Trying to Get Opinions and Information on the Swine Flu Vaccine

My great grandmother died during the Spanish Flu of 1918 leaving 6 kids. My grandmother was the oldest at 12 yrs old and did her best to keep track where everyone was adopted out to families across New York and Pennsylvania. We take vaccines very seriously. We are fortunate in that we've never had any adverse reactions to them. This time around it looks like the flu is a mild one. We've all had a few spiky fevers this summer and may have had the flu already, but we'll still get the shot when it becomes available. There are no guarantees in life. It's still possible to get sick even with a vaccine. If one of my family died and I'd felt I hadn't done all I could to prevent it - well, I'd have a hard time living with myself. Hopefully we will not in our lifetime have a flu or epidemic so bad the morgues run out of room and mass graves have to be used to deal with the sheer number of bodies. (My grandmother knew the location of a mass grave in Scranton Pa - no markers, just a grassy mound. I don't know if that's where her mother was buried.) You've got to do what you feel is right for you. I don't like what big business has done to health care in this country. But when it comes to communicable diseases, I think the vaccine is the lessor of two evils.

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Had this very discussion with some GF recently. These are comments from a good friend that I thought were particularly insightful. She works at an organization that develops vaccines not just for the flue:

Everyone should get a flu shot without execption. Even if you are healthy, the flu can take you down, also if you're healthy and get a mild case, you can pass your flu onto others who may get a more severe case.

I really wouldn't worry about the threat of the vaccine being rushed through. The technology behind the vaccine is already there. We have to re-make all vaccines every year based on what strains the CDC deems are needed- so this is not a new task for us in the vaccine world. Typically, the CDC releases strains in April, then by May/June we grow the strains up and start our clinical trials. We use sites that are well versed in how to run these trials and we enroll 300-800 subjects in one day. We follow the subjects for adverse events for 15 days, then we lock our database and review all of the data to ensure that the vaccine strains are safe. We still collect adverse events for 6 months, but we rarely have any- most adverse events with vaccines are fever and injection site reaction, and that shows immediately.

After we review the data, we write a report and submit to the FDA. The FDA reviews our findings, and will audit some of our sites to ensure that they carried the protocol out correctly. If they give us the go ahead, we send the vaccine to production. We use the same facilities every year, and the same formulation, just different strains.

For the H1N1 FluMist, we enrolled our first two clinical trials last week. One in adults and one in peds. Each had 800 subjects. So far, so good. No AEs. Next week we enroll our next two trials- one adults, one peds. I don't know how many subjects are in those.

Also, we've been funded by the US government for years to be able to gear up for pandemics like this- we're getting to stretch our wings now. This is all carefully planned, there hasn't been anything left to chance, so I am pretty confident in saying that you're safer getting vaccinated then not getting vaccinated.

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I am so glad you asked this question as my husband and I have been trying to figure out the right thing to do for our 15 month old daughter.
In general I am in favor of vaccines and follow the regular vaccine schedule. My husband is from the Middle East and so we will be traveling internationally with my daughter on a regular basis her whole life. Also living here at the nation's capital means she will be exposed to all sorts of people from all over the world - some may be from areas of the world where diseases that we no longer see here in the US are still a danger. Those are the reasons that we are having her vaccinated on schedule. So far my daughter has not had an adverse reaction to any of the vaccines.
That said - we are hestiant about this swine flu vaccine. I am well aware of the risks of the traditional vaccines but feel that the benefit is great enough that it is worth taking what I see as a small risk. I don't feel I understand this swine flu vaccine well enough yet and am waiting to hear what the studies say about it and what its risks are before we make a decision. I admire the mothers who are able to let their children be part of the study - I would not be brave enough and I do not have enough faith to trust the makers of the vaccine, even though when it comes down to it, the vaccine is made by people who presumably went into the field to help others, not to harm them. So I am sitting on the fence, waiting to learn more from the trials. At the moment we are not planning on vaccinating her, but once the study is completed we may change our minds.

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My family will NOT be getting this vaccine. For the same reasons the others that posted here but I would have to agree with Karen B on most points about the flu itself and the companies having immunity for any harm that is done to anyone. They will be immune to lawsuits unless it can be proven that they Intentionally caused harm. Because they are given immunity for their vaccines what will be their motivation to make the safest product possible if they don't have to worry about the consequences?

Look at Dr. Mercola's articles on the subject.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/0...

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/0...

Hope this helps.
I hope you find peace with whatever decision you make. I know how it feels to be making such a big choice. My son had a regression after a vaccination shot and I am still feeling unsure about his next shots when he turns five (most likely he will NOT be getting them). I think the media and the vaccination manufacturers use FEAR to make us doubt our maturnal instincts and get the shots when our guts are screaming "NO!".

