Who's had the H1N1 shot ?

[mac (Matt)]

Originally Posted by Craig.a.c

I think the way the world carried on about swine flu was and still is a joke. How many people have died from it now???????? Look at how the world carried on with the bird flu!!!!! Its all government and media bull poo.

The basic flu that gets around every year kills over 500,000 people world wide every year.

The people who usually die from the 'normal flu' are the typical high-risk groups - the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions.

My wife, who works at a hospital, has seen healthy teenagers with no pre-existing medical conditions die from swine flu.

[Terry B]

Originally Posted by Craig.a.c

I think the way the world carried on about swine flu was and still is a joke. How many people have died from it now???????? Look at how the world carried on with the bird flu!!!!! Its all government and media bull poo.

The basic flu that gets around every year kills over 500,000 people world wide every year.

Swine flu has fortunately not been too bad. It has a low mortality (<1% ) but is very infectious.
Bird flu is not infectious at all as you can only catch it directly from birds. It currently doesn't spread from person to person. It however is a very nasty virus with a mortality of up to 40% even with modern medical treatment.
The original H1N1 virus in 1918 was highly infectious but also had a low mortality. As it spread around the world it reached the midwest of the USA and it mutated. This was almost a year after it first appeared. It's mortailty went from something similar to the current swine flu to a mortality of ~5%. This went on to kill millions of people around the world.
It is not bull poo as you describe. If some unfortunate sole catches both swine flu and bird flu at the same time and the virus is successful in swapping it's DNA we have the potential to have a very infectious disease with a mortality of 40%.
Antiviral drugs are not terribly satisfactory so vaccination to prevent this type of world wide catastrophy is the best prevention.
I wouldn't want 40% of my family to die. Who would you choose?

[BerrieK]

I had the jab a week and a half ago (at work), with the ony side effect being a tender injection site. As a health worker I am in the group highly recommended to have the vaccine.

Yes perhaps the hype for avian flu was much greater than its reported infections here, but the H1N1 virus has seen people infected over a very wide demographic and gepgraphic distribution in Australia. Yes it is a greater risk for those with underlying health problems but it has also been lethal to otherwise previously healthy individuals.

If people choose not to have the vaccine, however, it is a personal choice..... as long as the choice is made sensibly after consideration of accurate clinical information (not media hype or rumour) and of personal theological, ideological and religious reasons (as Dave Pastern states). It may, however, also come down to population health rather than the health of the individual, in the case where an epidemic of a lethal disease occurs.

Kerrie

[casstony]

I'll wait for next seasons general flu shot since I think our family already had H1N1; the youngest member of the family (6yo) had the worst symptoms with a fever for 6 days - we moderated the fever with panadol and watched for serious complications and he got better by himself. The immune system takes 4-7 days to build the killer T cells needed to kill the virus so I don't like to go to the doc before day 8 if possible.