case this CFR guesstimate would be an overstatement.
correction: first sentence of paragraph 5 should read “here’s one way to guesstimate the US H1N1 case fatality rate”
Th1Th2,
I would first like to suggest you change your screen-name as recent advances in immunology have shown that the immune responses are much more complex than “TH1 vs. TH2″ responses. You know also should include TH17 and Treg cells as well. So a more appropriate name would be Th1Th2Th17Treg.
“So what’s in the vaccine that is capable of developing a general immune response in the body?”
Proteins. As I said earlier, the vaccine is made up of viral proteins including neuraminidase and hemagluttinin. But any protein would have the potential to elicit the same response. I could inject you with ovalbumin, a chicken egg product, and your body could have a similar general immune response including fever depending on the severity of the response.
“Vaccine-induced disease, that’s what you mean right? So your logic says, that you are going to inoculate a child with live MV who, in the first place, has never been exposed to natural MV. Nice way to becoming DISEASED but as you said, it’s just a “weaker form of the disease” and still protected? What??? You mean VIOLATED?”
Did you read my above comment using the example of smallpox and cowpox? The basis of vaccines and your whole immune system is memory. Your immune system is designed not just to repel threats, but to remember those threats and then to provide stronger responses upon later exposure in order to prevent infection. The whole point of exposing children to a live, attenuated virus is to allow their immune systems to practice and then be able to easily repel the actual virulent, deadly virus. If you don’t want your child to get a vaccine, don’t, but good luck when he/she dies from measles. You really didn’t combat this idea at all, just simply used scary words in capital letters, like DISEASED and VIOLATED. The really scary things are the diseases that used to kill lots of children. Are there risks in vaccination, yes, but are those risks higher than the risk of death from actually getting those diseases, hell no.
“Vaccines are not vitamins for children. Don’t be confused.”
No, vaccines are not vitamins, but they are just as important to keeping children, and all of us, healthy. I’m not even remotely confused. I have training in both immunology and virology so the confusion about vaccination if definitely not mine.
This article states that between April 15 and June 15 six H1N1-related deaths in pregnant women were reported to the CDC. Using the 6 fatalities rather than 12 would revise our H1N1 pregnancy CFR estimate to 6 in 13,300 or 0.045%, based upon the CDC’s estimated 1 million cases between April and June.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19643469
Harriet,
Flu shot does not cause warts for obvious reason that it LACKS any etiologic agents in the vaccine that causes warts.
Now, does Gardasil cause warts?
Do you deny the presence any influenza viral antigens in the flu shot? Aren’t they the causative agents for influenza?
Th1Th2,
Gardasil doesn’t cause warts.
You don’t seem to understand the difference between a virus that can cause an illness and an antigen that can stimulate an immune response. The antigens in the flu vaccine cannot cause influenza.
Let me see if I can oversimplify this to get the point across. We start with a virus, take it apart, and use a small piece of it (an antigen) in a vaccine. The body learns to respond to that small piece, and when it is later exposed to the whole virus, it recognizes that small piece of the virus and is able to eliminate the whole virus so it doesn’t cause an infection. The small piece of the virus is not capable of causing an infection by itself.
Archangl508,
1. “Proteins. As I said earlier, the vaccine is made up of viral proteins including neuraminidase and hemagluttinin. But any protein would have the potential to elicit the same response. I could inject you with ovalbumin, a chicken egg product, and your body could have a similar general immune response including fever depending on the severity of the response.”
———————————————————————————–
Try to be more specific and don’t get off-topic. So you agree that flu shots contain at least 3 strains of influenza viral antigens? Are these not the causative agents for causing the flu symptoms and the production of antigen-specific antibody?
2. “The whole point of exposing children to a live, attenuated virus is to allow their immune systems to practice and then be able to easily repel the actual virulent, deadly virus.”
—————————————————————————–
In short, you want the NON-DISEASED to become DISEASED by exposing them to vaccines. For there will be no immunity without exposure to diseases. So what is the difference between a natural MV and a live MV from the vaccine in the setting of exposure and immunogenicity in humans?
3. What kind of immunity do TH17 and Treg bring about?
Harriet,
“The small piece of the virus is not capable of causing an infection by itself.”
You mean non-infectious state of the disease or asymptomatic infection, right?
Archangl508,
“The basis of vaccines and your whole immune system is memory.”
Where did this superstitious belief come from? Do you have any idea of what you’re saying? Do you know that “immunologic memory” is NOT the primary and ultimate function of the immune system. It may be the logic behind vaccination but this concept is totally useless let alone physiologically devastating.
Archangl508,
“The really scary things are the diseases that used to kill lots of children.”
Drugs, vaccines and malnutrition are the reasons children die. Common childhood diseases are benign and self-limiting. Complications only arise when they became patients in the hospital in the hands of allopathic doctors.
Th1Th2 said,
“The small piece of the virus is not capable of causing an infection by itself.” You mean non-infectious state of the disease or asymptomatic infection, right?
No, I mean the small piece of the virus is not capable of causing any kind of infection, symptomatic or nonsymptomatic. It is only capable of stimulating an immune response.
““The basis of vaccines and your whole immune system is memory.”Where did this superstitious belief come from?
Not superstition, but metaphor. “Memory” is used metaphorically to indicate that the immune system had prior exposure to an antigen and now is capable of responding to it.
@th1th2
I like the cut of your jib. We could use you over at
scienceblogs.com/insolence/ – a mecca of vaccine idolatry
========
@Archangl508
——————————————————————————-
I would first like to suggest you change your screen-name as recent advances in immunology have shown that the immune responses are much more complex than “TH1 vs. TH2″ responses. You know also should include TH17 and Treg cells as well. So a more appropriate name would be Th1Th2Th17Treg.
——————————————————————————–
See that’s the problem we’re playing around with a system we know very little about to prevent in, healthy children, mild diseases.
—————————————————————————-
good luck when he/she dies from measles.
—————————————————————————-
It very hard to die from the measles – about a 1 in 10,000 chance – based on 400=500 deaths occurring in the pre-vaccine era when the CDC estimated entire birth cohorts contracted the “disease” each year. And that risk is further attenuated by easily controllable lifestyle factors
Is this thing on?
q
Th1Th2 said,
“Common childhood diseases are benign and self-limiting. Complications only arise when they became patients in the hospital in the hands of allopathic doctors.”
