H1N1 - To Vaccinate or Not to Vaccinate

[ollie]

Wow, that article I posted sure brought out a lot of insecurity!

[nibbler]

This thread gets funnier by the post... witch reminds me...

[nibbler]

Wow, that article I posted sure brought out a lot of insecurity!

Strange, I didn't see profound sense of insecurity listed as an adverse reaction anywhere on the H1N1 infosheet

Edited February 3, 2010 by Guest

[phishtaper]

[color:red]hey we need to get this important stuff correct:

looks like you are mixing up Kelly Rippa and Kathy Lee Gifford. the latter was the co-host until about 8 years ago. The show is much more watchable now with Kelly.

kelly lee left the show? is gilford still there?

[peipunk]

I really try to stay out of these things because I am the worlds worst debater (I am sure to be crushed in a rebuttal of some sort here), but I try as much as possible to live by my signature (not the waffles part). It probably has a lot to do with where I am from and where I live, but I truly believe that the corrupt, bad people in the world are the exception to the rule (unfortunately some of the bad ones seize power in places and affect a lot more people). Doctors, teachers and politicians here where I live are my friends, family and neighbors. There is no way I will believe a vaccine that is widely supported and distributed like this does more harm than good.....no way.

Sorry to blah blah blah, I blame Ollie! I will shut up now.

[ollie]

...I try as much as possible to live by my signature (not the waffles part).

Yeah, but what if the one time you're cheated you get Guillain-Barré Syndrome?

I never said the vaccine does more harm than good, just thought it was worthwhile to post an anecdotal story of what can go wrong.

It's up to us as individuals to decide what level of risk we're comfortable with. I would never tell someone *not* to get the vaccine, just as I hope no one would ever force me to get the vaccine.

And don't sell yourself short on your debating skills!

[hamilton]

I went skiing yesterday and didn't die...

I wouldn't expect you to die while skiing. Skiing itself doesn't cause death

tell that to Natasha Richardson!

oh wait...never mind

It wasn't the skiing that casued her death... it was the crashing!

[AD]

I went skiing yesterday and didn't die...

I wouldn't expect you to die while skiing. Skiing itself doesn't cause death

tell that to Natasha Richardson!

oh wait...never mind

It wasn't the skiing that casued her death... it was the crashing!

Who here wears a helmet when they ski/snowboard?

Because she didn't.

[phorbesie]

guess what velvet gave me for xmas? a snowboarding helmet!

snowboarding is more fun than flu shots.

first day on the hill this year will be this weekend i hope. i'm going to race in my new helmet!

[AD]

Velvet is a good man. And thorough.

Enjoy the hills!

[phishtaper]

so, who else actually got the shot? i did.

[Kanada Kev]

Who here wears a helmet when they ski/snowboard?

Because she didn't.

Interesting piece on CBC the other day regarding helmets for skiing. Why is it that NONE of the manufacturers of these helmets have applied for CSA standards set last March??? Technically there aren't any helmets out there that meet these standards!

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2010/01/05/f-helmets-ski-snowboard.html

Not arguing against ... hell, i just bought two for my kids last week. Protective gear should meet a standard and be used properly (see bike helmets, hockey helmets, kids car seats, etc.) since so often they are not

I haven't ever skied with a helmet, but i know i would nowadays for sure.

Much like pedestrians being aware of their surroundings, skiers must be too. Anything to take away from that increases risk (no helmet, headphones, beers, etc.)

[localcrew]

I'd go American on anybody who caused me to be paralyzed by a vaccine.

I'd sue everyone down to the freaking janitor who mopped the floor in the joint.

[nibbler]

Bernard Prigent, Pfizer’s inside man

PM Harper's appointment of drug company's VP to Canadian Institutes of Health Research is also a registered lobbyist… to CIHR.

by Tim Bousquet

February 4, 2010

Last October, the Harper government appointed Bernard Prigent to the governing council of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the federal agency that distributes about a billion dollars annually for health research. That appointment was met with near-universal condemnation from medical ethicists, because Prigent is a vice-president of Pfizer Canada, a firm that stands to profit from the decisions made at CIHR.

"There's a structural conflict of interest," explains Jocelyn Downie, the Canada Research Chair in Health Law and Policy at Dalhousie University. "On the one hand, it's [Prigent's] statutory duty to represent the best health interests of Canadians, and on the other hand, as an executive with Pfizer, he's legally bound to promote the profit interests of his company. Those competing interests will not always align, and will sometimes be in conflict."

Prigent's appointment was all the more remarkable because just a month before, Pfizer was fined $2.3 billion in the United States, the largest criminal fine ever assessed in that country, for fraudulently marketing the arthritis drug Bextra for unapproved uses.

Prigent's appointment resulted in an extraordinary review by the parliamentary standing committee on health, but it was not reversed.

But the parliamentary committee did not have a crucial piece of evidence: not only is Prigent a vice president of Pfizer, but he is also a registered lobbyist for Pfizer. That information is only now coming to light, and has never been previously reported. According to the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying of Canada, the government agency that regulates lobbyists, Prigent's position as Pfizer lobbyist is to sway policy at the "Canadian Institute of Health Researchers (CIHR) and other Research Oriented Spending Programs as it relates to private/public research and development partnerships," and Prigent is to achieve these aims through both oral and written techniques.

In other words, Prigent the Pfizer lobbyist is paid to lobby Prigent the CIHR official.

