WHO To Investigate Handling of Swine Flu Information, Vaccine Orders 372
krou writes "With swine flu fading in the UK (projected winter deaths of 65,000 have been downgraded to 1,000, and new cases are decreasing) the UK government has been left with millions of unused vaccines, and (unlike its contract with Baxter) no clear break-clause to get out of its contract with GlaxoSmithKlein. Although the amount paid for vaccines has not been disclosed, it likely cost the UK government several hundred million pounds. Other governments are also in a similar position: the US ordered 251 million doses of the vaccine, and France and Germany are aiming to cut back on their orders considerably. To say that the case for the pandemic has been over-estimated appears to be an understatement. Now, the WHO has announced that it is to investigate whether or not it bowed to pressure from drugs companies to overplay the threat." (Continues, below.)
"The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly has also announced an investigation into the matter after a resolution [pdf] from Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Health, was adopted. Dr. Wodarg labelled swine flu as a "false pandemic", and claims in the resolution that '"in order to promote their patented drugs and vaccines against flu, pharmaceutical companies influenced scientists and official agencies responsible for public health standards to alarm governments worldwide and make them squander tight health resources for inefficient vaccine strategies, and needlessly expose millions of healthy people to the risk of an unknown amount of side-effects of insufficiently-tested vaccines."' By some estimates, GSK was expected to net over £1 billion from vaccine sales."
Re:Fear-fad (Score:5, Informative)
Lol. I never could understand why people bought into the swine flu hysteria nonsense. If you looked at the numbers for how many people actually got sick and how many died from it, IT'S JUST THE FREAKING FLU! Jeesh. I wonder what the next fear-fad will be? I'm rooting for alien invasions.
Actually that's incorrect. "Just the flu" is far deadlier each year than the swine flu has ever been in sum total. Therefore, it's even more of a non-issue to me than the regular "feel like shit for a while and get over it" influenza. The only problem, and it isn't my problem, is that it's hard to sell vaccines to people who feel this way.
Re:Fear-fad (Score:5, Informative)
H1N1 hit hardest (i.e. killed people) in a different demographic than the seasonal flu; young people in generally good health.
I keep hearing this from people, but everything I've read about actual numbers contradicts this. Young people in generally good health might be a little more at risk, but people with preexisting medical conditions are the ones that need to worry (which is normal).
If you have a reliable citation otherwise, I'd love to see it.
Re:This made my day (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The WHO needs to shut the fuck up (Score:4, Informative)
The 1918 flu caused 650,000 deaths.
Actually, most estimates put it at 50,000,000 to 100,000,000 deaths.
/Mikael
Re:The WHO needs to shut the fuck up (Score:3, Informative)
Plenty of doctor's and virologists acknowledged pretty quickly that the virus wasn't all that deadly, that vaccinating everyone wasn't really helpful or required and that the chances of the virus becoming something extremely lethal we're very small, and if it would have happened, we wouldn't have an answer to it anyway. Somehow these virologists weren't the ones dragged onto TV every night, writing apocalyptic newspaper articles and advising the government to buy all those vaccins. The virologists and doctors doubting the whole situation were mostly served-off as tinfoil conspiracy believers.
Also, most of your arguments are dogmatic and besides the point. The WTC attacks have nothing to do with a global pandemic, and they're incomparable. 3000 people on a scale of 6 billion in fact doesn't mean shit. Right now 100s of thousands of people are possibly dead in Haiti, and every year millions of people die from diseases nobody in the western world dies from anymore, such as cholera or dysentry. Neither of these facts are relevant to the H1N1 situation, just like your own arguments. Just picking and choosing random factos to support your position.
Last but not least what happened with the 1918 flu is most likely incomparable to what would happen when a really deadly flu virus came along right now, sanitation, health care and knowledge about viruses and how they spread haven't stood still the last 100 years.
You want a link? (Score:2, Informative)
you gotta link
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090505174547.htm [sciencedaily.com]
this was also a slashdot story, But if you don't read the flaming summaries, you'd never know.
Re:The WHO needs to shut the fuck up (Score:3, Informative)
I am a doctor, and like many in the medical field, I am fed-up with all the BS related to the swine flu.
Every time that news agencies (Reuters, AFP, etc) publish headlines saying "12500 deaths from the Swine flu" but omit to state in the article that the "classic" seasonal flu kills hundreds of thousands worldwide every year, this is inappropriately biased. I think we can call this fear-mongering.
Ok, the H1N1 strain might be a bit more aggressive. But the vaccine itself has also been more aggressive, and normal safety checks and clinical studies were bypassed; the vaccine injections themselves have caused hospitalizations and casualties. And many have been put under pressure to get vaccinated, even if we did not want to ("you don't get vaccinated for yourself, you get vaccinated to protect those around you..."). I am fortunate that I have been able to resist.
So the "pandemic" might have been worse, but the negative side effects of the vaccine itself might have been much more dramatic as well.
Another core issue is that we must manage risk objectively, and focus our resources (which are always limited) in the areas where are going to provide the best return, to the best of our knowledge at that point.
We have squandered billions of dollars on flu shots, benefiting the pharma industry, with a probably dubious and very short-term benefit to the people. With their powers, and leveraging WHO announcements, big pharma corporations have pulled all these funds towards them, benefiting only themselves and their shareholders.
Some flood-resistant levies and earthquake-resistant buildings are still waiting to be built. New sports facilities, more gym hours in school, promotion of healthy lifestyles, are all things which may have been better investments, providing better returns for the money.
Governments and health authorities must objectively assess which investment is likely to be the most beneficial to their community.
Because of pressure from pharma lobbies, and the leverage that the WHO has provided by declaring a pandemic, I am certain that the risks were not weighted and assessed objectively, and that precious health funds were squandered in a way that only benefited to the pharma industry.
This is not only a "hindsight is 20/20" kind of thing, but a real societal problem.
-Ivan
Re:Fear-fad (Score:5, Informative)
Having seen what it can be like for healthy people, and that most of us have no immunity to this version, I'm really happy they did order lots of vaccine. I'd hate to think what it would be like if you did have some health problem. I've got an appointment to get my youngest son vaccinated on Monday. Maybe the risk is over, maybe it's not. Either way, I think it makes sense. If another H1N1 pandemic comes along in a few years time, maybe he'll have a little immunity the way the over-60s seem to have had for this one.
Re:Fear-fad (Score:2, Informative)
Here in the UK, while a greater number of people with pre-existing conditions died (as you say), 36% of deaths occurred in people with no pre-existing condition (see the Chief Medical Officer's report in the BMJ http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/339/dec10_1/b5213). This is not what you would expect of seasonal 'flu and is a cause for concern especially if H1N1 had had a greater mortality rate.
Re:Oh, I see (Score:3, Informative)
Re:This worked out OK. (Score:3, Informative)
Maybe not a single person, but even a relatively small EMS agency can save hundreds of lives a year (for various definitions of 'save'; I'm counting people who probably would die without intervention)
Go to New York, and they save hundreds of people *a day*. At least. That's tens of thousands a year. A single EMT could easily save 400 people a year
Think before you speak. Someone having a life threatening medical problem (trouble breathing, chest pains, possible spinal injury, possible internal bleeding) is a lot more frequent than a Coast Guard emergency. And I have nothing but respect for the Coast Guard - my uncle was in the CG for many years.
But don't pretend EMS doesn't do anything - you make yourself look like an idiot, and a jackass to boot.