I have lost patience. This is the most arrant bullshit.
I’m beginning to wonder – Th1Th2, are you for real, or are you a spoofer trying to perpetrate a Sokal-type hoax on us?
Th1Th2:
This is person who cannot be reasoned with. After being asked several times for evidence, he produces stuff that he does not understand, writes several posts in a row (spamming) and then concludes with this bit.
He is a troll, and should be treated as such. Trolls are best ignored (or treated like pec).
Also, the same goes for “Sid Offit”, who is a troll that just tries to pick fights. Which is why he as taken on the last name of “Offit”, and the initials for “Sudden Infant Death” (even though there is not evidence that vaccines contribute to SIDS, and may actually be preventative).
(see my moderated comment to get the context of my latest non-moderated comment — this place has a very random spam bucket!)
@ Harriet
I have lost patience. This is the most arrant bullshit.
Stay calm, it’s not good for a doctor to lose her “patients”
@Chris
Which is why he as taken on the last name of “Offit”, and the initials for “Sudden Infant Death” (even though there is not evidence that vaccines contribute to SIDS, and may actually be preventative).
I never even thought of SIDS in regards to the name. It would have been in poor taste. It actually came from the wrestler Sid Justice/Vicious – a stark contrast to the mild mannered Paul Offit and therefore a template for an alter ego
@Harriet
I have lost patience. This is the most arrant bullshit.
Stay calm. It’s bad for a doctor to lose her “patients”
“Try to be more specific and don’t get off-topic. So you agree that flu shots contain at least 3 strains of influenza viral antigens? Are these not the causative agents for causing the flu symptoms and the production of antigen-specific antibody?”
I was completely on topic. If you would like an explanation of flu pathogenesis, disease pathology of the influenza virus, and subsequent immune response please read the following review article:
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2504709
“3. What kind of immunity do TH17 and Treg bring about?”
See the following websites for discussions of helper T cell biology.
http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/T/Th1_Th2.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_T_cell
“Common childhood diseases are benign and self-limiting. Complications only arise when they became patients in the hospital in the hands of allopathic doctors.”
I must now turn to my esteemed Congressman Barney Frank and say, “Continuing to argue with you is like having an argument with my dining room table.”
“It very hard to die from the measles”
Not so hard: 197,000 managed to die of it in 2007.
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2008/pr47/en/index.html
@Harriet
Not so hard: 197,000 managed to die of it in 2007.
Not the Africa gambit. When I move to the Gambia I’ll worry
Harriet,
“No, I mean the small piece of the virus is not capable of causing any kind of infection, symptomatic or nonsymptomatic. It is only capable of stimulating an immune response.”
———————————————————————-
An infection, whether natural or vaccine-induced, is also an immune response unless you believe otherwise.
“Not superstition, but metaphor. “Memory” is used metaphorically to indicate that the immune system had prior exposure to an antigen and now is capable of responding to it.”
———————————————————————————-
They target the antigen, but they don’t kill.
Enjoy the weekend everyone. See ya’ll back here on Monday.
Sid Offit said, “Not the Africa gambit. When I move to the Gambia I’ll worry.”
If all you anti-vaccine people got your way, we would soon have a resurgence of measles and would have our own Gambia. Wakefield’s alarmist proclamations in the UK has already allowed a return of endemic measles there. Children have died.
Th1Th2 said,
“An infection, whether natural or vaccine-induced, is also an immune response unless you believe otherwise.”
Infections trigger immune responses; so do antigens without infection. Flu vaccines DO NOT induce an infection. How many times do we need to explain this before you get it?
“They target the antigen, but they don’t kill.”
What do you mean? The immune system is sensitized by the vaccine so that when the actual virus appears it is “killed” – it is not allowed to multiply and cause infection.
No h1h2, an infection can occur in the complete absence of an immune response and even in the absence of an immune system. Athymic mice are used all the time to grow things without an immune response. Athymic mice have to be kept in sterile conditions because virtually any type of bacteria will kill them.
An infection cannot occur in the absence of infectious living microorganisms. Killed vaccines such as flu, do not contain living microorganisms, so they cannot cause an infection, no matter what immune response they stimulate.
daedalus2u,
“No h1h2, an infection can occur in the complete absence of an immune response and even in the absence of an immune system. Athymic mice are used all the time to grow things without an immune response. ”
—————————————-
Surely, you have not heard about innate and adaptive immune system. The thymus gland is just one organ that plays a role in the human immune system. Anything else? I have not seen nor heard of a post-thymectomy patient living in a sterile world, have you?
——————————————-
“An infection cannot occur in the absence of infectious living microorganisms. Killed vaccines such as flu, do not contain living microorganisms, so they cannot cause an infection, no matter what immune response they stimulate.”
——————————————–
What do these infectious living microorganisms have? Antigens, right? Like these influenza viral antigens in the vaccine for example:
A/Brisbane/59/2007, IVR-148 (H1N1), A/
Uruguay/716/2007, NYMC X-175C (H3N2), (an A/Brisbane/10/2007-like strain), and B/Brisbane/60/2008
http://www.afluria.com/docs/pi.pdf
Unless you deny they exist.
Th1Th2,
I tried to explain this to you in the simplest terms. Try reading it again:
“Let me see if I can oversimplify this to get the point across. We start with a virus, take it apart, and use a small piece of it (an antigen) in a vaccine. The body learns to respond to that small piece, and when it is later exposed to the whole virus, it recognizes that small piece of the virus and is able to eliminate the whole virus so it doesn’t cause an infection. The small piece of the virus is not capable of causing an infection by itself.”
What part of this do you not understand?
Antigens don’t cause an infection, infectious and (usually) replicating organisms do.
Are you denying the germ theory of infectious disease? Are you saying it should be the antigen theory of infectious disease?
Th1Th2 – you want to know what happens when you’re born without a thymus? Google SCID.
I go away for one day and I’m declared a coward who has abandoned his point?
