October 5, 2009 – 12:21 pm
Maryann Napoli from the Center for Medical Consumers in New York recently interviewed Dr Tom Jefferson, a medically trained epidemiologist who has long experience as a reviewer for the Cochrane Collaboration, for this story titled “why the swine flu virus is not a major threat”.
A previous Croakey post linked to this interview, as well as [...]
September 25, 2009 – 1:17 pm
For those who would like to dig deeper into the issues surrounding swine flu and vaccination, it’s worth having a read of this interview with Dr Tom Jefferson, a medically trained epidemiologist who has long experience as a reviewer for the Cochrane Collaboration, examining the evidence around seasonal influenza vaccines.
The interview, conducted by Maryann [...]
September 25, 2009 – 11:32 am
Following the previous post about informed consent and swine flu vaccination, I thought it might be useful to have a consumer organisation’s view on the issues.
Carol Bennett, executive director of the Consumers Health Forum, is encouraging the public to discuss the pros and cons of vaccination with their health provider, rather than relying on [...]
September 24, 2009 – 6:53 pm
Further to the earlier post about Minister Roxon’s spruiking of swine flu vaccination (you can see various interviews here, here and here – what a busy day she’s had), I’ve been pondering the issue of informed consent.
Below is a document that the Medical Indemnity Protection Society has sent members, making it clear that they will [...]
September 24, 2009 – 8:28 am
Minister Roxon was spruiking the benefits of swine flu vaccination to Fran Kelly this morning and downplaying any potential risks.
Asked about infection control concerns surrounding the use of multidose vials(as outlined in this Crikey story recently), Minister Roxon said these are “very minimal”.
Does she realise what dangerous territory she’s entering here?
Our national infection control guidelines [...]
September 22, 2009 – 8:46 pm
The announcement last Friday that the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) has approved CSL’s vaccine against swine flu and that a national vaccination campaign will be rolled out in the next few weeks means two things:
• a lot of people must be working pretty hard and wondering how on earth they’re going to pull it all [...]
September 3, 2009 – 4:50 pm
Dr Julie Leask, a social scientist in the medical faculty at the University of Sydney, has done much research and thinking on the issues around public acceptance, or otherwise, of vaccination.
She wrote an interesting article in Crikey today about the image problem of swine flu vaccination and the need for “full transparency from the [...]
August 31, 2009 – 12:02 pm
In some public health circles, it is seen as verging on cardinal sin to raise questions in public about the safety or effectiveness of vaccines. The fear is that even mentioning these issues risks lending fuel to the anti-vaccination brigade.
One problem with this view is that is inhibits a discussion that we need to have [...]
Fears about the impact of swine flu upon pregnant women are generating alarm and some confusion. And not only in Australia. In Britain, various health and medical sources have been giving the public conflicting advice, according to this report in the British Medical Journal.
Meanwhile, Professor Peter McIntyre, Director, National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance [...]
Some links to new publications – on everything from the history of swine flu to obesity prevention and disaster planning - that may be of use or interest:
• History of swine flu
The latest issue of The New England Journal of Medicine has two interesting articles exploring the history of swine flu, otherwise known as influenza [...]
