The benefit claimed from flu vx is the antibodies in the blood of the person 2 plus weeks after being vaxed.
There has never been a study done of large studies of populations both vx’ed and non-vx’ed, to see if they got flu or not. Even a simple uneducated layman such as myself can see how such a study could be done easily. But for some mysterious reason, neither the CDC and other medical institutions like the NIH, or pharmaceutical companies, seem to want to do that study.
So until that happens, it’s really up in the air.
Plus, at best the flu vx is, according to vx manufacturers, 70 to at very best 80% effective - based solely on antibody response in people who got vxed; not by studying whether vx’ed people got flu or not. Also their percentage of utility of vaccine is whether the three strains of flu (most flu vx’s are trivalent) wind up being a good match for the flus that arrive.
Since the flu vx is formulated months before flu season, the CDC tries to figure out (”guesses”) which flus will be circulation in 6 or more months, and uses those strains. Flu viruses mutate promiscuously, and very often the vx winds up not being a good match for the yearly flus.
There is also some evidence from a Canadian study done last year, IIRC, that getting vx’ed over and over can cause the person to get flu more severly. If I have time I’ll try to find that.
So it is a grey “science” at best. And makes a ton of $ for the manufacturers. Interesting to note that the last head of the CDC, Nancy Cox, when she left, went to head up Merck’s vaccine division. Nice revolving door.
Actually the CDC head who ‘discovered’ the 35k+ ‘flu deaths’ that had been happening every year for decades (how did they miss them for decades?) in the exact same year that Merck’s patent for their blockbuster statin went off patent AND they had significant financial legal issues with VIOXX was named Julie Gerberding. She’s now head of Merck’s vaccine division.
So it is a grey “science” at best. And makes a ton of $ for the manufacturers. Interesting to note that the last head of the CDC, Nancy Cox, when she left, went to head up Merck’s vaccine division. Nice revolving door.
Wow, kind of sick.
Hey, we’re on the same side for once, LJ. :)
I had both a vaccinated and unvaccinated child get the chicken pox during a local outbreak (most of the kids that caught it were vaccinated, by the way). Purely anecdotal, but here is how it went: the unvaccinated child got cold symptoms for one day. Mild cold symptoms. Then the pox came out. The first or second night, he was very uncomfortable. After that, he was mostly low key and playing, though he had hundreds of pox everywhere. The vaccinated child only got about 10-15 pox, mostly on his trunk. But he was sick with fever and in bed for a full week, too sick to even get up for more than bathroom. I don’t know what that was worth, but interesting. Less pox but more sick.