I’m curious how you decided to get the RSV vaccination. I was on the fence about this and decided that using my normal Covid practices would protect me from RSV.
Wow, your orchestra went through heroics to keep playing. I applaud you. Obviously they cared about themselves, fellow musicians, and the audience—and their music. Why I practice Covid measures that may seem extreme to others: because I want to stay alive. I have more I want to do and achieve and contribute. I’m willing to make certain sacrifices, give up certain former freedoms, for these larger goals. Prior to the availability and acceptability of KN95 masks and social distancing, I lost huge amounts of time to illness. That no longer happens, leaving me more time to do socially relevant work. I haven’t missed a single day of work to upper-respiratory illness in the last four years.
I think the awareness of how our behaviors affect others will last to some extent in the coming years. It used to be tacitly socially acceptable to go to closed public places when you had a cold or with sick children in tow. I see much less of that now.
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I suspect that part of our Covid attitudes come from whether we lost people close to us during the pandemic. I’m wondering how many people here lost friends, family, or coworkers. I lost my closest friend, who I had known for 35 years. He embarked on a one-month vacation to four continents, all high infection areas, in early 2020, before we knew much about Covid and how serious it was going to get. In my last conversation with him I urged him to wear a mask on the plane. Neither of us realized that this trip was totally unsafe even with a mask. He had no chance of surviving it. There was no funeral and hence no closure because funerals weren’t allowed.
Thanks. I stopped counting the Excedrin number 99 headaches long before we got to our first performance.
We had a total of two players who we had to forgo using because their ideas about vax were not in keeping with our own players’ wishes or the College policy. Both rejoined us for the May 2022 performance with no harm done. In fact one of them has asked about their youth group being made an offshoot of our orchestra. Frankly they are seeing some money there. But we are n9t set up to manage such a thing so it is an easy thanks but can’t.
Good one! I had forgotten about “laetrile” and those Mexican clinics claiming to cure cancer with it…
Just getting over it. Totally missed Christmas and Boxing Day. Felt a bit better yesterday and even more so today. Had what I thought was just a cold for about a week then boom. The grands bring everything home and they’ve been sick, my sil is a teacher and he too brings things home, they all were Covid positive before Christmas, it was inevitable. We won’t be visiting with them indoors for a while Our last vax was Sept, hubs is fine. I’m glad to be on the mend now.
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While you are at it, medical errors are the third leading cause of death. people that don’t like conservatives can read about it on Bernie Sanders website. 
To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System is a landmark report issued in November 1999 by the U.S. Institute of Medicine that may have resulted in increased awareness of U.S. medical errors. The push for patient safety that followed its release continues. The report was based upon analysis of multiple studies by a variety of organizations and concluded that between 44,000 to 98,000 people die each year as a result of preventable medical errors.
so:
- cardiovascular disease 2) cancer 3) medical errors
Don’t shoot the messenger
That’s a big reason Americans do so poorly on global health outcomes: over-utilization
We have some of the best and much of the worst being delivered. Most of our kids have chronic diseases. Is anyone asking why?
navigate with care, maintain some skepticism
John Hopkins agreed with this rough estimate in a study in 2016. Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in the U.S. - 05/03/2016
That said, if you read the Hopkins report it does not indicate over-utilization as a factor. Rather things like poorly coordinated care and lack of coordination in the safety net. That goes more to people not getting the crucial interventions they need when they present at an ER or urgent care center. So they get discharged and die at home. An all too common experience for people of color.
(I was unaware that this needed to be presented in terms of someone’s politics. Numbers is numbers.)
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I think it was inevitable, at some point, based on the topic. 
.
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Since you like to read medical journals, here’s a rebuttal of the 1999 study by the editors of the British Medical Journal Quality & Safety, delving rather deeply into its errors:
And another positive offshoot of more normalized mask-wearing is this: There are plenty of us who MUST mask, because of chemo, autoimmune disorders, etc. It isn’t a choice, it’s a survival strategy. Anything that makes folks like me look less odd in public, I’m all for!
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I don’t understand the point you’re trying to make about Covid. That we should avoid Covid treatment because doctors don’t know what they’re doing? What kinds of medical errors are you referring to, and how does this pertain to Covid?
