Fever broke?

[icarus]

I think the fever's broken, not sure. Either that or I'm having a brief respite, which -- hey -- I'll take it. My throat hurts like you wouldn't believe but even that's an improvement.

I have a theory.

I think these flus are the fault of flu shots.

I never used to get sick, or else which I did, it wasn't very serious. I got a very bad virus back in 1987, then the next one (other than a sniffly week or two) was in the late 90s, once flu shots started to gain popularity. Once my office (from 2000 onward) started pushing flu shots on the entire staff (and you were strongly advised to get one, it was provided for free, in-house -- seems someone examined the stats on on the costs of missed work days) I caught a severe virus every year.

So here's my working theory: flu shots are great for those who get them, terrible for those who don't. By combining the worst flu viruses into one vaccine, people are being exposed to a greater variety of brutal viruses. Most of which they would never face without the shot. Those who have the shot become carriers because viruses aren't the same as polio, measles, etc. Viruses mutate. The whole flu shot theory is founded upon everyone getting the shot.

Now here's where I get cynical. There are only a couple companies allowed to produce flu shots in the U.S. This is a very profitable business, increasingly so with corporations on board with the flu shot theory, sponsoring flu shots for their employees. There may be good intentions involved, but I bet someone at these businesses knows there's a risk of increasing flu epidemics if not everyone gets the shot.

God, I'm so sick of the U.S.

Comments

[winterthunder.livejournal.com]

That particular strain was recently sequenced, if I remember correctly, and they found that it had mutated from an avian source and passed through swine before emerging as something that humans had never been exposed to in any way, shape or form, meaning that no one had any type of immunity to it. The viruses we typically see on a yearly basis are usually variants of prior years- descendants of the 1918 Spanish Influenza pandemic are out there, but they've lost the ability to attack the way they used to, both because the population has already been exposed and because the virus itself has mutated into a less lethal form.

If you're interested, The Great Influenza (http://www.amazon.com/Great-Influenza-Deadliest-Plague-History/dp/0670894737) by John Barry is very readable and a great source of information about the 1918 pandemic and the general dynamics of the influenza virus.

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

I think they also found that it messed up the immune system, so young adults, normally the first to recover from illnesses, were the worst affected.

[droolfangrrl.livejournal.com]

I know. This is the way that I know flu strains change and adapt.

I think if I understood better what was in a flu vaccine then maybe I would be able to figure out if the idea that the vaccine is making things worse is a valid one or not.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

The vaccine has a (supposedly) inert virus that triggers your body to produce antibodies because your body doesn't know it isn't live. Those antibodies then protect you when you encounter the live version because -- as far your body is concerned -- you've already had it. It was assumed that no one could create "a" flu vaccine because the flu mutates so rapidly and comes in 31(+) flavors. There are new strains every year. The flu vaccine is a compilation of several of the most likely (and nastiest) candidates for the coming flu season each year. (Someone above said that it's just one flu virus, which is incorrect.)

When you first get the flu vaccine, since your body thinks it has the flu, you will get flu-like symptoms.

I have no confidence in the flu vaccine. We have only a couple companies producing massive quantities of the vaccine under tight time constraints. The likelihood that some of those flu shots are either ineffective, contain live viruses, or other quality control problems, is very high at present.

[droolfangrrl.livejournal.com]

Now that I can see possibly happening.

[akaspeedo.livejournal.com]

I agree with you 100%. But I'm not in favor of vaccines in general, and don't even get me started on the one supposedly to keep young women from getting some kinds of cervical cancer.

[winterthunder.livejournal.com]

Originally, vaccines contained small amounts of the thing it was supposed to protect against. There's evidence that civilizations hundreds of years ago in India would immunize their children by rubbing the oozings from various pox victims into small cuts on the skin.

The problem that I (and many other people) have with today's vaccines is that they contain not only killed or modified live viruses, but a cocktail of other chemicals and preservatives necessary for mass production. The companies that create vaccines each have their own version of the cocktail and each of them claim that it's proprietary information, so they won't release the contents. It does at least have to be approved by the FDA, but given the number of drug recalls and stories of company funded studies that suppress information that would hurt sales, I don't find myself overly inclined to trust my health to the FDA.

There's also some research to indicate that gaging immunity based on the circulation of antibodies is inaccurate and that by constantly exposing ourselves to viruses in unnatural ways (since most illnesses aren't spread by injection into the muscle) we're setting ourselves up for longer term chronic immune issues. All this leads me to believe that we don't understand our immune systems well enough to be fooling with them. Call me crazy, but I'll eat well and exercise and trust my immune system to do the job that it's been evolving over millions of years to do.

[droolfangrrl.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

I just don't know. It's all one gigantic mess.

I seem to remember that cats have had bad reactions from being "over vaccinated"

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I just learned a great deal from you, and your comments here gave me more information than I've ever encountered on the subject.