When I said that the influenza vaccine contained no active viral particles, I was referring to the injected one, which contains only purified proteins and some trace stuff. I was not aware until seeing your reference that Flumist was an attenuated virus vaccine, which does in fact contain active viruses. Someone given the nasal spray vaccine does in fact get a (minor) viral infection which it is reasonable to call “the flu”.
Note: this is what grownups do when they get new information: they say “Oh. That’s true.”
I know the feeling. Certain commenters have seemed to think that I should be continuously monitoring the comments and that if I don’t respond within an hour or two I must be a coward who has abandoned the argument.
nitpicking said, “Someone given the nasal spray vaccine does in fact get a (minor) viral infection which it is reasonable to call “the flu”.”
The CDC says otherwise:”The nasal-spray flu vaccine — a vaccine made with live, weakened flu viruses that do not cause the flu (sometimes called LAIV for “live attenuated influenza vaccine” or FluMist®). ”
http://www.cdc.gov/FLU/protect/keyfacts.htm
Is this perhaps why Th1Th2 was confused? I thought he was talking about the injectable vaccine.
Dr. Hall,
Th1Th2 is not technically confused. As a troll he is obtuse. No amount of data or reasoning will work on him.
@Wales:
Since about 4 million children are born each year in the US, there must be 4 million pregnant women at any given time.”
I think you’ll find that works out at 3 million pregnant at any given time…..
@Dr. Hall
I have to agree with Chris. Th1Th2 ignores requests for evidence. He still has not provided his citation showing that even one individual has contracted influenza from a vaccine. Instead, he just shifts the argument around, trying to take the focus off of his lack of evidence. He’s quite adept at doing the two-step, it would seem.
daedalus2u,
“Antigens don’t cause an infection, infectious and (usually) replicating organisms do.”
The antigen load is the direct reflection of viral replication such as in natural MV infection or the live MV in the MV vaccine. In the absence of replication such as in killed or inactivated vaccines, the degree of immunogenicity and symptomatology of the disease depends on the amount of the antigen load present in every dose of the vaccine. This transmutation (killed, inactivated, attenuated, subunit, VLPs) is a significant process to make these pathogens less virulent thus lesser symptoms of the disease.
In short, vaccines are NOT placebos. They contain the pathologic evidence of the disease.
(Hint: Read the package insert and look for the MAIN INGREDIENT)
Troll1Troll2, reread these replies to you:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=1296#comment-30869
and:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=1296#comment-30883
I think that he has been exposed to information about vaccines and has developed a humoral response to those bits of information and is now immune or allergic to learning.
Dee Tee: Good point, what with multiple births. That would mean pregnant women comprise 1.0% of the US population and revises the CFR guesstimate to 6 in 10,000 or 0.06% based upon the CDC’s estimate of 1 million cases between April and June. Still less than ½ of 1% and significantly less than the 3 in 20 figures posted earlier.
Wales I believe the calculation was based on a pregnancy lasting 3/4 of a year (at most).
Th1Th2, killed pathogens are not “less virulent” than living pathogens, they are non-virulent.
Calling the immune response from a killed virus vaccine “the same” as the disease is simply wrong.
You are deliberately distorting things by using false definitions for terms which have clear and well accepted meanings. The immune response to a killed vaccine is not a disease or an infection and the killed vaccine is not a pathogen.
daedalus2u,
“Th1Th2, killed pathogens are not “less virulent” than living pathogens, they are non-virulent.”
——————————————————————–
Even a killed vaccine can provoke antigenic stimulation to the immune system causing clinical symptoms specific of the disease or infection. Of course, the symptoms exhibited from killed vaccines are milder compared to other vaccine prepared with live viruses.
And even the CDC knows this BASIC fact. Read this.
Prospects for Universal Influenza Virus Vaccine
Vaccine-induced or natural upper respiratory tract infection in humans may not engender an optimally protective memory Tc-cell population because of insufficient number or composition.”
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/vol12no04/05-1020.htm
Now tell me why do you think vaccines are PLACEBOS?
Deetee and Daedalus: Regarding pregnancy statistics, there are actually about 6 million pregnancies in the US annually, with about 4 million resulting in live births. 2 million are miscarried or aborted probably most near the first trimester mark. So 3-4 million through full term gestation, another 2 million through only the first trimester, kind of evens out.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/03facts/pregbirths.htm
You tell me why you are lying and putting words into my mouth? Why are you lying and misrepresenting what a “disease” is? Why are you lying and saying that anyone here has said that vaccines are a placebo?
“Having symptoms of a disease” and “having a disease” are two completely different things. I showed you a list of over 100 things that cause “flu-like symptoms”. Are you telling me that TB causes flu because it causes “flu-like symptoms? Does inhaling metal fume particles cause flu? Does Percocet withdrawal cause flu because it causes flu-like symptoms? Does food poisoning cause flu?
Why do they have all those different diseases that all have “flu-like symptoms”? Why don’t they just call them all “flu” the way that you want to? The reason is because real health care clinicians and everyone else who understands the germ theory of disease appreciates that similarity of symptoms does not necessarily mean that they are all caused by the same thing, or that the treatment is the same. TB is caused by a specific organism and requires specific treatment for recovery. Similarly flu is also caused by a specific organism that is different than the organism that causes TB. Treatments for TB won’t cure flu. Treatments for flu won’t cure TB.
If you cared about the health of individuals you would try and understand the science that is used to produce effective treatments. You don’t care, so you wallow in your ignorance and spout transparently foolish lies.
From now on, I think Th1Th2 should be called Humpty Dumpty.
daedalus2u,
Why don’t you argue with what the CDC stated regarding “vaccine-induced upper respiratory tract INFECTION”? Is this statement enough to debunk your belief that ” antigens don’t cause an infection”?
Th1Th2,
You just don’t learn do you? We’ve had this discussion before and you were wrong then and you are wrong now.
The paper you refer to, if you read the whole thing, talks about a vaccine containing an attenuated virus, and not killed virus. The attenuated virus can cause an infection because it is a live virus that replicates inside cells, not because it is an antigen. The vaccine strain does contain antigens, but it is NOT the antigens that are causing the infection. It is the virus that is causing the infection.
Please come back when you have improved your reading comprehension to at least a high school level.
