Flu shot & COVID vaccine, who is getting it or not?

[disneysteve]

Good points! And it is encouraging that so many companies have trial vaccines in the works, so it seems like a matter of when, not if it's released to the general public. Shows what can be accomplished when the world's best minds and countries tackle a problem!

The effort to develop a COVID vaccine has been remarkable. There will definitely be a vaccine in the not too distant future, likely late this year or early next year. It will be the fastest a vaccine has ever come to market by far, but at least in modern times, it's the most devastating global epidemic we've ever had. Back in 1918 they didn't yet have the technology to make a vaccine for the flu pandemic.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

The effort to develop a COVID vaccine has been remarkable. There will definitely be a vaccine in the not too distant future, likely late this year or early next year. It will be the fastest a vaccine has ever come to market by far, but at least in modern times, it's the most devastating global epidemic we've ever had. Back in 1918 they didn't yet have the technology to make a vaccine for the flu pandemic.

doesn't mean it's a vaccine that should instill confidence. How do you know it won't be short term like the flu? We have no idea what the side effects will be on children. My DH and I staunch advocates for vaccinating are not planning on getting it anytime soon for us or our children. We are going to wait and watch EU and Canada. To be honest we will preferably get it in canada and know that we trust the government not to ram a vaccine through for political gain.

Guess it's true. Better to ask for forgiveness and settle millions of $$$ for side effects than actually care about the side effects.

[myrdale]

I think someone already addressed this "you can't get sick from vaccine" lie.
I'm definitely not going to be on the front lines of a brand new vaccines.
I'll let others be the guinea pig.

You're not going to catch the flu, or Covid, or HPV, or shingles from a vaccine. The rates of people getting seriously ill from a vaccine are like 1 in 100,000 or less. It's like eating shell fish. 99% of people are going to be just fine, there is that 1% who is going to swell up, and have allergic reaction, but that doesn't mean we take it off the menu.

[disneysteve]

doesn't mean it's a vaccine that should instill confidence. How do you know it won't be short term like the flu? We have no idea what the side effects will be on children.

The vaccine has not yet been tested on children as far as I know. That means when it first comes out, it will probably be approved for adults only until they are able to complete the pediatric studies.

[disneysteve]

I got my flu shot on Tuesday.

Normally, a team from occupational health travels around to the different offices and gives the shots. This year, due to COVID, they wanted to eliminate that exposure risk. So they shipped vaccine to each practice directly so that we could administer them ourselves. That was actually a lot more convenient. I hope they keep doing it that way in the future.

[klarose]

Not sure what you are referencing, but there are plenty of opinions in the medical community that vary on a lot of things.

Agreed. Ask ten different doctors the same question and you are likely to get multiple different answers and opinions. A degree does not make you all knowing or always right, and science is constantly changing. Remember when Pluto was a planet? ...

I agree that the internet has some crazy stuff that people believe. But I also don't think people should just blindly believe everything their Dr. or the CDC, or whoever, says. Even outside of medical stuff, you should never take everything you are told as 100% fact. As a kid I asked a lot of questions, and people were annoyed. I would say, "If I don't ask questions how will I learn anything?" Still good words to live by.

[~bs]

Agreed. Ask ten different doctors the same question and you are likely to get multiple different answers and opinions. A degree does not make you all knowing or always right, and science is constantly changing. Remember when Pluto was a planet? ...

I agree that the internet has some crazy stuff that people believe. But I also don't think people should just blindly believe everything their Dr. or the CDC, or whoever, says. Even outside of medical stuff, you should never take everything you are told as 100% fact. As a kid I asked a lot of questions, and people were annoyed. I would say, "If I don't ask questions how will I learn anything?" Still good words to live by.

Yes, and this goes for ALL profession, not just doctors. Regardless of your qualifications or lack thereof, you are ultimately responsible for decisions in your own life. And it is your personal responsibility to determine how closely you will follow the advice of a professional. One should not blindly trust someone just because they have a bunch of letters next to their name. And this is coming from someone with letters next to their name. lol

[disneysteve]

Agreed. Ask ten different doctors the same question and you are likely to get multiple different answers and opinions. A degree does not make you all knowing or always right, and science is constantly changing. Remember when Pluto was a planet? ...

I agree that the internet has some crazy stuff that people believe. But I also don't think people should just blindly believe everything their Dr. or the CDC, or whoever, says. Even outside of medical stuff, you should never take everything you are told as 100% fact. As a kid I asked a lot of questions, and people were annoyed. I would say, "If I don't ask questions how will I learn anything?" Still good words to live by.

I agree. It's important to ask questions and understand where the information is coming from and how it was determined.

That said, there has been a disturbing trend in this country in recent years to put personal opinions above science and data, to value anecdotal stories over controlled studies. The internet is a big cause of this problem. So many sites and posts tout "the secret your doctor doesn't want you to know".