Good luck

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They ARE doing extensive clinical trials for the vaccine, specifically because of the concerns about Guillan-Barre (sp?) syndrome. Furthermore, some vaccine will be manufactured without particular preservatives for pregnant women and young children.

When the vaccine becomes available, I will have my child and myself vaccinated.

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Hello, K., I suggest you skip getting the shot and focus on keeping the immune system in top shape..preventing is something you do have control over....take responsibility for your own health, think about what you put into you body...know the source and and trust your instints...m. hudddleston

This is a long post, but I hope you get something from it to help you make an informed decision.

I've done extensive research on this vaccine. I would NOT recommend that anyone take it. The perservatives in it to "stretch" the vaccine is what is dangerous (thermasol or squalene). It is all about the companies making money and not about our safety. The reality is that not many people have died from this man-made flu. Think about it, how does pig, bird and human flu get together to form one bug? Also, the vaccine makers lobbied to absolve themselves of lawsuits if anyone dies or becomes ill, therefore, you will not be able to sue them for damages incurred. Moreover, the companies are trying to make it mandatory that you take it. The companies have representatives on boards that make these decisions.

If you look into other drugs that have been pushed, over 50,000 people died from Vioxx. The company didn't care because they made their money up front. Guardisil is becoming a big issue because young girls are being affected by it...dying as well as other complications (just wait until they are of child-bearing age, how many will be infertile?) They made their money up front. The main company making the product is Baxter. They got busted last year sending contaminated vaccines to another country.

Read article below:

Vaccine May Be More Dangerous Than Swine Flu

Tuesday, July 7, 2009 9:54 AM

By: Dr. Russell Blaylock Article Font Size

An outbreak of swine flu occurred in Mexico this spring that eventually affected 4,910 Mexican citizens and resulted in 85 deaths. By the time it spread to the United States, the virus caused only mild cases of flu-like illness.

Thanks to air travel and the failure of public health officials to control travel from Mexico, the virus spread worldwide. Despite predictions of massive numbers of deaths and the arrival of doomsday, the virus has remained a relatively mild disease, something we know happens each year with flu epidemics.

Worldwide, there have only been 311 deaths out of 70,893 cases of swine flu. In the United States, 27,717 cases have resulted in 127 deaths. Every death is a tragedy, but such a low death rate should not be the basis of a draconian government policy.

It is helpful to recall that the Centers for Disease Control with the collusion of the media, constantly tell us that 36,000 people die from the flu each year, a figure that has been shown to be a lie. In this case, we are talking about 300 plus deaths for the entire world.

This virus continues to be an enigma for virologists. In the April 30, 2009 issue of Nature, a virologist was quoted as saying,"Where the hell it got all these genes from we don't know." Extensive analysis of the virus found that it contained the original 1918 H1N1 flu virus, the avian flu virus (bird flu), and two new H3N2 virus genes from Eurasia. Debate continues over the possibility that swine flu is a genetically engineered virus.

Naturally, vaccine manufacturers have been in a competitive battle to produce the first vaccine. The main contenders have been Baxter Pharmaceuticals and Novartis Pharmaceuticals, the latter of which recently acquired the scandal-ridden Chiron vaccine company. Both of these companies have had agreements with the World Health Organization to produce a pandemic vaccine.

The Baxter vaccine, called Celvapan, has had fast track approval. It uses a new vero cell technology, which utilizes cultured cells from the African green monkey. This same animal tissue transmits a number of vaccine-contaminating viruses, including the HIV virus.

The Baxter company has been associated with two deadly scandals. The first event occurred in 2006 when hemophiliac components were contaminated with HIV virus and injected in tens of thousands of people, including thousands of children. Baxter continued to release the HIV contaminated vaccine even after the contamination was known.

The second event occurred recently when it was discovered that Baxter had released a seasonal flu vaccine containing the bird flu virus, which would have produced a real world pandemic, to 18 countries. Fortunately, astute lab workers in the Czech Republic discovered the deadly combination and blew the whistle before a worldwide disaster was unleashed.

Despite these two deadly events, WHO maintains an agreement with Baxter Pharmaceuticals to produce the world's pandemic vaccine.

Novartis, the second contender, also has an agreement with WHO for a pandemic vaccine. Novartis appears to have won the contract, since their vaccine is near completion. What is terrifying is that these pandemic vaccines contain ingredients, called immune adjuvants that a number of studies have shown cause devastating autoimmune disorders, including rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis and lupus.

Animal studies using this adjuvant have found them to be deadly. A study using 14 guinea pigs found that when they were injected with the special adjuvant, only one animal survived. A repeat of the study found the same deadly outcome.

