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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Nov 15, 2012 - 11:58am PT
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they guess which one
Uh, there's guessing and then there is scientific probability analysis.
I guess there might be a difference.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Nov 15, 2012 - 11:59am PT
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No, the Elderberry research is interesting, but playing around with cytokine response is definitely a double-edged sword which can work both for and against you depending on the specific circumstances. While it may be helpful with more common flu strains, it may act as an 'accelerant' with those flu strains which promote cytokine storms.
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Caveman
climber
Cumberland Plateau
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:00pm PT
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Locker, just sharing my opinion of elderberry. I am nothing close to a doctor.
" While it may be helpful with more common flu strains, it may act as an 'accelerant' with those flu strains which promote cytokine storms."
Good reason for doing your research before diving in.
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BuddhaStalin
climber
Truckee, CA
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:03pm PT
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<--RN and doesn't flu vaccine. I just wear a mask during flu peak at work like im supposed to. I'll wait until I have a need for the vaccine.
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:08pm PT
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I've read that the 1918 flu deaths were the result of immune response (cytokine storm). Elderberry is an excellent flu treatment with the exception of strains that are unresponsive to cytokine effects. With those strains elderberry is contraindicative.
This is one of the funniest tinfoil hat assertions I've ever read.
The 1918 epidemic was caused by flu vaccine which was not invented until 1931.
Hmmmmm.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
-A race of corn eaters
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:11pm PT
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yet another inspiring thread, I see, telegraphing to all the universe our human savvy
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:12pm PT
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I would avoid it, ever. I think it's a scam by the drug companies to make a lot of money every year out of people's fear. In a practical sense, it's useless because, like Tami said, they guess which one will be the dominant strain for the year so they can grow it up and process it in time for flu season. If you notice, they never get it right, either.
The manufacturers make very little money, if any, from it.
They virtually always get the strain right. What you notice are the infections among the people who did not get immunized......
Hmmmmm
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Caveman
climber
Cumberland Plateau
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:14pm PT
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(I've read that the 1918 flu deaths were the result of immune response (cytokine storm). Elderberry is an excellent flu treatment with the exception of strains that are unresponsive to cytokine effects. With those strains elderberry is contraindicative.)
"This is one of the funniest tinfoil hat assertions I've ever read.
The 1918 epidemic was caused by flu vaccine which was not invented until 1931.
Hmmmmm."
I said 'immune response'. I did not say 'vaccine'. To further clarify..........the deaths in healthy people were due to immune response (cytokine storm).
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:24pm PT
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Branscomb: I ended up with Guillan-Barre Syndrome, the paralysis starting in the feet and moving upwards until it paralysis your autonomic nervous system and you stop breathing. Didn't get to the last part fortunately. I'm the 1 in 100,000 you read about on the insert!
Did you have asthma, use an inhaler or have any other respiratory distress/issues prior to getting the shot? The 1976 vaccine prompted a lot of Guillan-Barre as an adverse reaction in an unusually high number of people, one of my climbing partners among them. His didn't stop and he ended up in an iron lung for months before it remissed and then he had to re-learn muscular control over his body and suffered the atrophy of a lot of small muscles which was tough as an artist.
But prior to the shot he suffered from chronic bronchial asthma and used an inhaler constantly in order to climb. Given we don't know what triggers Guillan-Barre syndrome (or asthmas) I believe there is some speculation that there maybe underlying issues with folks who have Guillan-Barre induced via the vaccine which was my reason for asking in your case.
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:27pm PT
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Ok, the opportunity for a little education.
The manufacturers do not "guess" which strains to include in a vaccine. The flu circulates around the world, starting in East Asia, then spreading west. It takes about 9 months to make the journey to the US, then it starts again.
The problem with the vaccine arises when, during that journey, the virus mutates into another strain, and the new strain predominates. It is rare, but it happens.
The vaccine that is used these days are all three-strain containing. They contain last years predominant Type A strain (which always hangs around a bit), the predominant strain that has arisen this year in Asia, and the current circulating Type B strain (which changes much less fast)
The vaccine does give some protection to a newly arising strain, though.
