What's a Fujian Flu?Written by Dr Tim Ong
Introduction There is a flu outbreak every year and there is a new flu vaccine being introduced every year. The reason is this - flu virus changes or mutate a little every year, making it impossible to create a vaccine that is permanently effective year after year. Instead, each year a new flu vaccine needs to be introduced that is effective for that particular year. According to data from Center for Disease Control, Atlanta, USA, this year's flu outbreak that is happening in USA is mainly due to flu virus of Fujian variant (79%) and Panama variant (21%). So, is flu vaccine effective? No vaccine is 100% effective. For flu vaccine to be effective for this outbreak, ideally vaccine needs to contain both Fujian and Panama variants. Unfortunately, present available flu vaccine isn't. However, that is not to say that vaccine is totally useless. It would still afford a certain degree of protection as there is cross-immunity. In other words, immunity that you get from one particular variant provides you with partial protection against other variants. Some protection is better than no protection, particularly for immuno-compromised, such as: -those above 65 years old -children below 2 -people undergoing treatment for terminal illness -those travelling to affected areas in USA
| | What Are You Going to Inoculate Yourself Against in 2004?Written by Susan Dunn, MA, cEQc, The Emotional Intelligence Coach™
Ever wonder why there’s a new flu vaccine every year? That’s because flu virus mutates a little every year, in order to infect us better, and we have to come up with a new vaccine to keep ahead of game. The virus keeps evolving so it can do us in, and we keep trying to find new ways to combat it. There is no such thing as a permanent “flu” vaccine, and there never will be. Getting vaccine makes us resistant to that particular strain, or resilient. We’re likely to stay healthy and be able to fight it off, or to get over it quickly it we get infected. Resilience is an Emotional Intelligence competency and same principle applies: when we learn skills that give us resilience, we’re better able to cope with stresses of our lives. Today more than ever, stressors are changing rapidly, and we need to be able to change quickly too; to keep injecting ourselves, as it were, with new “vaccine.” Emotional Intelligence gives you power to do this.
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