Flu: A Government U-Turn too late?

[Gromit]

Penny Pinching Government scrapped the annual flu advertising campaign. The result was a shockingly low take up of the flu jab this year.

http://www.dailymail....-jab-given-fives.html

Now, with the worse outbreak for 20 years, and the highest incidence in under fives for 10 years, the Minister for U-Turns has flipped again, and the advertising campaign is set to be relaunched.

Reassuring don't you think, that when voters start to die, that the Government admits its mistake?

[boxtops]

I can't understand why people just didn't take responsibility for their own health, and goes to get their flu jabs anyway if they are entitled to them or in a high risk group, Most GP surgeries have personally sent out reminders to eligible patients, we don't need a whacking great TV advert campaign to remind people to look after their health. More nanny state, IMO - what happened to "write it in my diary in November, contact GP for this year's flu jab" (which is what I did)? Flu happens every year, flu vaccine is available every year - and people die of it every year. Look after yourself, don't expect that the State does it for you - this is part of the reason why the NHS is in such massive financial straits at the moment, trying to be all things to all people.

(If you are going to blame the Government, remember that it was the last Government which massively overordered on swine flu vaccine and this Government inherited that overspend - but they were damned if they do/damned if they don't with that one.)

[Gromit]

boxtops

I wonder which is the most expensive, a jab costing a few pence, or looking after someone in hospital for a week. It could be that it is coincidece that we have our worse outbreak for 20 years in the year the Government stop publicing the jab. The rest of Europe seem to be having a normal dose of the flu.

[jake-the-peg]

The last government overspent on swineflu vaccine?

What an outrageous slur!

At the time when nobody knew how fatal it was going to turn out the papers were full of screaming about whether there would be enough to go around and people on this site were screaming for ports and airports to be closed.

The Government wisely took a precautionary approach and bought enough if the worse came to the worse.

And now we have people sitting back in their armchairs with the benefit of hindsight saying "Oh they overspent on that you know!"

I suppose you think insurance policies are a waste of money too if you don't need to claim!

[Sqad]

I agree with Jake the Peg............nothing to do with the Government overspending, they just acted on the advice of the WHO who predicted a mass epidemic with increasing mortality................neither materialised.

The problem with the last N1H1 epidemic was that we have no idea of the incidence of H1N1 compared to the seasonal flu viruses as ALL cases of "flu like symptoms " disorders were automatically assumed to be N1N1 without serological testing.

A case of how not to manage an epidemic by the medics.........nothing to do with Politics.

[Hopkirk]

Under fives have never been included in the seasonal flu jab, just in the swine flu jab last year.

Your comment on the under fives is therefore misguided.

[jake-the-peg]

I think that's a little unnecessarilly damning.

The first indications from the US and Mexico indicated very high mortality rates coming from this flu which turned out not to be the case.

That's not to say there aren't things that could have been done better but the speed of reaction throughout the world and the ramping up to produce vaccine and stockpile drugs like Tamiflu was impressive.

It will also have given an opportunity to study Tamiflu's effectiveness.

In a strange way it may have been a useful dry run in case something nastier turns up like the 1918 epidemic

[Hopkirk]

The 1918 epidemic attacked a population severely weakened by war, poor nutrition, soldiers living in less than adequate conditions etc.

It is hardly fair to judge a possible epidemic with that occurence.

[Gromit]

Hopkirk

The 1918 epidemic was worldwide, while the conditions you attribute to contibuting to the large number of deaths was confined to Europe.

[Gromit]

// Most victims were healthy young adults, in contrast to most influenza outbreaks which predominantly affect juvenile, elderly, or weakened patients. The flu pandemic was implicated in the outbreak of encephalitis lethargica in the 1920s.
The pandemic lasted from June 1917 to December 1920, spreading even to the Arctic and remote Pacific islands. Between 50 and 100 million died, making it one of the deadliest natural disasters in human history. An estimated 50 million people, about 3% of the world's population (1.8 billion at the time, died of the disease. Some 500 million, or 1/3 were infected. //

[dotty.]

