Influenza
Welcome to this week’s I Call Bullshit, a regular column that looks at pseudoscience and magical thinking. Unsurprisingly, vaccination pops up quite a bit.
The Australian reports today that the Government has renewed CSL’s contract to supply Fluvax – the vaccine found to trigger febrile convulsions in children and subsequently banned.
Fluvax also has a “modestly higher” risk of side effects in adults – it is more likely to cause headaches, fatigue, vomiting and injection site pain.
Continue reading "ICB: Anti-vaxxers injecting credibility into their cause" »
It’s the stuff of an edge-of-your-seat thriller: Scientists develop a fatal flu virus, one that could decimate humanity. What happens next?
Well, the fatal virus, a mutated strain of bird flu that can pass between other animals, is here. Scientists have created it in a lab - and it’s not clear what will happen next. Some scientists want to stop all the details of the research from being published for fear of bioterrorism, while others say ‘censorship’ will obstruct the search for a vaccine.
The very existence of the fatal virus, though, is a dramatic development. It echoes the plot of myriad horror flicks where the heroes battle an invisible villain amid gruesome illness and an increasing body count.
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Mark says:
Hate to see the death of 90% of the population. But if we continue to overpopulate the way we have, it may not be scientists who create the virus that could wipe us out but mother nature. All other species on Earth have at some stage have populated in large… Read more »
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J says:
Oh dear. Erick & Bruno; that second post was almost entirely me taking the mickey (bar the first mini-paragraph). Hence the sledgehammer comment at the end. Annnnd now I’m roped into the debate itself, rather than pointing out an error in an argument I don’t disagree with. You have me… Read more »
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