Should I get a Flu shot this Fall?
Thimerasol and other Vaccination issues
 
 Every year in September I start to get questioned on my position on vaccinations for the flu. This year I thought I would get ahead of the issue and perhaps give some information early enough to help people make a more informed choice.
 
First, I would like to start with a common misunderstanding of my position on vaccination. I have had patients say "I know you are against vaccinations", and this is not really correct. I would advise against vaccinations for diseases that are no longer a common threat. Vaccinations are not without risks ( as I will go into later here) and the risk of harm from the vaccination itself has to be weighed against the risk of harm from the disease. A good illustration of this principle would be the vaccination for Smallpox. There are numerous texts, articles and documentary films on the eradication of Smallpox that you can refer to to educate yourself on this subject. What you will see in all of them is that as long as entire populations were continually vaccinated against Smallpox, the disease persisted. This is because the vaccination causes the disease in some people and these people then became a reservoir of the disease that spreads to others. The disease was eliminated when broad vaccination was stopped and a system of vaccinating a circle around outbreak areas was adopted. That is why you & your family have not been vaccinated for Smallpox in the last twenty years, and why we have seen no occurrences of this disease.
 
I feel that a vaccination is parallel to a gun in the house for defense. If I lived in Israel I would have a loaded assault rifle over the mantle. The risk of unlikely incidental misuse causing an injury to my family would be offset by the very real and likely protection it would give us from attackers. But since I live in Westchester County NY I keep no weapon at the ready believing that the extra risk from doing so is not justified by threats in my environment. My "protection" would be more dangerous than my environment. Likewise when the incidence of a disease falls low enough the risks of protecting yourself from it with a vaccination can be statistically more hazardous to a population than the disease itself.

In addition to Smallpox, where vaccination has long ceased, another example of a disease where the risks of vaccination might now outweigh the risks of the disease is Polio. How long would a population need to be free of a disease before vaccination became an unnecessary risk? I would suggest that 20 years is very safe, and it has been 20 years since there was a case reported in the US according to the World Health Organization (W.H.O.). Unless you travel to countries where this disease is more likely to occur, the greater risk might be in the vaccination. You can check on the US & world wide incidence of Polio at this link:
 
Some vaccinations, like Polio, are believed to yield benefits that last for many years. The Flu vaccine is NOT one of these. Because the influenza virus mutates rapidly we must update the vaccine every year to reflect this. Even doing so, we are always a year behind and therefore not fully protected. If one decides to go down the "flu shot road" it would require yearly vaccinations. Thimerasol, a mercury containing substance, is still present in most influenza vaccines along with other delicious chemicals like formaldehyde. Repeated vaccinations will result in accumulation of mercury at higher than EPA safe limits. I have pasted below a link to an excellent review of the related risks and two excerpted paragraphs from that review. It seems that exposure to such a toxin as mercury alone, one that is teratogenic (cancer causing ) is a great deal of risk to assume to protect oneself from the flu, a generally self limiting disease without any lingering effects. The risks to children and pregnant women is much greater than the rest of the population. 
http://www.jpands.org/vol11no2/ayoub.pdf
 
BUT VACCINATION IS THE ONLY WAY TO PREVENT DISEASE, RIGHT?
 
Despite the very good job of selling the value of vaccination, especially for the Polio epidemic, it is unclear how much benefit it was even for that. Polio was steeply declining BEFORE the Salk vaccine was developed (See chart below). Improvements in nutrition & sanitation certainly play a larger role in disease prevention than any other two factors.
 
HOW ACCURATE IS OUR DATA ON VACCINE RISKS?
 
I would say marginal. A large reason for this is that most vaccine related reactions and negative consequences go unreported by physicians not eager to indict themselves for patients injuries and illnesses. The same can be said for the complications of treatment in every profession, including mine.
 
WHAT CAN WE DO TO GET BETTER RISK DATA?
 
Probably the best thing  for the vaccination related debates would be a facilitation of reaction reporting directly by the patients. There can be situations where a patient is certain of an ill effect that their doctor does not want to acknowledge. You can, and should, report such reactions yourself (see the graphic below). Remember, your doctor has no control over the manufacture of the vaccine or the oversight of it's testing and safety. Also your doctor probably does not have "research" quality resources or the time to use them to document a problem with a vaccine. While individual bad reactions may be noted, you cannot expect your doctor to have an overview of the practices of thousands of doctors and the reactions of hundreds of thousands of patients. That is why you must report these problems yourself.

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UPDATE: This is a letter I received from a patient today in response to this newsletter. When Joe was 50 I advised him against a flu shot. He chose to get it. He suffered a rapid development of pain at the injection site followed by neuropathy in the arm culminating in a form of paralysis knows as an "ulnar claw hand" on that side. Until that time he had played piano and keyboard professionally. This later developed into broader constitutional symptoms including fatigue and a general loss of his ability to be active physically. This is his story, and he is a major reason why I wrote the Flu Shot newsletter. I have removed some interpersonal dialogue and changed the names for privacy. One good or bad story proves nothing about the overall efficacy of vaccinations, but  these stories are the ones the organized phamaceutical industry denies ever happen or are insignificant. Joe feels his experience was very significant. Vaccinating for killer diseases or those with great potential for harm is a more complicated issue than vaccinating for the flu. In hind sight, Bob would have loved to have had the flu that year...
 
 
Hi Glen-
Bob and Mary here in Sunny florida sending our greetings!  Glad to receive your newsletter today - good for you for spreading the word on vaccine injury!  Quick update on Bob - he was treated at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesotta this year - he had 2 visits, each one about 2 and 1/2 weeks long.  What a great place!  The diagnosis from them is an autoimmune illness from a vaccine injury (tetanus and pneumonia).  He has good days and bad but we work around them - living here has been a huge benefit - the warmth, environment, etc.  Bob was also accepted by the Vaccine Injury Program (VICP) this year and that has been very helpful; they acknowledged his illness and injury from the vaccines.  This has also enabled us to get Joseph a permanent medical exemption from the State.  Bob has found a wonderful orthopedic chiropractor here in Florida and has been getting a good response from treatment with her. Please keep in touch - Thanks again for supporting vaccine awareness. 
-Mary & Bob