My great great grandfather, his second wife and 6 of his children including 2 aged under 3 all died in the 1918 flu epidenic and they lived on the Yorkshire moors in a huge stone house, they were no where near living in poor conditions, he was a self made man with his own stone masonry business, (he built the Ripponden Arches), they have a juge memorial stone in Barkisland grave yard.
My Dad should have gone for his annual flu jab in the winter of 2004, he caught flu in early 2005, after he died at the start of february we found 3 reminders in his desk drawer and we called him rotten for ignoring them,

[McMouse]

I take personal responsibility for my own health and there was masses of information on radio, tv, local pharmacy and GP surgery about those vulnerable groups who should have the flu jab. What was interesting was the number of health professionals who refused to have the jab!

[R1Geezer]

well the public should take some responsibility for their own health. I suppose they were used to your Noo Labour control freak luvvies to tell them when to f&rt. Well here's the news people, you are responsible for your own health, end of!

[Gromit]

True Geezer,

So why when everybody knows the speed limit do the police have to spend a fortune stopping motorcyclist from killing themselves? The Government cannot absolve themselves of all responsibility. Labour may have overdone it, but the results of underdoing it is that people die.

[R1Geezer]

ah so we are exahausted here so let's take the argument to bikers, right oh!, flu jabs to speeding bikers in one go! you excell yourself Gromit. Some bikers hit things, guess what so do some car drivers and also people on roller blades. I'm still here R1 ing at full throttle, I haven't crashed and died! Pisst! guess what? I occasionally exceed th speed limit! Arrest me Gromit and save me, perlease, LMFAO!

[boxtops]

Interesting responses - seeing both sides. Yes I agree that the Department of Health did the right thing in ordering the vaccines last year - not blaming them at all, jtp - if they had underbought, they would have been slated for ever for underestimating the possible position and not making enough available. I agree too that I cannot understand why so many health professionals themselves have not availed themselves of the jab this year - which is free to NHS employees - so it doesn't set a good example. However - I am glad to see that others do agree that we should also take responsibility for ourselves in this. Gromit, your analogy of speeding is not dissimilar - people will always take risks, and in both these instances, it seems, without properly taking on board a potential outcome. Good thread, btw.

[Gromit]

Because the public refuse to take responsibily for their own health, and routinely exceed the speed limit, the Nanny state is pending a fortune trying to preserve selfish bikers...

// Having already spent £500,000 on a number of safety measures (including reducing the speed limit, installing high-friction surfacing, barriers and signs, widening the carriageway, and using mobile speed cameras, in January 2009 it was revealed that Cheshire Council, on behalf of Cheshire Safer Roads Partnership and Derbyshire Partnership for Road Safety, intended to spend a further £1.2 million on installing average-speed cameras along this road. Installation of these cameras began in February 2010.

[R1Geezer]

As you have clearly conceded on the original subject Gromit, I'll join your bikers are evil thread if you like. Which group of road users cause the most deaths?

[Gromit]

Bikers are not evil, but just like vunerable people not getting a flu jab, they can be irresponsible and need reminders.

Some of my best friends are Bikers, just ask at 'the Bike & Hound' on tit night.

[mushroom25]

with this subject in the news right now, was it perhaps the wrong time for the scottish government to divert a fair proportion of their flu vaccine budget to help pay for the 2014 commonwealth games?

[Gromit]

They are claiming it is from a different budget.

// "That budget we're talking about was a capital budget set aside for the pandemic we dealt with last year, in case we needed to buy additional vaccines and antivirals to deal with that pandemic situation," she said.

"We didn't need to do that - we had sufficient vaccines to administer the vaccination programme - and we have a remaining stockpile of vaccine.

"The vaccine for this year's seasonal flu campaign is completely separate to that." //


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-12107627