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Avoid Flu Shots, Take Vitamin D Instead



 
 
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Old October 7th 08, 02:15 AM posted to misc.health.alternative,misc.headlines,misc.kids.health,misc.kids
Jan Drew
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Default Avoid Flu Shots, Take Vitamin D Instead

http://heidilore.wordpress.com/2008/...min-d-instead/

Avoid Flu Shots, Take Vitamin D Instead
{ October 3, 2008 @ 10:57 am } · { Health }
{ Tags: flu shot, flu shots, mercury, vaccine, vitamin, vitamin d,
vitamins }

Another influenza season is beginning in the northern temperate zone, and
our government's Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will
strongly urge Americans to get a flu shot. Health officials will say that
every winter 5-20 percent of the population catches the flu, 200,000 people
are hospitalized, and 36,000 people will die from it.

The CDC's 15-member Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP)
makes recommendations each year on who should be vaccinated. Ten years ago,
for the 1999-2000 season, the committee recommended that people over age 65
and children with medical conditions have a flu shot. Seventy-four million
people were vaccinated. Next season (2000-01) the committee lowered the age
for universal vaccination from 65 to 50 years old, adding 41 million people
to the list. For the 2002-03 season, the ACIP added healthy children 6
months to 23 months old, and for 2004-05, children up to 5 years old. For
the 2008-09 season the committee has advised that healthy children 6 months
to 18 years old have a flu shot each year. Its recommendations for influenza
vaccination now covers 256 million Americans - 84 percent of the U.S.
population. Only healthy people ages 19-49 not involved in some aspect of
health care remain exempt. Pharmaceutical companies have made 146 million
influenza vaccines for the U.S. market this flu season.

Almost all the ACIP members who make these recommendations have financial
ties to the vaccine industry. The CDC therefore must grant each member a
conflict-of-interest waiver.

The CDC mounts a well-orchestrated campaign each season to generate interest
and demand for flu shots. Along with posters for the public, flyers, and
health care provider materials, it encourages doctors to "recommend/urge flu
shots." Medical groups, nonmedical organizations (like the YMCA), and the
media trumpet CDC-released messages on influenza, notably: "Flu kills 36,000
per year," "This could be a bad/serious flu year," and "Flu vaccine is the
best defense against flu." The government promotes National Vaccination
Week, which this year is December 8-14. This year, however, rather than
uniformly following the government's "Seven-Step Recipe" for generating
demand for flu shots, the mainstream media has questioned their benefits.

The New York Times had an article in the September 2, 2008 issue titled
"Doubts Grow Over Flu Vaccine in Elderly," which says, "The influenza
vaccine, which has been strongly recommended for people over 65 for more
than four decades, is losing its reputation as an effective way to ward off
the virus in the elderly. A growing number of immunologists and
epidemiologists say the vaccine probably does not work very well for people
over 70, the group that accounts for three-fourths of all flu deaths." The
article refers to a study done by the Group Health Center for Health Studies
in Seattle on 3,500 people, age 65-94, to determine if flu vaccines are
effective in protecting older people against developing pneumonia (Lancet
2008;372:398-405).

The National Vital Statistics Reports compiled by the CDC show that only
1,138 deaths a year occur due to influenza alone (257 in 2001, 727 in 2002,
1,792 in 2003, 1,100 in 2004, and 1,812 in 2005). Bacterial pneumonia causes
some 60,000 deaths each year, mainly in the winter, when surveillance data
show increased prevalence of the flu virus. Using a mathematical (Poisson)
regression model, officials estimate that the flu virus triggers some of the
winter-time deaths from pneumonia, along with deaths in people with
cardiovascular disease and other chronic illnesses. More than 34,000 of
those "36,000? flu deaths are what officials estimate are
"influenza-associated" pneumonic and cardiovascular deaths.

The Group Health study reported in the New York Times and other newspapers
around the country found that flu shots do not protect elderly people
against developing pneumonia. Pneumonia occurs with equal frequency in
people over age 65 with or without a flu shot. Earlier studies, biased by
the "healthy user effect," over-estimated the vaccine's effect on pneumonia
because they did not adjust for the presence and severity of other diseases
in unvaccinated people. As the Group Health authors point out, "The study
found that people who were healthy and conscientious about staying well were
the most likely to get an annual flu shot. Those who are frail may have
trouble bathing or dressing on their own and are less likely to get to their
doctor's office or a clinic to receive the vaccine. They are also more
likely to be closer to death." Other investigators question that there is a
mortality benefit with influenza vaccination. Vaccination coverage among the
elderly increased from 15% in 1980 to 65% now, but there has been no
decrease in deaths from influenza and pneumonia (Am J Respir Crit Care Med
2008;178:527-33). As one vaccine researcher puts it, "I think the evidence
base [for mortality benefits from flu shots] we have leaned on is not valid"
(Lancet Infect Dis 2007;7:658-66).

