Swine flu could hospitalize 2 million in U.S. this winter — latimes.com — It could be this, it could be that. DO all these vague comments make us confident in these agencies?
As many as 300,000 could clog intensive care units in heavily affected regions, a new report says. But the CDC director notes that the H1N1 outbreak also could be much milder.
Nearly 2 million Americans could be hospitalized during this winter’s novel H1N1 influenza pandemic, with as many as 300,000 clogging intensive care units in heavily affected regions, according to a report released Monday by the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
Overall, 20% to 40% of the population could develop symptoms of the strain commonly known as swine flu, and 30,000 to 90,000 could die, according to the report. During a normal flu season, the virus kills about 35,000 Americans.
So, to summarize, they really have no clue.
I don’t want discussions whether this is right or not. I want those thinking it’s not an issue to raise their hands and sign up for the fist shot. Please list your names below thank you. If you happen to die (whether from it or side illnesses), some of us will feel a bit sorry.
1. Your Name Here
If you want certainty, join Alfie ((HEY ALFIE)) in his religion–or pick any other religion.
Add “Discomfort with Ambiguity” to the list of why otherwise intelligent people turn to religion.
I don’t want discussions whether this is right or not. I want those thinking VIRULENT FLU PANDEMIC is not an issue to raise their hands and sign up for RELEASE OF YOUR MEDS TO THOSE WITH AN IQ OVER 45. Please list your names below thank you. If you happen to die (whether from it or side illnesses), some of us will feel a bit sorry.
1. Your Name Here
I nominate alfie and pedro to get the first 2 shots.
Lets vote for shots, shots, shots….yaayyyyyy.
Anyone who cares to read the report might notice the potential 30-90K swine flu deaths is in addition to the usual 35,000.
Just mother natures way of saying, I have had enough of your BS.
Nice! The word “could” is in that short LA Times article seven times. I guess it’s just a matter of faith! 🙂
The disease will kill us or the shots will. Bottom line? We’re all gonna die.
How about some actual news. Not speculation. Not propaganda.
I really do need to get out more. I thought this anti-vaccine nonsense was just an artifact of the blogoshere. Nope.
Nice lady next door, been friends for 3 years. Picks up some cash doing day care. Had two beautiful kiddies in tow, her relatives. I asked her if she was going to get them vaccinated. She said no, she couldn’t trust the government.
Wow. I asked her if she believed in science, she said yes. Polio vaccine, she said yes, but “times have changed.” You can’t stop people from being stupid, but her kiddies.
Sad.
#10. The issue for most of us is the possibility of being forced to take the vaccine. If this idea doesn’t bother you, than I don’t know what else there is to say.
While science is all we have, you have to admit that it is not infallible.
#11–McCullough==I agree, science is all we have and science clearly demonstrates the value of vaccines. Including the deaths from vaccines that do occur and the net/net is less people die the more vaccines are used. Unless you have a “scientific based reason” not to take a vaccine, then what non-science based reason are you using?????
Are you a man of science, or something else?
When your emotions, for whatever reason, collide with science, you have a life affirming opportunity to define who you are. Science is not just for those things you agree with. Science is not infallible, its not even supposed to be. Science is a process to asymptotically approach the truth, or the reproducible, or whatever. Nothing else works.
You read these blogs. Whazzzzzup?
I’m at home right now, sick with a flu. I don’t know if it’s the swine flu or not. This is the first time I have gotten a flu outside of the winter season.
Personally..getting the flu doesn’t bother me. Let’s call it the natural part of science. The science that says what doesn’t kill you just might make you stronger.
Where will it end bobbo? When we are all hermetically sealed like the Bubble Boy? It’s just the sniffles and a sore throat for crying out loud, stop being such a pussy. When it comes to this, you’re like Alfred1 in your true beliefs.
And yeah, I don’t trust the idiots in the government. They haven’t EARNED it.
There are many doctors who are against this, why do you think yours are correct, because the government says so?
My scientists can beat up your scientists….so there.
Back when the polio vaccine was created, there was no law requiring that the corporation that created it be forced to turn a profit for their shareholders above all else.
#14–McCullough. Your posted material, the linked article, and my post is concerned with VIRULENT FLU PANDEMIC causing widespread deaths, or not.
When you avert the discussion to one of your preference to risk only getting ill and recovering, it makes me think Giulherme is posting under your name.
I have to laugh. Still an effort not to get upset when people disagree with me, in the way that you are doing.
So both of us can choose to learn, or not.
#15–Chwis==not the law then or now. Same law: legal obligation to maximize shareholder return within the law. Do you know who created the Polio vaccine? It may have been non-profit org. Don’t know.
We need a pandemic for people to be scared enough to actually BELIEVE the government. It is a sad state of affairs. That is what happens when your government is run by thieves and lairs for a couple of generations.
#17–Improb==yes, I hadn’t made that direct connection, but you are right. Thing is, “trusting”/believing the government doesn’t even play into it for “a man of science” unless you think the CDC, UN, WHO vaccine and flu statistics have been falsified for the last 100 years.
Some people disdain trailer trash for believing in astrology, and then turn right around and believe vaccines are bad, all on the same type of “evidence” or emotions. That could even almost be tolerated, but they refuse to see the self evident.
Go figure.
It isn’t the science people don’t trust. It is the implementation of the science people have no faith in. For the most part scientists are trustworthy (they have journals people can read). Corporations, bureaucrats and politicians are about as transparent as mud.
#16. “When you avert the discussion to one of your preference to risk only getting ill and recovering, it makes me think Giulherme is posting under your name.”
Ouch! OK, maybe I earned that one for calling you a pussy. But seriously, getting back to my original comment, if the government tries to force this vaccine on the us, how do you think they should handle those of us who may want to think for ourselves? You know, the unwashed masses who aren’t enlightened by men of science such as yourself? What would your advice be to those in control?