Federal rules require that lobbyists file monthly reports about "oral and arranged communications relating to a contract regardless of who initiated the communication," but Prigent has not filed such a report.

Prigent did not respond to a request for comment.

http://www.thecoast.ca/halifax/bernard-prijent-pfizers-inside-man/Content?oid=1503474

[SaggyBalls]

Since when is a conflict of interest enough for Canadians to care about?

Now take away our hockey and our beer and we'll be fighting.

[nibbler]

While Canada is busy wasting over a Billion Dollars on the hyped up G8/G20 meetings, I am reminded of another recent episode where they wasted a fortune of taxpayers money on un-necessary "security"...

Swine flu risk 'was vastly over-rated' by World Health Organisation

By Fiona Macrae

The Daily Mail

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1289418/Swine-flu-risk-vastly-rated-World-Health-Organisation.html

June 25, 2010

Threats of a swine flu pandemic were 'vastly over-rated' by the World Health Organisation, an inquiry has concluded.

The Council of Europe last night also accused the UN's health arm of 'grave shortcomings' in the process that led it to declare a pandemic last year.

Plummeting confidence in health advice could prove 'disastrous' in the event of a severe future pandemic, parliamentarians at the Strasbourg-based senate said.

The assembly also accused the WHO of being 'highly defensive' of its handling of the outbreak and drugs companies of influencing the decisions taken.

Members, including five British MPs, voted overwhelmingly in favour for greater transparency in public health decisions.

It wants governments to 'ensure that the private sector does not gain undue profit from public health scares' and drug companies to revise their rules to ensure any potential conflicts of interests are made public.

The debate and recommendations follow a report which described the declaration of the H1N1 pandemic as a ' monumental error' driven by drug companies - spreading fear and wasting huge amounts of money.

Paul Flynn, the British MP who led the Council Of Europe probe, described it as 'a pandemic that never really was'.

Mr Flynn said predictions of a 'plague' that would wipe out up to 7.5million people proved to be 'an exaggeration', with fewer than 20,000 deaths worldwide.

Britain braced itself for up to 65,000 deaths and signed vaccine contracts worth £540million.

The actual number of deaths was less than 500 and the country is now desperately trying to unpick the contracts and unload millions of unused jabs.

The focus on swine flu also led to other health services suffering and widespread public fear.

Pharmaceutical companies, however, profited to the tune of £4.6billion from the sale of vaccines alone.

Mr Flynn said: 'There is not much doubt that this was an exaggeration on stilts. They vastly over-stated the danger on bad science and the national governments were in a position where they had to take action.

'In Britain, we have spent at least £1billion on preparations, to the detriment of other parts of the health system. This is a monumental failure on the WHO's part.'

The WHO has firmly rejected all the criticism, saying the outbreak fitted the criteria for a pandemic - and to claim otherwise was disrespectful to those killed by the virus and their families.

It also takes the view that not all ties to drug companies are necessarily conflicts of interest.

[SaggyBalls]

" to claim otherwise was disrespectful to those killed by the virus and their families."

[Tooly]

is it any wonder thought, that they declared that BS a "pandemic"? If they do that, then they sell a shitton more vaccine, and they all make more dough. dont think for a minute that these drug companies and WHO and Gov't are seperate entities

[phishtaper]

i got the vaccine. and yeah, i guess i did suffer a little brain damage. i no longer feel a need to bother arguing with idiots.

[SaggyBalls]

Tooly - it's very important to recognize the difference between the concepts of 'being the same' and 'answering to the same interests'.

The drug companies, WHO, and Gov'ts are certainly not the same entity, while it could be effectively argued that the system they've created and work within are all set up not for us but for their process.

Don't turn into a tinfoil hat wearing whackjob...save the shielding for your signal path and your home.

[Booche]

Fake data was used in the studies linking autism and vaccinations. In other news, 'boom' goes the dynamite.

[SaggyBalls]

According to the BMJ, not one of the 12 study cases tallied fully with the children's official medical records. Some diagnoses had been misrepresented and dates faked in order to draw a convenient link with the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) innoculation. It found: Only one child clearly had regressive autism and three did not have autism at all.

Despite the study claiming all 12 children were "previously normal," five had documented pre-existing developmental concerns.

Some children were reported to have experienced first behavioural symptoms within days of MMR, but the records documented these as starting some months after vaccination. Nine children had normal test results from their bowel but this was changed to "non-specific colitis."

Patients were recruited through anti-MMR campaigners, and the study was commissioned and funded as part of planned litigation against the vaccine's manufacturer.

Shocking the autoimmune system to react rather than supporting it and the body's overall health is lazy and while that unreliable study didn't prove anything it did spark research into vaccination which has led to more knowledge and understanding about it.

Boom the dynamite did not go.

[Im going home Donny]

Quack, quack, quack. My fingers are crossed for an HIV vaccine and a cancer vaccine.

[SaggyBalls]

Not going to happen.

Keep in mind, the main point of the study was to show a correlation between gastrointestinal disease and autism, which it had and has been found since.

There is a higher risk for some children to become autistic/have it emerge from some vaccines, but those studies are unrelated to that one.

I look forward to us finding ways to become and remain healthier. Hoping for vaccines isn't cutting it.

[Im going home Donny]

Dissing vaccines is just small minded. Vaccines are the greatest success of science and medicine period.