Many, Many people confuse "influenza" with flu-like diseases, particularly colds. When I was practicing full time, I'd have 20 people/day come in complaining of the flu. PERHAPS one actually had it.
In my experiece, the symptom that most closely matched the disease was absolutely debilitating muscle fatigue and pain. Such that getting out of bed was something that required real determination.
The last time I got the flu, I was hospitalized for 4 days. Never again!
I get it every year, and always will.
Like an earthquake, we are overdue for a killing pandemic. It will happen, and when it does, it is going to be ugly.
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Caveman
climber
Cumberland Plateau
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:32pm PT
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Speaking of disease reduction, I read an article about a study done at a prestigious university that stated they had isolated to essential oils that killed MRSA on contact. As I read I thought they will not tell in the article what oils were involved. They didn't. In fact when the study results became known funding for the study was dropped. Most likely reason was that it was not an exotic substance but one available in almost every garden. Not what the drug companies want to hear.
Another small trial examined possibilities that MRSA could be held in check by simply dispersing oils into atmosphere in clinics, hospitals. doctors retaliated saying it could not possibly be that simple. Money is the motivator and if it is not involved forgetaboutit!
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Caveman
climber
Cumberland Plateau
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:49pm PT
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"The effect of essential oils on methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus using a dressing model.
Or google: 'mrsa oil ncbi' to see a boat load of study abstracts on various oils..".
My point is that funding was dropped as said substances were common. There are many oils that might work. That came out as more study was done around the globe.
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splitter
Trad climber
Cali Hodad, surfing the galactic plane
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Nov 15, 2012 - 12:57pm PT
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I have gotten the flu vacine/shot every year since the early 80's except for two (2) years. I have only come down with the flu twice in about 30 years. Yep, it was during the two winters (flu seasons) that i didn't get a flu shot!
I haven't even gotten a common cold. But, the two years I did get the flu, it was hideous and lasted about 3 weeks! It was very hard to shake both times!
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Caveman
climber
Cumberland Plateau
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Nov 15, 2012 - 01:50pm PT
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(I've read that the 1918 flu deaths were the result of immune response (cytokine storm). Elderberry is an excellent flu treatment with the exception of strains that are unresponsive to cytokine effects. With those strains elderberry is contraindicative.)
"This is one of the funniest tinfoil hat assertions I've ever read.
The 1918 epidemic was caused by flu vaccine which was not invented until 1931.
Hmmmmm."
The paragraph at the top is what I wrote. Below that is the response by Ken M. Aside from not understanding what I said just what is tinfoil hat about what I wrote? Please educate.
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splitter
Trad climber
Cali Hodad, surfing the galactic plane
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Nov 15, 2012 - 01:55pm PT
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1918 flu deaths... My mother lost seven (7) young brothers & sister during that outbreak. She wasn't born yet (was born later) but she had pictures of them, which she would occasionally bring out to look at, all her life. It was obvious that she mourned deeply for them.
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monolith
climber
albany,ca
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Nov 15, 2012 - 02:02pm PT
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Caveman, Ken likes to show what a professional he is and how uneducated the masses are so much that his reading comprehension is sometimes overwhelmed.
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nature
climber
Boulder, CO
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Nov 15, 2012 - 02:02pm PT
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nope.
what werner said
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Branscomb
Trad climber
Lander, WY
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Nov 15, 2012 - 02:12pm PT
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Healyj: didn't go to the respiratory distress thing. I decided I should go see a doc when I couldn't feel my feet anymore and started having a lot of trouble walking. Before that, I thought my climbing shoes were just too tight. Oh boy. Fortunately there was a good neurologist here who knew right off what it was and put me in ICU in case I did crump. Seems like they constantly did ABGs and Respiratory capacity tests but it didn't go that far.
He got ahold of five vials of highly purified human IgG that was used by the military to vaccinate their people for HepA. It was so highly purified that there was zilch chance of transmitting HIV. By a competitive inhibition chemistry thing, the high concentrations of IV IgG given over five days knocked the IgMs off the protein sites of the long neuron myeline sheaths, stopping the complement cascade from further eroding the sheaths (which had caused the lack of neuron transmission, causing the paralysis) and allowed the sheaths to heal. The IgMs were gobbled up by phagocytes and eliminated from the system.