There is also a lack of evidence that young children benefit from flu shots.
A systematic review of 51 studies involving 260,000 children age 6 to 23
months found no evidence that the flu vaccine is any more effective than a
placebo (Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2006;1:CD004879).

Randomized controlled trials are the most reliable way to determine the
efficacy - and safety - of a given treatment. No randomized trials show that
flu shots reduce mortality from influenza or flu-related pneumonia. Some do
show that the flu vaccine is somewhat effective in preventing influenza. In
one widely quoted study, 1838 volunteers age 60 and over were randomized to
receive a flu shot or placebo (a shot of saline). The flu shot reduced the
relative risk of contracting (serologically confirmed, clinical) influenza
by a seemingly impressive 50%. The incidence of influenza in the
unvaccinated people in this study was 3%. In the vaccinated group it was 2%
(JAMA 1994;272:1661-5). Flu shots reduced the absolute risk of contracting
influenza by a meager 1% (not 50%, as the "relative risk" portrays it). In
actuality, for every 100 people that have a flu shot only one will benefit
from it - this, in medical parlance, is the "number needed to treat" (NNT)
in order to achieve any benefit from the treatment. A flu shot provides no
benefit for the other 99 people - 2 of them will get influenza anyway - and
all 100 risk being harmed by the vaccine.

Another randomized trial by Zaman and coworkers published recently (NEJM
2008;359: published online September 17, in print October 9) found that the
incidence of influenza in infants whose mothers had a flu shot during their
pregnancy was 4% (6/159). The incidence of flu in infants whose mothers did
not have a flu shot was 10% (16/157). In this study (done in Bangladesh and
funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, and
others) flu shots reduced the relative risk of influenza illness in infants
by a seemingly impressive 63%. But only 6 out of 100 infants benefited from
the shot. The other 94 received no benefit - 4 got influenza anyway - and
all are at risk from being harmed by the vaccine, particularly from the
mercury, aluminum, and formaldehyde in it.

After officials select the three strains of flu virus that they think are
most likely to be circulating during the next winter season (they picked the
wrong ones last year), vaccine makers grow the viruses in fertilized chicken
eggs, with 500,000 eggs per day (each examined by hand) for up to eight
months. Formaldehyde is used to inactivate the virus. It is a known
cancer-causing agent. Aluminum is added to promote an antibody response. It
is a neurotoxin that may play a role in Alzheimer's disease. Other additives
and adjuvants in the flu vaccine include Triton X-100 (a detergent),
Polysorbate 80, carbolic acid, ethylene glycol (antifreeze), gelatin, and
various antibiotics - neomycin, streptomycin, and gentamicin - that can
cause allergic reactions in some people.

Two-thirds of the vaccines made for the 2008-09 flu season, 100 million of
them, contain full-dose thimerosal, an organomercury compound, which is 49%
mercury by weight. (An unidentified number of the other 50 million vaccines
contain either "no" or "trace" amounts of thimerosal.) It is used to
disinfect the vaccine. Each one of these 100 million flu shots contain 25
micrograms of mercury, a mercury content that is 50,000 part per billion,
250 times more than the Environmental Protection Agency's safety limit.
Mercury is a neurotoxin, which has a toxicity level 1,000 times that of
lead.

There is some evidence that flu shots cause Alzheimer's disease. This most
likely is a result of combining mercury with aluminum and formaldehyde,
which renders them much more toxic together through a synergistic effect
than each would be alone. One investigator has reported that people who
received the flu vaccine each year for 3 to 5 years had a ten-fold greater
chance of developing Alzheimer's disease than people who did not have any
flu shots (Int J Clin Invest 2005;1:1-4). (The brains of people with
Alzheimer's disease display three pathologic hallmarks: neurofibillary
tangles, amyloid plaques, and phosphorylation of tau protein. Brain cells
grown in test tubes develop these changes when exposed to nanomolar doses of
mercury, doses similar to the amount of mercury a person gets from a flu
shot.)

