The campaigning and propagandizing for people to get flu immunizations seems to me bigger than ever. This is a problem for me because, like most everything pharmacueticals do, it's not about your health or that of your family, but about making money. The fact is that the average, healthy adult should NOT be getting a flu shot.
WHO SHOULD GET A FLU SHOT?
The CDC recommends children (6 months to 5 years), pregnant women, those with chronic medical conditions, adults over 50, and those living in longterm care/nursing home facilities get vaccinated. In addition, people who live with those who are at risk/cannot get vaccinated (eg if you have an infant under 6 months or care for someone with a chronic illness).
It is dangerous to get a vaccine if you are allergic to chicken eggs, had a severe reaction to the vaccine in the past, if you developed Guillain-Barre Syndrome after receiving the vaccine in the past, if you are under 6 months of age (and I'm SO impressed you're reading this if you are!), or if you have a fever.
However, the following factors (not to mention that GBS issue!) lead me to question if even the recommended population should get the vaccine.
WHY NOT GET A FLU SHOT?
1. The vaccine contains chemicals such as mercury, aluminum, ethylene glycol (antifreeze), phenol, and formaldehyde. Aluminum and mercury have been linked to Alzheimer's. Pretty sure everyone knows antifreeze and formaldehyde are poison. You may be thinking that these things must only be in very small concentrations, but these toxins do build up in your system year after year.
2. There is no guarantee! There are lots of strains of the flu virus out there, and they are all adapting and changing. The vaccine that is given each year is a "one-size fits all" solution--scientists monitoring and evaluating these changes choose which strains they think will be most common that year--given to everyone everywhere. The vaccine does not protect you against all strains. It takes time to produce the vaccine, and sometimes the predictions made so far in advance as to which strains will be common are wrong. Also, after several months the strain your body produced antibodies for could very well have already mutated, rendering that vaccine less effective.
3. If you have a chronic medical illness your immune response may be depressed enough that even in the presence of the inactivated virus particles it does not produce sufficient antibodies to protect you if you are infected.
4. Increased use of vaccines (in a case like this where evolution occurs so quickly), and antibiotics, can only increase the virulence of a pathogen. Meaning that we are acting to create a pathogen that will be far more deadly than it currently is, so we are not doing ourselves any favors.
WHAT ARE THE ALTERNATIVES?
Promote a healthy immune system! It's there to protect us from harmful invaders, so why not fully equip it?
Diet is essential:
-Avoid sugar! It suppresses the immune system and most of us are totally oblivious to the amount of sugar we are actually eating/drinking each day. I challenge you to try to go just one day without consuming any sugar--read labels!--just to make you aware of where it's coming from in your diet and better equip you to limit your intake.
-Avoid processed foods. They have been stripped of nutrients and contain harmful ingredients.
-Avoid junk food, fast food, trans-fats, etc. (obvious)
-Do consume essential fats and complex carbs
-If you eat meat, buy naturally raised (free-range, hormone-free, antibiotic-free) meat.
Sleep is essential. Do it!
Move your body. The more the better.
Do things that make you happy. (ok, I can't say I've read any studies linking happiness and healthy immune systems--which doesn't mean they're not out there--but as long as I'm talking about a healthy lifestyle, I figure this is pretty important. And it's easy to forget.)
Ultimately everyone has to judge their own situation and decide for themselves what they are, and are not, willing to do. Just don't be guilted into anything by a commercial!
I agree that nobody should be guilted into doing anything by a commercial or advertisement. However, I do believe in the power of education. Most people do not know what influenza (the flu) is. It is NOT the icky colds that we all hope to avoid in the winter. The flu is a very bad family of diseases that can and do kill people whose bodies are not prepared to fight off infection. Worse than that, there is a common secondary infection rate with getting the flu. If you do get the flu and do fight it off, you are highly susceptible to other diseases like pneumonia and often times it is the secondary disease that will kill you. Because the flu is a family of diseases, and that family likes to procreate every year, it is not possible to put every strain into the flu vaccine. However, the science and research behind creating the flu vaccine is quite good and we are lucky to be in the United States where we get a chance to observe Southeast Asia having all the flu problems and then we create a lovely cocktail of a vaccine so that we don't have to get sick here. While I understand that there are many problems with the vaccine (such as the fact that the viral products are grown in eggs and people can be allergic to eggs) the possibility from dying of anaphylactic shock in Walgreens or wherever you get your flu shot is highly unlikely. While I can't personally vouch for the other stabilizing ingredients in the vaccine, it is up to you to get the facts on their levels and how much of a problem they present. I personally do not find them to be a great threat to my health in comparison to actually getting the diseases that vaccines help to ward off. Getting a vaccine actually is an extremely natural immune response. Vaccinations allow the body to create an antibody army against very dangerous microbes that can make us very sick, permanently disable us, or even kill us. The process our bodies go through in dealing with a vaccine is the same as that of dealing with the actual disease, we just don't have to go through being sick. And THAT is an extraordinarily good thing. Especially in the case of the flu. I could continue, as I feel very strongly about vaccines, but I'll spare you the rest!
ReplyDeleteI agree that vaccines are a wonderful thing, our history and our present would be a very different story without them. I myself just went through a round of vaccines in preparation for Africa. By no means do I think we need to get rid of them. I just think that, as you said, education is very important, and when it comes to vaccines there are a lot of issues. I was just talking to a friend this week who has a 2 year old and an infant--which means they are in the process of receiving something like 38 vaccines over the next several years. Her own research told her that the mercury used as a preservative in vaccines has been linked to autism. While this is a genetic disease, the mercury acts as a trigger for it to be expressed. The rate of autism skyrocketed after mercury was added to vaccines. Since there is autism in her family she is very concerned (legitimately) about the risks versus advantages of many vaccines, and is having to choose which ones are most essential and which she will risk skipping. There were several other concerns, but I'll leave that to her to write about in her own blog (that she should start).
ReplyDeleteMyrra said that the flu can kill people who's bodies are not prepared to fight it off. I know this is true and I know it happens. My point that people who ARE healthy DON'T need this vaccination, despite the impression going around that everyone should get it. In addition, people should be aware of the problems associated. I think that, no matter the quantity in a single shot, toxins that put our longterm health at risk need to be taken out of vaccines. We are in a culture that thinks faster and cheaper are better, and we ignore the longterm affects those decisions have in every aspect of life.
Ultimately, while vaccines can be an essential player to our health, I think there are problems in the system that people need to be educated about so they can make individual decisions about what is best for them, apart from what commercials, and sometimes even doctors (unfortunately), tell them.