Everyone in our household got the flu in December and half of us are sick with not-necessarily-flulike symptoms as we speak. We are getting hammered by pre-school germs that we aren’t used to, but I wonder what people think about the relative merits of getting the flu shot. I think it is a great idea for the elderly who are at serious risk of dying from the flu, but I’m not sure about the cost/benefit analysis for people in their mid-40’s who are in otherwise decent health.
How do you calibrate your decision?
I’ve never gotten the flu, and I’ve never had a flu shot. Maybe I’m just lucky, not sure. Every day when I walk into work there’s a big sign saying we can come get our free flu shot in the clinic, but I’ve never had the flu so I’m just pressing my luck.
seabe, maybe you’re one of the lucky minority:
http://blog.23andme.com/23andme-research/snpwatch/genetic-armor-in-flu-season/
I’ve never had the flu either, well I did get the Hong Kong flu in 1969 but hey.
I haven’t had a cold in over 3 years but ocassionally I do get the startup of a cold and at the very very first sign I take a cold pill…an OTC brand and I take one pill a day for a week. Seems to stop the symptoms from swamping me into full blown misery.
So you just cough in people’s faces spreading it?
We usually do not get the shot, but this year we decided to get vaccinated. My kids (7 years old) and I are all at the same school, and figure we are highly likely to get exposed. I heard on NPR that the CDC guessed correctly about one of the strains of flu the vaccine is designed to fight, and that was the tipping point.
I do what the doctors say, and these days they say everyone should get it.
It used to be that the standard recommendation was children, people over 60 and medical workers (plus maybe teachers; I forget), but now the standard recommendation is that everyone ought to get it. I don’t know if that’s based on a herd immunity notion or just individual benefit, but either way it seems there’s been a definite change in the public health analysis in the last few years.
Herd immunity is a very big deal. The CDC estimated that 6 out of 10 people who got the vaccine last year developed significant resistance to that year’s flus. And every person who is not a vector due to vaccination has a profound impact on the spread of the disease, which has a profound impact on public health and the economy.
This. This. This.
If you haven’t seen it, Steven Soderbergh’s 2011 film, “Contagion”, with its fabulous cast (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1598778/) is a great way to learn this point.
For those who have less time, start with this Wikiepedia entry on the “basic reproduction number” or R-nought which is, for public health experts, the key factor in determining how fast and how severely an epidemic spreads. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number
The higher the percentage of a population that has some level of immunity to a hostile microbe, the less severe the epidemic is. Fewer human deaths. Fewer human illnesses.
A friend at the CDC told us that Contagion was as close to real, and the reality they face every day, as you will ever get on film. Making it a very unpleasant movie to watch, understanding that it could easily be a documentary.
I have no patience with people who don’t get flu shots cause FREEDOM or BIG PHARMA or I NEVER GET SICK. This really isn’t just about individual health.
I always get the shot and I haven’t (knock on wood) gotten the flu yet. Because of soshulism, I walk across the street and get it for free.
After a bad case of flu in my 40’s, I began getting the flu shot every year. I’ve never had the flu again.
Twice in my late thirties. Both times led to pneumonia and neither time did anyone that I came in contact with contract it. Since then only one not so bad flu four years ago and I haven’t gotten any flu shots.
Haven’t gotten the shot and not likely to get it because of the cost. When I had good health insurance I got it every year after I turned 55. Never had the flu. Essentially, you are playing virus-matching roulette every year. The last time I had the flu was when I was 42. I was out for a week, had pleurisy for another week and what was called “walking pneumonia” from a secondary infection for another 3 weeks. That was a particularly rough year for the flu.
You can get a shot here for $25.
I believe they are free under the AHCA. No co-pay or deductibles. In any event, Medicare pays for 100%.
How do I decide?
Whatever Big Pharma, Big Insurance and Big Med unanimously recommend, I do the opposite.
Strong and healthy, knock on wood.
It’s just another devolved mainstream scam now, Booman.
Corporate bullshit with the short-term bottom line as its top consideration.
Bet on it.
I am.
You bet your life.
So do I.
Later…
AG
Actually it is the public health sector that pushes this, and pushes pharmaceutical companies into making something they don’t want to make due to liability issues.
Not only that, but they can’t gouge people for it or else no one would get it. While it’s not a money loser for them, it certainly doesn’t pad their profits as much as they’d like.
Where and how do you plan to disconnect “the public health sector” from the corporate health sector, wvng? That is exactly like trying to disconnect so-called federal watchdogs like the Securities and Exchange Commission…which is almost totally in the pocket of big corporate finance….from the ongoing criminal enterprise that we laughingly call “Wall Street.” “Stonewall Street” would be more accurate. If the CDC (Center For Disease Control) were to really be taking care of the business for which it is named it would be vigorously attacking the Big Pharma, Big Med and Big Insurance establishments as well as Big Agriculture and the whole denatured foods system. That group is responsible for the alarmingly bad health of the U.S, which has the highest per capita health expenditures in the world and yet doesn’t even come in among the list of the top twenty healthiest countries.