Th1Th2 probably does not mean that the posters here who do understand the science behind vaccination regard vaccines as authentic placebos. His ignorant confusion coupled perhaps with an innate inability to grasp the science behind vaccination (he/she seems to be focused/stuck on a very primitive grasp on how human physiology interacts with its outside environment) is ‘guiding’ him/her to conclude that it is ridiculous that toxins/germs do not behave in the way that his misunderstanding is telling him/her that they should.
Hence, if they do not act that way, if instead they act the way informed scientists are telling him/her, then they are not acting the ONLY way they can, that is, as arbiters of disease. In other words, vaccines are unwittingly being called placebos, that is inert substances without any significant effect. Th1Th2, knowing that we do not think that, is trying to jar us into comprehending his ‘point’ that vaccines act the only way that they can act (based on his misunderstanding of the science). If not, they they do not act at all. He/she is trying to help us see something that is obvious to her/her (based on his/her misunderstanding of the science) He/she is stuck in a vicious circle.
He/she is unable/resistant to understanding that vaccination can achieve acquired immunity without the patient becoming diseased. You would think that the alternative medicine crowd would embrace something as clever and health-preserving as vaccinations! I am afraid these anti-vaxers are violating their own concept of the importance of assisting our bodies in fighting diseases by helping out the immune system–for vaccinations, it is to give the body acquired resistance to specific diseases through a very scientific-based approach, via a non-infective, non toxic acquainting of the immune system to antigens, so antibodies can be produced NATURALLY by our own bodies for future protection against getting very ill. And we won’t even mention the additional bonus of herd immunity.
Anyways, I learned heaps from all the valiant responses to Th1Th2 comments, esp from Daedalus.
@quetzal
Agreed. He certainly seems to share similar qualities.
@Th1Th2
Still waiting on that citation showing influenza contracted from the vaccine.
Then again, you appear to be using the crank tactic of “If I can’t actually answer the question, I’ll just ignore the person asking.”
gr8blessings,
“The vaccine strain does contain antigens, but it is NOT the antigens that are causing the infection. It is the virus that is causing the infection.”
—————————————————————————–
Your argument is laughable. The virus itself whether live or killed will remain antigenic and antigenic stimulation of the immune system will cause manifestation of clinical symptoms of the disease. Obviously, killed vaccines pose fewer symptoms of the disease. Even a grade-schooler knows this basic fact:
——–
“Antigens are any substance that stimulates the immune system to produce antibodies. Antigens can be bacteria, viruses, or fungi that cause infection and disease.
When a foreign substance enters the body for the first time, symptoms of disease may appear while the immune system is making antibodies to fight it.
Immunization is the process of making a person immune to a disease by inoculating them against it. Inoculation is the introduction of an antigen into the body—usually through an injection—to stimulate the production of antibodies.”
Read more: http://www.scienceclarified.com/Al-As/Antibody-and-Antigen.html#ixzz0R3w9UNT0
——–
Michelle B.,
“for vaccinations, it is to give the body acquired resistance to specific diseases through a very scientific-based approach, via a non-infective, non toxic acquainting of the immune system to antigens, so antibodies can be produced NATURALLY by our own bodies for future protection against getting very ill.”
Resistance?? Are you dreaming? That is certainly NOT resistance, instead vaccination is a violation and destruction of the normal physiology of the human body. Like I said, vaccines are NOT vitamins for children. Yeah you’re right, vaccines transmit a “non-infective and non-toxic” form of the disease to someone who never had previous exposure to the disease.
Read:
Fever, malaise, myalgia, and other systemic symptoms can occur following vaccination and most often affect persons who have had no prior exposure to the influenza virus antigens in the vaccine (eg, young children).
https://www.vaccineshoppe.com/image.cfm?doc_id=10205&image_type=product_pdf
That’s for you too Todd W.
gr8blessings,
“The attenuated virus can cause an infection because it is a live virus that replicates inside cells, not because it is an antigen”
I don’t know whether Harriet Hall or daedalus2u will agree with you this time. One characteristic of some vaccine apologists is that they don’t know what they are saying thus, creating misunderstanding and confusion among themselves.
Only someone who doesn’t know any immunology or medicine would find confusion and misunderstanding in gr8blessings’ statement.
@Th1Th2
Yet again, you fail to provide a citation to any case of an individual developing an influenza infection from the vaccine. Let me point this out, since you did not seem to get it last time: the package insert is not a case.
So, I will continue waiting.
“Your argument is laughable. The virus itself whether live or killed will remain antigenic and antigenic stimulation of the immune system will cause manifestation of clinical symptoms of the disease.”
So by your definition, an immune response is what defines an infection. If I inject you with the chicken protein ovalbumin, which will most likely cause an immune reaction with the potential for flu-like symptoms, you are now suffering from an ovalbumin infection?
The actual definition of infection, from Wikipedia, is :
“An infection is the detrimental colonization of a host organism by a foreign species.”
Antigens alone are not capable of colonization. So antigens on their own can not cause an infection. They can cause an immune response, but not an infection.
If all your arguments are going to be based on semantical nonsense, can you at least do a better job with your semantics?
“Resistance?? Are you dreaming? That is certainly NOT resistance, instead vaccination is a violation and destruction of the normal physiology of the human body. Like I said, vaccines are NOT vitamins for children.”
Where on here did anyone say vaccines are vitamins for children? How is vaccination destruction of the normal physiology of the immune system? Vaccinations take advantage of the exact mechanisms of your immune system to produce long lasting immunological memory and immunity to disease. If vaccines don’t work, how do you explain the eradication of smallpox?
According to Th1Th2
The normal physiological state of an individual naive to a disease is susceptibility. A vaccination against that disease renders the individual non-susceptible thereby destroying the initial normal physiological state of susceptibility.
Of course it needs to be realized that some physiological states should be destroyed, for example the physiological state of hunger is destroyed by giving food. The physiological state of thirst is destroyed by giving water. The physiological state of disease susceptibility is destroyed by giving vaccines. The physiological state of ignorance is destroyed by giving knowledge.