Mercury in vaccines has also been implicated as a cause of autism. Vaccine
makers have now removed thimerosal from all childhood vaccines, except flu
shots. For more on this subject see my article "Mercury on the Mind," with
its recommended reading list, and Evidence of Harm: Mercury in Vaccines and
the Autism Epidemic: A Medical Controversy by David Kirby.

Three serious, acknowledged adverse reactions to the flu vaccine are joint
inflammation and arthritis, anaphylactic shock (and other life-threatening
allergic reactions), and Guillain-Barré syndrome. Guillain-Barré syndrome
(GBS) is a paralytic autoimmune disease that fells people several weeks
after their flu shot. One woman with post-vaccination GBS writes:

"I had a flu shot in November, and by December I became weak and continued
to get weaker until I collapsed and was taken to the hospital. I was
helpless, totally paralyzed with Guillain-Barré syndrome. I was in ICU for
three weeks and then transferred to a rehabilitation center. Three months
later I was released to come home because I could ambulate approximately 100
feet with a walker. I continued rehabilitation as an outpatient for the next
three months until I could walk with hand crutches. Today, I need a cane. I
was not forewarned of any possible hazard when they gave me the flu shot."

Another:

"I have a friend, now in a wheelchair, who took the flu shot, got
Guillain-Barré and now cannot walk."

Another woman, diagnosed with GBS after a flu shot, spent 16 months in the
hospital paralyzed on a ventilator and life support. After several
subsequent multi-month hospitalizations she writes:

"On my last visit to my neurologist I was able to walk about 6 feet holding
his hand, not much but it took years to be able to do that. I scratch my
head when I hear them promoting flu shots. Most people that I come into
contact with - in the hospital and out (nurses, doctors, and regular
people) - after hearing my story, feel that it is better to chance the flu
and not get the shot." (These statements are in Vaccine Safety Manual for
Concerned Families and Health Practitioners: Guide to Immunizations Risks
and Protection by Neil Miller [no relation], pages 84-86.)

The package inserts that come with the flu vaccine note that GBS is a
potential complication. There are 1 to 2 cases of GBS per 1 million
vaccinated persons. (There were 10 times that many cases of GBS in 1976 with
the flu vaccine used that year). Taking a flu shot is essentially the same
as buying a lottery ticket for acquiring Guillain-Barré syndrome.

Seventy percent of doctors do not get a flu shot.

Flu virus exists in people year-round, and new strains seed a population
during the "off-season." In the northern and southern temperate zones, flu
epidemics occur in the cold part of the year, October-March and
April-September respectively. Flu epidemics occur in the tropics during the
rainy season.

Explanations for why flu epidemics occur in the winter when it is cold -
people being indoors in close contact, drier air dehydrating mucus and
preventing the body from expelling virus particles, the virus lingering
longer on exposed surfaces, like doorknobs, with colder temperatures - do
not explain why flu epidemics occur in the tropics.

Something that can explain why flu epidemics also occur both in warm and
cold climates is this: During a flu epidemic, wherever it may be, the
atmosphere blocks ultraviolet B (UVB) radiation from the Sun. In the
temperate zones above latitude 35 degrees North and South, the sun is at a
low enough angle in the winter that the ozone layer in the atmosphere
absorbs and blocks the short-wavelength (280-315 nanometers) UVB rays. In
the tropics during the wet season, thick rain clouds block UVB rays.

Skin contains a cholesterol derivative, 7-dehydrocholesterol. UVB radiation
on skin breaks open one of the carbon rings in this molecule to form vitamin
D. The activated form of vitamin D (1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D) attaches to
receptors on genes that control their expression, which turn protein
production on or off. Vitamin D regulates the expression of more than 1,000
genes throughout the body. They include ones in macrophages, cells in the
immune system that, among other things, attack and destroy viruses. Vitamin
D switches on genes in macrophages that make antimicrobial peptides,
antibiotics the body produces. Like antibiotics, these peptides attack and
destroy bacteria; but unlike antibiotics, they also attack and destroy
viruses.

