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There is also other side of vaccination when pharma industry pushes untested and ineffective serum. Mostly it is for viruses (hint: virus mutates too fast and v

by altero 13y ago

There is also other side of vaccination when pharma industry pushes untested and ineffective serum. Mostly it is for viruses (hint: virus mutates too fast and vaccination is practically useless). Great example is bird/pig flu, serum was untested and used only thanks to massive hype. More people died from vaccination than actual flu. And best part are doctors which refused to have themselves vaccinated :-) disclaimer: I am well educated and my children got full vaccination.

bayesianhorse 13y ago
Knowing some of the details on vaccination, I can't agree. There is profit to be made in vaccines, sure. But it's hardly the same as in patented drugs. Competition is usually harder. I wouldn't call the bird/pig flu story hype. There was a wide consensus that these viruses were a threat and might have the potential for a pandemic. It killed a lot of people, and as far as I remember it had a higher mortality rate than most flus. So the threat was real. Now we know the virus probably didn't have the potential. In hindsight. I hope the next time there is a preventable pandemic threat people don't trump up the anti-pharma rhetoric and say "last time it wasn't so bad, was it?"
- altero 13y ago
  > There is profit to be made in vaccines, sure. But it's hardly the same as in patented drugs. But there is also good chance to convince government to buy huge quantities. Flu kills and becomes pandemic nearly every year. Bird/pig flu was just a bad year. There are more effective measures to fight flu. For example closing schools for couple of weeks. Also employers should allow tele-commuting during flu seasons.
  - pessimizer 13y ago
    >just a bad year. 1918 was just a bad year, too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic >It infected 500 million people across the world, including remote Pacific islands and the Arctic, and killed 50 to 100 million of them—3 to 5 percent of the world's population at the time—making it one of the deadliest natural disasters in human history.
  - bayesianhorse 13y ago
    Exactly the kind of attitude which can hurt people. Even kill them.
    - altero 13y ago
      Yes, and someone who thinks that NSA is spying on him is tinfoil-hat.
    - bayesianhorse 13y ago
      Actually last year, most people who thought the NSA was spying on everyone, were in fact highly vulnerable to all sorts of conspiracy theories. There just was no evidence. Today, with all the data we have on incompetence and failure in most intelligence agencies, we can still have some hope...
      - altero 13y ago
        Echolon is widely known since 1980ies, "spying on everyone" is just question how filters were set. And "all the data on incompetence and failure" you have now are just a few PowerPoint slides and speculations. I would say NSA is actually very competent. And checking basic facts != conspiracy theories.
  - dalke 13y ago
    Nah, that's a poor argument. The medical industry would make more money if they let the people get sick so they need to be hospitalized for weeks or even, in the case of some polio victims, need to be in an iron lung for the rest of their lives. (In Ontario, for example, a cost-benefit analysis shows that a universal free influenza inoculation program reduces costs of the medical system; see http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1000256 http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fj... .) I can turn the argument around: companies don't want people to get vaccinated so they can sell more expensive palliative care. Why would a hospital want to get less business if more people are vaccinated and so don't need their services? If a given argument predicts X and it predicts not-X, then it's a poor argument. This appeal to the profit motive is a poor argument.
    - altero 13y ago
      > The medical industry would make more money There is strong competition in medical industry. One company sells vaccine, some others sells medicine and hospital equipment.
