Fox: Nearly Half of Americans Think Flu Shot Can Make You Sick

Colorized transmission electron micrograph of
Avian influenza A H5N1 viruses (seen in gold)
Image from Cynthia Goldsmith at the CDC

Is it just me or does there need to be a "[sic]" in the title of today's post? I'm pretty sure it should read "...Think the Flu Shot..." but either way, today's article comes from Fox News. It shares the findings of a study published earlier this week in the journal Vaccine about how sharing information with patients affects their willingness to get their annual flu shot.

According to Fox, researchers found that 40% of adult Americans believe that the flu vaccine can give you the flu, and that explaining to patients that this is a myth is not as effective as researchers expected it to be. The researchers polled 1,000 people about their perception of the dangers of flu shots, then they gave some people information about flu shots, some information about the flu, or no new information (control). In addition to the finding regarding belief that the flu shot could give you the flu, they found that the participants who had initially believed the flu shot to be the most dangerous were actually more convinced of their position after reading the information about the flu shot's safety. The flu kills many people every year, and the annual vaccine is the best protection we've been able to develop. So then the question is, what should a health care professional say to some one who is worried about the safety of the flu shot?

Nature News: HIV Vaccine Raised Infection Risk

Or, What Several Failed HIV Vaccine Studies Can Teach Us about the Risks of the Planned Phase III Ebola Vaccine Study.

 

HIV infecting a human T cell. From NIH via Wikimedia commons

Last week I wanted to start an informed discussion about the complications involved in the plan to begin phase 3 trials of at least two Ebola vaccines in response to the current pandemic in west Africa. Particularly regarding the study design, should a control group (who receives inactive placebo shots) be included, or not? As part of my attempt to explain the considerations I mentioned the story of the failed HIV vaccine trials, but I did not go into any detail, as the post was about Ebola and not HIV. I have decided that was a mistake. So today I will tell you about the HIV vaccine trials, as understanding what went wrong has the potential to teach us a lot about how to go forward with both new HIV vaccines and the Ebola vaccine trials scheduled to start early 2015. The news article we are starting with comes from the news desk of the scientific journal Nature, as Nature is edited by scientists for scientists I'm confident in the quality of it's science journalism, this post will focus on breaking down the story they've told.

NY times: Testing for Ebola Vaccines to Start Soon, W.H.O. Says

Ebola virus. Image from Thomas W. Geisbert via WikiMedia Commons

Everyone is very worried about Ebola right now, so it seems like a good choice of topic. The news story I'm going to talk about is from today's NY Times, Testing for Ebola Vaccines to Start Soon, W.H.O. Says.