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A CDC panel has concluded that a spray version of the influenza vaccine is ineffective and shouldn't be used during the 2016-2017 flu season:
What led to the abrupt fall of FluMist — the nasal spray version of influenza vaccine — which until recently was considered the first choice for younger children? On Wednesday, an advisory panel to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention concluded that the spray version was so ineffective, it shouldn't be used by anyone during the 2016-2017 flu season.
Just two years ago, that same Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices [ACIP] recommended FluMist as the preferred alternative for most kids ages 2-8, after reviewing several studies from 2006-2007 that suggested the spray was more effective in kids than the injectable forms of the vaccine.
What changed to make the spray so much less effective than studies had shown it to be in the past? The bottom line is that right now "we don't understand what it is," said David Kimberlin, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, who said academic researchers and those at MedImmune, the subsidiary of Astra Zeneca that makes FluMist, are working to get answers.
AstraZeneca, the maker of FluMist, says its own numbers conflict with the CDC's. The ACIP recommendation must be reviewed by the CDC's director before it can become official policy. The FluMist spray comprises 8% of the projected vaccine supply for the upcoming flu season.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 28 2016, @03:11PM
Is it possible to admit that however helpful and effective the flu vaccine is (in all its forms) for at-risk individuals
Is it? With 80% failure rates in a culture of generally bad sick day support, all it means is money was spent not saving anyone from the flu.
However... that money could have been spent on extensive pneumonia screening of at risk flu victims or hiring more medical personnel to handle the inevitable flu.
The argument boils down to the flu vaccine being faith healing alternative medicine type stuff... sure go have fun but it certainly is not going to work and don't waste any serious money on it.
On a micro scale it costs me time and money and since it has placebo level effectiveness I'm better off keeping my time and money.
I believe it provides a good propaganda weapon in that truly dangerous flu epidemics are uncontrollable and inevitable sooner or later and the government is better off with a population blaming themselves for not getting a (placebo) injection than a city rioting like a zombie movie for the .gov to "do something".