to want the anti-vaxxers to explain themselves?

[Goldfsh]

My Facebook feed is full of GP practices etc. promoting the flu jab, and EVERY response is from people saying they are full of poison, giving everyone flu, part of a government conspiracy, Bill Gates, big pharma, etc.

It doesn't matter where the GP surgery is in the country, the responses are all the same.

Just... WOT IS GOING ON????

It's literally 100% of the respondents. Please can someone explain to me why the general public (on my feeds anyway) have become convinced that the flu jab is part of a conspiracy... to what end?!

@RubySquid - no, the flu vaccine for children is 60-65% effective, for adults 50-55%.
So I would ignore those lower figures from pp.

The covid vaccine has scared people to death and forced people to lose trust. People died and received life threatening injuries from that vaccine which was basically forced on everyone. A lot of people i know felt pressured into having it and now are terrified about the potential long term effects, having basically been used as human guinea pigs. I too don't feel keen to get unnecessary vaccines after that ordeal!

Exactly my thoughts

I wonder how many anti vaxers have travel jabs and Botox, I wonder if they look at the ingredients of their medication and antibiotics as closely.

What some people don’t realise is that the flu can have secondary infections like ear and sinus infections, pneumonia, bronchitis, and it can worsen existing health problems such as asthma and heart conditions.
Children are the biggest spreaders of flu, and having them vaccinated helps babies who are too young to have it, people with existing health problems such as cancer treatment and immunosuppressants, and the elderly for whom the vaccine isn’t as efficient.

DH (recent heart operation) and I attended our "fluathon" event last weekend. It was incredibly well organised. In through the front door, jabs in one of the rooms and out through the back door. Not even a queue, just a regular stream of people wanting to protect themselves from flu.

Never ask a conspiracy theorists to explain themselves. You will be there all day with their bullshit.

It's just Darwinian natural selection. The rest of the gazelles always used to wonder why the Juliette the gazelle went to the waterhole alone, but despite her explanations that lions hunting packs was a conspiracy theory, nature catches up in the end.

I’m sure most people do realise that flu can have complications, children can spread it and the elderly or immunocompromised are more vulnerable. It’s not exactly difficult information to understand or find.

People can know all those things and still choose not to have the flu vaccine. Most of us aren’t offered it for free anyway and would still want to avoid vaccines unnecessary for ourselves anyway.

I think some people deem it unnecessary because they've never been really ill with flu etc

Same here, it was brilliant. In, short queue, jab, out. 10 minutes 👍

You'd only get a pile of meaningless word salad, anyway.

There is sector of society that get together and try and fight to share a piece of a brain cells they usually believe any conspiracy going, i would love for them to actually give genuine evidence but alas no i do wonder how they coped at school but shudder to thunk they actually raise children

I think you can be entitled to your opinion but be aware that if it's based on nothing, what you saw on Tik Tok or what "they" say, then you cant expect anyone to take it seriously or respect it. This is the line I use to the teenagers I teach when they tell me that immigrants are taking all the jobs, we no longer live in a sexist world and that NF, whose party they frequently can't name, let alone list their members or policies has a point.

I'm not anti Vax, my kids have their normal vaccines. I won't get them jabbed against COVID or the flu nasal spray. In my daughter's primary school in her class only her and one other child didn't have the flu vaccine. The other child was the child of a pharmacist

Maybe the pharmacist had already given her child the vaccine. It's highly improbable that anyone with a science degree and working in healthcare wouldn't agree with vaccination!

Or maybe the pharmacist’s child has an egg allergy, or lives with somebody immunocompromised (they would have the injection instead of the nasal spray, but OP would not necessarily be aware of that).

Yes, those ar are good points.

Flu vaccine is also cumulative because of the number of different strains, if you have it every year the protection is better. Flu is phenomenally dangerous anyway, I’m glad that take up is so high and sorry that some people choose not to have it when they would benefit.

It's highly improbable that anyone with a science degree and working in healthcare wouldn't agree with vaccination!

Exactly. DD has a degree in biomedical sciences and is doing a related medical post grad degree. She has worked in pharmacies and is horrified at the lack of understanding these conspiracy theorists have about vaccination.

I sometimes wonder if these anti vaxxers even did GCSE biology.

Me too, I sometimes wonder if some people paid attention in science! It seems like wilful ignorance, although the pp saying that some people get information from tiktok explains a lot.

I always wonder about what other things anti-vaxxers put in their bodies. Do they smoke, drink, use ultra processed or even processed foods, eat takeaways, Botox, diet jabs, HRT, antibiotics, anesthetic…. I often find there is a lot of hypocrisy and they pick and choose the things that suit them.

No conspiracy here OP but I don't think any (otherwise healthy) adult or child needs a flu or covid jab. But people should be free to choose and I wouldn't influence anyone else's choice outside of my own family.

MMR, meningitis etc, yes but flu and covid, no.

This ⬆️. It's never been easier to be properly informed, but I suppose it still takes effort. I've no idea why some people consider themselves to have completed better research than those in high spec laboratories under high standards of supervision.

uneducated is the only adjective

logically and critically are adverbs

(which someone educated and able to think logically and critically would know)

Maybe you don't "think" so, but healthcare professionals do, based on more than suppositions or hunches. I would always consider that. I would never want a child of mine to become very ill, when that could have been avoided or minimised.

However, as you say, your choice.