Of course if an individual does not have an immune system sufficiently capable of coping with a vaccine, then vaccination is unable to provide them with immunity and so they must depend on the herd immunity of those who can be vaccinated. Similarly when an individual does not have a brain that is sufficiently capable of coping with knowledge, they must rely on the “herd intelligence” of those who do understand that knowledge.
The normal physiological state of an individual is ignorance. Ignorance is a bad thing, but many people can’t handle being in a non-ignorant state.
daedalus2u,
“The physiological state of disease susceptibility is destroyed by giving vaccines.”
——————————–
The physiological state of disease susceptibility is destroyed by giving good food and clean water. You just said it, how come you missed it? Unbelievable.
When did vaccines become man’s physiologic need? You are comparing “crap” from food and water. It makes no sense. What kind of nourishment will vaccines give to the malnourished children? You see all you have to do is read and don’t fantasize.
————————————
Archangl508,
Antigens alone are not capable of colonization. So antigens on their own can not cause an infection. They can cause an immune response, but not an infection.
daedalus2u,
“The physiological state of disease susceptibility is destroyed by giving vaccines.”
——————————–
The physiological state of disease susceptibility is destroyed by giving good food and clean water. You just said it, how come you missed it? Unbelievable.
When did vaccines become man’s physiologic need? You are comparing “crap” from food and water. It makes no sense. What kind of nourishment will vaccines give to the malnourished children? You see all you have to do is read and don’t fantasize.
————————————
Archangl508,
“Antigens alone are not capable of colonization. So antigens on their own can not cause an infection. They can cause an immune response, but not an infection.”
Oh you mean like the antigens found in a killed vaccine wouldn’t cause infection?
Read:
FLULAVAL is an inactivated influenza virus vaccine indicated for active immunization of adults 18 years of age and older against influenza disease caused by influenza virus subtypes A and type B contained in the vaccine. (1)
ADVERSE REACTIONS
Therefore, spontaneous adverse event reports were more frequent in this trial. As indicated in Table 2, upper respiratory infection, arthralgia, myalgia, nasopharyngitis, back pain, injection site erythema, diarrhea, fatigue, nausea, and nasal congestion were each reported by ≥5% of the recipients of FLULAVAL in the Canadian study.
Adverse events described here are included because: a) they represent reactions which are known to occur following immunizations generally or influenza immunizations specifically; b) they are potentially serious; or c) the frequency of reporting.
Infections and Infestations: Pharyngitis, rhinitis, laryngitis, cellulitis.
http://us.gsk.com/products/assets/us_flulaval.pdf
Now you see what an antigen from a killed vaccine can do to the body? It is not just INFECTION but INFESTATION.
Vaccination is indeed a form of infestation. Res ipsa loquitur.
Th1Th2 says
“Antigens alone are not capable of colonization. So antigens on their own can not cause an infection. They can cause an immune response, but not an infection.”
By george, perhaps we are getting through.
Now lets take another baby step and repeat “the killed flu virus vaccine only contains antigens. Antigens alone are not capable of colonization, so antigens can not cause an infection. They can cause an immune response, but not an infection. Thus the killed flu virus vaccine does not cause the flu.”
How could you answer someone who insisted apples were airplanes? I think Th1Th2 has removed himself from the realm of possible rational discourse and does not deserve any more of our attention. His behavior and his handle remind me of the disruptive mischief-makers Thing One and Thing Two in Dr. Seuss’s “Cat in the Hat.”
gr8blessings,
I didn’t say that, you have mistaken me for someone else. Check that again.
Th1Th2,
darn, I see that you screwed up your quotes and you were actually quoting Archangl. Archangl is the smart one and you went on to add the nonsense afterwards in a subsequent post. Sadly, I’m afraid Harriet is right.
gr8blessings,
You don’t know anything about vaccines. You’re just pretending. You don’t even know how to read a package insert and you’re evading to answer why a killed vaccine like FLULAVAL would cause INFECTION and INFESTATION.
Harriet once stated from the CDC: that FLuMist, which is a live attenuated vaccine, cannot cause the flu. But you said otherwise.
You two should make up your mind. It’s quite embarrassing.
Troll1Troll2:
You are a bit slow, aren’t you? I recommended that you to re-read some posts, but it seems you never read them in the first place:
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=1296#comment-30883
Again, Th1Th2, you are mistaken. I did not say that an attenuated vaccine caused the flu. I said that the attenuated virus is capable of replicating inside cells, which is an infection. There is no evidence that this replication leads to the disease. This is consistent to what Dr. Hall has said.
I’m afraid you are the one that doesn’t know anything about vaccines. You have been proven wrong again and again and again by several people. Todd W explained to you how to read a package insert. The package insert does not state that the vaccine caused infection and infestation. We are still waiting for your evidence that a killed vaccine causes infection of any kind.
gr8blessings,
“Again, Th1Th2, you are mistaken. I did not say that an attenuated vaccine caused the flu. I said that the attenuated virus is capable of replicating inside cells, which is an infection. There is no evidence that this replication leads to the disease. This is consistent to what Dr. Hall has said.”
OK. This is really funny. You claimed that attenuated vaccines can cause an infection, right? But at the same time it will not cause the flu, right? WTH does that mean?
1. You certainly believed in vaccine-induced infection.
2. Influenza, according to you, is NOT an infection and at the same time, not a disease.
What’s going on here?
Do you have any idea what influenza viral strains in an attenuated vaccine replicate inside the cells?
@daedalus2u,
Your child-like attempt at logic amuses me.
————————————————————————
the physiological state of hunger is destroyed by giving food. The physiological state of thirst is destroyed by giving water. The physiological state of disease susceptibility is destroyed by giving vaccines.
————————————————————————–
When we destroy hunger by giving food and water substitutes such as formula, pizza, fries and soda we encounter adverse affects. The body has not evolved to handle such harmless looking substitutes.
Natural infection causes the immune system to act naturally while artificial “infection” subjects the body the detrimental affects that accompany anything for which humans have not evolved.
When is this site going to get software that allows posts to appear in a timely manner?
@daedalus2u
Your attempt at logic amuses me
———————————-
the physiological state of hunger is destroyed by giving food. The physiological state of thirst is destroyed by giving water. The physiological state of disease susceptibility is destroyed by giving vaccines.
