105 US children died from flu this season, 90% were unvaccinated

[Cliffy]

Well, I'm 66. In the early 50s I nearly died from polio vaccine. I have never trusted vaccines ever since. I don't trust the pharmaceutical or the medical industries either. I learned to become my own doctor.

 

[Tonington]

Well, yes; answering some questions often does require an investment of some kind. Investing your time to dig around, investing your time and money to educate yourself, or investing money to help make sure the question can be answered. I don't think just because money is involved that the end result is suspect. Afterall, the systems which make the availability of information that we have today so broad was heavily funded.

 

[darkbeaver]

Well, yes; answering some questions often does require an investment of some kind. Investing your time to dig around, investing your time and money to educate yourself, or investing money to help make sure the question can be answered. I don't think just because money is involved that the end result is suspect. Afterall, the systems which make the availability of information that we have today so broad was heavily funded.

A lot of people think there's things the rich and powerful just wouldn't do. Selling worthless dangerous drugs to simple minded sheep like us isn't one of the things. Corporate profit clearly trumps health and value in their estimation. It's just good business.

Well, I'm 66. In the early 50s I nearly died from polio vaccine. I have never trusted vaccines ever since. I don't trust the pharmaceutical or the medical industries either. I learned to become my own doctor.

Polio vaccines continue to bother those that have had them.

 

[Walter]

I'm wondering where you took your stats class... the error on a sample mean varies with one over the square root of the number of participants. With 400 million Americans being the total population, that makes for an incredibly small standard error on the sample mean of deaths amongst the unvaccinated. So as opposed to a large country making a statistical 0, the large country increases the accuracy of the number giving it higher significance.

The efficacy of the vaccine is a similarly measurable quantity. So, you are wrong. It is known how many of the unvaccinated would have died had they taken the vaccine: (1 - efficacy)*105=40.

Early Estimates of Seasonal Influenza Vaccine Effectiveness — United States, January 2013

Let's say there are 100 million Mericans under 18. That's 105/100,000,000=0.00000105. I'd say that's pretty close to zero. I used base 10 math.

 

[Tonington]

Let's say there are 100 million Mericans under 18. That's 105/100,000,000=0.00000105. I'd say that's pretty close to zero. I used base 10 math.

Just because an answer is close to zero per cent, does not mean it is statistically zero. That's why Niflmir said your stats understanding is crap. It is.

To prove the point, how about botulism? Botulinum toxin is toxic at doses as low as 1.2 ng/kg. That's 1.2 parts in 1,000,000,000. In fact that's even more orders of magnitude smaller than your above calculation, yet it certainly does not qualify as statistically zero.

 

[petros]

My suggestion is get the damn flu shot

Mine is don't do stupid sh*t that compromises your immune system and overall well being.

One of the benefits of age is exposure to the majority of cold and flu strains. Even after mutation most are still in your arsenal of immunities.

It's why kids and drunks have perpetual snotty noses.