School immunizations

[glinda]

I will repeat something I posted yesterday...

Thanks for bringing that info back to the fore.

From that article...

If the vaccine were to pan out in human trials, that would be a significant factor in preventing people from coming down with the flu, which represents a serious health threat each year. Globally, there are about 650,000 deaths from the flu worldwide and millions of people are hospitalized due to the illness. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, those people who are considered at high risk of serious flu complications include people over the age of 65, as well as people who have pre-existing conditions such as asthma, diabetes, heart disease or chronic lung disease.

I had no idea there were that many deaths from flu worldwide. We hear numbers like 30,000 per year in the US and until I had a serious run in with the flu I think I took that number cavalierly.. sort of yeah right. But as you and others have pointed out, OMG it is as scary as it comes if you really get it!

I do the shot. I ain't all that pro or against but have one of them pesky pre-existing conditions that limits my repository system enough that the flu is a deadly threat to me. A solid one size fits all solution would be wonderful. Though I am sure for younger folks there will always be that sense of immortality to carry them through. Whereas with age and a sense of our vitality waning I think we all become more appreciative of modern medicine. Crossing the flu off from one's list of things to be worried about would be great.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

The llama antibodies are effective enough to work on a wide number of flu viruses,

This would provide a great improvement over the current method of identifying and tracking new and mutating flu viruses, then developing a vaccine in time for each flu season. If the tests are successful, it would greatly reduce the "650,000 deaths from the flu worldwide and millions of people (who) are hospitalized due to the illness."

It's also a good example how humans can benefit from an unexpected source in the animal kingdom. When some say it's not a big deal whether flora and fauna go extinct, or an island disappears, it's without respect and consideration for the interconnectivity we have with the world, and still need.

"I want great climate, we’re going to have that.” President Donald J. Trump, while viewing the massive wildfire devastation 11/17/18. (The J stands for Jenius)

[ElysianWort]

A big part of earning respect in friendly debates is knowing when to admit you were wrong.


Just to be clear, my stand in this debate is I like the fact that "they don't MAKE teachers take this yearly (only semi-effective) shot"

Doesn't seem to me like it is a right/ wrong issue.

I'm all for science. It was my major in College.

I respect the other opinions.

And best of all I'm thrilled to hear the news that Rob just posted about a universal Flu vaccine.

[leilanidude]

The flu can have dire consequences (costs) for a business. My company even has flu/pandemic plans in our disaster recovery and business continuity planning.

[David M]

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an estimated 80,000 Americans died of influenza and its complications during the 2017-18 season.

This is the highest death toll from the flu in at least 4 decades.

Ninole Resident

[TomK]

EW wrote:

"I'm all for science. It was my major in College."

Would someone be kind enough to explain this comment? I didn't go through the US education system and a major in science means nothing to me. What does a college major in science actually involve?

[rainyjim]

I’m assuming science major, means that he got a bachelor of science or BS degree (no pun intended) rather than a bachelor or arts or BA degree. Both are undergraduate (4 year degrees) however the BS has some degree of background in science - i’m assuming requiring an intro chem, bio and math classes (possibly more depending on the institution). Approximately 1/2 of the coursework is considered ‘general education’ and has no relevance to the specific major, the other 1/2 is somewhat related to the specific major, but may be only tangentially related - for example pre-med students may substitute plant physiology classes with human-anatomy and physiology courses for a physiology credit at UH.

[ElysianWort]

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an estimated 80,000 Americans died of influenza and its complications during the 2017-18 season.

This is the highest death toll from the flu in at least 4 decades.


Could someone kindly prove to me how this yearly flu shot is effective with numbers like this?

I have asked kindly several times earlier in this thread for someone to prove that the flu vaccine is effective.

One would think, even though not everyone is getting it, the trend would be in the opposite direction, (declining numbers of people infected)

Just saying... I mean, once the vaccines came out for those other terrible diseases that I mentioned earlier, (polio, smallpox etc) the prevalence of such said diseases didn't have this same trend.

When the universal LLama derived flu shot comes out things might start changing, I hope.


* Edited to add: Besides intro to Chem there was also the grueling but fascinating Organic Chem 1 and 2, Biochemistry, Botany, Statistics, Zoology, Physics and of course the hands-on Lab courses that went with the book-work. P.S (no astronomy and I believe in aliens)
Fun and educational times.

[rainyjim]

FWIW, my graduate work was all done in a virology lab.

I can try to explain a little bit, but it seems like the argument is moot anyways as you both seem to agree that it [read: flu vaccines] is not 100% effective.

If you think about a virus - like the virus that causes the flu you might liken it to another species such as humans. Viruses like humans exist in populations, not solitarily. While humans are mostly the same e.g. 99.9% the same DNA, there are obviously huge differences like height, weight, ethnicity, etc. and then same can be said of viruses. These changes to viruses however can often result in drastic differences when considering their ability to infect and replicate in hosts or pathogenicity.

The virus populations for some species (particularly true of RNA viruses - yes some viruses are comprised of RNA genomes and have no DNA whatsoever - this includes influenza viruses) are more prone to mutation than others - just as certain groups or ethnicities may be more genetically prone to some types of diseases.

Our vaccines work by recognizing specific ‘shapes’ or epitopes on the exterior of the viruses - more appropriately referred to as virions or individual viral units.
You might liken these ‘shapes’ or epitopes to a child’s toy such as pegs and a box with square, round and triangular holes - the child of course develops manual dexterity by discovering which specific shape can fit into which hole.

The vaccines developed today are designed to recognize all of the epitopes of the influenza virus known/identified thus far by scientists. Imagine how the circular and triangular peg of the right size might fit into a square whole, but a square peg may not be able to fit into a round hole. Anyways, if I haven’t confused you yet you may be able to imagine the possibility of a receptor in a vaccine that could recognize any possible viral epitope - that is essentially the universal flu vaccine they are working on - in laymans terms.

[ElysianWort]

Thanks RainyJim. Virology, admirable and interesting.

I remember wanting to take the Microbiology course but it wasn't offered during the semester(s) that I was able to fit it in while striving to finish up the degree in a timely manner.