      - bayesianhorse 13y ago
        In theory maybe. The data suggests that the same companies are providing vaccines and drugs. Competition in the US Health System certainly doesn't do a good enough job at driving costs down... I don't like to use these strong words, but I do find it dangerous and reckless when people with nearly no medical knowledge want to reason against proven methods on the basis of costs and the hatred of "evil, profit seeking companies". If mistakes were made it's up to the medical establishment to judge about and avoid them in the future. Anticapitalists should not play a role in that.
        route66 13y ago
        I don't believe what I'm reading here: You suggest that the medical industry is more or less a monopoly / oligopoly with lack of competition and at he same time barf at people dependent on that system to keep out of the discussion? Maybe you (or I) missed a sarcasm tag ... Otherwise it might be the place to remind you that the medical industry does not operate on a free market because sick people mostly don't have much to choose from. I cannot imagine why the profit seeking aspect of that industry should not be questuined and/or observed?
  - mpyne 13y ago
    The DOD mandates flu vaccination every year for their servicemembers (who can't simply "take a couple of weeks off"). It does indeed usually significantly decrease the incidence of flu infection. If it didn't the DOD would probably find some better way to spend that money, like buying a missile or something. :P
kevinwuhoo 13y ago
[citation needed] Edit: I was doing academic influenza drug discovery research at the height of the H5N1 threat. 59% morality rate [1] is no "hype". Your generalization of viruses mutating "too fast" is a false clause. Vaccination against influenza isn't "useless", it's actually effective [2]. [1]: http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/EN_GIP_20130829CumulativeNumberH5N1cases.pdf http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/EN_GIP_2... [2]: https://www.landesbioscience.com/article/19917/full_text/#load/info/all https://www.landesbioscience.com/article/19917/full_text/#lo...
- altero 13y ago
  Q8: Is a vaccine available to prevent human infection with H5N1avian influenza? Candidate vaccines to prevent H5N1 infection have been developed, but they are not ready for widespread use. http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/avian_influenza/h5n1_research/faqs/en/ http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/avian_in...
tjogin 13y ago
How do you know that bird/pig flu wouldn't have had more severe impact if it wasn't for the vaccinations?
- altero 13y ago
  Large part of population was not vaccinated. Also some countries did not provide vaccination at all. Dead were mostly related to overall fitness rather than some magic virus.
- tsotha 13y ago
  Last year the flu vaccine was only about 35% effective in my area and the world didn't end. In a normal year you're in no danger from the flu unless your pulmonary or immune systems are compromised. Of course that's not true every year.
  - tjogin 13y ago
    The seasonal flu isn't like H1N1, the latter put some young healthy people under so bad that they had to be hospitalized for weeks and needed equipment to breathe. Those who suffer that bad from the seasonal flu are very old, very young or have a very weakened immune system.
  - ceejayoz 13y ago
    > In a normal year you're in no danger from the flu unless your pulmonary or immune systems are compromised. As the parent of twins born three months early, that sort of attitude is distressing. Vaccination protects more than just the person vaccinated.
    - tsotha 13y ago
      Don't misread me. I'm not saying people shouldn't get vaccinated. All I'm saying is we have a pretty good idea what a "normal" non-vaccinated flu season looks like. Of course getting vaccinated is the right thing to do, even if it's only partially effective. My dad has emphysema, so I know where you're coming from.
  - 13y ago