Wake the fuck up.
AG
Always predictable. You remind me of my son, who is 22. No one can tell him anything. Geezus.
I assume you mean that you can’t tell him anything. On the evidence all that I have read of yours here it sounds like he’s got it just about right, to me.
AG
I work in a health care system. Everyone is strongly urged to get the flu shot. IN some health care systems, you can get fired if you don’t, and I am on board with that. Flu is not a little problem. We have vaccines and vaccines work, if they guess right. I’ve heard that there is a better shot a year or so down the road.
The Spanish influenza in 1919 killed a huge number of people. I had a great-great uncle who had a case, and it permanently disabled him – he was a WWI vet, and he spent his entire life as an invalid on a soldier’s pension. He had graduated from Univ of Illinois in 1917, and got the flu. I have the 50 years of petitions to the Cook County Clerk of Courts by my greatgrandfather on the status of his estate.
Get the shot. It’s quick, not expensive and a good idea. Plus, since you are a family, you protect yourself and others.
I’ve had the flu once in 25 years. Even so, I started flu shots last year, and hopefully won’t miss another for the rest of my life.
My whole work group got sick this year, except me.
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Is they didn’t do a good job predicting which strains would be prevalent this season. Sometimes they are right on. Sometimes they aren’t. This year they weren’t.
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Mid-september the CDC predicted the H3N2 virus. They were right on, see the charts. Looks like we sorta peaked end of December. This season the flu was found early on in Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. California is pretty lucky and everyone should spend the winter months on Hawaii.
I started getting flu shots in my fifties. Not taking any chances. No ill effects and am lucky enough not to have to pay for it. Great peace of mind. Plus…washing hands.
Have gotten a flu shot in 12 of the last 13 years. Missed one about 8 years ago and promptly got the flu. My wife is a professor and has tons of germ/virus exposure from her students and we travel a good deal-often during flu season.
Don’t know if I possess the genetic resistance to most forms of flu, but I’ve also never had the flu and am now of an age where it’s highly recommended. I don’t plan on getting the shot.
I’ve an older brother who lives in another state who got a flu shot 2 decades ago and promptly came down with the flu or a reaction to the shot. He never knew which, but he says he’s never been so sick, and he’s never gotten another shot.
I don’t think I’ve ever gotten the flu shot as an adult, and maybe I got the flu once in that time. At my most recent appointment, my doctor asked if I wanted one and I said I didn’t know. Since I don’t work with children or the elderly, she didn’t encourage it. But she encouraged the whooping cough/tetanus vaccine so strongly that I got it right then. Either she gets a commission for it or it really is important. I trust her, because when I went to her with yet another sinus infection, she advised that I use a non-prescription sinus rinse which works marvelously.
I should mention that I’m n CA, which apparently has been spared so far from the epidemic everywhere else. Also, there’s this riot-act article:
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2013/01/for-gods-sake-go-get-a-flu-shot.html
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Looking at the official CDC stats which are updated weekly, I call bs on this journalist stating “20 child deaths in NY”. [Paid for by pharma?] As far as I can read on the charts, total deaths in the USA contributed to flu influence is 20 (age under 18) . In New York 2 children have died, not 20. Comparing flu seasons, this year’s influenza will be moderate to severe but not near to any sort of pandemic.
View charts in power point presentatiom
She gets a commission. I’ve never heard that recommended for adults.
That’s not true at all. Whooping cough is highly contagious and has been making a comeback. Why? Because people are not getting vaccinated. Every single adult should get their tetanus boosters, particularly high risk workers.
The combination vaccine is highly recommended for adults.
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What I’ve been reading is that people are not getting their kids vaccinated. That doesn’t mean that adults and especially adults who had these childhood diseases as kids need vaccination.
NO ONE has a flu immunity. The flu is always re-rolled. You can have it over and over. It is not like chicken pox or cowpox.
I thought his comment was in reference to whooping cough.
Yes, it was.
Some vaccines wear off in efficacy. Others weren’t around when some of us were kids. I don’t know whether whooping cough is one of these, but I do believe that every adult should look over his or her vaccination record with a doctor.
It was called Pertussis, the “P” in DPT.
My family has never gotten the shot before, but we plan to do it tomorrow. Everyone says this year is especially dangerous. Children are dying. Why take the risk?
Every one I know who gets a flu shot gets the flu within a week of the shot. I never get a shot and I never get the flu. I have a chronic health problem so I guess that makes up for not getting the flu. I also don’t get colds either. But, that is because I do what Linus Pauling recommended for colds–take vitamin C.
” I think it is a great idea for the elderly…”
First, thank you SO MUCH for not using the annoyingly ridiculous euphemism, “seniors”. Elderly, elder, old – those are accurate terms.
Second, I wonder about flu shots for elderly people who are in robust health. Why would they be any more likely to die than a healthy 40-something?
Yes, with “senior” having the connotation of “respected”, “wise”, “important” it is certainly inaccurate.
Get the shot. Don’t spread the disease. Have a little sense of civic duty.
Ask your doctor. Or maybe the CDC. People who don’t get the shot are epidemic-fodder.
