Sunday, January 6, 2013

The Medical Dangers of Social Networks

A social network can waste your time but it can also cost you your life if you listen to the medical advice.  It's not clear when it started but a great many people today push personal agendas regarding vaccinations, genetically-modified food, and various other trendy topics of the day.  Much of the reporting is based on half-baked Web sites with little or no science to document the positions they have taken.

Today I was particularly outraged by a recommendation that people should not get a flu shot.  It appeared quite a formal presentation and that alone can give credence where it doesn't belong.  There's nothing quite like an impressive graphic to give the aura of professionalism where it doesn't really belong.

Those who advise against flu shots don't seem to have any knowledge of the influenza pandemic of 1917-1918 that affected five hundred million people around the world and killed between twenty and fifty million of them.  Being young and healthy was no protection as that segment of the population was particularly vulnerable to it.

From my personal experience I know my last experience with flu resulted in profound illness with a fever of 107F / 41.6C and delirium.  This was in my twenties and I resolved thereafter to get a flu shot every year.  I never got it again.  According to the Facebook advice those shots should have killed me or caused some other hideous problem but there is one simple fact:  influenza can definitely kill you and it didn't kill me.

When I was a manager, sometimes my boys would call in sick and say something like they're down with a 'touch of the flu' and they will be back to work in a few days.  I would accept that as it was pointless to call them on it but it's rubbish as you don't get a touch of the flu, it hits you like a hammer blow and you will be down for two weeks, most likely begging for death most of that time.

Another thing that affected me greatly and has a high risk of mortality is pneumonia as it was getting so bad that I was getting sick with it several times a year and it would take a very long time to get over it.  Quite likely I would be dead by now if I had not received a shot to prevent it and my report is that I haven't had it since.  As with the flu shot, there are theories on the social networks that the pneumonia shot is dangerous as well.  That report is rubbish and, worse, it's dangerous rubbish.

There is one place to get medical information and that's from a doctor.  If you're not satisfied with the information then go to another doctor.  Going to a social network for medical advice could quite easily kill you as the information such mediums present is often ill-advised, ill-informed and dangerous.



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