Universal Flu vaccine???

[mama1803]

http://www.yahoo.com/s/1034536

Yet another new vaccine in the works!!

[kiara7]

I saw that on NBC but couldn't find an article to post.

It's scary to think what monster flu virus they are going to create with this one.

[mommyofemma]

I just heard about this on world news!!!!! Wonder what vaccine they will come up with next? Nothing suprises me anymore with these people. I will not be getting this universal flu vaccine-no telling what all will be in it!It will even "protect" against the bird flu (so they say)!

[PassionateWriter]

they are just so arrogant that they think they can immunize us all for all flu strains.

[Juvysen]

i heard this, too. I can't imagine why it wouldn't pressure the virus to mutate that segment - at least, if you believe the vax works AND in basic principles of microevolution. Anyway, I'm over this...

[kriket]

Originally Posted by kiara7

I saw that on NBC but couldn't find an article to post.

It's scary to think what monster flu virus they are going to create with this one.

I saw this too. It made me sick "a strand that does not mutate"was found and blah blah... what a load of crap.

How aarogent to think that it will never mutate. That flies in the face of biology/genetics/ the natural order of things!!!

[mamadelbosque]

Yeah, but see, when it starts mutating, we can just say that its no longer 'the flu' but now some wierd strange new disease! And then we can make a new vax for it!!

[littlecindy]

didn't we learn anything from last year's vaccine? where we didn't catch the worst strain or two of flu? if we can't predict the strains 6 months out, how are we going to predict years out?

[Ensemble]

I am fascinated that people would consider this a bad thing. Influenza kills tens of thousands of people in the United States each year.

Besides, if this works, it might eliminate annual influenza vaccinations. Fewer shots, cheaper... sounds good to me.

[anewmama]

Google it and you will find TONS of articles on it. Type in Vaccine in google and then hit News at the top. Articles have been there for days. I

It works differently than the current flu vax. Actually kind of interesting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/23/he...tml?ref=health

Here is a list of Google News on it:

http://news.google.com/news?client=s...ncl=1307116853

[anewmama]

Originally Posted by littlecindy

didn't we learn anything from last year's vaccine? where we didn't catch the worst strain or two of flu? if we can't predict the strains 6 months out, how are we going to predict years out?

It works entirely different or so the article says. It's not based on prediction like the current vaccine.


"The spike’s tip mutates constantly, which is why flu shots have to be reformulated each year. But the team found a way to expose the spike’s neck, which apparently does not mutate, and picked antibodies that clamped onto it. Once its neck is clamped, a spike can still penetrate a human cell, but it cannot unfold to inject the genetic instructions that take over the cell’s machinery to make more virus."

[ursusarctos]

Originally Posted by Ensemble

I am fascinated that people would consider this a bad thing. Influenza kills tens of thousands of people in the United States each year.

Besides, if this works, it might eliminate annual influenza vaccinations. Fewer shots, cheaper... sounds good to me.

Stepping up on to the soapbox... Hm, nice view from here
Not to sound arrogant myself, but I question whether all of those people would have died were they in any kind of good health beforehand, or if they had taken the remotestly good care of themselves when they noticed they were sick. (No, I am not blaming them for their own deaths. Nobody can control death, and diseases can take unexpected courses. I'm just saying I believe that there are other ways to prevent/get through flu than the vaccine.) We got the flu at least once every winter when we were kids (puking for days and sick/recuperating for weeks) and I never even thought to think of it as potentially deadly until I heard in my late teens that there was such a thing as a flu vaccine. Humans have an immune system that thrives when it has to fight a disease once in a while - it needs exercise just like the rest of us! And if it is well nourished it almost always comes out on top.
Not to mention that we don't know how many of those people were vaccinated anyway. The flu vaccine, as many have pointed out, is hit and miss.
I'm not completely anti-vaccine, but I am anti-useless-vaccine, which in my book includes the one for flu.
And while I try to be open to technology's potentially helpful role in healthcare, which it does play in many areas, I think that we have long passed the point where it can be helpful in supporting basic immune system function. Real life is just not a test tube. I simply do not believe that there is one part of a flu virus that "does not mutate". Like a PP said, that's just not how life on this planet works, on any level. To presume to say so is incredibly arrogant and short-sighted. Read any biology textbook to see for yourself. Or just look around.

[Marnica]

Originally Posted by Ensemble

I am fascinated that people would consider this a bad thing. Influenza kills tens of thousands of people in the United States each year.

Besides, if this works, it might eliminate annual influenza vaccinations. Fewer shots, cheaper... sounds good to me.

No actually the flu kills about a thousand people each year in the US. The other 34,000 deaths they talk about each yaer are guessed to be "flu related".

The National Vital Statistics Reports compiled by the CDC show that only 1,138 deaths a year occur due to influenza alone (257 in 2001, 727 in 2002, 1,792 in 2003, 1,100 in 2004, and 1,812 in 2005). Bacterial pneumonia causes some 60,000 deaths each year, mainly in the winter, when surveillance data show increased prevalence of the flu virus. Using a mathematical (Poisson) regression model, officials estimate that the flu virus triggers some of the winter-time deaths from pneumonia, along with deaths in people with cardiovascular disease and other chronic illnesses. More than 34,000 of those "36,000" flu deaths are what officials estimate are "influenza-associated" pneumonic and cardiovascular deaths.

You know what else goes after the hemagglutinin spike. Elderberry. (or so Ive been told by someone I think knows a heck of alot about this stuff)