Look Out Joe Queenan or Dr. Offit will Launch Columnists Science Foundation!
Uh oh! Dr. Offit had better file for a new organization called "Mainstream Columnist Science Foundation" to combat this wicked column by Joe Queenan in the Wall Street Journal HERE. It's likely written tongue in cheek - you can take it any way you'd like. It's just very interesting.
They Shoot Flu-Shot Skeptics, Don't They?
By JOE QUEENAN
Two weeks ago, at the insistence of my wife, I went and got a flu shot.
I am one of those people who hates getting flu shots because I subscribe to the addled, scientifically insupportable, just plain stupid myth that if you get a flu shot you'll get the flu. But because my wife runs a senior-citizen center—pro bono—in our town, I understood that it would look bad if I did not get a flu shot. It would lend credence to the scientifically insupportable and fundamentally idiotic myth that getting a flu shot will give you the flu.
Three hours after I got the flu shot, I started to feel sick. Headache, mild sore throat, rasping. I mentioned this to a friend and she snapped, "You can't get the flu from a flu shot. They use dead flu virus in the serum they inject you with. It's just a coincidence." The next day I felt worse, and the next day, and the next. Each time I mentioned the flu shot to friends, they got really defensive and said that I must have already been incubating a nasty cold, because the flu shot could not make me sick. They referred me to assorted websites where I could get more information. They made me feel like a moron for even suggesting that there might be a connection between the flu shot and my deteriorating physical condition.
Five days later, fully prone at death's doorstep, I went to the doctor.
He told me that I had a throat infection and an eye infection, and that my ears didn't look so good, either. He wrote me prescriptions for cough syrup, antibiotics and eye drops. When I mentioned how weird it was that I got sick—like, really sick—right after the flu shot, he laughed as if I were a four-year-old.
"You can't get sick from the flu shot," he chided me. "The cells in the flu serum are dead."
"So it was just a coincidence?"
"Yes, just a coincidence."
All these days later, my infection is abating, but only slowly. I still feel terrible. I still can't sleep. I still have headaches and a sore throat, and I can't clear my lungs, and I'm coughing a lot. But I'm not mentioning my wretched condition to anyone anymore. I'm tired of the abuse. I'm tired of being singled out as a flu-shot agnostic. There's something about questioning the efficacy of flu shots that automatically puts you in the same category as climate-change deniers. People hate it if you say anything bad about flu shots; it's worse than saying that you believe in the Laffer Curve.
"If you got a flu shot and then won the lottery, you wouldn't think you won the lottery just because you got a flu shot," sneered one friend, quoting a popular website. "It's just a coincidence."
"You don't take care of yourself, and then you blame the flu shot," said another.
"You already had a cold when you got the flu shot," my wife insisted.
"If I already had a cold, why would I agree to get the flu shot?" I fired back.
"You don't always think things through," she suggested.
Let me be clear on one thing: I do not seriously believe that my hideous illness that has now dragged on for more than 10 days is connected in any way, shape or form with my getting that flu shot. The science is clear on that. And I certainly don't want to be responsible for old people in my town getting really sick or dying because they deliberately didn't get a flu shot after I perpetuated some imbecilic myth. I don't want blood on my hands.
So I'm letting this thing go. I got a flu shot; I got really sick; it was all a strange coincidence. Still, next year, come flu-shot time, I'm going to start coughing and wheezing and hacking and spewing a few days before I'm due for my shot, so my wife will let me take a pass. I'm not afraid of needles, I'm not afraid of my wife, and I'm not afraid of the flu. But I'm deathly afraid of coincidences.
@ Beth - "A couple of years ago an NHL hockey team rolled up their sleeves to get the flu shot in conjunction with some "health fair" that was really a creative marketing campaign for pushing flu shots."
Do you have a link to any of the newspaper articles about this particular hockey team and their misadventure with the flu inoculation? This should be revisited, especially in light of the impending H1N1 "pandemic" flu fraud and hysteria of 2010-2011. Does anyone seriously doubt that it's coming? Pharma already has in place advanced market commitments, liability waivers, and a new pharma-friendly definition of "pandemic".
Posted by: patrons99 | December 06, 2010 at 08:47 PM
so funny!!
The world is just filled w/ amazing flu shot coincidences!
Posted by: Katie Wright | November 10, 2010 at 08:15 PM
Google "flu shots, autism" and you'll get a wealth of information about the probable link between the two.
