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[sudgy]

What does that say at the end?

I just looked it up on google translate, and according to it it says:

"Now we will show you a cartoon.

Compound no connection with the server. Thank you, all free."

[Titandrake]

Oh my goodness is Dustforce an addictive game. If you like platforming games, highly recommend it. There's an in-browser version you can try out for free at Humble Bundle right now - I got a copy from another bundle a while back.

[Kirian]

Fun fact: Giuseppe Peano first discovered his eponymous space-filling curve while playing Snake on a graphing calculator.

This seems legit.

[Hydrad]

Oh my goodness is Dustforce an addictive game. If you like platforming games, highly recommend it. There's an in-browser version you can try out for free at Humble Bundle right now - I got a copy from another bundle a while back.

Its also super hard and made me give up way to many times.

[Kirian]

Getting a flu vaccine is a civic duty

Is this your personal opinion or some official policy?

Obviously personal opinion.  Though many hospital campuses do require it of their staff, but that's separate.  Similarly, I feel that voting is a civic duty, but I only know one democracy (Australia) with mandatory voting.  There may be others though.  (Edit:  Apparently most of South America has it as well.  Very interesting!)

(1) The flu vaccine is around 70% effective.

Do you have the reference?

http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/vaccineeffect.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/benefit-publications.htm

Medical research is often biased/flawed. The medical researchers I know are horrible in correctly interpreting their data, and I think there is an interest in keeping it that way because it makes it so much easier for the drug companies to request papers that praise their products without compromising the researcher's ethics too much.

This is why peer review exists.  Crappy data interpretations don't get you published in research journals.  They can, however, get you through a nation's approval process.

So, I tend to think there is a lot of overmedication in the US, although this is just a sensation. I would love some counterpoints if you have them.

There has been a tendency to overmedicate here in the US, though that tendency has been, surprisingly, waning.  However, vaccination is not medication per se; barring allergies, there is no good reason not to vaccinate as many people as possible.  (There is doubt as to whether we could actually produce enough vaccine doses each year to actually vaccinate everyone on the planet, but given that we have difficulty actually getting some of the most educated populaces in history to actually get the vaccine, I don't think we need to worry about that.)

The risks are essentially zero

There is such thing in medicine, because there is a lot of unknown things.

You're splitting hairs; obviously the incidence of some form of side effect is greater than zero.  By "essentially zero," I mean that hundreds of millions of doses have been given over the course of several decades, and ignoring a few one-in-a-million cases, the only adverse effects have been allergic reactions.  But... man, if you're going to skip a vaccination because of a one-in-a-million risk, then I sure hope you weren't planning on driving anywhere anytime soon.  Or walking anywhere:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromort

Aspirin for instance, was used a lot for many years with no knowledge of its risks on the stomach.

Aspirin was developed because its predecessor, salicylic acid, was a stomach irritant.  Aspirin was expected to be irritating to the stomach from its first use; it was merely a matter of "is this less irritating than what we had before?"  (Yes, it is.)

[Witherweaver]

Don't argue with the Alchemist about Aspirin.

[pacovf]

Klein bottle... hats

[soulnet]

This is why peer review exists.  Crappy data interpretations don't get you published in research journals.  They can, however, get you through a nation's approval process.

Peer review is also flawed and biased, specially when the journal is funded by a pharmacological company and the editors are paid. I have only seen a handful of medical papers, and every single one of them has errors in the use of the data because they are horrible at math/statistics. Moreover, in my experience with my own experience (that are not medical, but it is the only experience I have) only about 25-30% of the reviewers actually read the paper deeply/carefully enough to find non-obvious technical problems.

You're splitting hairs; obviously the incidence of some form of side effect is greater than zero.  By "essentially zero," I mean that hundreds of millions of doses have been given over the course of several decades, and ignoring a few one-in-a-million cases, the only adverse effects have been allergic reactions.  But... man, if you're going to skip a vaccination because of a one-in-a-million risk, then I sure hope you weren't planning on driving anywhere anytime soon.  Or walking anywhere:

I agree that everything has side effects. I do get medications and get vaccinated. But the flu shot is a vaccine that is only good for one season, that it is not as nearly as effective as other well known vaccines, and that only prevents against a disease which is non-lethal in almost every case. You are usually fine within 2 days, and describing those days as "agony" is an overstatement for me. I mean, if you show me studies that show lives are saved because of a population takes the shot instead of only the people in risk groups, I will definitely take it. I have not seen such studies, and the public health authorities here say you do not need the shot if you are not at risk (though you can take it if you want, and it is cheap, and my university gives it for free if you are willing to stand in line for a couple of hours).

[Kirian]

Klein bottle... hats

Yes!  Cliff Stoll is awesome.

Don't argue with the Alchemist about Aspirin.

Indeed, there's a reason I use that avatar...

[Kirian]

This is why peer review exists.  Crappy data interpretations don't get you published in research journals.  They can, however, get you through a nation's approval process.

