10-22-2004, 04:33 PM
My vote is to immunize if possible, don't get wound up in a knot if you can't. Many of the people around me who get flu shots get sick (Not as sick as if they actually got the flu.) while most of the others around me don't.
From what I've seen the scientists developing each flu vaccine for that year make an educated guess as to which strain will be prevalent in the population. Sometimes they are right and sometimes wrong. The way the flu vaccine has been made, created, and distributed has been largely unchanged for many years. This panic in the US, I would guess, largely developed because it's an election year. Certain political figures are finger pointing at the current administration when the real cause of this year's shortage is in the UK. Chiron had a large portion of their vaccine become contaminated and the UK pulled their manufacturing license for a time.
BBC article on Flu Vaccine shortage
From what I've seen the scientists developing each flu vaccine for that year make an educated guess as to which strain will be prevalent in the population. Sometimes they are right and sometimes wrong. The way the flu vaccine has been made, created, and distributed has been largely unchanged for many years. This panic in the US, I would guess, largely developed because it's an election year. Certain political figures are finger pointing at the current administration when the real cause of this year's shortage is in the UK. Chiron had a large portion of their vaccine become contaminated and the UK pulled their manufacturing license for a time.
BBC article on Flu Vaccine shortage
The Bill of No Rights
The United States has become a place where entertainers and professional athletes are mistaken for people of importance. Robert A. Heinlein
The United States has become a place where entertainers and professional athletes are mistaken for people of importance. Robert A. Heinlein