Posted by: timeforchange | November 09, 2010 at 09:32 PM
It bothers me how much the neuro's must know about vaccine damage and yet they're not speaking out either. My friend's friend had nerve damage/paralysis after her flu shot ( in the arm that got the vaccination) and the neuro quietly told her just not to ever get another flu shot again. oops, almost said flu shit ;)
Posted by: Jen | November 09, 2010 at 08:09 PM
Keep in mind, Joe, that the U.S. has an extremely high rate of senior citizens being vaccinated and is ranked 28th on the longevity list -- just another one of those quirky coincidences.
One of my patients worked for a medical office where everyone on staff received the flu vax. She opted out. All of them (29 staffers) developed the flu, except her. Of course, that was just another quirky coincidence.
I remember when the Swine flu vax was given in the 70’s, which I received because I didn’t know better. I was immediately and severely ill for an entire week; yup, just another coincidence.
Joe, developing flu symptoms after receiving a flu vax is actually very common. Do doctors really believe they can inject dead viral protein components, heavy metals, chemicals and other reactive food toxins sub Q without initiating an immune response, sometimes with deadly or permanently disabling consequences? Here’s another coincidence: vaccine science and uncompromised medical research.
Awakening to the possibility that one has been duped by an imposed health care belief system will typically arouse a sense of denial and indignation in most people. Unfortunately, this is because most people are more concerned about their public image or job status rather than the welfare of their fellow man and taking the initiative to seek the facts for themselves. In that respect, you certainly have your own self-interests to preserve, so I appreciate you had the courage to share your "coincidental" medical experience.
Posted by: Dr. L'Hommedieu | November 09, 2010 at 02:49 PM
> It would lend credence to the scientifically insupportable and fundamentally idiotic myth
No, it would lend credance to the Cocochrane 2010 review that getting the flu shot *won't* help you *not* get the flu..
>at the nursing home,they are under tremendous pressure to immunize and maintain "herd immunity".
Does this apply to brain-injured PVS people in nursing homes? I mean, you'd think that the idea of giving any vaccine to a person with an injured BBB and overactive astroglia already would be considered ludicrous - but.. We live in a Lewis Carol world now.. (Disgustingly ironic, the name of the PVC patient is Alice..)
>It seems to me that if an insurance company were to carefully evaluate their claims records
Insurance companies are stupid.. If they weren't, *they* would have funded the Phase 2/3 study of HBOT for brain injury years ago (NBIRR-1 [http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01105962]). And they would actually be paying for HBOT for diabetic foot wounds more often.. Are they allowed by the FDA to "advertise" treatments such as this - if it can not only save *them* money, but save the patient's feet (or brain)?
Posted by: Jim Witte | November 09, 2010 at 02:35 PM
Hey Joe, You just got the mercury from the flu shot .( If you are the size of a Sumo wrestler, maybe that is ok) . Mercury is now in your brain frying your neurons and in your blood making sure you have no defense against other infections. Wait.... That's just the beginning. Now, maybe you make the mistake of eating fish and chips a couple of times a week (more mercury there) and then you go to the dentist and he drills out your old amalgam filling.. Bingo! a new burst of vaporized mercury going straight to your brain. Now you're well on your way to mercury toxicity and one of the symptoms you may notice are heart palpitations and when you go to the cardiologist, he finds that your ECG is abnormal so he sends you for an angiogram along with other cardiac tests.
No Joe, This is not a joke; these effects happen to people all the time, but rare is the person who recognizes these symptoms for what they are. Good luck to you Joe. If all you suffer is a long flu, consider yourself one of the lucky ones.
Posted by: Cherry Sperlin Misra | November 09, 2010 at 10:39 AM
Two years ago my mother had facial paralysis
five days after the flu shot. I warned my mother not to get it. My brother took her
to the doctor for the usual check up and they agreed to the flu shot after the "but
we must protect her health" introduction by the family doctor. My brother agreed (why listen to me,anyway?)and we had another
"coincidence".She had to go back to the hospital for five days and received many infusions,today her right side is partly paralyzed and can only go around by a walker.(pulling her right leg along)Keep an eye on your family members
(my mom and brother live in the same town)
at the nursing home,they are under tremendous pressure to immunize and maintain "herd immunity". Another coincidence.