———————————–
When we give apparently harmless food and water substitutes such as formula, pizza, fries and soda we affect the body negatively. We’ve evolved with very specific needs. Small alterations induce unintended consequences. Simply refining grains and sugar demonstrates this. When we induce unnatural “immunity” by bypassing normal avenues we take the same risk for, in healthy populations, negligible benefits
@Sid Offit
—————————————————————————–
When we give apparently harmless food and water substitutes such as formula, pizza, fries and soda we affect the body negatively. We’ve evolved with very specific needs. Small alterations induce unintended consequences. Simply refining grains and sugar demonstrates this. When we induce unnatural “immunity” by bypassing normal avenues we take the same risk for, in healthy populations, negligible benefits
—————————————————————————-
That’s spot on. I agree totally. Why can’t these vaccine acolytes understand?
No, Th1Th2, it is you that is unable to understand the complex host-pathogen relationship.
An attenuated virus is able to replicate within a cell, but this replication is limited and easily controlled by the immune response, thus damage is minimal and there is no disease.
You are wrong on premise #2. Influenza is a disease (I never claimed that it wasn’t) caused by the influenza virus. The wild virus has a greater virulence and is not so easily controlled by the immune system. This causes greater damage and thus infection with the influenza virus leads to influenza, the disease. The disease is caused by damage resulting from both the replication of the virus and the host response to that replication.
So, WTH does that mean? It means that infection and disease are different concepts, which you fail miserably in understanding. It means you don’t understand the difference between an attenuated strain and a wild strain of the same virus. It means you don’t understand the concept of virulence. It means that you don’t understand the role of host defenses in controlling an infection and preventing disease. It means that you don’t understand basic virology.
What is going on here is your complete and lack of comprehension and the lack of intelligence to understand what is being explained to you. Everyone else grasps the concepts. You don’t. Instead you make up your own definitions of well-defined concepts and these definitions have no foundation in any science because you can’t backup any of your claims with any scientific studies despite being asked repeatedly to provide them.
Your last question makes absolutely no sense and indicates that you don’t understand the vocabulary.
But if my responses are so laughable and funny to you, how about you have a go. Please explain your understanding of what causes influenza and how it can be prevented. You will be sure to back up your explanation with published, peer-reviewed primary literature and make a point of how your point of view is better supported than the current scientific explanation.
I love the unsupported and rather implausible assertion that vaccinations have all these horrible effects. The many studies showing that negative effects actually range from the mild to the extremely rare are irrelevant–mere facts, after all.
And Troll1Troll2′s assertion that good eating habits can prevent the flu is remarkably silly. I now suspect it’s an actual troll that doesn’t believe what it’s posting.
Gr8blessings,
“darn, I see that you screwed up your quotes and you were actually quoting Archangl. Archangl is the smart one and you went on to add the nonsense afterwards in a subsequent post. Sadly, I’m afraid Harriet is right.”
Thanks. I like to think I am a smart one
Th1Th2,
“ADVERSE REACTIONS
Therefore, spontaneous adverse event reports were more frequent in this trial. As indicated in Table 2, upper respiratory infection, arthralgia, myalgia, nasopharyngitis, back pain, injection site erythema, diarrhea, fatigue, nausea, and nasal congestion were each reported by ≥5% of the recipients of FLULAVAL in the Canadian study.”
In any clinical trial, it is mandated by the FDA that any and all adverse events be reported to the the FDA and included in the prescribing instructions for the doctor. You are correct in what is written in the package insert, however, you are woefully in correct in your conclusions that you draw from that. I will try to explain using small words so as to not further confuse you.
Those increases in adverse events shown occur when the patients, all over 50 years old, are followed for 6 months. During that time any and all adverse events would be reported, regardless of whether the vaccine is implicated in causing the adverse event or not. Nowhere in the package insert does it say that the vaccine caused these infections, nor is there even any inference that that is the case. Correlation is not causation. If I drink a glass of milk tomorrow morning, then 4 months from now have a respiratory infection, did the milk cause that infection? At best you could argue that a very small percentage of those immunized with the vaccine become more susceptible to respiratory infection, but that is not the same as saying that the vaccine itself is causing the infection, and certainly not terming it an infestation. You still haven’t offered any proof or immunological evidence or citation showing how an antigen can act as an infectious agent. Again, you are using semantics and altered definitions to try to make a claim, but you are still failing to do so. I find it hard to believe your grasp of the English language is quite so poor.
“When we induce unnatural “immunity” by bypassing normal avenues we take the same risk for, in healthy populations, negligible benefits”
Are the millions of people saved from smallpox and the eradication of that disease a negligible benefit?
How about polio?
Tetanus?
Diphtheria?
It is unnatural to prevent those diseases. It is natural to have the diseases, die from them or survive them with or without sequelae.
gr8blessings,
You are obviously confused and don’t know how to characterize an influenza. You are desperately trying to evade humiliation, I guess.
1. “An attenuated virus is able to replicate within a cell, but this replication is limited and easily controlled by the immune response, thus damage is minimal and there is no disease.”
——Since you never mentioned infection either, then influenza, according to you, is NOT a disease and infection caused by attenuated vaccine.
2. “I said that the attenuated virus is capable of replicating inside cells, which is an infection.”
——-Here you are saying that attenuated virus can, indeed, cause infection.
Are you still there? Hello.
OK, I will give you a chance to justify all your superstitious beliefs regarding influenza.
Is influenza:
A. a disease.
B. an infection.
c. an infectious disease.
d. none of the above.
“Please explain your understanding of what causes influenza and how it can be prevented.”
The causative agents are here right under your nose.
Each 0.5–mL dose contains 15 micrograms (mcg) hemagglutinin (HA) of each of the following 3 influenza viruses: A/Brisbane/59/2007, IVR-148 (H1N1), A/Uruguay/716/2007, NYMC X-175C (H3N2) (an A/Brisbane/10/2007-like virus), and B/Brisbane/60/2008.
http://us.gsk.com/products/assets/us_flulaval.pdf
You can prevent influenza, if you avoid the causative agents.
Now you can use your imagination.
flulval is a killed virus vaccine. It even says so in the link you provided.
“FLULAVAL is an inactivated influenza virus vaccine”
“inactivated” means “killed”.