It's an interesting immune phenomenon, one theory being that some people are genetically inclined for this--they have this unique protein on their myeline sheaths that attracts these IgMs produced in the initial immune response to the vaccine. Another theory involves allergy to the denatured egg proteins produced in the purification of the vaccine after growing in eggs.
And, another theory is based on the observation that people who have had a Campylobacter jejeunii diarrea have a 20% chance of developing Guillan-Barre post-infection. C. jejunii is a real problem in mass egg producing operations as chickens are very prone to this disease. The bacteria can cross the egg shell and lodge in the egg protein. I had my vaccine in 1997 (I think) which was a year when something like 15-25% of people vaccinated contracted Guillan-Barre. In the last two years there has been some discussion revolving around the fact that the quality control on the chicken eggs used to grow the virus wasn't very good and that a lot of the eggs were infected with C. jejeunii. There were problems in the egg manufacturing sector at that time with C. Jejeunii infections in the chickens. Unfortunatley there isn't any vaccine left from that year to test for the presence of C. jejeunii antigen, so it's just an interesting theory.
Anyway, there weren't any residual effects in me at least. But, I attribute that to the fact that I was in very good physical shape. One other person here in town contracted GB at that time after a flu vaccine and after quite a struggle, she came back, but with a lingering numbness in her toes and soles of her feet. She's always been quite overweight.
I'm a med lab technologist so I'm not some layman about this stuff. I feel quite strongly that anyone who trusts what pharmacutical companies say about the 'wonders' they produce is rather foolish and naive. There are some pretty amazing things they can do...look at antibiotics and some other meds. But they're not in it for charity. It's about $$ and if you don't get that and stay highly circumspect about these things, you're going be in a lot of trouble.
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Dec 3, 6:03 PM (ET)
By MIKE STOBBE
NEW YORK (AP) - Flu season in the U.S. is off to its earliest start in nearly a decade - and it could be a bad one.
Health officials on Monday said suspected flu cases have jumped in five Southern states, and the primary strain circulating tends to make people sicker than other types. It is particularly hard on the elderly.
"It looks like it's shaping up to be a bad flu season, but only time will tell," said Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The good news is that the nation seems fairly well prepared, Frieden said. More than a third of Americans have been vaccinated, and the vaccine formulated for this year is well-matched to the strains of the virus seen so far, CDC officials said.
Higher-than-normal reports of flu have come in from Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Texas. An uptick like this usually doesn't happen until after Christmas. Flu-related hospitalizations are also rising earlier than usual, and there have already been two deaths in children.
Hospitals and urgent care centers in northern Alabama have been bustling. "Fortunately, the cases have been relatively mild," said Dr. Henry Wang, an emergency medicine physician at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Parts of Georgia have seen a boom in traffic, too. It's not clear why the flu is showing up so early, or how long it will stay.
"My advice is: Get the vaccine now," said Dr. James Steinberg, an Emory University infectious diseases specialist in Atlanta.
The last time a conventional flu season started this early was the winter of 2003-04, which proved to be one of the most lethal seasons in the past 35 years, with more than 48,000 deaths. The dominant type of flu back then was the same one seen this year.
One key difference between then and now: In 2003-04, the vaccine was poorly matched to the predominant flu strain. Also, there's more vaccine now, and vaccination rates have risen for the general public and for key groups such as pregnant women and health care workers.
An estimated 112 million Americans have been vaccinated so far, the CDC said. Flu vaccinations are recommended for everyone 6 months or older.
On average, about 24,000 Americans die each flu season, according to the CDC.
Flu usually peaks in midwinter. Symptoms can include fever, cough, runny nose, head and body aches and fatigue. Some people also suffer vomiting and diarrhea, and some develop pneumonia or other severe complications.
A strain of swine flu that hit in 2009 caused a wave of cases in the spring and then again in the early fall. But that was considered a unique type of flu, distinct from the conventional strains that circulate every year.
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