Ha, ha==well done #20–McCullough (for short, but I do appreciate the humor of the crutch reference).
1. “how do you think they should handle those of us who may want to think for ourselves?” /// Well, that really is the crutch of the matter in that YOU AREN’T THINKING!!!!!!!!! Without scientific FACTS as the basis of your self and societal destructive antediluvian Luddite paranoid fantasies, you are emoting=not thinking.
I hope our government makes a rational assessment of the situation and without getting into a dick measuring contest, decides if the risk of those unvaccinated is dangerous enough ((ie–valid estimated death counts)) to warrant mandatory vaccinations, or lesser inducements only, or let the plague run its course.
I think you participated in the “no shitting in the public water supply” thread a few weeks ago?
Nothing has changed.
I still question why the CDC is being so gloom and doom and this. We have had strains of the flu in the past which have affected the US worse and heard much less from the CDC. This dooms day frenzy has fed on itself for so long. I am wondering what the amount of wasted money is going into these preparations? Other then Mexico other countries have faced little in terms of dramatic rises in terms of severe symptoms or deaths then any other strain. Unless their is more to this strain then anyone has said. I think we may be in for more sickness but then again maybe not. Looks as though their guessing.
Herd Immunity is what I’m hoping for. And yes there is ‘mathematical proof’ to be had on both sides — in the form of computational epidemiology and biostats — do a quick search of the EID journal. Its rather dense but informative.
I agree that the interaction between immunology and virology is complex, especially in terms of epidemiological studies. Those of us in public health often have to operate on incomplete information and make the ‘optiaml’ decision based upon the available data. Of course, there is no such thing as a 100% safe drug (or food for that matter). There is always an element of risk that is associated with a gain.
Do we have an attack or incidence rate for the current H1N1? Yes, albeit it is not inclusive for all cases.
Do we understand the H1N1 vector in the epidemiology triangle? Yes, for now (direct contact).
Does H1N1 have the lineaments of other rapidly mutating, highly infectious agents? Definitely yes on that one.
Will I be getting the novel H1N1 vaccine? Heck yes! Of course, I have no choice because the higher ups have deemed it necessary.
Share and enjoy 😉
Also remember that there great concentrations of young men in cantonments (temporary or semi-permanent military quarters) getting ready to ship off to World War I. That is were the 1918 flu really got a head of steam. If you want to learn more read John Barry’s The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague In History. I would put a link to Amazon but I am afraid my post would get nuked.
#24–wumpus==with your expertise, if you had complete free choice:
1. Would you get the vaccine for yourself?
2. Would you require others to have it or not?
Do you know: can the risk of further mutations in the unvaccinated population be fairly made or it that an “existential question?”
#25
Cool book, I think the history channel made a short based upon it.
Purple Death
“I had a little bird
its name was Enza…
I opened the window
and in flew Enza…”
#26
In truth, I always get vaccinated because I have never really felt it was to my benefit to avoid them. I usually respond well to the seasonal flu vaccine — maybe a few sniffles last year, but otherwise it beats the heck out of hacking up a lung for 3 weeks every fall/winter.
I don’t think I am really qualified to make a statement about the mutagenic susceptibility of H1N1 (never stopped me before). Although the haphazard way in which viruses replicate themselves leads to many mutations, I don’t know if anyone has calculated the median amount of errors or strikes on the genetic structure is required before it gains a mutative property that would increase pathogenicity — that is a question for a highly paid immunologist or virologist.
I will get the shot.
I almost always get a flu shot — I got the infamous swine flue shot in 1976 when I was a teen and I’ve gotten them most years since.
The worst reaction was a slightly sore arm.
It strikes me as really weird that people are blasé about a potentially lethal LIVE flu virus but afraid of the harmless DEAD version.
#27–wumpus==thanks for your expertise. Nice to see some on display.
Just if you make it back and care to opine:
I expect a world wide plague of some sort to hit mankind==just a function of human density, time, increasing drug resistance and what not.
Is there smart money on such a thing “ever” happening, or if it happens it being most likely a common flu, or some more exotic virus, or just what? I’m looking for something that may not have hit the popular press–but is “real.”
>> bobbo, REALITY is a bitch said, on August 26th, 2009 at 9:11 am
>> If you want certainty, join Alfie ((HEY ALFIE)) in his religion–or pick any other religion.
>> Add “Discomfort with Ambiguity” to the list of why otherwise intelligent people turn to religion.
It seems like Alfred confirmed every ugly stereotype you have about religion!
Be aware, though, that most Christians are annoyed by guys like Alfred, too. As happens so often, highly conservative people often unleash their most virulent vitriol for fellow insiders who don’t toe the line.
You should also know that, perhaps ironically, many Christians love of the ambiguity of faith that makes religious experience rich. It’s the “scientific world view” which strikes as as too black-and-white.
Greg, too much to blog post about but its not the “extreme” religious, the bibble thumpers, that get me going. We both agree they are just nuts.
No, its people like YOU that upset me. Nice, reasonable, common sense people that I actually like. Its YOU I don’t like and for all the reasons you think should cause the reverse.
Have you ever bought a beautiful girl a drink and started a nice conversation with her only to find out she is a bigot or a NASCAR fan? Its really disgusting. You want her, she’s beautiful, but its oil and water.
Same with nice religious types.
“love of the ambiguity” the Malcolm Muggeridge smuggery based on failure to deal with the incongruities that prove the dogma to be nonsense or otherwise disproven. Its disgusting.
But yea, if I have to associate with the religious, I’d rather it be with the hypocrites, liars, befuddled and foolish rather than the bible thumpers.
That would be true of the scientific thumpers as well. The interesting questions in life are a mystery.