Conspiracy Theorists and Flu Vaccines – Pick Another Battle Please
A couple of weeks ago I posted a flu vaccine commentary and poll after listening to Dr. Dean Edell on the radio. He was talking about people who refuse to get vaccinated. He made the comment that vaccines have been proven effective for decades, and he’s tired of trying to defend them. That if people refuse to get vaccinated, and die — well — that’s just a way to clean out the gene pool.
Readers of the post took offense, calling me arrogant and ignorant. Among them are people who are truly afraid, people who are allergic, people who feel as if they have done their due diligence and have dismissed vaccines (empowered patients!) — and conspiracy theorists.
I wrote a follow up post, citing highly credible sources for all to see, showing why I believe flu vaccines are so important. The bottom line is that the flu is dangerous — both the H1N1 swine flu and the seasonal flu are killers. Vaccines are the only defense we have today (who knows – maybe we’ll have something better in the future?) And the statistics tell us that we have a 591% better chance of dying from the flu than we do dying from the flu vaccine. You don’t have to be a Las Vegas gambler to understand those odds.
I am actually VERY pleased that so many people have given researched thought and consideration to the question – even the ones who disagree with me. However — I must say — I’ve had it up to my eyeballs with the flu vaccine conspiracy theorists…. seriously. And if you are one, I say to you — get a life!
Here are the conspiracy theorists’ arguments. They remind me of a saying I heard many years ago — “Just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get me.” Further – they have violated the first rule of questionable healthcare practices, and that is – Follow the Money.
Here are some of their lines of reasoning, and my comments:
1. Flu vaccine is only produced to make pharmaceutical companies richer. To that I say — don’t be silly. For the cost, personnel and too tiny profits to be made by producing vaccine, pharmaceutical manufacturers would much prefer to put their efforts into producing something that actually makes a worthwhile profit for them. Included is the manufacturing are symptoms relievers — far FAR more profitable in the long run. Why would they want to prevent an illness at very little profit at the expense of bigger profits from medicine that could relieve or fix us?
2. Flu vaccines were developed from African Green Monkeys - and the real intent is to eradicate the population of the earth! This one gets the “give me a break” award on so many counts… First… if the government wanted to eradicate the entire population of the earth, they could do it FAR more efficiently by using, oh, say anthrax or dengue fever – or some other killer. Why would they go to all the trouble to develop something that actually took science? Why not a shortcut, and something cheap to do it?
3. And then I have to ask – why would the government (which government anyway?) want to eradicate the world’s population? If the government eradicated the world’s population, then who would be left to govern? and who would be left to pay taxes to that government? and who would be in charge anyway? (because the government is comprised of people who would get sick, too)…. etc etc….
Sorry — but these theories are just plain laughable. You want a conspiracy? I think there’s a conspiracy to make me waste my time looking these things up — because I do my due diligence, unlike some of my readers.
Here’s the deal — I understand that not everyone wants to be injected with flu vaccines, and even that some must avoid vaccines because their bodies cannot tolerate them. However — for the great majority of us (GREAT majority) — flu shots will keep us healthier — and will keep our loved ones and those around us healthier — than not getting flu shots will.
Further — as reasonable people, we need to understand that unless we have a real concern about negative effects of vaccines, we must accept responsibility for passing possibly deadly flu on to others when we don’t get the flu vaccine. H1N1 or seasonal — they are both killers. I’m not willing to be responsible for making someone else sick, nor chancing that they could die. I would not be able to sleep at night.
Do you?
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
DISCUSS | TIPS | NEWSLETTER | FACEBOOK | TWITTER
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
I`m sorry to say but this article reads like a propaganda piece for the Pharmaceutical industry.
There is an alternative to vaccines for seasonal and swine flu,Vit D3, its inexpensive, its natural, and it works much better than any vaccine on the market.
Please take a look at these article about Vit D then do your own research.