Posted by: Anonym | November 09, 2010 at 12:56 AM
Bendetta,
You are correct. Since the effects of mercury exposure can be quite delayed, as very clearly shown by the Karen Wetterhahn tragedy, most consequences of getting a thimerosal-laden flu shot may well be quite separated in time from the date the shot was received. It is for this reason that studies comparing the total longterm health outcomes of vaccinated versus not vaccinated must be done, and perhaps also why this does not ever seem to be done as part of the safety testing of vaccines.
It seems to me that a longterm (1-2 year) study of the health outcomes (enumerating the incidence of ALL adverse health events) of adults who take the flu vaccine versus those who refuse might help to reveal the truth. I have wondered if the dispersal of vaccine administration sites to drugstores, groceries, etc. (which must result in muddied waters in terms of the records of who had a vaccine and who didn't) might be for reasons other than providing easy access to vaccines.
It seems to me that if an insurance company were to carefully evaluate their claims records, (if they had good records of who had received flu vaccines and who hadn't-which they may not), a partial picture of the dangers might emerge. And, if health insurance companies are independent of pharma (though it is not at all clear to me that this is the case), this information might be quite informative and valuable. Perhaps an insurance data mole/whistleblower could find the truth.
Posted by: Sue | November 08, 2010 at 10:01 PM
"If you got a flu shot and then won the lottery, you wouldn't think you won the lottery just because you got a flu shot," sneered one friend, quoting a popular website. "It's just a coincidence."
Sorry, but that's the LAMEST analogy I've ever heard!
Hmmm...
FLU shot/lottery. Okay, I get THAT those two things are COMPLETELY unrelated.
Kinda like these:
FLU shot/pumpkin pie. Or FLU shot/mercedes benz. Or how about this one, FLU shot/stupidity (oh wait, those two MAY be related -- at least in my book)
But FLU shot/FLU. Let's see...I think I see the word FLU twice...wonder if that means anything. Hmmmm...
Geeez.
Posted by: Kelli Ann Davis | November 08, 2010 at 09:58 PM
well the vaccine court didnt think my illness was just a coincidence. They settled with me this year. Ruling all my damage was caused by the flu shot.
Posted by: the flu shot almost killed me | November 08, 2010 at 09:19 PM
He best hope that he recovers!
Do you suppose that in three weeks when his muscles are all stiff and hurting he will reliaze it is the flu?
He will never guess than a few months later that acid reflux, or perhaps that lower gut trouble might be linked to his flu shot.
Perhaps a year might go by before he experience aniexty?
----And when he experiences a galloping heart beat, and they say it is a panic attack - why he will have long forgotten that flu shot.
That is if he does not come down with something a lot worse.
My mother got off the phone just yesterday - the preacher's wife told her she got the flu shot a couple of weeks back. She became sick immediately and has been sick every since.
Now why did she call my 80 year old mother to tell her that. She was delivering the message to me. Well, I warned 'em.
Posted by: Benedetta | November 08, 2010 at 09:08 PM
Of course the flu shot didn't "cause" his flu, but perhaps his flu "resulted" from the flu shot.
Posted by: Mark L. Olson | November 08, 2010 at 06:52 PM
Oh, poor Joe. Getting the flu shot didn't CAUSE him to get the flu, it only RESULTED in the flu. Big Difference. (sarcasm intended!)
Posted by: Jill Fenech | November 08, 2010 at 06:22 PM
Beth - re: your NHL Hockey comment. I recall Mayer Eisenstein saying that the entire Chicago Blackhawks team took Vitamin D3 during their Stanley Cup run. Here's the youtube clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lGBDbejH0c
There have been reports that high dose D3 not only enhances immune protein biosynthesis, but also enhances athletic performance. If the team was not vaccinated, they would represent a cohort of unvaccinated professional athletes which could be followed prospectively, as of the date that they declined vaccines in favor of natural immune enhancement.
Nursing home patients, on the other hand, are invariably heavily vaccinated. Again, one can envision another prospective cohort study, looking at vaccinated versus unvaccinated seniors.
Posted by: patrons99 | November 08, 2010 at 05:35 PM
@Kendra - I believe we call those "flu-like tendencies".
Posted by: Amy in Idaho | November 08, 2010 at 05:17 PM
A couple of years ago an NHL hockey team rolled up their sleeves to get the flu shot in conjunction with some "health fair" that was really a creative marketing campaign for pushing flu shots.
I was not surprised to read in the sports columns a couple of weeks later how sick the hockey team was and that they were having trouble having enough healthy players to play their games. And news reported on how sick these big healthy guys were and how flat on their backs ill they were. As a "curiousity", they put in print a quote from one of the "lucky" players who managed to stay well. "Funny" they noted how this player didn't even get his flu shot but he somehow managed to avoid the flu.
