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Swine Flu Shots Revive a Debate About Vaccines
New York TimesA1
Steinhauer, Jenniffer
10/16/2009
Although vaccines have been a subject of debate for years, division is even greater over the H1N1 swine flu vaccine. In a CBS News poll last week, only 46 percent of participants said they were likely to get the vaccine and about 60 percent of parents were likely to have their children vaccinated. Many public health officials are attempting to counter the vocal anti-vaccine movement and persuade the public to be vaccinated. These officials emphasize the low risk of vaccine complications and cite studies that find a high occurrence of intensive care unit admissions among Americans who contract the swine flu. One study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that last spring, one in four Americans hospitalized with the swine flu were placed in intensive care and 7 percent died. One of the most common complaints from skeptics is that the vaccine is newly formed and being distributed without clinical trials; however, the H1N1 flu vaccine is being made using the same techniques that have been used in seasonal flu vaccines over the past 20 years, and clinical trials were conducted to determine proper dosages.