Well, first of all “most” means more than half, so this is a statistic that needs to be verified. Upon searching, I can only find sources that deny it.
Is anyone asking why? Well, yes, it’s an important research topic. So I asked google this exact question and here’s part of the answer: More kids have chronic illnesses these days in part because they are being treated by recent medical advances, whereas prior to the development of these treatments they would have died. Paradoxical, eh?
But of course the rise of illnesses like diabetes and obesity is alarming. Again, I’m not sure what your point is. That too many kids are getting diagnosed because they’re overusing doctors?
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I don’t enjoy having influenza so I get the flue vaccine every year along with the COVID vaccines and boosters. Pnemomia vaccine, too, because I don’t want to be knocked down with that, either.
When you come into contact with RSV as you probably will, you may become infected, in which case you may be compromised for weeks or months, you may recover, or you may not. I would have to ask, is your life so miserable and useless that you would take that risk rather than get a vaccination?
I saw no reason not to get the RSV since it was available to me. I simply scheduled all 3 for the same appointment, Covid booster number 4 and flu in my left arm and RSV in my right. Figured I might as well feel half like crap for one day and get it over with and that’s what happened. Stiff arms and felt tired and crappy the next day and night, laid low and drank a lot of water and chicken soup while my system pumped up its defenses and was fine less than 30 hours later.
More and more studies are linking the increased rates of chronic diseases to modern environmental and behavioral factors, for instance recent findings that having a natural gas range in a dwelling greatly increases the incidence of asthma for children in the home. And research has found a correlation between regular exposure to outdoor exercise and even to pet and farm animals in building a stronger immune system in children. (Besides always having assorted pets, my siblings and I spent summers on family farms in direct contact with livestock in performing our daily chores, which probably helped bolster our immunities.) Vitamin D deficiency still remains a problem in many US populations and this has been shown to increase vulnerability to chronic diseases as well as reduce resistance to acute infections, including covid. And you can’t discount stress and the quality deterioration of the American diet in contributing to chronic health woes.
FWIW, I asked my normally very pro-vaccine doc about RSV shot before I went in for my annual visit. I did walk out with the new-new pneumo shot in my arm.
But his take for me was that my risk of getting full blown RSV is pretty low, combination of retirement activities and very little bronchial risk. He was not entirely happy with the numbers for someone getting Afib as a result of the shot. So he is recommending it for anyone who is at high risk of complications if they get it, for ex young or old and more compromised. But for me he suggested taking a pass until they had more data in to understand the Afib stuff.
Most people I interact with just went in and got all the shots. The only reason I asked the doc about the RSV was because I myself had some questions about my real risk, and I would as soon not ding insurance for stuff I don’t need. No one I know personally has had any side effects or deleterious impacts.
Thanks for this. I had similar questions and didn’t come to a clear answer about my personal risks after doing some research. I’m still not certain about RSV and vaccinations, will continue trying to learn more. I never even heard of RSV until a couple of months ago, so there’s a learning curve. In the meantime, my Covid practices should help against RSV.
Let’s see . . . miserable and useless . . . Hmm. I’ll give that some thought, I promise. Thanks for planting that seed of introspection in my mind. Excellent end-of-year topic for meditation as we plan for our unfolding in the new year.
About RSV, it’s more that I haven’t had the time to do enough research to understand RSV and weigh my personal risks of getting or not getting vaccinated. And I haven’t had the opportunity to discuss it with my doctor. Pending those steps, I decided to continue my Covid practices (which are pretty thorough) in hopes that they would provide some protection against RSV.
Were you thinking that I’m against vaccinations? Nope, strong advocate.
Oh gosh, I just realized: my life actually is miserable and useless. I’m going to go make some fava beans and wash them down with a good chianti. Pretty sure that will help.
RSV vaccine is associated with the rare complication of Guillain-Barré syndrome. The American Heart Association says it’s especially important for older patients with cardiopulmonary issues to get the RSV vaccine.
It’s the Covid vaccine that is associated with Afib, more so with the Pfizer variety. Again this is very rare. Some studies suggest 5/1,000,000 for cases where the person never experienced Afib prior to vaccination, and the overwhelming number of people that get Afib after vaccination recover fully.
Oncologist and biostatistics professor UCSF
(Also “science”)