Of course the reporting covered the whole thing as a coincidence, the vacc'ed players getting sick and the unvax'ed player being solidly healthy, but anyone who has followed the vaccine debacle for years knows....
....they always say it's a coincidence.
And the sheeple, they listen and they believe...
Posted by: Beth | November 08, 2010 at 04:54 PM
Apparently this guy didn't ask to read the insert where the potential side affects are listed including;
Fever
Malaise
Sore Throat
Headache
All sounding very similar to the flu, but of course it is not because the flu shot cannot cause the flu, just apparently identical symptoms to it.
It doesn't get much crazier than that.
Posted by: Kendra Pettengill | November 08, 2010 at 04:30 PM
Then only year I was deathly ill from the flu was the year I got a flu shot.
Posted by: polliwog | November 08, 2010 at 10:13 AM
There is something "1984" ish about social pressures to dismiss "observation" as a source of information and knowledge. At some point in the whole long journey of trying to decide what is true and what isn't, who is telling the truth and who isn't, I decided the only thing I can know for certain is what I observe and experience first hand.
Posted by: Sue | November 08, 2010 at 09:41 AM
Leave our seniors alone! Imo, they are MUCH more apt to die or get really sick because of their annual "flu" inoculation, than they are without them. Disclosure: I'm a senior. Why not just consider giving them adequate amounts of D3, C, B12, glutathione precursors, cysteine, colloidal silver, etc?
"The science is clear on that. And I certainly don't want to be responsible for old people in my town getting really sick or dying because they deliberately didn't get a flu shot after I perpetuated some imbecilic myth. I don't want blood on my hands."
How clear is the science on that? The vaccine industry is rife with placebo fraud.
“Does Seasonal Influenza Vaccination Increase the Risk of Illness with the 2009 A/H1N1 Pandemic Virus?” by
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pmed.1000259
http://www.naturalnews.com/z030164_flu_vaccines_senior_citizens.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/z022611_flu_shots_senior_citizens.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/z030209_placebo_medical_fraud.html
Posted by: patrons99 | November 08, 2010 at 09:28 AM
Poor Joe. I think we should email him our thoughts, maybe then he won't feel so silly- unless the Hg has totally poisoned his brain.
Posted by: casey | November 08, 2010 at 09:21 AM
Here's an interesting article from childhealthsafety.
“Flu Vaccine Caused 3587 US Miscarriages & Stillbirths” on September 22, 2010.
http://tinyurl.com/3ydy9zh
http://childhealthsafety.wordpress.com/2010/09/22/flu-vaccine-caused-3587-us-miscarriages-%C2%A0stillbirths/
This statistic tends to support the Gates, Rockefeller, and GAVI alliance eugenics agenda, doesn't it? Miscarriages is only one measure of the damage done. There is an undeniable holocaust of vaccine-induced diseases.
Posted by: patrons99 | November 08, 2010 at 08:39 AM
When I was teaching full time in an elementary school, the flu shots were dispensed to teachers in late Oct. or early Nov. Soon after that we would have 3 days of parent teacher conferences. We taught a half day and then had conferences until 7 or so at night. By the end of the week we were all sick. We blamed it on exhaustion and parents bringing babies and toddlers into the school, thereby spreading their germs. It happened like clockwork every year, and it sure felt like a mild case of the flu to me. I now wonder about the connection to the flu shot.
Posted by: CT teacher | November 08, 2010 at 08:17 AM
I used to wonder at the gullibility of supposedly "savy" New Yorkers .. lured by the idea of making "easy money" by playing one of the many "three card monte" schemes that once flourished in the Times Square area. These "marks" would stand there and watch as "shills" for the con-man would "win" .. time after time .. until the mark put his own money down .. guess what happened to HIS money?
With all due respect .. in my personal opinion .. annual flu vaccines are just another "three card monte" scheme .. run by con men none-the-less .. whose "marks" are otherwise savy men and women .. not trying to make "easy money" .. but .. desperate to avoid catching the flu.
Posted by: Bob Moffitt | November 08, 2010 at 07:28 AM
He's right he didn't get the flu, he was POISONED.
Posted by: Mary | November 08, 2010 at 06:20 AM
My kid got vaccinated with crap.
He got autism.
Coincidence?
Posted by: Elizabeth | November 08, 2010 at 05:47 AM