Peer review is also flawed and biased, specially when the journal is funded by a pharmacological company and the editors are paid. I have only seen a handful of medical papers, and every single one of them has errors in the use of the data because they are horrible at math/statistics. Moreover, in my experience with my own experience (that are not medical, but it is the only experience I have) only about 25-30% of the reviewers actually read the paper deeply/carefully enough to find non-obvious technical problems.

Specifically, an example of a respected journal and/or editor actually funded by a pharmaceutical company.  Certainly there are journals out there where you can publish anything you want, but those niche journals have names like (I'm making this one up) Journal of the Alaskan Surgeons Society and an impact factor of zero.

The complaint that peer review is biased/flawed generally comes from people who deliberately misunderstand science, e.g., anti-vaxxers, global warming deniers, conspiracy theorists.  It eventually ends up repeated by people who didn't check their sources properly when something was posted to their Facebook wall.

You are usually fine within 2 days, and describing those days as "agony" is an overstatement for me.

OK, actual question:  Have you experienced influenza?  Or have you merely experienced what people call "the flu" but is really just a bad head cold?  The course of influenza is 4-7 days, assuming no secondary pneumonia infection.  The symptoms are a lot more than just a severe cold, and include moderate muscle pain, severe lethargy, difficulty swallowing, etc.

"Agony" is perhaps overstatement, depending on what you feel is agonizing.  Two years ago I fucked up badly, putting off getting the vaccine because of other illnesses (I later learned that you can get the vaccine while you have even a bad cold, so long as you do not have a fever) and life stressors.  I got influenza early in the season, and it knocked me on my ass.  I could hardly move for the first two days, I probably slept for 18-20 hours each of those days, and I wasn't able to eat much more than water and saltines/bread.  The remainder of the week got better, but I was mostly bedridden and utterly useless for any purpose for 5 days, and still very ill on days 6 and 7.  No, this wasn't pain level 8, but as an otherwise somewhat healthy* 30-something adult, being unable to do much of anything is pretty agonizing to me, psychologically.  The associated economic and psychological costs--my wife had to take several days off of work; the kids (who were one and three) had to be kept out of my bedroom, kept entertained in abnormal fashion, and of course worried about why they couldn't see daddy except from a distance and why he was so sick--were no fun either.

I mean, if you show me studies that show lives are saved because of a population takes the shot instead of only the people in risk groups, I will definitely take it. I have not seen such studies

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15694506

Five minutes on Google.  Alas, without academic access you can generally only see abstracts.

*I say somewhat healthy; I am epileptic and have persistent depressive disorder, both medicated.

[soulnet]

Specifically, an example of a respected journal and/or editor actually funded by a pharmaceutical company.  Certainly there are journals out there where you can publish anything you want, but those niche journals have names like (I'm making this one up) Journal of the Alaskan Surgeons Society and an impact factor of zero.

I have 0 idea of what journals are respected or not in medical science, and there are LOTS of journals. Moreover, the one you cited before is the 2nd abstract I have read in my life about non-psychiatry non-neurology medical science, so it is possible that only mental health papers do bullshit in their math. But I have been to the doctor many many times and heard ridiculous statistical interpretations.

The complaint that peer review is biased/flawed generally comes from people who deliberately misunderstand science, e.g., anti-vaxxers, global warming deniers, conspiracy theorists.  It eventually ends up repeated by people who didn't check their sources properly when something was posted to their Facebook wall.

Well, I do not belong in any of the groups you mention in that paragraph, including the group "people with facebook". I certainly do not think I misunderstand science, and if I do, I am certainly not doing it on purpose. Specifically, I did not say peer review IS biased or flawed. Well, I may say it is biased, because it is. It is biased towards the current scientific consensus in the discipline of what is interesting or relevant, which is something entirely subjective. And it is biased towards the current scientific consensus of what is "true" which hopefully approaches truth, but it is not equivalent to it. Scientific consensus once disbelieved the existence of germs and the most respected doctors suggested bleeding people to cure them, so... I am pretty sure that whatever we are doing today is going to be deemed as barbaric and/or stupid in some time, a couple of centuries at best.

That is not to say we should not do it. I certainly support scientific research. I do use medicine and trust the research behind it. And I mostly disregard 95% of "alternative medicine" due to being not scientific (there is some scientific alternative medicine, but I will digress a lot if I go into that).

OK, actual question:  Have you experienced influenza?  Or have you merely experienced what people call "the flu" but is really just a bad head cold?  The course of influenza is 4-7 days, assuming no secondary pneumonia infection.  The symptoms are a lot more than just a severe cold, and include moderate muscle pain, severe lethargy, difficulty swallowing, etc.

I did have all of those symptoms but the difficult swallowing simultaneously, and had to remain in bed for 3 days and to remain in the house for 7. It was the week before graduating, though, so not the best case study for a general discussion. It is not like that every time nor every year, though. Mostly, I am in decent shape to go out and work (in my desk-job) after only 2 days of bed time. And the people I know have usually even better health in this regard.

"Agony" is perhaps overstatement, depending on what you feel is agonizing.  Two years ago I fucked up...