So, what is this deadly ingredient? It is called squalene, a type of oil. The Chiron company, maker of the deadly anthrax vaccine, makes an adjuvant called MF-59 which contains two main ingredients of concern—squalene and gp120. A number of studies have shown that squalene can trigger all of the above-mentioned autoimmune diseases when injected.

The MF-59 adjuvant has been used in several vaccines. These vaccines, including tetanus and diphtheria, are the same vaccines frequently associated with adverse reactions.

I reviewed a number of studies on this adjuvant and found something quite interesting. Several studies done on human test subjects found MF-59 to be a very safe immune adjuvant. But when I checked to see who did these studies, I found—to no surprise—that they were done by the Novartis Pharmaceutical Company and Chiron Pharmaceutical Company, which have merged. They were all published in "prestigious" medical journals. Also, to no surprise, a great number of studies done by independent laboratories and research institutions all found a strong link between MF-59 and autoimmune diseases.

Squalene in vaccines has been strongly linked to the Gulf War Syndrome. On August 1991, Anthony Principi, Secretary of Veterans Affairs admitted that soldiers vaccinated with the anthrax vaccine from 1990 to 1991 had an increased risk of 200 percent in developing the deadly disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also called Lou Gehrig's disease. The soldiers also suffered from a number of debilitating and life-shortening diseases, such as polyarteritis nodosa, multiple sclerosis (MS), lupus, transverse myelitis (a neurological disorder caused by inflammation of the spinal cord), endocarditis (inflammation of the heart's inner lining), optic neuritis with blindness and glomerulonephritis (a type of kidney disease).

Because squalene, the main ingredient in MF-59, can induce hyperimmune responses and induce autoimmunity, a real danger exists for prolonged activation of the brain's immune cells, the microglia. This type of prolonged activation has been strongly associated with such diseases as multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, ALS and possibly vaccine-related encephalitis. It has been shown that activation of the systemic immune system, as occurs with vaccination, rapidly activates the brain's microglia at the same time, and this brain inflammation can persist for long periods.

So, how would the gp120 get into the brain? Studies of other immune adjuvants using careful tracer techniques have shown that they routinely enter the brain following vaccination. What most people do not know, even the doctors who recommend the vaccines, is that most such studies by pharmaceutical companies observe the patients for only one to two weeks following vaccination—these types of reactions may take months or even years to manifest.

It is obvious that the vaccine manufacturers stand to make billions of dollars in profits from this WHO/government-promoted pandemic. Novartis, the maker of the new pandemic vaccine, recently announced that they would not give free vaccines to impoverished nations—everybody pays.

One must keep in mind that once the vaccine is injected, there is little you can do to protect yourself—at least by conventional medicine. It will mean a lifetime of crippling illness and early death.

There are much safer ways to protect oneself from this flu virus, such as higher doses of vitamin D3, selective immune enhancement using supplements, and a good diet.

© 2009 Newsmax. All rights reserve

Today's Washington Post Health Section has a big write-up on this topic, with all kinds of web links. Whatever your opinions about the Post's political coverage, its medical and science reporting are first-rate. I would also rely on the CDC's webpage. The government is full of first-rate scientists who do great work under Republican and Democratic administrations alike. (My husband is one, though he's not in the medical field).

As for the observation that most of the cases so far have been mild--that's missing the point. The fear is a virus MUTATION; the mild cases we've seen so far may have nothing to do with what we get this winter. Fears of a vaccine based on what happened in the 70s are similarly misplaced; those are exactly the manufacturing mistakes we now know how to prevent.

I agree with the other postings. Would strongly discourage getting this vaccine. It has been fast tracked by big Pharma. Too many risks at this time.
L. M.

I am pregnant, have two small children (2 & 5) and no one in our family plans on getting the vaccine. I have done my own research and am not comfortable with the speed and volume at which they are preparing the medication. They have not released what is in it either, which concerns me. I tend to break up vaccines and/or delay them anyway, so there may be a bias there. I am also watching what Dr. Sears says as he is VERY up on his vaccines. He has a blog and promises to update it when he has made a conclusion on the safety, efficacy and necessity....

We will not be getting the vaccine either. It will be completely experimental. I have read that it will contain squalenne oil which is a substance that contributed to Gulf War Syndrome.

I can only recommend that you be very cautious. There may be something that would counteract any negative reactions to this flu vaccine. I am also trying to research this. All moms are concerned about unnecessary vaccines. We know very little about any swine flu epidemics which would cause them to have to be so alarmed about this.

You are correct in talking to as many as possible about this.

My children that are 2 and a half and 8, we are not gettin this vaccine. Too dangerous. It is rushed and not enough research. I am not getting this just because the government says we should.

