If the Doctor refuses the shot, then what?

And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;it tolls for thee.
-John Donne

The outlook was scary! The world health organizations were predicting that an outbreak of swine flu could at any moment turn into the worst pandemic since the Spanish flu of 1918-1919. Something had to be done, right away. The year was 1976. So, in a rush to immunize the citizens of the United States, President Gerald Ford threw millions of dollars in resources to fast track a vaccine. As it turned out, the vaccine was worse than the disease. No pandemic or even epidemic materialized. Plus, according to one source, the rushed vaccine led to “532 cases of vaccine-related Guillain-Barré syndrome and at least 25 deaths.” (http://www.semp.us/publications/biot_reader.php?BiotID=177).

Subsequently, in addition to the millions of dollars spent on producing the little administered vaccine, the government then spent millions of dollars compensating the vaccine’s victims.

Is it just me, or do we seem to learn nothing from the past?!?

Now, 33 years later we are again engaged in a similar potential medical cataclysm, and dealing with it in a similar fashion. Please note, that at this time, the Swine flu a.k.a.H1N1 is less dangerous than the typical seasonal flu. Since the H1N1 first made an appearance, an estimated 4,437 deaths have occurred in the entire world, while seasonal flu killed an estimated 36,000 in a single winter. Yet, because of ignorant governmental intrusion into medical care, the majority of vaccine producers have spent their resources to rush the H1N1 vaccine to the market and have put the seasonal vaccine on the back burner. We now are told that the seasonal vaccine supply will be only half of what is necessary.

Believe me, I am not belittling even one death, as John Donne said, “Any man's death diminishes me", but Perspective Please: we have an H1N1 vaccine rushed to completion (which I might add many health care providers are refusing to take) for a disease that killed hundreds over several years in the U S since its first occurrence, but we will be unable to sufficiently vaccinate U S citizens for seasonal flu which killed tens of thousands just last winter! The math here is simple…and the bottom line is even simpler: Keep the government and their inadequately educated noses out of out health care!