H1N1 Vaccine?

[ghoststalker2004]

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/10/06/h1n1.vaccine.questions/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

[eLDiablo]

About 2 dozen people died world wide and there's a widespread media panic to get the vaccine and use hand sanitizer.


I already got Swine flu a few months ago. It was little worse than the regular flu; and I don't need big pharma telling me what chemicals to put into my body when half their damn drugs have side effects like "Sudden Irreversible Death".

[kwark]

Not going to get it, in the Netherlands 2 people died from it, but they both had a chronic illness, any other flu would have done the same.

Up to a week ago a Dutch virologist advised everybody to get the vaccine, bat last weak a newspaper reporded he had shares in the company who produced the vaccine :p

[truefeel]

Someone in the family had it too. Really, H1N1 is not that dangerous, but the media and the masses make a huge fuss about it. It got leaked to the press who it and where he lives. Since then -2 months ago- completely till today he is receivng treatening letters. One of those even treatened him with death if he gets outside, while he was cured of it long after he received that one.

Really, H1N1 has to be one of the most overrated diseases of all times.

[Derek]

About 2 dozen people died world wide and there's a widespread media panic to get the vaccine and use hand sanitizer.
More like 4,000, but whatever.

I have to get the vaccine though, because my dad has a genetically weak immune system. I doubt I would ever get it though, the virus went around my campus at the start of the year but has passed.

[ein1017]

Have not seen it, and not worried about it.

[Statalyzer]

Less dangerous than the ordinary flu.

[wthigon]

Posting just to get rid of this....

It appears that you have not posted on our forums in several weeks, why not take a few moments to ask a question, help provide a solution or just engage in a conversation with another member in any one of our forums?

[Fenring]

More like 4,000, but whatever.
Care to cite that source? Last I heard, it's not that high.

However, swine flu? Please.
Spanish Flu? Then you can panic.

[Derek]

Care to cite that source? Last I heard, it's not that high.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_flu_pandemic

Mind you, seasonal flu kills more than that every year. I'm just saying.

[SirSnake]

Im not sure who that wiki cites, but from the horses mouth is the latest stats from the only folk who really count: WHO (http://www.who.int/csr/don/2009_10_02/en/index.html).


Latest result say over 4100, so Derek is spot on.

It is, however, a laughably small number compared to normal flu. This can be fairly compared in per month death rate as well.


Either way, its not really _that_ serious a thing. It becomes a major problem only to high-risk people, like the elderly, immuno-suppressed, critically ill etc etc. However its the same risk-group for normal flu, TB and many other infectious diseases.
But you may as well get the vaccine if you have the offer; its unlikely to really cause you any harm and its more pleasant than actually having flu.

IMHO a lot of the reason its been such a minor thing is exactly because everyone has over-reacted. (Cynical hat says pharmaceutical companies also wanted to make money, but may as well say most politicians are liars for an unneeded reminder of the truth).

Point in case, I know some, and have met many more (in hospital) people who have had swine flu and were fine. And for 99% of people who have died from swine flu, normal flu would also have killed them anyway.

[kyle]

I go into basic December. Should I get the vaccine to prevent getting the flu before/during the training? Also, if I did get the flu before Basic Training, would I be withheld from participating?

[NodMan]

Vaccinations are laughable.

[Thumper]

wow thats ignorant. enjoy your small pox.

[NodMan]

Yarp. Because a vaccine for a Virus is usually just hit or miss. Something like Measles and Small Pox is easy to make a vaccine for. However a Flu is always changing and mutating. So getting a 'Vacine' for it is just dumb.

[KrasnyOktyabr]

I go into basic December. Should I get the vaccine to prevent getting the flu before/during the training? Also, if I did get the flu before Basic Training, would I be withheld from participating?

Don't bother, you'll get it there. By the time you're out of the military you'll have 5 types of cancer and glow in the dark, I've got vaccinations and shots for **** I didn't know existed.

[SirSnake]

Yarp. Because a vaccine for a Virus is usually just hit or miss. Something like Measles and Small Pox is easy to make a vaccine for. However a Flu is always changing and mutating. So getting a 'Vacine' for it is just dumb.


wow thats ignorant


Thats still fairly applicable.


Though you arent wrong that virus' mutate, you clearly have little to no understanding about everything surrounding them (including the need for vaccines).

If you read my post above you might be able to work it out, but I sense you probably arent capable of that; and I certainly cant be bothered explaining it to you.

