The Skinny on the Swine Flu

I spoke with a friend of mine who was dealing with his four year old who was not feeling up to par after having an H1N1 vaccination the other day. What he was describing made me recall when my eldest had his one, and only, flu vaccination as a small child-and had a couple of similar days of not feeling well. I refused to put him thru the vaccination again as it seemed silly to me to encourage illness in my young child whose body (I feel) was supremely equipped naturally to handle the common flu. However, this conversation spurred on my internet quest on what the current rate of swine flu cases have been, in comparison the typical flu season, and the efficacy of the vaccination. What I found was a lot of nothing! (unless you want to consider fear mongering - in that case there was a lot of that nonsense to be found)

Essentially, there are a number of "viral flu strains", the usual flu vaccination released each year is an "umbrella" vaccination that covers the majority of the known strains. The H1N1 is the one strain not typically covered under that umbrella. Annually, there are a reported 30-50 thousands deaths in the U.S. from the flu. The CDC warned recently that the H1N1 may "maim and kill 30,000 Americans" although they admit that typically the symptoms between the "normal flu" and swine flu are the same and unless specifically tested the cases will be mixed.

The special vaccination for H1N1 is currently being produced at high levels, pushing all the the standard flu vaccinations on the back burner (essentially covering only one strain of multiple flu strains....hmmmmm). Also, the H1N1 vaccination is untested, much is being manufactured differently than what has been testing in the past so it has not passed FDA requirements but is still being released because....well, I really could not cull this information out of the multiple articles and releases other than this is just where the focus is right now.

All of this leads me to wonder, since we will only be covered for mainly one strain of flu, vs. the multiple we are usually covered for, will we not have more deaths in general as the majority of the strains are being overlooked? Also, why on earth would the FDA allow wide release of an untested flu vaccination-with a focus on delivering it to our most delicate of humans (children and the elderly) - it's my humble opinion that these groups are not where you want to "test" an unproven vaccination and seems counter intuitive to the thought that they are the groups we want to most protect.

Am I the only one who sees some holes in the logic of the CDC, FDA, and health organizations pushing this vaccination? The visual of chasing a greased pig at the local fair comes to mind!

Underwriting "Term du Jour": PIG- pertussis immune globulin

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