Flulaval also contains thimerosal which would kill any virus present if if wasn’t dead already.
It contains the antigens from several different viruses, Hemagglutinin is an antigen, it is one of the proteins that flu viruses make that cause bad stuff to happen. By vaccinating an individual with it, the individual’s immune system mounts an immunological response that inactivates the hemagglutinin before it can do that bad stuff.
@All
I would agree with Dr. Hall. Th1Th2 is not interested in learning or having any sort of meaningful discussion. My suggestion is to not respond at all, or, if you must, respond simply by asking for the evidence that the influenza vaccine has resulted in an influenza infection in an individual, and reminding him that a package insert is not such evidence, since, as he quoted himself (emphasis added):
There is nothing in the insert that points to a causal connection for every AE reported.
daedalus2u,
“It contains the antigens from several different viruses, Hemagglutinin is an antigen, it is one of the proteins that flu viruses make that cause bad stuff to happen.”
This is the problem with some vaccine apologists they really don’t know what they are talking about. They can’t even say the word they want to say because they will be contradicting themselves if they do. OK, could you possibly explain what “bad stuff” mean? According to you, what causes the “bad stuff” is the protein (HA) and not the “killed” virus, is this true? If a virus is non-replicating, can it possibly cause the “bad stuff”? (attn: gr8blessings)
If you looked up the definition of hemagglutinin, you would understand that it is defined as something that causes red blood cells to clump together. Normally red blood cells don’t clump together, so something that causes them to clump together is understood to cause “bad stuff”.
I think (but this is only a guess) that the reason the vaccine manufacturer reported the quantity of hemagglutinin is because it is easy and straightforward to assay. You take a certain amount, put it in with some red blood cells and see how fast they clump together. Then you know how much hemagglutinin there is in the killed virus preparation you are using. Then you can standardize and give a lot of individuals the same dose and then track their responses.
I don’t know that much about hemagglutinin, so I did what every scientist does in that circumstance, I went to the literature. I went to PubMed, and using hemagglutinin as a search term found 16,126 hits. When I don’t know that much about a topic, I often like to start at the beginning. Hit 16,125 was a paper titled: “Absence of Hemagglutinins in Certain Viruses.”
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=17648116
It is available open access, so I downloaded it and read it. Turns out that HA can be used to measure the quantity of virus present, but that not all viruses have it. The paper references a paper using it to assay a strain of swine flu. Not bad for 1945, after all, there was a war on. This paper wasn’t clear if killed viruses still retain active hemagglutinin. I presume that depends on how they are killed. The point of using inactivated virus for a vaccine is to retain the immunogenic properties while losing the infectious properties. So I looked a little more and found this paper.
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=9990079
Also open access. It is a nice piece of work. They recovered flu virus RNA from victims of the 1918 Spanish flu and sequenced the gene for hemagglutinin to see where it fits with the other hemagglutinin genes from other flu strains. Now they can make vaccines to the 1918 flu too.
So what is your point? Oh, that’s right, you don’t have one other than that you are afraid of vaccines and will say and do anything to magnify and justify that fear. That is anything but trying to learn and understand the actual science.
I found a nice review paper on flu
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2504709
It does talk about the pathology, which is sometimes characterized by thromboses, which explains the interest in hemagglutinin (which by causing red blood cells to clump together can cause thromboses).
It is not hard to find good and reliable information on flu. Why you are spending so much effort trying to shield yourself from that good and reliable information is not something that I understand.
Not everybody is convinced on the vaccine. Look at the results of a poll of Healthcare workers in the U.S.
http://www.medscape.com/px/instantpollservlet/result?PollID=3201&src=mp&spon=17&uac=121842PR
@OZDigger
And your point would be? The results just show that healthcare workers can have the same unjustified fears as non-healthcare workers. It’s not surprising, though. I mean, there are doctors and nurses who subscribe to other baseless ideas, such as therapeutic touch, homeopathy, etc. The poll says nothing about the actual safety or efficacy of the vaccine.
I’d note, though, that the majority are likely to get it.
OZDigger employs another logical fallacy, the argument from popularity. As if scientific truth could be determined by vote! In fact, the link undermines his own argument: it indicates that a majority are likely to get the vaccine.
I suspect that many more will decide to get the vaccine as they respond to peer pressure, to the concerns of the infection control committees at the institutions where they work, and to the requirement that the unvaccinated protect patients by using cumbersome masks and gloves. At least one medical center has said that getting the vaccine will be a condition of employment – employees will have to either get it or leave.
Your egos are too fragile. All I was pointing out was that there is some disquiet amongst the medical fraternity about the flu vaccine. It points out the 45% of health care workers in the U.S. have yet to be persuaded about the validity of the vaccine. So, with all the “science” you are subjecting them too, only 55% are going to get the vaccine. Hardly convincing. It would be really interesting to see a breakdown of professions choosing not to receive it. e.g. nurses, M.D., D.O. etc.
Now that would be science in the terms of statistics. Might be a bit much for you.
And they are just opinions and anecdotes. The plural of anecdote is not data, and says nothing as to the safety or effectiveness of the vaccine.
Fragile egos? That’s a good one coming from OZ. There may very well be some fragility with our egos (after all, we are humans), but at least our egos are not so fragile that they need to reject evidence so we can remain ignorant of reality.
@OZDigger
In addition to the poll being totally irrelevant as to the S&E of the vaccine, another factor that we do not know is the reason for people in the 45% to be unlikely to get the vaccine. For example, those who are allergic to eggs would be included there.
In the end, the poll is pretty much useless as far as an evaluative tool for whether the vaccine is good or not and whether one should get it or not.
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well im no doctor or a medical worker but i do know that my head and my heart tells me not to take this vaccine..
i truly do believe on all levels that this vaccine isnt for the good of us all…
there are too many doctors scienists from all over the world stating on record that theres more to this vaccine than most of us would know…
this isnt a some random statement and a belief that all doctors are out to get us…but a belief in my own mind that something doesnt ring true with this vaccine..
what i did find amazing was that the british medical council meet with eu/who advisers over 2 years ago and agreed a set price for doctors to give the vaccine currently 7.50 per shot…(this has only just been released in the press)
anyways i really hope my gut is wrong and people dont get hurt with this vaccine..
i know i wont be taking the vaccine and i wish us all good luck in the coming months…
btw i know this is going to sound crazy as hell but look up fema coffins on youtube…they currently have 20million plastic coffins ready for use outside most usa citys…hmmmm
as i said maybe this vaccine isnt going to work/or maybe it is depnding on what you want the vaccine to do..