[Camel]

Don't bother, you'll get it there. By the time you're out of the military you'll have 5 types of cancer and glow in the dark, I've got vaccinations and shots for **** I didn't know existed.


:DYup, in the military they vaccinate against everything, probably a vaccine to cover the vaccination program:evil:

[NodMan]

Thats still fairly applicable.


Though you arent wrong that virus' mutate, you clearly have little to no understanding about everything surrounding them (including the need for vaccines).

If you read my post above you might be able to work it out, but I sense you probably arent capable of that; and I certainly cant be bothered explaining it to you.

Yes yes, I know all about the young and the elderly's basic need for vaccines. However I strongly believe that someone who's health enough and at the susceptible ages doesn't need to get them.

Also, you may have thought you were smart trying to be all educated and what not; but everyone has Google around these parts.

:DYup, in the military they vaccinate against everything, probably a vaccine to cover the vaccination program:evil:

You mean the alcohol swab? :P

[Derek]

Also, you may have thought you were smart trying to be all educated and what not; but everyone has Google around these parts.
And some people go to med school.

[truefeel]

He made a point though; very concrete information for which someone has to follow years of med school to get to know it, is just up for grabs at the internet. It is a good thing that Universities keep their information only open for their students on their intranets.

About that the H1N1 virus mutates: I've readed somewhere that it hasn't mutated very much and as such the vaccine would still do its job. They should give to elder people and young children, but otherwise other people should do just fine without.

[SirSnake]

Information is easy to acquire. What you do with it is what counts!


In addition, the t'interweb has lots of false, misleading and bizarre information, for which its hard for the layman to sift through. Medical related stuff I have (as you say) a wealth of trusted information I can compare to.

Something else, like say, modern armour, I couldnt tell you a good article from a bad one.

The thing is Nodman, is the very young and very elderly and susceptible because they are that age. Very ill people of any age obviously can fall into the high-risk category. But Ive seen ill babies, and you see them die from less irregardless they are of how healthy they were prior, the same can be said for the elderly.

But it depends on classification, and obviously there is considerable variation between individuals. So for many that might fall technically into the old or young group, you are right they'd probably be fine, but from the healthcare perspective why take the risk? From my point of view its going to give them a much better chance of staying healthy. From another its also cheaper (probably the largest deciding factor sadly).

But honestly everyone reading this forum is most likely going to be fine without it, but as Derek mentioned he is around high-risk folk so he should take it for their benefit (similar to me I am.... encouraged to take flu vaccines and the like because Im round high-risk folk).

I apologise if I sounded a little abrupt but its hard to tell when people are being dismissive out of ignorance or frustration (at how OTT the whole thing is, no matter how much I advocate vaccines for whatever reason, no doubt swine flu is blown way out of proportion, but thats the media for you!)

[truefeel]

Information is easy to acquire. What you do with it is what counts!I don't think that's the issue. I mean I have talked about information, that I can't put myself into action, so many times. Nobody here is going to decide which people will get the vaccine or not; we can only discuss what way the best way should be how others apply that information.

In addition, the t'interweb has lots of false, misleading and bizarre information, for which its hard for the layman to sift through. Medical related stuff I have (as you say) a wealth of trusted information I can compare to.I think it is quite easy to find objective and accurate information. I mean everybody can for instance look if the website has a good reputation concerning good information. e.g. A website about diseases brought by some or other university -the university is not a fake one- is assumed to be accurate.
Of course, some very specific, accurate information is always hard to find, but I do think it is generally not a problem to find accurate information. Of course that does mean taking the effort to double check your sources.

About nodman: let's give him a break. He only wants to try to hang out the tuff guy inbetween the older members :p. We all were like that once. Lets give him time to adapt to the ways people generally behave here.

[SirSnake]

We all were like that once.


Speak for yourself! :p

[truefeel]

Who? me? Nah, I was born leet:p.

[Statalyzer]

I don't know much about viruses so I'm not saying "mutate" is the wrong word, but I've noticed that in casual biology discussions, especially those having to do with disease, people tend to mix words like "adapt", "vary", "evolve", and "mutate", around as if they were all synonyms. Are the viruses actually mutating that rapidly? I supposed that since virus are not alive, they would tend to only be able to change by mutation (since otherwise they'd produce identical copies of themselves), whereas bacteria would have natural genetic variation like most other living things.

