Should You Get A Flu Shot?

by David Brownstein, M.D.
DrBrownstein.com

Just as you can be sure that the sun rises in the East and sets in the West, you can count on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to encourage everybody to receive the flu vaccine.

Folks, this is flu season. Here is the 2019 CDC campaign to convince us all to the get the flu shot:

However, before you rush off to receive the flu vaccine, let me share some information with you. Last year, while the CDC was heavily promoting the flu vaccine for everybody, the flu vaccine was found to be ineffective for the vast majority who received it.

This is shown in the Table below (data from CDC).

Age Range	Adjusted vaccine Effectiveness
Overall	29%
6 months to 8 years	49%
9-17 years	6%
18-49	25%
50-64 years	12%
>65 years	12%

Folks, the ineffectiveness of the flu vaccine was nothing new—unfortunately, this is the norm. You see, the flu virus mutates every year and to expect the flu vaccine to match the circulating strains is ridiculous.

And, the flu vaccine is not a benign medical intervention. There are side effects to receiving the flu vaccine including serious neurological problems like Guillain-Barre syndrome.

The flu vaccine is the most compensated vaccine for vaccine injuries from the US Government.

Children are recommended to receive the flu vaccine even though the majority who do get it are not protected from the flu.

But, that is not all.

One study found children who receive the flu vaccine are at a 4.4x higher risk of virologically-confirmed non-influenza infections—in other words, they are more susceptible to other common flu-like viral infections.(1)

And, to make matters worse, asthmatic children who receive the flu vaccine have been found to have a 3x significantly increased risk for hospitalization for the flu and flu-like illnesses. (2)

I feel very sorry for health care workers who are required to have the flu vaccine for employment. There is not a single randomized study showing that there are any benefits to immunizing health care workers either for themselves or the patients they are in contact with.

Look at the above table for the effectiveness of the flu vaccine last year—the vaccine failed 75-88% of adults who received it!

And, just a comment about pregnant women being recommended to get the flu vaccine.

This is ridiculous!

It is important for pregnant women not to activate their immune systems via an inflammatory response. Maternal immune activation (MIA) is the term coined to describe a pregnant woman’s immune system that has been activated by an inflammatory response.

To be fair, the flu can cause MIA and problems in the fetus. But, not all pregnant woman get the flu and it must be kept in mind that the flu vaccine (along with every other vaccine) was designed to create an inflammatory response in the recipient. This inflammatory response can lead to MIA.

Epidemiological data has shown the relationship between prenatal exposure to MIA and the occurrence of autism as well as other neurological, immunological, and behavioral abnormalities in animals and humans. (3)

Why would anyone promote the use of a medical intervention—such as a vaccine—that is well known to activate inflammation in a pregnant woman?

The package insert for the Fluarix Quadrivalent vaccine states,

“ There are insufficient data on FLUARIX QUADRIVALENT in pregnant women to inform vaccine-associated risks.”(4)

In fact, flu shots have been shown to be associated with spontaneous abortion (i.e., miscarriage) in pregnant woman. (5)

The science would lead anyone to predict giving a pregnant woman a medical intervention–such as a flu shot–which causes MIA will increase her risk of miscarriage.

Please tell me why the flu shot is recommended for a pregnant woman each time she is pregnant?!

Folks, the flu vaccine is terribly ineffective. It causes more problems than it helps. We continue to waste untold amounts of scarce health care dollars on ineffective therapies like the flu vaccine.

Should you get a flu vaccine? Fuggetaboutit!

~DrB

Read the full article at DrBrownstein.com.

Comment on this article at VaccineImpact.com.

References

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22423139

American Thoracic Society. “Children Who Get Flu Vaccine Have Three Times Risk Of Hospitalization For Flu, Study Suggests.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 20 May 2009. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090519172045.htm>.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3068755/

https://www.gsksource.com/pharma/content/dam/GlaxoSmithKline/US/en/Prescribing_Information/Fluarix_Quadrivalent/pdf/FLUARIX-QUADRIVALENT.PDF

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264410X17308666