LONDON — Pharmaceuticals company GlaxoSmithKline PLC said Tuesday it has advised medical staff in Canada to not use one batch of swine flu vaccines in case they trigger life-threatening allergies.
Company spokeswoman Gwenan White said that they issued the advice after reports that one batch of the swine flu vaccine might have caused more allergic reactions than normal.
“We have advised health care professionals not to use that batch while health authorities and GlaxoSmithKline investigate,” she said.
White said the batch at issue, which has been distributed across Canada, contains 172,000 doses of the vaccine. She declined to say how many doses had been administered before the advice to stop using them was given.
It seems people often need to experience a bullet to the head before they will believe bullets can be deadly…and then they rue the day they ignored warnings about playing with loaded guns.
Vaccination seems to hold a similar place. People ignore words of caution and roll up their sleeves to get a flu shot. It seems they think getting a vaccine is the same as taking a multivitamin, and equally as benign. But when serious adverse events occur, such as Guillain-Barre paralysis, a seizure disorder or even a death, a jolt of reality lays bare just how damaging a “simple vaccine” can be. Read the rest of this entry »
Now it turns out that one of the public school students given the swine flu vaccine without parental consent had to go to the emergency room after getting sick. Six-year-old Nikiyah Torres, who suffers from epilepsy (her parents had been waiting to see what their family doctor said about the swine flu vaccine) told WCBS 2, “He just gave me the needle, without asking me what is my name.”
The little girl told the Daily News, “My stomach was hurting, and I was itching,” and was taken to the hospital from her school, PS 335 in Brooklyn. According to the News, “When the nurse called for a student Thursday morning, Nikiyah’s teacher misunderstood and sent the wrong student, [NIkyah's mother Naomi] Troy said. The error was compounded when the nurse didn’t check Nikiyah’s name before sticking her in the shoulder.” Read the rest of this entry »
The elderly, the young, and the frequently exposed are being advised to get vaccinated against H1N1 flu virus this year, due to predictions of a possible influenza epidemic. A new law in New York requires nurses and doctors to receive the vaccination by the end of November. A band of four nurses in Albany, however, is taking a stand against mandated vaccination.
“I have had more staff that have become ill after the flu vaccines this year than coworkers that have actually come down with the illness,” Lorna Patterson, a nurse at Albany Medical Center’s emergency room, told news network WTEN. Patterson is one of the nurses who is filing a lawsuit this week against the state. She and her coworkers hope that they can stop the state from enforcing the mandatory vaccinations.
The World Health Organization, the UN agency (ir-)responsible for declaring a Phase 6 “PANDEMIC” global alert over what it calls H1N1 Influenza A or Swine Flu, whose chief Dr Margaret Chan has repeatedly warned that while Swine Flu to date had been rather mild, that the emergency declaration was necessary because it “could mutate” aggressively into a deadly pandemic killing millions, now admits well into the flu season in the Northern Hemisphere that H1N1 has apparently not mutated.
This year, the New York State Health Department is requiring all health care workers who come into contact with patients to get the flu vaccine, and will also require the H1N1 or swine flu vaccine as well.
It’s something the department says is for everyone’s safety, but a number of workers are concerned about being forced to get the shot. Steve Ference has more on why some hospital workers say the mandate is flat out wrong.
Rob Kozik, a registered nurse in Stony Brook University Medical Center’s neonatal intensive care unit, doesn’t want the government to force him to be vaccinated against H1N1 swine flu.
Dozens of Long Island nurses – many from Stony Brook University Medical Center – plan to rally with health care workers from across the state next week in Albany to protest a state regulation that mandates they be vaccinated for swine flu or lose their jobs.
If you have been paying attention than you already know that the vaccines being produced will contain a live virus. What was a surprise to me was that it will be available in a spray. Does that not seem like the worst idea ever, how will the live virus be contained when people are spraying this in the air? -ed
Inhalable vaccine available only between ages 2 and 49; not for pregnant women
Some flu shots will be available in early October as well
New H1N1 has not changed much from earlier virus, officials say
21 states are now reporting widespread flu activity
ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) — Health officials expect more than 3 million doses of H1N1 flu vaccine to be available in the first week of October.
“3.4 million doses of vaccines will be available,” said Dr. Jay Butler, who heads the 2009 H1N1 Vaccine Task Force at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“All of that vaccine is the inhalable vaccine,” he said Friday.
That form of vaccine is marketed in the United States as FluMist and is approved only for healthy individuals between the ages of 2 and 49. Pregnant women are not allowed to get this type of vaccine because it contains a live virus.
WASHINGTON (CNN) — The U.S. military wants to establish regional teams of military personel to assist civilian authorities in the event of a significant outbreak of the H1N1 virus — the swine flu — this fall, according to Defense Department officials.
The proposal is awaiting final approval from Defense Secretary Robert Gates.
The officials would not be identified because the proposal from the U.S. Northern Command’s Gen. Victor Renuart has not been approved by the secretary.
Posted by Brian 