Vitamin D also expresses genes that stop macrophages from overreacting to an
infection and releasing too many inflammatory agents - cytokines - that can
damage infected tissue. Vitamin D, for example, down regulates genes that
produce interleukin-2 and interferon gamma, two cytokines that prime
macrophages and cytotoxic T cells to attack the body's tissues. In the
1918-19 Spanish flu pandemic that killed 500,000 Americans, young healthy
adults would wake up in the morning feeling well, start drowning in their
own inflammation as the day wore on, and be dead by midnight, as happened to
my 22-year-old grandmother and my wife's 24-year-old grandmother. Autopsies
showed complete destruction of the epithelial cells lining the respiratory
tract resulting, researchers now know, from a macrophage-induced severe
inflammatory reaction to the virus. In a terribly misguided way, these
victims' own immune system attacked and killed them, not the virus,
something in future pandemics vitamin D, in appropriate doses, can prevent.

A creditable hypothesis that explains the seasonal nature of flu is that
influenza is a vitamin D deficiency disease. Cannell and colleagues offer
this hypothesis in "Epidemic Influenza and Vitamin D" (Epidemiol Infect
2006;134:1129-40). They quote Hippocrates (circa 400 B.C.), who said,
"Whoever wishes to investigate medicine properly should proceed thus: in the
first place to consider the seasons of the year." Vitamin D levels in the
blood fall to there lowest point during flu seasons. Unable to be protected
by the body's own antibiotics (antimicrobial peptides) that this
gene-expresser engineers, a person with a low vitamin D blood level is more
vulnerable to contracting colds, influenza, and other respiratory infections
(e.g., respiratory syncytial virus).

Studies show that children with rickets, a vitamin D-deficient skeletal
disorder, suffer from frequent respiratory infections; and children exposed
to sunlight are less likely to get a cold. Given vitamin D's wide-ranging
effects on gene expression, other studies, for example, show that people
diagnosed with cancer in the summer have an improved survival compared with
those diagnosed in the winter (Int J Cancer 2006;119:1530-36).

A growing body of evidence indicates that rickets in children and
osteomalacia in adults (both a softening of bones due to defective bone
mineralization) are just the tip of a vitamin D-deficiency iceberg.
Tuberculosis and various autoimmune diseases, such as multiple sclerosis,
lupus, and type I diabetes have a causal association with low vitamin D
blood levels. Vitamin D deficiency plays a causal role in hypertension,
coronary artery disease, congestive heart failure, peripheral vascular
disease, and stroke. It is also a risk factor for metabolic syndrome and
type II diabetes, chronic fatigue, seasonal affective disorder, depression,
cataracts, infertility, and osteoporosis. At the bottom of the vitamin D
iceberg lies cancer. There is good evidence that vitamin D deficiency is a
causal factor in some 15 different common cancers. (NEJM 2007;357:266-81.)

The increased number of deaths that occur in winter, largely from pneumonia
and cardiovascular diseases, are much more likely due to vitamin D
deficiency than to an increased prevalence of serologically-positive
influenza virus (which also results from vitamin D deficiency).

Experts reckon that an optimum blood level of vitamin D (25-hydroxyvitamin
D) is 50-99 ng/ml. (Children need a blood level 8 ng/ml to prevent rickets.
It takes a concentration 20 to maintain parathyroid hormone levels in a
normal range. A level 34 is needed for peak intestinal calcium absorption.
And in elderly people neuromuscular performance steadily improves as vitamin
D blood levels rise to 50 ng/ml.) The government's recommended daily
allowance (RDA) for vitamin D is 400 IU (international units) a day, an
amount sufficient to prevent rickets and osteomalacia but not vitamin D's
other gene-regulating benefits. To achieve all of vitamin D's benefits one
has to take an amount ten times the government's RDA - 4,000 to 5,000 IU a
day.

A light-skinned person will synthesize 20,000 IU of vitamin D in 20 minutes
sunbathing on a tropical beach, at which point vitamin D synthesis shuts
down for the day (it takes a dark-skinned person 6 to 10 times longer to
make this amount). Human breast milk does not contain vitamin D, since, from
an evolutionary standpoint, our African ancestors' infants, reared near the
equator, could readily synthesize this gene regulator from sunlight in their
skin. Food contains very little vitamin D. (The highest concentrations are
in wild salmon, mackerel, sardines, and cod liver oil.) Federal regulations
now require that some foods, like milk, be fortified with vitamin D. But one
would have to drink 200 glasses of milk to obtain the amount of vitamin D a
light-skinned person can make in 20 minutes sunbathing.