You're wise to be suspicious of vaccines. You can boost your immunity with nutrition and with detox protocols.
See updates on how to increase your resistance to harmful microbes at www.perelandra-ltd.com

As well, visit me at www.greenrita.com for guidance regarding preventative healthcare through blood type dietary recommendations and more.

What a great question! My family is not going to get the vaccine. Instead, we are going to take probiotics and general vitamins to raise our baseline of health (things we all know we should do anyways like sleep, avoiding junk food, etc).

The official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics published this GREAT article (based on a double-blind clinical trial) about how incredibly effective the use of probiotics are in minimizing the symptoms of viruses. Very timely!

Here's a link to the article abstract (which distills the study into the main points):

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/abstrac...

Feel free to dive into the full article if you'd like, but this is exactly what my whole family will be doing. Between school, office buildings, and just living in society in general, I think building up our immune systems through probiotics will be a valuable resource in keeping my family healthy!

Best of luck in your decision making!

I agree with Karen. I've been researching into this vaccine since they began talking about it. I am not comfortable with the ingredients (thimerosol is just one of the dangerous ingredients. Squalene is of great concern to me.) nor the speed at which they are doing the trials. There is no way that they can determine long term or delayed effects from the vaccine when they only research it for a few weeks or even a month or two.
http://www.nvic.org/vaccines-and-diseases/h1n1-swine-flu....
http://www.medicalvoices.org/en/vaccination/
http://drtenpenny.com/default.aspx

The flu virus may mutate as someone noted but then the vaccine wouldn't be effective anyway becuase the strain would then be different. That is why we need to keep our immune systems strong by eating healthy and having good hygiene.

The flu vaccines still contain quite a bit of thimerisol (mercury). I would stay completely away from them. They also are not guaranteed to work. It's much more important to teach children to wash their hands.

ixnay on the vaccines here (although honestly i view a lot of vaccines with a hairy eyeball.) flu viruses mutate very quickly, and this one seems extremely efficient at it. even if you're willing to risk the vaccine side-effects, chances are the virus you encounter will be laughing at it.
boost your immune system naturally and take sensible precautions.
khairete
S.

I won't lie. I have detected in the media the sense that this si "fast-tracked" and it has raised my hackles. But I am far more worried that someone in my family will get the flu. I have an 18 month old, a five year old, and two grandmothers over the age of 65 who are frequent caregivers.

This is basically the flu vaccine; it is just divided into the seasonal and swine this year because it took longer to produce the latter. The issues from decades ago was very different. I don't think the problem is really so much that it is "fast-tracked" as there is physically a limitation on the time it takes to create any vaccine. And I think tha tis what is being detected in all these media reports.

I always get the flu vaccine for me and my kids, and I urge you too as well. I fear for my kids well being, and I sort of resent the fact that I may be exposed to unvaccinated kids if I can't get the vaccine myself.

I will add that the mild version of the flu has been around this summer. My pediatrician thinks tha tmy toddler had it, although they didn't actually test anymore. It was awful. I wouldn't want to see the worse version.

At either rate, I urge you not to listen to scare tactics by either side of the vaccine argument. Look at the science and the rates of complications with the flu vaccine. Ask your pediatrician and family doctor to fill you in. Go read some actual studies and not just internet crazies. IF you aren't willing to do the legwork on the isse, I wouldn't take the risk of not getting the vaccine.

My mother-in-law is a hospice nurse. She talked to me a bit about how bad swine flu is, and she's getting the vaccine. She encouraged me to have my family get it as well. Her opinion is always-the more you get vaccinated against, the better. My brother's mother-in-law is not a nurse, but from the time she had her first daughter she fully researched all vaccines, and would not let her children get most of them because of all the questionable side effects. (As in, if it can cause all these short-term, what is it doing long-term?) Then She'd research more and more. THe family my brother married into-both parents and all 5 kids- get sick less than anyone else I've ever met. I haven't researched this vaccine yet, but after reading the other posts I will be this week. There are a lot of people who swear by getting every vaccine, including this one, and then those who swear by never doing. The right way for me is in the middle-getting some, but not all. Good luck with whatever you decide, and remember--it's YOUR decision-do what's right for you and your family.

I concur with SM and Tracey C. We always get the seasonal flu vaccine in our household, adults as well as children. The issue here isn't how mild it's been so far, it's the potential for mutation. And yes, this is being developed quickly, but every year a new vaccine's developed anyway. As for "reports" of this or that ingredient -- wait until you know the full and official list rather than worrying about what you hear or read, especially on the Internet. I'm not sure why you're asking here before you talk to the pediatrician instead of the other way around.