[truefeel]

I'm not an expert either, but some viruses indeed mutate that rapidly.

Infact that is the sole reason why there is still no effective medicine against the HIV virus: it mutates so rapidly that vaccines become useless.

Viruses being alive or not alive, is discussable. They do duplicate, a factor that living creatures own, but they also cristalise, a factor owned to not living objects. It's a matter of where you draw the line. If I'm correct (and someone correct me if not) Viruses can only adapt by mutating; they can't genetically alter as they simply have no DNA.

[Derek]

I'm not an expert either, but some viruses indeed mutate that rapidly.

Infact that is the sole reason why there is still no effective medicine against the HIV virus: it mutates so rapidly that vaccines become useless.
I don't think thats the reason, actually. I think it has more to do with the fact that it destroys the immune system, thus making immunity hard if not impossible to acquire.

[SirSnake]

Viruses are not living. They are bits of DNA or RNA floating around in a protein shell. Pretty much no-one considers them living in any fashion, and any classical definition of "life" does not include them.


Because they are essentially bits of genetic code they are indeed able to mutate (a "mutation" is simply an umbrella term for a change in genetic sequencing. There are many many forms of this, and can lead to a complete change in the organism (such as single-cell life forms), a change in the cell (such as cancer), have no effect etc etc). If there is a field that consider them living I havent come across them!

Adaption in reference to bacteria (viruses dont adapt as they are not living and therefore dont directly respond to the environment they are in) normally involves vector transference of genetic code. Unlike us bacteria have essentially a core of DNA but also other bits floating around which they are easily able to pass from species to another (a feat not possible in multi-cellular organisms by and large). This leads to (for example) anti-biotic resistance spreading from one species to another.

Evolve is an even more umbrella term that includes everything of the above for the overall survivability or "betterment" of the species. So whilst probably not used incorrectly its so broad as to be unhelpful most of the time.

The Human Immunodeficiency-Virus does indeed "attack" the immune system (hence the name :p).
Importantly it is a retrovirus and thus it inserts itself into the cells DNA and remains "hidden" there. It is very difficult to treat because its hard to find a specific thing to target. (This is straining my memory back a few years but as I recall the HIV reverse transcriptase is unique and thus the target of choice.... I think :p). Either way thats why its hard to target.

As an aside there are many viruses that also hide in such a fashion, but are not as devastating as HIV. Its cell of choice is essentially white blood cells (I wont go into specifics, we'd all die of boredom) but essentially this means that the body cant respond to infections when serious enough (and HIV infection only becomes serious when you reach the stage of AIDs), to which ends HIV wont kill you.... whatever you catch next will!

[truefeel]

I don't think thats the reason, actually. I think it has more to do with the fact that it destroys the immune system, thus making immunity hard if not impossible to acquire.

No, I think that's aids. I mean really a vaccine against which protects you against HIV even it gets activated.

[NodMan]

Born and raised on a Farm. We had tons of pigs, chickens, cows, and some horses. This bird flu and swine flu, stuff makes me and my family laugh. Talk to any farmer that's ever had chickens or pigs, they'll laugh at you when you mention these flues.

[truefeel]

But farmers are not doctors or scientists. Farmers don't know the potentional danger of all those diseases.

[NodMan]

And farmers aren't like the rest of the world. They don't sit enclosed in their houses hoping things will get better. They get to it. The immune system I built from growing up on a farm is one potent mother. I never get sick, and I'm always around sick people. Wither it be at the store, picking my niece up from school, or being at the hospital. So yah. All these mothers that overly clean stuff in their houses is why kids get sick. Because they don't have an immune system. So one little virus can get into them and they are as sick as a dog.

Check into it. The cleaner you make your environment for you and your family. The more likely hood they have of contracting an illness. Because their bodies aren't used to fighting off colds and flues on a regular basis.

[truefeel]

And farmers aren't like the rest of the world. They don't sit enclosed in their houses hoping things will get better. They get to it. The immune system I built from growing up on a farm is one potent mother. I never get sick, and I'm always around sick people. Wither it be at the store, picking my niece up from school, or being at the hospital. So yah. All these mothers that overly clean stuff in their houses is why kids get sick. Because they don't have an immune system. So one little virus can get into them and they are as sick as a dog.


We can't be all farmers, man. I do agree the society has a less strong immunity system then a few centuries back, but you know: it is one of disadvantages we have to take from modern society.