The majority of Americans are vitamin D deficient, with a 25-hydroxy D blood
level 20 ng/ml, or insufficient, with a level of 20-30 ng/ml. Cheap
vitamin D supplements (D3, not D2) provide the only way most of us can
maintain a year-round vitamin D blood levels greater than 50 ng/ml. That
requires taking 4-5,000 IU of vitamin D a day (50,000 IU every ten days or
150,000 IU a month).

Taking vitamin D in these doses is safe, far safer than a flu shot with all
the bad chemicals it contains. Concerns about vitamin D toxicity are
overblown. One can take a 10,000 IU vitamin D supplement on a daily basis
without any adverse effects. In healthy persons, long-term consumption of
more than 40,000 IU a day is necessary to cause an elevation in the blood
calcium level (hypercalcemia), the first manifestation of vitamin D toxicity
(Am J Clin Nutr 2006;84:694-97). Check your vitamin D (25-hydroxy D) blood
level. People with granulomatous diseases like sarcoidosis should also check
their blood level of 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D, the active form.

Can a shot (or tablets) of vitamin D prevent influenza better than a flu
shot? There is good reason to believe that it can.

Doctors in India and Canada give people a once-yearly injection of 600,000
IU of vitamin D (MJA 2005;183:10-12). That would be better, and safer, than
having a flu shot. Daily, weekly, or monthly vitamin D tablets work just as
well. For more on this subject see my article "Vitamin D in a New Light" and
visit Dr. Cannell's Vitamin D Council website.

Investigators have completed one double-blind, randomized,
placebo-controlled trial that shows vitamin D prevents colds and influenza
significantly better (P 0.002) than a placebo pill (Epidemiol Infection
2007;135:1095-6). A large multi-center randomized trial conducted over
multiple flu seasons comparing vitamin D to a flu shot can show conclusively
which is better, and safer. But given the financial stakes underpinning flu
shots, and unpatentable vitamin D, who will fund it?

In the meantime, considering what is most likely to be the outcome of such a
trial, if it is ever conducted, I recommend that you avoid flu shots and
take vitamin D instead.

Notes

Influenza virus Flu viruses are classified into types A, B, and C. Type A
viruses cause most influenza epidemics. They exist, replicate, and mutate in
swine and horses; seals, dolphins, and whales; migratory water birds, geese
and ducks; domestic birds chicken and turkeys; and humans. Type B and C
viruses exist only in humans and only type B causes (relatively mild)
infections. Influenza A viruses are further categorized into subtypes on the
basis of two surface antigens (proteins): hemaglutinin (H) and neuraminidase
(N). There are 15 different H and 9 different N antigens. The 1918-19
Spanish flu pandemic was caused by an H1NI Type A virus. Subtypes of
influenza viruses are further classified by the names of cities, states or
countries, along with the year they were discovered. For the 2008-09
(northern temperate zone) season, officials predict and have directed
vaccines to be made against A/Brisbane/59/2007 (H1N1), A/Brisbane/10/2007
(H3N2), and B/Florida/4/2006. In an unusual departure, they are all
different from the previous season, which missed the strains that caused
influenza that season. What doctors diagnose as "influenza" is often an
influenza-like illness caused by a respiratory virus other than the flu.
Serologic tests are necessary to prove that one's respiratory illness is
actually caused by the flu virus.

Other things to do to prevent the flu Avoid sugar. It suppresses immunity.
Avoid Omega-6 vegetable oils (corn, safflower, sunflower, peanut, canola,
and soybean oil). Americans consume 50 times more of these oils than are
necessary for good health. In this amount they are powerful immune
suppressants. Take a well-balanced multivitamin/mineral capsule on a daily
basis. Eat garlic. Manage stress. Exercise. Get enough rest. And wash your
hands. Viruses spread most often from touching contaminated objects, like
doorknobs, phones, shared computer keyboards, and shaking hands.

  #2  
Old November 7th 08, 12:56 AM
TopNotchDad TopNotchDad is offline
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Hmmm - that's an interesting read. I will have to try some of these tips. Flu season is around the corner.
  #3  
Old November 7th 08, 04:48 AM
jackie0109 jackie0109 is offline
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For me taking vitamins everyday helps but choose the right vitamin for your needs. Sometimes people tend to be dependent on drugs like this.
 




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