Although its often thought as impossible, people sometimes even get sick with the flu after being vaccinated. But, as we just discovered, feeling like you have the flu doesnt mean you have an influenza virus. It could be that youve gotten another type of infection. This is exactly what is discussed in the 2012 research paper by Cowling et al. In a double-blind randomized controlled trial, children aged 615 years either received a 20082009 seasonal trivalent influenza inactivated vaccine [TIV] or a REAL SALINE placebo (which you dont often see in vaccine trials).
TIV recipients had higher (5 times) risk of confirmed noninfluenza respiratory virus infection. The majority of the noninfluenza respiratory virus detections were rhinoviruses and coxsackie/echoviruses, and the increased risk among TIV recipients was also statistically significant for these viruses.[13]
The authors note that the influenza vaccine may have reduced immunity to noninfluenza respiratory viruses by some unknown biological mechanism. Whats worse is what they noticed between the vaccine versus the placebo:
There was no statistically significant difference in the risk of confirmed seasonal influenza infection between recipients of TIV or placebo.[14]
Perhaps that is why a hepatitis A vaccine or another old influenza vaccine is so often used as a placebo in vaccine trials?
The immunity picture that we might have of a vaccine stimulating an antibody to protect us from a specific illness is actually much more complicated. There are multiple infections that can cause us to feel like we have the flu and when we get a shot it can make us more susceptible to another infection. This is exactly what has appeared to have happened with the use of the flu vaccine and susceptibility to the swine flu.
Professor Peter Collignon has called for a review of Australias flu vaccine
What was a bit surprising when we looked at some of the data from Canada and Hong Kong in the last year is that people who have been vaccinated in 2008 with the seasonal or ordinary vaccine seemed to have twice the risk of getting swine flu compared to the people who hadnt received that vaccine, Some interesting data has become available which suggests that if you get immunised with the seasonal vaccine, you get less broad protection than if you get a natural infection. It is particularly relevant for children because it is a condition they call original antigenic sin, which basically means if you get infected with a natural virus, that gives you not only protection against that virus but similar viruses or even in fact quite different flu viruses in the next year. We may be perversely setting ourselves up that if something really new and nasty comes along, that people who have been vaccinated may in fact be more susceptible compared to getting this natural infection.[15]
- See more at:
The Flu Vaccine: Something to Sneeze At ~ by Roman Bystrianyk | International Medical Council on Vaccination