Instead of asking your readers, I mean.
Yep.
And it does not matter which vaccine. You don’t take them, you have made yourself fodder.
.
More precisely, you make yourself a viral shotgun shell, rather than fodder.
We started getting the flu shot a number of years ago because my middle son has asthma. Every person in my office and their families has been hit hard by this flu but so far I have been fine-the sniffles and a day of feeling sort of tired.
Lots of students at my sons’ schools are out with the flu but mine are doing fine so far.
Get the flu shot!
well, didn’t AG make the most compelling argument in this thread?
How so?
Here’s what the CDC says: “An annual seasonal flu vaccine (either the flu shot or the nasal-spray flu vaccine) is the best way to reduce the chances that you will get seasonal flu and lessen the chance that you will spread it to others. When more people get vaccinated against the flu, less flu can spread through that community.”
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/keyfacts.htm
Only “compelling” to those who have not been totally hornswoggled by the media, Booman.
Dr Big Brother is on call 24/7, and has been since at least the 1960s.
The AMA is more damaging to this country than the NRA, dollar for dollar and death for death.
Way more.
Bet on it.
Bet on it.
AG
I don’t have health insurance, and don’t want to part with the money. Sure, the flu sucks, but it’s not the end of the world for someone like me: early 40s, generally healthy, physically fit.
Well, in your case, it’s a judgement call. If you can afford it, spend it. What does it cost? The cost of a night at the movies? Dinner in a mid-level restaurant? If you can’t afford it, look into free shots. Cook County Illinois will vaccinate anyone for free who is willing to stand in line.
We need better education on the flu shot. This is the first that I’ve heard it associated with herd immunity, like other vaccines. I’m also confused about whether the elderly should take it: on the one hand, they’re most vulnerable to bad consequences of the flu; on the other hand, they’re also vulnerable to bad consequences of the shot. My mother’s doctor doesn’t encourage her to get it and she doesn’t. What I see in this thread is a lot of people making conclusions based on anecdotal correlations: I do/don’t get the shot and I don’t/don’t get the flu. Whatever happened to the Surgeon General?
Herd immunity is not a characteristic of one vaccine or another. It’s simply math.
Good point. Just to elaborate: A deadly microbe (e.g., a flu virus) needs to spread to new hosts. Otherwise the microbe dies when its first host dies. More specifically, a deadly microbe needs to spread to new hosts before the old host dies.
The faster the microbe spreads, the more it can reproduce and survive. For the host species (in this case, that’s us humans), that means the more it can do to slow the spread and the fatality of the microbe, the better that is for the host species.
The more people who get a flu shot, the more people there are with increased immunity to the flu virus, the harder it is for the virus to spread more widely, infect (and kill) more humans.
To clarify, I meant that I hadn’t heard the principle applied to the flu vaccine in discussion the way it’s commonly applied to the measles or polio vaccines, for example. Not that the principle is true for some viruses and not for others.
Those of you who are healthy and not worried about getting ill should consider the effect you can have on other people. Do you know any small children, elderly, anyone with health problems or pregnant women? If you carry the virus to them, they can die. This isn’t just about you.
We lost twenty children in Newtown, and the whole country mourned. Making sure it doesn’t happen again has become a priority even though it’s a huge undertaking. We have lost twenty children to the flu this year alone, and we can easily reduce the number who will die in the rest of the year by stopping the spread of the disease.
If you can get the shot, please do. You may save a life.
Can you carry the flu if you don’t get it?
Carry is one thing. Transmit is another.
How would you carry it if you were not infected? On your hair, skin, or clothes is probably the answer. Flu is (to the best of my knowledge; IANAP) transmitted mostly by airborn particles, and secondarily by contact with surfaces. So, if it was on your skin, someone would have to have contact with your skin and a mucous membrane. So, stop having bums lick you.
So, my guess is that others with the active infection which leads to sneezing and coughing account for a large proportion, and passive non-infected carriers for a very tiny fraction. People like Typhoid Mary were infected but non-symptomatic. I don’t think that is your suggestion.
yes, that was my question – is flu a typhoid mary situation where a person can be infected buy non symptomatic;
and if one is non-symptomatic would they be transmitting it
For those who are interested, here are some basic facts about flu and flu vaccines: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/keyfacts.htm
For those who feel like public health officials get too worked up about influenza and the possibilities for deadly epidemics or pandemics, check out some basic history of the 1918 influenza pandemic that killed 20-50 million people (roughly 1-3% of global population at the time), and infected about 500 million. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic
A similar pandemic today would result in about 70-175 million deaths, with about 1.5-2 billion people infected.
Because you never know how virulent any strain might be. I got that H1N1 going around a couple of years ago – that was bad.
You should read John Barry’s The Great Influenza. The hardest hit in 1919 were young and in good health. They just hadn’t been exposed to any variants of that particular strain. They were effectively killed by their own immune systems.
A lot of folks are mistaking a nasty Norovirus (aka stomach flu) going around for the flu.
For those of you who were curious, Finn and I got the flu shot.