Lee.org

I expected to watch a snippet and smile. At the end of the 10 minute video, I feel transformed, reminded of the vastness of our world.

Joy!

An article titled  Johns Hopkins Researcher Releases Shocking Report On Flu Vaccines  made it around Facebook about how you shouldn’t get the flu vaccine for a variety of reasons. The article used several dubious pseudoscientific scare tactics but I kept reading. Way down the list, it hit on an idea that looks pretty important. I’ve done some research and I am surprised to say that, in my mind, the jury is still out on the usefulness of the flu vaccine for many people.

Short form:

The CDC (a usually reliable source) says that getting the flu vaccine each year will reduce your chance of getting the flu by about 50% and it will usually shorten any flu you do get. But then I found another usually reliable source (Cochrane) that says flu vaccines are not worthwhile unless you are sick or a youth between 2 and 18 years-old. Hmmm. Hmmmmmmmm. Cochrane didn’t find any real downside to the vaccine so if you’re worried for your long term health, getting it is still the safer bet.

Long form:

First, here is Snopes tearing apart the article I found, calling it “mostly false.” So that’s not a good start!

In the “Johns Hopkins” article, they write  “… a study by the Cochrane group studied hundreds of thousands of people and found it offered zero protection for those three things in the general community.” I tracked that study down  here   (no thanks to the author, they need to cite their references!!! grrr).  This large meta-analysis reported “The preventive effect of parenteral [injected or inhaled] inactivated influenza vaccine on healthy adults is small: at least 40 people would need vaccination to avoid one ILI [influenze like illness] case”

The main conclusion of this Cochrane-backed meta-analysis with lots of participants is that  getting the flu vaccine decreases an adult’s (18-65 year-old) chance of getting the flu by 1 in 40, or a measly 2.5%!  That’s not worth $20 and feeling yucky for a week!

I went looking for other Cochrane meta-analyses:
Children – The flu vaccine probably doesn’t help kids 0-2 years-old. The flu vaccine helps kids 2-18 years-old.
Elderly – They looked for research on flu vaccines for people over 65 years-old but found, astoundingly, very poor evidence of the  safety, efficacy or effectiveness of vaccines for this population!

So at this point it’s not looking good for the flu vaccine for anyone except kids aged 2-18. But the CDC reports the flu vaccine is quite effective! This article   reports that it is roughly 50% effective, and works pretty well across all age ranges. Googling “cdc influenza vaccine effectiveness” turns up reports each year of how the vaccine saved thousands of lives!

Is the flu vaccine valuable? Probably, maybe, no. I don’t know.

Recommendation for Compact Washer and Dryer.

We may be replacing our compact (24″ wide) stacked washer dryer very soon. We have a vent. Can you recommend any particular models?

I long for when I used to have a tiny apartment washing machine. That was a completely awesome appliance! But no use in looking back, I’m a family man now!

I’ve been making and teaching bread baking for a while. I just put the instruction sheet I use for the class (which also happens to be my own cheat sheet) online. Find it on my recipe site here. And please browse my other recipes on my personal recipe wiki.

Today, I was offered a position as an occupational therapist in a nearby public school district!

I got a book in EPUB format and wanted to read it on my Amazon Fire HD 8 (5th Generation). It’s easy to do once you know the secret recipe:

1. Get the free  Calibre  e-book management tool
2. Use Calibre to convert your EPUB file to AZW3 format (the native Kindle ebook format)
3. Connect your Amazon Fire to your computer with a USB cable
4. Using the USB connection, find the folder named “Books” on your Amazon Fire HD
5. Copy the AZW3 book file into the Books folder
6. Open your Kindle app on your Amazon Fire HD
7. Rejoice for the books are on your bookshelf!

Before figuring this out with the great help of my friend Michael, I tried several other methods unsuccessfully. See what doesn’t work.

First, want something funny and completely related to the post below:

Now on to my rant…

The common narrative is that the Presidential Primaries are elections that determine for each party who will be put forward in the general election. This narrative is incorrect. Political parties are not governmental bodies and are not beholden to the election process. Case in point: Bernie Sanders was favored by Democratic party members but Hillary was put forth by the party. A lawsuit against the DNC was dismissed last week, partially because Bruce Spiva, representing the DNC, described how they could do whatever they want, regardless of what their members wanted. Here is a snippet from the Washington Post:

Bruce Spiva, representing the DNC, made the argument that would eventually carry the day… he explained how the DNC worked, Spiva made a hypothetical argument that the party wasn’t really bound by the votes cast in primaries or caucuses.

“The party has the freedom of association to decide how it’s gonna select its representatives to the convention and to the state party,” said Spiva. “Even to define what constitutes evenhandedness and impartiality really would already drag the court well into a political question and a question of how the party runs its own affairs. The party could have favored a candidate. I’ll put it that way.”

Now I remember why “politics” is a four letter word.