What's new
TerraForums Venus Flytrap, Nepenthes, Drosera and more talk

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Where does everyone stand in regards to...

  • #21
I am not saying all shots are bad,some are very good and I readily admit that. I am just saying that the flu shot is pointless if you are health. We are never going to wipe out flu with just vaccination.

As for smallpox. It has not gone the way of the dinosaur, it is alive and well in numerous labs around the world. No disease will ever be wiped from the Earth because someone will always want to keep one last strain around for some reason.
 
  • #22
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]As for smallpox. It has not gone the way of the dinosaur, it is alive and well in numerous labs around the world. No disease will ever be wiped from the Earth because someone will always want to keep one last strain around for some reason

its virtually extinct in the common populace
 
  • #23
Thanks pyro for enumerating the problems.  I have a roommate who's at the Harvard School of Public Health, and was asking him about superstrains the other day, and his nonchalance about the subject awed and dismayed me.  So i'm glad to know there are some learned people who care.

On the other hand, my father (an MD) is rabidly opposed to giving antibiotics when they are not called for, so that's good.  (He was also one of those who refused to give in to strong pressure from patients to prescribe Phen Phen for weightloss back in the wonder days- but that's a different topic.)  So at least it's not all doctors screwing up the future.

I'm curious where you get your statistics about the number of people who develop flu from the vaccine.  I find it very hard to believe that the FDA would continue to promote flu shots if the incidence of disease from the shot was so bad.

Are you aware of any organized effort to get antimicrobial consumer products regulated and public awareness ads broadcast?  I'd definitely be interested in supporting such a group.  Right now i've just got the "bottle bill", hardly life-threatening. Although i did have a chance yesterday to explain to a couple friends about the loss of tropical forests, the consequences, and the causes. I hadn't realized how little many (most?) people know about the importance of that ecology and the destruction going on, and was gratified to find a willing audience when the subject came up. So often people just don't know.
 
  • #24
Only have one moment so I will elaborate later. I do not recall where I got the numbers but I want to say it was an NIH study or something. I'll try to track them down again (been aboutr 5 years since I read the study.)
 
  • #25
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Finch @ Jan. 26 2005,5:14)]its (small pox) virtually extinct in the common populace
key word, virtually. yah never know where some of this may be hiding in the natural world. the bubonic plague is actually still rather common in third world countries, yah can even find it here in the states if yah know where to look and it wiped out a significant percentage of the worlds population at one point.

personally ill keep getting my flu shots, not because the flu scares me but the high likely hood of ME developing serious pnuemonia does. im also a firm believer in "exercizing" my immune system. i spend LOTS of time in the outdoors hiking, swimming in lakes and streams, camping and all that good stuff. i rarely take antibiotics as usually when i do get sick its a mild form of the common cold or flu. a super strain will show up. its not a matter of if but when.
 
  • #26
[b said:
Quote[/b] (Pyro @ Jan. 25 2005,10:13)]With doubling times on the order of 20 minutes at 37C (that is body temp
smile.gif
) you go through a couple million generations a day with bacterial.
While you are correct about quickly developing resistant strains, you're million generation a day is wrong. I calculate 72 generations in a single day with an ideal 20 minute replication time. Unless you meant millions of replications, then you would be correct.

I'm sure it was a typo on your part, I just didn't want to freak people out.
 
  • #27
This reminds me of Lewis Black's bit on flu shots.. "Of course you don't get the flu when you get a flu shot, because you always have a COLD!! Every year, it's the worst flu season ever, it's coming! There's a guy over in France, he doesn't wipe himself properly.. HE'S COMING!!!!"
 
  • #28
j, I think you might also want to take into acount your not talking about one single strain of microbe, Pyro (and I may be wrong) was probably meant something more along the lines of your 72 generations multiplied by X number of strains or something.. Anyway, why argue with a microbiologist, that is splitting hairs, the point is what matters.

I think everyone should go roll around in a cold mud puddle every day.
smile.gif
All I can say about you people that don't shower every day is Phew!
smile.gif
just kiddin...
smile.gif
 
  • #29
J,

You are correct, brain going faster than the fingers can type. Millions of offspring is what I was shooting for but replicant works just fine too.

The point I was trying to make is that if you are given just a single bacterial then given the random mutation of the genome and the total number of bacteria present at the end of the day from that one bacteria then there is a 1 in 4 chance of a mutation that will render resistance. And no one ever gets infected with just one bacteria.
 
Back
Top