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/technology/science/study-prompts-provinces-to-rethink-flu-plan/article1303330/
“Report suggests people who get vaccinated are more likely to catch H1N1″
Ann-Cathrin Engwall (born Svensson) a Swedish PhD in molecular cell biology has suggested that the reason for these findings could be that cell-mediated generated immunity will not be as well developed with continous flu vaccination programmes which tend to prevent natural immunization by infection to occur. Natural immunization gives a much broader protection than the one caused by vaccination.
Several, also inner, components of different influenza viruses may be recognized as similar or the same in different influenza viruses and may thus cause a cell-mediated immune response even if the actual virus – such as the A/H1N1 swine flu virus – is categorized as “new”. This would well explain why people in Sweden born before 1980 as a group so far seem far less (< 1/4-1/6 or so) likely to catch the swine flu. They have often encountered the Asiate and/or Hongkong flues during the 1950´ies and 1960´ies, whereas the younger age groupes have not. Even if these influenzas were of different A/HxNy-types (which the vaccine manufacturers have to focus on) the inner virus components may to some extent be the same or similar with A/H1N1 according to Ann-Cathrin Engwall.
This is also why a mass vaccination programme is suboptimal for a generally healthy population assuming influenza viruses cannot be totally exterminated from earth. As a group the mass vaccinated loose more protection in the longer term than they gain in the short term. The herd natural immunity thus will diminish compared to if there was no mass vaccination programme at all. Therefore an optmimal influenza vaccination programme probably should focus on the high risk groups with people that have a special underlying desease that make them highly at risk if they get infected by the influenza virus.
This is of course not what the pro mass vaccination propaganda people want to here. Therefore even in Sweden where the authorities want to vaccinate the whole population they try to "hush" inconvenient conclusions like this one.
In Sweden some 1000-4000 die in seasonal flu every year and so far only a few deaths in A/H1N1 have occured, both with an underlying severe desease.
There is interestingly enough also an older american study that confirms the suggested explanation by Ann-Cathrin Engwall.
http://news.bio-medicine.org/medicine-news-3/Benefits-of-flu-vaccine-substantially-overestimated-says-study-6985-2/
These findings could suggest that the same mechanism of the cell-mediated generated immunity or rather the lack of it in vaccinated people as briefly explained above could be the reason.
One may add that since the influenza virus changes fast mass vaccinationation against that type of virus (or against the common cold) naturally is less efficient than in e. g. the polio case where it of cource is appropriate.
The suggestion or theory, which is based on commonly known scientific evidence, that Ann-Cathrin Engwall has proposed may seem too simple but it matches with experience and also seems to do so with both of these cited studies
loparn said
“Natural immunization gives a much broader protection than the one caused by vaccination.”
Does it? Reference, please.
Harriet Hall on 18 Oct 2009 at 11:43 am “loparn said “Natural immunization gives a much broader protection than the one caused by vaccination.”
Does it? Reference, please.”
Yes, reference please …
It seems the (unvaccinated) ones who don’t die the first time around are merely luckier than the unvaccinated ones who do die of the disease the first time around; they could have benefitted from the vaccine. Whether or not the unvaccinated have a better immune response subsequently; they relied on dumb luck the first time around.
According to Dr Ann-Cathrin Engwall the basics were taught in her education in the 1980´ies and 1990´ies, so it should be common knowledge among other specialists in immunology and virology.
I have learned that vaccines against influenza virus mostly can generate an immune response to the HxNy components of the surface of the virus since the virus inner parts is protected by a 3-D “shell”. It is well enough for a new influenza virus.
Natural immunization i.e. when you get infected is generally the only time when all of the virus parts are presentented on the infected cell surface causing a so called cell-immediated immune response to all parts of the virus not just the HxNy surface proteins. That is very important to know !
The advantage is that the cell-mediated immunity thus is broader and may recognize so called new viruses but which could have common inner components with previously encountered influenza viruses. This is one reason that you do NOT get sick in the flu that may times in your life even if you never have vaccinated against it.
And it seemes (?) that mass vaccination programmes (I referr to the US link above) have had little success in reducing influenza sickness long term.
The natural immunity lasts long and is quite efficient even if you cannot avoid getting the flu some times.
People with underlying severe sickness of course should consider vaccination before every flu, if they are at high risk otherwise.
—————————
For the moment I have only this Wikipedia information about cell-mediated immunity
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell-mediated_immunity
I do believe though there must be other scientists than A-C Engwall who has begun to think in similar patterns.
I may add or emphasize that IF the population has been influenza mass vaccinated before several times it implies that the natural broader immunization process has been reduced on all those occassions so that you get more likely to catch a new flu compared with a similar population which has not undergone such vaccination programmes.
Therefore of course there will be a higher risk for persons in the first population NOT to get vaccinated before future influenzas. The will get more dependant on vaccine programmes…
If that is the case in the USA today I understand that you may need mass vaccination…
This rather new link deals with the cell-mediated system
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327266.000-mystery-immunity-could-boost-swine-flu-protection.html
“Seasonal H1N1 infection may have primed another part of the immune system, called cell-mediated immunity, which may not prevent infection but limits the severity of the disease. This could be why the pandemic has spread fast but remained mild in many people, though not all.”
This is in line with what I have stated before.
You could predict then, if Dr Ann-Cathrin Engwall´s theory is reasonable or correct, that countries with historically relatively high vaccination programmes penetration ought to have a higher incidence of swine flu sickness in the population know, all other factors equal.
Such a study though may be difficult to make just by the reported figures but maybe you would get a hint ?
I noticed on one A/H1N1 international statistics site that USA seems to have a rather high portion of swine flu sickness, whereas Germany with recently just ONE person who had died.
Maybe they have had different influenza vaccination strategies in the last few decades ?
Just give it time.
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