The Good, the Bad, and the Frustrating…continued

In contrast to Amy Wallace’s excellent article in Wired, there was a recently a fairly awful piece in The Atlantic entitled Does the Vaccine Matter?

This article has been making the rounds on my mommy board in that being waved in your face sorta way: “Oh yeah? Well what about this? Did you see this?” And more panic, confusion, and general mayhem ensue.  The article suggests that the H1N1 vaccine, as well as all seasonal flu vaccines, are not that effective.  Naturally this has moms in a tizzy.  Too much confusing information out there.  How are they supposed to know what to do?

As soon as I read this article, I emailed the friend who had told me she heard “somewhere” that the vaccines don’t work anyway, and here’s my email response, with the colorful bits edited.

Okay, I read this, and it’s terrible!

First problem: the author [Brownlee] also wrote a book called Overtreated and is very biased against “too much” medicine. It may be true that Americans are overtreated, but in this case, she’s got it wrong.

Second (and way huger) problem: she’s writing almost exclusively about studies regarding the seasonal flu. It’s true that the seasonal flu mainly kills older people. But this new flu strain is particularly bad for younger people–the group that she says herself is most likely to benefit from the vaccine. So…I don’t get it. And why say, “Yeah, but the kids who died had underlying health issues.” So freakin’ WHAT? That means the vaccine could have saved them. Pretty heartless. And even if your kid doesn’t die, are you really interested in taking the chance that they’ll need to be on a respirator? Because that’s what’s happening to kids with this strain. And I ain’t interested!

Third problem: Her language is blatantly anti-vaccine. After reading a ton on this all year, I can spot it a mile away. The doctor championing hand washing is a pariah. I DOUBT it. The big medicine dudes won’t listen to evidence. UNlikely. This is drivel.

Fourth problem: Dr. Jay Gordon is heroizing this article on his website. RED FLAG that it’s full of sh**.

Fifth problem: What the f*** is she talking about when she asks for trials where half the population is given a placebo? Wha???? Would you like to be in the placebo group during a pandemic? No thanks.

All my sciency blogs are tearing this one a new a**hole. It sucks. Feel awesome about getting this vaccine. It’s a public health victory.

You see what an expensive education can do for your diction?

While I’m not exactly proud of my language here, I was sort of happy with myself that as something of a baby skeptic, I nailed most of the problems with this article right away.

So for anyone who doesn’t want to take my lit major word for it that The Atlantic article was pretty bad, please read Orac’s more fleshed out and much less swear word filled (though no less irritated) take on it.