A few years ago, I had a patient come in convinced she had a rare thyroid disorder. We talked about it and I honestly wasn't familiar with the disease she mentioned. She said she would bring in the research she had done online. That "research" turned out to all come from a single website run by a doctor (supposedly) who had discovered this disease and, of course, was selling the only treatment on the market. I did my own searching and could find no other mention of this condition or treatment anywhere in any medical or non-medical literature. The disease and treatment existed entirely at this guy's website. Of course, I explained all of this to the patient but I couldn't convince her that it was all a fraud created to sell products.

So absolutely ask questions. Read. Research. Ask the authorities for documentation. Just use some common sense, too. If every expert says the same thing, don't go down the road of believing that one guy on Twitter who says the opposite.

Science evolves over time, as we have clearly seen with COVID. That's exactly what is supposed to happen. I could tell you half a dozen things I learned in medical school that we now know to be wrong but those were the leading theories based on the information we had at the time. As new information and new technologies became available, better theories came with them.

[QuarterMillionMan]

Trump said after taking Regeneron he felt immediately better. He said it could have been the other drug cocktails as well but he is convinced it was the Regeneron. God speed.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

I had to applaud Kamala Harris's response of "i'll take a vaccine when the public health officials say it is. Not when donald trump says so." Exactly. Right now they are saying they want to wait 2 months after the phase 3 trials to see if there are side effects. Mind you not long term but 2 months. But that two months puts the vaccine at earliest approval next year sometime. Sooo....you tell me how it's not political that the Biotech/Pharma companies are not pushing a vaccine when they themselves say there should be a waiting period to properly assess the data, see if there are side effects before moving forward.

Right....it's not donald trump influencing them and pushing the FDA to approve a vaccine that even the companies themselves probably will hesistate to administer to their own employees knowing they aren't 100% confident about it.

[QuarterMillionMan]

[~bs]

Trump is hilarious, he's the president of the united states, and while everyone is moaning and hand wringing, literally guinea pigged an aggressive drug combination that very few people, if any have tried, at his stage of the virus. Either crazy or has balls the size of grapefruits. lol I will say that it does seem like he picked two drugs that show a lot of promise with little reported known side effects. I have a feeling that use of regeneron will be pretty widespread once FDA approved. Remdesivir will be widely used in the hospital setting, especially for critically ill patients.

[Like2Plan]

Trump is hilarious, he's the president of the united states, and while everyone is moaning and hand wringing, literally guinea pigged an aggressive drug combination that very few people, if any have tried, at his stage of the virus. Either crazy or has balls the size of grapefruits. lol I will say that it does seem like he picked two drugs that show a lot of promise with little reported known side effects. I have a feeling that use of regeneron will be pretty widespread once FDA approved. Remdesivir will be widely used in the hospital setting, especially for critically ill patients.

As I was reading this, I was wondering if Trump had any stock connection to Regeneron--(which by the way is the name of the company--as far as I know, the drug that he took is called
"REGN-COV2" -- I don't believe the company has picked a name for the drug, yet). I don't know if Regeneron knows all the possible side effects, yet. I thought they harvest the antibodies from convalescent plasma--isn't there always a risk of contracting some other disease agent that way?

A google search yielded these links :
https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/05/inves...ron/index.html
https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/...197f9407ccde60

The question I have is if Remdesivir is more effective if it is administered early on in the case? (They don't know this, yet)

Trump reportedly took a 2 week course of hydroxychloroquine at a time when the clinical trials didn't show it to be effective for treatment or prevention of covid-19. There are some potential bad side effects including:

"Cardiovascular
QT interval prolongation has been reported in patients with specific risk factors, which may lead to arrhythmia (torsade de pointes, ventricular tachycardia).^[Ref]
Rare (0.01% to 0.1%): Cardiomyopathy (sometimes resulting in cardiac failure; some with fatal outcome), conduction disorders (bundle branch block/atrioventricular heart block), biventricular hypertrophy
Frequency not reported: Arrhythmia (torsade de pointes, ventricular tachycardia)
Postmarketing reports: QT interval prolongation, ventricular arrhythmias, torsade de pointes"

https://www.drugs.com/sfx/hydroxychl...e-effects.html

My question is how his Dr. could justify prescribing it hydroxychloroquine) for him giving the risks.

Now, I totally get it--if you are going to otherwise die and this is your only shot at survival (think battlefield direct transfusion), I guess it is worth taking a risk. And, covid for Trump's risk profile is not a good risk. But, I have to ask myself --why wasn't he protected from exposure in the first place?

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Trump is hilarious, he's the president of the united states, and while everyone is moaning and hand wringing, literally guinea pigged an aggressive drug combination that very few people, if any have tried, at his stage of the virus. Either crazy or has balls the size of grapefruits. lol I will say that it does seem like he picked two drugs that show a lot of promise with little reported known side effects. I have a feeling that use of regeneron will be pretty widespread once FDA approved. Remdesivir will be widely used in the hospital setting, especially for critically ill patients.

crazy and desperate. i am going to guess he was like "dose me up I have to be ready to campaign."

[bjl584]

I see that J&J just halted their Covid Vaccine trials due to some unexplained illnesses.
Back to the drawing board I guess