I am really sorry about that. The only time there were a lot of reported cases of several influenza here was a couple of years ago with the H1N1 thing. And the regular vaccine did not work on that, so I did not consider those when thinking about whether the vaccine is / would have been a good idea. Are you certain that the strain you got would have been prevented by the vaccine? Is there a significant amount of those cases (i.e., strong flu's that the vaccine available at the time would have prevented)?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15694506

Five minutes on Google.  Alas, without academic access you can generally only see abstracts.

I read the abstract, but it seems to me to be saying the opposite: vaccinating only ~25% of the children helped immunize the adults to some extent. That seems completely within reason even without a paper to support it. My point is whether immunizing risk groups is enough, that is, whether immunizing risk groups only vs immunizing everyone has a significant difference in the numbers.
 

*I say somewhat healthy; I am epileptic and have persistent depressive disorder, both medicated.

Everyone has something. I hope you are one of the many people that have the mild epilepsy variants and that it is the curable kind.

BTW, are you a medical researcher of some kind? I was under the impression you were a mathematician.

[2.71828.....]

As much as I enjoy learning about vaccinations and all that fun stuff, it probably deserves a rsp topic rather than Random Stuff.

[soulnet]

As much as I enjoy learning about vaccinations and all that fun stuff, it probably deserves a rsp topic rather than Random Stuff.

As long as there are no real conflict and that we are not taking up too many pages, it seems harmless to keep it here. Videogames also took up a couple of pages for a while, and then the randomizer did its job.

[eHalcyon]

As much as I enjoy learning about vaccinations and all that fun stuff, it probably deserves a rsp topic rather than Random Stuff.

Are vaccinations religious, sexual, or political?

[KingZog3]

As much as I enjoy learning about vaccinations and all that fun stuff, it probably deserves a rsp topic rather than Random Stuff.

Are vaccinations religious, sexual, or political?

Well I worship them if that counts. Otherwise not really.

[liopoil]

As much as I enjoy learning about vaccinations and all that fun stuff, it probably deserves a rsp topic rather than Random Stuff.

Are vaccinations religious, sexual, or political?

They're pretty political, right? And some people turn them down for religious reasons.

[Awaclus]

I find this discussion arousing, therefore it is sexual.

[Teproc]

Though I do not mind it, this discussion is definitely political : we are talking aout wether or not it is worth it for our society to get everyone vaccinated against the flu, as opposed to only vaccinating risk groups.

[Donald X.]

Vaccines can totally be bad for people. Consider the case of the chickenpox vaccine:

Adults with latent VZV infection who are exposed intermittently to children with chickenpox receive an immune boost.[14][64] This periodic boost to the immune system helps to prevent shingles in older adults. When routine chickenpox vaccination was introduced in the United States, there was concern that, because older adults would no longer receive this natural periodic boost, there would be an increase in the incidence of shingles.

Multiple studies and surveillance data, at least when viewed superficially, demonstrate no consistent trends in incidence in the U.S. since the chickenpox vaccination program began in 1995.[68] However, upon closer inspection, the two studies that showed no increase in shingles incidence were conducted among populations where varicella vaccination was not as yet widespread in the community.[69][70] A later study by Patel et al. concluded that since the introduction of the chickenpox vaccine, hospitalization costs for complications of shingles increased by more than $700 million annually for those over age 60.[71] Another study by Yih et al. reported that as varicella vaccine coverage in children increased, the incidence of varicella decreased, and the occurrence of shingles among adults increased by 90%.[72] The results of a further study by Yawn et al. showed a 28% increase in shingles incidence from 1996 to 2001.[73] It is likely that incidence rate will change in the future, due to the aging of the population, changes in therapy for malignant and autoimmune diseases, and changes in chickenpox vaccination rates; a wide adoption of zoster vaccination could dramatically reduce the incidence rate.[5]

(Vaccines are obv. awesome.)

[XerxesPraelor]

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/04/28/the-control-group-is-out-of-control/

This might be relevant.

[Kirian]

As much as I enjoy learning about vaccinations and all that fun stuff, it probably deserves a rsp topic rather than Random Stuff.

Are vaccinations religious, sexual, or political?

They're pretty political, right? And some people turn them down for religious reasons.

People also turn down bacon for religious reasons, but I think we can safely discuss bacon here.

As to whether it's political... I don't see it.  The closest is my suggestion that getting the vaccine is a civic duty, but even with that I'm not going to advocate for mandatory flu vaccination.  The discussion of whether it's sufficient to only vaccinate risk groups is a public health discussion that ought to be apolitical.

The HPV vaccine is sexual, I suppose.  Or at least, its existence is an acknowledgement of human sexuality.

[Teproc]

Public health is political. Who is taking these decisions ? Politicians. Something being political doesn't mean it's about poltics, it can also be about policy.

[pacovf]

Probably the fact that we are discussing whether this is political or not should already be a hint that this is better in RSP.

Not that I mind the discussion, though.

[Kirian]

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/04/28/the-control-group-is-out-of-control/

This might be relevant.

OK, I was going to post something really snarky, but that would have gotten this split to RSP.

[soulnet]

Science must be critiqued. That is what science is all about. Everything needs to be questioned. Something being questioned does not mean it is not true. Quite the opposite. Prohibition to question something is a great indicator that there is something wrong there.