FLU VACCINE = Ticket to the Hospital !
Flu Vaccine Puts Kids at Risk
Flu vaccine does not help children stricken with influenza stay out of the hospital, but instead, increases their risk of being hospitalized, compared with those who have not had shots, according to a new study.
In fact, the risk triples, according to the study at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
The new study aimed at evaluating the effectiveness of the flu vaccine (trivalent inactivated flu vaccine, or TIV) in children, especially asthmatic children, study leader Avni Joshi, M.D., told Science Daily.
The relative benefit of the vaccine is of paramount importance in light of the recommendation of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Academy of Pediatrics to vaccinate all children between 6 months and 18 years every year, a recommendation that the National Asthma Education and Prevention Program endorses.
The Mayo Clinic study spanned eight consecutive flu seasons and involved 263 children ages 6 months to 18 years. All of the children had laboratory-confirmed influenza between 1996 and 2006. Researchers verified which children had or had not received the vaccine, which were asthmatics, and which had to be hospitalized with flu-related illnesses.
The study showed that children who had been vaccinated had three times the risk of hospitalization of children who had not been vaccinated. Asthmatic children who received the vaccine had a “significantly” higher risk of being hospitalized than asthmatic children who had not received it. No other factors, such as the severity of asthma, appeared to have an effect on the risk of being hospitalized.
The findings do not implicate the flu vaccine as the cause of hospitalizations, Joshi said, adding that they do, “raise questions about the efficacy of the vaccine.”