Best regards
Jim
Jim,
Sorry — I’m not willing to give over this space to links to blogs that cite only opinion and no research to back them up. If you think my post is propaganda for pharma then you have clearly never read my articles and blog posts.
Really? You’ve never passed a cold or virus of any kind to anyone…ever? I know, I know, you didn’t really say that, but the last time I checked, this was still a free country where we get to make our own informed decisions about our health care. My decision, not anyone elses. Just like I decide to eat whatever I like… despite all the people with opinions and research to back up why what they eat is better. I can also choose to live where I like. But clearly there are places “the experts” say are better or worse than others based on any number of criteria and facts. At the end of the day, we all have to live with our choices. Welcome to America. My doctor recently pointed out to me that he “practices” medicine. It’s a rehearsal. An exploration. We all try our best.
Trisha
I just read a bit of your story about how you came to advocacy work and I think you are someone that so many parents, who watched theirs children regress into autism in direct correlation to a vaccine or a series of vaccines in one day, can relate to in terms of being “led” into advocacy work.
We are not conspiracy theorists, for the most part. Of course it is an issue that draws that element, unfortunately. This is a debate based in fact. Facts that have absolutely nothing to do with the conspiracy theories you have listed above.
In the past two years many in government and medicine have expressed the very concerns regarding vaccines that we have been expressing for years.
I truly hope that you will read the sources that I provided in my previous post and also David Kirby’s book “Evidence of Harm”. It is a shocking story and a great read in terms of parents love leading them into advocacy for the sake of all children.
It really looks like you are doing some great work through this blog and I hope you will consider this issue, not from the perspective of the conspiracy theorists, but from the perspective of intelligent, reasonable parents who support advocacy groups like SafeMinds, National Autism Association and Generation Rescue. These groups are in a very different camp than those who push the conspiracy’s you have listed above and many in government and science share the same concern as these parents.
Again here is a link to a source that includes citations http://safeminds.org/news/pressroom/what-causes-autism-has-science-ruled-out-vaccines.html
From Fox News
H1N1 Flu Is a False Pandemic, Health Expert Claims
From the article
“A leading health expert said the swine flu scare was a “false pandemic” led by drug companies that stood to make billions from vaccines, The Sun reported Monday.
Wolfgang Wodarg, head of health at the Council of Europe, claimed major firms organized a “campaign of panic” to put pressure on the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare a pandemic…
“But there is worse to come. The vaccine developed by Novartis was produced in a bioreactor from cancerous cells, a technique that had never been used until now.
“This was not necessary. It has also led to a considerable mismanagement of public money”
The problem with flu shots is simple- they’re the cause of the flu. You may not be aware of this because you seem gullible and very trusting of lobbying companies, but flu vaccines contain the real deal… the live (mostly dead) thing. So sure a lot of people may get it an have a fairly decent immunity, but there’s a small percentage that get sick from it, and usually very sick at that. This is where it gets sketchy… so what, they got sick from the vaccine, but they sneeze here and there, cough around the stores…. they not only spread the flu, but are the sole source of it. To show how gullible and blind people are, almost no one has taken in consideration that the flu “session” is when everyone gets their vaccines…. and if you’re familiar with influenza you’ll also know that there is no good reason for it to randomly disappear in the summer months since the virus can exist and spread in warm habitats (hence why the warmer continents also get the virus). Outside of huge pandemics (usually animal related) there hasn’t been much documentation on basic random influenza outbreaks (especially seasonal) until after the original vaccine was first created in 1931. Am I saying it’s some sort of conspiracy? I’m not really into those type of things, but yes I am.
I do agree with John. Here it is spring 2012. The kids go off to school for their nasal-flu-mist, and the majority of parents allow this believing it is “responsible”. Soon after, we have an outbreak of super-flu. Doctors are booked, and you can bet over the counter products are flying off the shelves as we struggle to get on with our lives. Sound familiar?