Children should not be given the anti-viral drug Tamiflu for swine flu because its harms outweigh any benefits, Oxford researchers have said. They called on the Department of Health to have an urgent rethink of its current policy in the swine flu pandemic. Their study found that Tamiflu caused vomiting in some children, which can lead to dehydration and complications.
[…]
Dr Carl Henegan, a GP and expert from the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, said the current policy of giving Tamiflu for mild illness was an “inappropriate strategy”. He added: “The downside of the harms outweigh the one-day reduction in symptomatic benefits.”The study comes little over a week after other research found that children given Tamiflu preventatively reported side-effects including nausea and nightmares.
Researchers analysed four studies involving children aged one to 12 taking Tamiflu or another anti-viral, Relenza.
The children were being treated for normal seasonal flu but the experts behind the research said their findings would extend to the current swine flu pandemic.
I wonder if this means that they must get flu shots so they don’t need Tamiflu.
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Imitating hysterical woman’s voice: “Won’t somebody please think of the drug makers?!!”
Or should I say “their stockholders”. What’s more profitable, will determine what’s policy. Not how it effects the children.
This is an old, known adverse effect for Tamiflu. This “new” hype is probably for mandatory vaccinations for the kids. It’s in the HHS/FEMA game-plan for the squalene tainted vaccine.
Schools will be central hubs for vaccination. Kids get the shot when they get there, parents get the shot when they come to pick ’em up. Refuse the shot, I’m sure you’ll get a stern talking to by a Law Enforcement official and some jackass from CPS.
I am looking forward to the fall flu season. This will either be another bird flu/ west nile virus event, or it will be a big deal. Either way, I will be interested is watching. I never get the flu, and am likely not at risk, since I was alive in 1957. Fun to watch. Maybe something good will come of it all.
I’ve had about twenty flu shots in my life, I’d guess.
I think you’re an idiot to be afraid of the vaccine but not the flu.
Every year about 35,000 American die from the flu. (200,000 are hospitalized which is no picnic, either.)
How many die from the shot every year?
I searched and searched and couldn’t find a statistic but there are lots of sites against the vaccine citing the 1976 debacle.
That year, a total of 25 people died.
How is a smart person going to play those odds?
#4 what odds?
How many people got the vaccine in 76? 25/???
If only 50 people got the vaccine, then NO,I won’t take those odds.
25 out of ???? is an unknown risk.
Given that the flu rarely kills an otherwise healthy middle-aged person, I’ll skip the vaccine. My kids and my grandparents will probably get one.
As far as the flu, the time off work and the weight loss make it *almost* worth it!
Swell moondawg, then pass the flu onto six others. Looking out for number one and screw everyone else. How wise.
“Given that the flu rarely kills an otherwise healthy middle-aged person, I’ll skip the vaccine. My kids and my grandparents will probably get one.
>> moondawg said, on August 11th, 2009 at 5:06 am
>> 25 out of ???? is an unknown risk.
Thanks to Google it’s not an unknow. risk.
40 million vaccines and 25 deaths.
So, 0.00006% died from the shot — AND THAT WAS THE DISASTROUS YEAR! In a normal year, (I’m suspecting it might be 0% but I can’t tell for sure.)
Yet EVERY YEAR the flu kills tens of thousands and hospitalizes hundreds of thousands.
Seems like fools odds not to get the shot.
#5 “As far as the flu, the time off work and the weight loss make it *almost* worth it!”
You can loose weight from the flu? Yes, it’s worth it then. Not getting a vaccine. My special friend wants me to lose a few pounds, probably so I can marry her after she gets her Ph. D. and needs a visa.
#5, moondawg,
I understand your use of statistics. I also imagine you haven’t been run over by a truck yet. So go ahead, keep crossing the road without looking at what’s coming. While you are at it, stand in your yard holding a metal pole in the air during a rain storm. Walk into a police station and show them your fake hand grenade. Keep smoking and eating tons of red meat, the odds suggest not everyone is prone to cancer or even heart attacks.
Then a suggestion. Make a side trip to a couple of cemeteries and see all the others that thought they were invincible too.
#7 I think the point is that the swine flu vaccinations were made mandatory in 76 because of the epidemic, and in that case the vaccine killed more people than the actual flu.
Personally I’m getting a little tired of the vaccination conspiracies though. Gov’ment isn’t out to kill you, our economy depends on millions of consumers spending themselves to death.