by altero 13y ago

bayesianhorse 13y ago

Knowing some of the details on vaccination, I can't agree. There is profit to be made in vaccines, sure. But it's hardly the same as in patented drugs. Competition is usually harder. I wouldn't call the bird/pig flu story hype. There was a wide consensus that these viruses were a threat and might have the potential for a pandemic. It killed a lot of people, and as far as I remember it had a higher mortality rate than most flus. So the threat was real. Now we know the virus probably didn't have the potential. In hindsight. I hope the next time there is a preventable pandemic threat people don't trump up the anti-pharma rhetoric and say "last time it wasn't so bad, was it?"

altero 13y ago
> There is profit to be made in vaccines, sure. But it's hardly the same as in patented drugs. But there is also good chance to convince government to buy huge quantities. Flu kills and becomes pandemic nearly every year. Bird/pig flu was just a bad year. There are more effective measures to fight flu. For example closing schools for couple of weeks. Also employers should allow tele-commuting during flu seasons.
- pessimizer 13y ago
  >just a bad year. 1918 was just a bad year, too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic >It infected 500 million people across the world, including remote Pacific islands and the Arctic, and killed 50 to 100 million of them—3 to 5 percent of the world's population at the time—making it one of the deadliest natural disasters in human history.
- bayesianhorse 13y ago
  Exactly the kind of attitude which can hurt people. Even kill them.
  - altero 13y ago
    Yes, and someone who thinks that NSA is spying on him is tinfoil-hat.
  - bayesianhorse 13y ago
    Actually last year, most people who thought the NSA was spying on everyone, were in fact highly vulnerable to all sorts of conspiracy theories. There just was no evidence. Today, with all the data we have on incompetence and failure in most intelligence agencies, we can still have some hope...
    - altero 13y ago
      Echolon is widely known since 1980ies, "spying on everyone" is just question how filters were set. And "all the data on incompetence and failure" you have now are just a few PowerPoint slides and speculations. I would say NSA is actually very competent. And checking basic facts != conspiracy theories.
- dalke 13y ago
  Nah, that's a poor argument. The medical industry would make more money if they let the people get sick so they need to be hospitalized for weeks or even, in the case of some polio victims, need to be in an iron lung for the rest of their lives. (In Ontario, for example, a cost-benefit analysis shows that a universal free influenza inoculation program reduces costs of the medical system; see http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.1000256 http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fj... .) I can turn the argument around: companies don't want people to get vaccinated so they can sell more expensive palliative care. Why would a hospital want to get less business if more people are vaccinated and so don't need their services? If a given argument predicts X and it predicts not-X, then it's a poor argument. This appeal to the profit motive is a poor argument.
  - altero 13y ago
    > The medical industry would make more money There is strong competition in medical industry. One company sells vaccine, some others sells medicine and hospital equipment.
    - bayesianhorse 13y ago
      In theory maybe. The data suggests that the same companies are providing vaccines and drugs. Competition in the US Health System certainly doesn't do a good enough job at driving costs down... I don't like to use these strong words, but I do find it dangerous and reckless when people with nearly no medical knowledge want to reason against proven methods on the basis of costs and the hatred of "evil, profit seeking companies". If mistakes were made it's up to the medical establishment to judge about and avoid them in the future. Anticapitalists should not play a role in that.
      - route66 13y ago
        I don't believe what I'm reading here: You suggest that the medical industry is more or less a monopoly / oligopoly with lack of competition and at he same time barf at people dependent on that system to keep out of the discussion? Maybe you (or I) missed a sarcasm tag ... Otherwise it might be the place to remind you that the medical industry does not operate on a free market because sick people mostly don't have much to choose from. I cannot imagine why the profit seeking aspect of that industry should not be questuined and/or observed?
- mpyne 13y ago
  The DOD mandates flu vaccination every year for their servicemembers (who can't simply "take a couple of weeks off"). It does indeed usually significantly decrease the incidence of flu infection. If it didn't the DOD would probably find some better way to spend that money, like buying a missile or something. :P

kevinwuhoo 13y ago

[citation needed] Edit: I was doing academic influenza drug discovery research at the height of the H5N1 threat. 59% morality rate [1] is no "hype". Your generalization of viruses mutating "too fast" is a false clause. Vaccination against influenza isn't "useless", it's actually effective [2]. [1]: http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/EN_GIP_20130829CumulativeNumberH5N1cases.pdf http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/EN_GIP_2... [2]: https://www.landesbioscience.com/article/19917/full_text/#load/info/all https://www.landesbioscience.com/article/19917/full_text/#lo...

altero 13y ago
Q8: Is a vaccine available to prevent human infection with H5N1avian influenza? Candidate vaccines to prevent H5N1 infection have been developed, but they are not ready for widespread use. http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/avian_influenza/h5n1_research/faqs/en/ http://www.who.int/influenza/human_animal_interface/avian_in...

tjogin 13y ago

How do you know that bird/pig flu wouldn't have had more severe impact if it wasn't for the vaccinations?

altero 13y ago
Large part of population was not vaccinated. Also some countries did not provide vaccination at all. Dead were mostly related to overall fitness rather than some magic virus.
tsotha 13y ago
Last year the flu vaccine was only about 35% effective in my area and the world didn't end. In a normal year you're in no danger from the flu unless your pulmonary or immune systems are compromised. Of course that's not true every year.
- tjogin 13y ago
  The seasonal flu isn't like H1N1, the latter put some young healthy people under so bad that they had to be hospitalized for weeks and needed equipment to breathe. Those who suffer that bad from the seasonal flu are very old, very young or have a very weakened immune system.
- ceejayoz 13y ago
  > In a normal year you're in no danger from the flu unless your pulmonary or immune systems are compromised. As the parent of twins born three months early, that sort of attitude is distressing. Vaccination protects more than just the person vaccinated.
  - tsotha 13y ago
    Don't misread me. I'm not saying people shouldn't get vaccinated. All I'm saying is we have a pretty good idea what a "normal" non-vaccinated flu season looks like. Of course getting vaccinated is the right thing to do, even if it's only partially effective. My dad has emphysema, so I know where you're coming from.
- 13y ago