"Extreme headache and stiff neck that causes severe pain when you attempt to put your chin to your chest. It's not like you just get a headache and then you die from meningitis."
Despite daily (okay... couple times a week) yoga, I occasionally wake up with a horrible crick in my neck that makes me unable to touch my chin to my chest. It's awful. I seriously suspect that this is not recurrent meningitis since there is no accompanying headache. But if you consider morning-after symptoms (headaches, cricks, nausea) and think about the people who are most likely to get infectious diseases, then it should not surprise you that a lot of young people will miss the symptoms of meningitis. Not to mention the fact that most people don't even KNOW the symptoms, and moreover, a lot of people stay in denial about disease symptoms that they have because they don't want to face reality.
I am absolutely opposed to mandatory vaccinations, but I do think that this vaccine has a place, especially where people are sharing living quarters. And yeah, college students can be pretty gross sometimes. Usually colds, flus, and other infectious diseases raged through the whole campus like wildfire. Something about shared eating quarters, shared toilets, showers, and sleeping in the same airspace as four other people.
"A little while back we actually had someone post that docs receive less than 5 hours (their entire medical school career) on average on vaxes...to cover safety, ingredients, side-effects, effectiveness, etc. Basically they get told ~ vaxes are good, vaxes are safe, vaxes are recommended for everyone...very little beyond that."
We have also had people post that they spent much more time than that studying the immune system and vaccinations. That person, a doctor, also pointed out that they discuss (not "are told") vaccines in the context of pros and cons for a large population and for the individual. So it seems that (a) the entire medical community does not receive exactly the same education and (b) that even if they did, they might get different things out of it. Moreover... I hate to point it out, but do any of us know that these people are even doctors? I've read a number of posts here and in other forums by people claiming to have a higher education but who cannot even spell or form a proper paragraph. Not that knowing such things are essential to a medical education but... well. Okay, they are actually essential. In short, I doubt that everyone here on the net is who he or she claims to be. I'll take this "a doctor I know said" more seriously when I see the syllabus.
"If the vax actually matches the serotype. If the vax actually works for the particular person. Then it might make a difference. But there is always an excellent chance that the vax won't match the serotype."
Deborah and Mamakay, I think I might be missing part of your argument here. Please let me know if I've got it right:
1. A treatment (preventative or curative) is appropriate if, and only if, it is guaranteed (i.e., nearly 100% certain) to prevent or cure the illness in question.
2. The meningitis vaccine can only prevent some forms of meningitis.
3. From (2), it is not the case that the meningitis vaccine is guaranteed to prevent or cure the illness in question.
4. From (3) and (1), the treatment in question (meningitis) is not appropriate.
If that is indeed the argument, then I would question the first premise. I would say that a treatmen is appropriate if it lowers the risk of an illness or increases the risk of its being cured, provided the risks incurred from the treatment itself do not then outweigh the risks of the illness.
As we have all posted a bazillion times here, we do need to better understand the risks of these vaccines. However, from what I am reading on the CDC website, even with the vaccine, we are still much better off getting it (at least, if we are in a high risk group, living in public housing and the like) than if we don't.
No, it's not 100% effective. But it helps. And if we're talking about my life or my baby's life, I'm going for lowering the chances of paralysis and death as much as possible.
From the way some people in this thread are talking, most college kids are so irresponsible they can't be bothered to wash their hands after pooping, much less learn how to take care of themselves and recognize the signs of serious illness.
: When my brother was in school a student died of meningitis in the dorms and everyone was terrified! I don't know that there was a vaccine then, this was a long time ago... say about 19 years ago! (Gosh I feel old now!) Was the vax around then? (ETA, according to a pp it was intro'd in 2001, so definitely not available when my brother was in college!) Anyways I definitely agree with Holly on this one. Your average college student is running around day and night and is not even going to think twice about ignoring that random headache and stiff neck. It just comes on so fast, I think that is part of what is so scary about it.
: and the symptoms are nothing alike. I couldn't MOVE my neck, my less touch my chin to my chest. My neck was painfully IMMOBILE and accompanied by a headache so severe I couldn't even hold my head up.
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Now you now that NEVER happens!
