I started to notice perhaps five or so years ago that efforts to get people vaccinated for the flu appeared to be ramping up quite significantly each year when autumn arrived. I did not seem able to pass by any pharmacy or medical office without seeing signs encouraging people to come in and get their flu shot. This included, of course, any retail location that had a pharmacy on the premises so I was seeing these signs outside of all the local supermarkets and my local Wal-Mart store. I had not noticed that in previous years.
There was also a very noticeable increase in television and radio commercials that were pushing the flu shot, and some of them were pushing rather hard. I recall one television commercial a few years back from a state-run health agency that rather blatantly attempted to make viewers feel guilty if they did not want the flu jab. The commercial showed four actors who took turns relating their “excuses” for not getting a flu shot. One said she was just too busy, one said that he was so healthy he did not need one, the third one asked if the flu shot even worked while the fourth one, obviously a “conspiracy theorist,” expressed doubts about the safety of the flu shot. The authoritative voice of the narrator dismissed all of their excuses and encouraged viewers to avoid being a “shot dodger.” As if there was some obligation to allow a foreign substance formulated by a corrupt, greedy pharmaceutical company to be directly injected into your body.
All this promotional activity for a flu shot was something I found a bit strange. I had the same unsettled feeling I had when the pharmaceutical companies were given the green light to advertise on television in the late 1990s. I just didn’t feel right about it and it left me with this creepy feeling that it was being done for reasons other than the health and general well-being of the public. Which leads me to my next point.
Why, I asked myself, would there be such a determined effort to get flu shots injected into people’s bodies? Let’s, for a moment, put aside the most obvious reason. Profit! We all know the big pharmaceutical companies love to make boatloads of money and there is no doubt that the ones pushing those flu shots directly to the public like the pharmacies and retail chains are getting a piece of that action. For now, however, I want to focus not so much on their motivation for pushing these injections and talk about what actually doesn’t motivate them to do it.
Despite what they tell us, I feel quite confident in saying that they are not doing it for altruistic purposes. These shots are not being pushed so hard because Big Pharma or giant pharmacy and retail chains sincerely do not want you, your kids or grandma coming down with the flu. My 60-plus years of observing human behavior has thoroughly convinced me of that. The people that run these organizations did not get to where they are through their philanthropic generosity and although it may shatter some idealistic notions, they truly do not care if you, your kids or your grandma live or die. I’m sorry, but that is just the sad truth.
Granted, there may be a few decent people within the ranks of the world’s billionaires but I am certain they are few and far between. And don’t allow their allegedly charitable “foundations” make you believe otherwise. That’s a whole other can of worms for another post but suffice to say that their their “foundations” actually benefit themselves more than any needy individual on the planet.
It is indeed a very sorry state of affairs but if you could actually believe that any more than 5 percent (and that’s an optimistic number!) of billionaires and Washington politicians care about the well-being of the general public, I would conclude that there probably is no way I can reach you and you may as well close this page and go back to watching the nightly network “news.” And don’t forget to wear your little obedience mask the next time you leave your house!
Now that we have established that flu shots are not being pushed to actually help anyone except those that are doing the pushing, we can move on to what their true motivations are. Yes, profit has to be one of them. Can there be any doubt that Big Pharma rakes in massive boatloads of cash distributing their magic potions every fall and winter?
And by the way, just how effective are flu shots anyway? If you make a determination based on the “public service” commercial above, you might think they are 100 percent effective and that you would stand virtually no chance of getting the flu after you roll up your sleeve and accept the sacred jab. After all, at the end of that little propaganda piece the narrator tells us that we should get our flu shot “to protect your and your family and prevent the spread of the flu.”
I wonder if the flu shot prevents the spread of the flu the same way the Covid-19 jabs prevent the spread of Covid-19. Oh wait.
Let’s get down to it answer the question about the effectiveness of flu shot, shall we? It appears that the jab’s effectiveness changes from season to season and probably has a lot to do with how well health officials predict the strain that will be most common during the next flu season. Depending on which source you choose to believe, it looks like the flu shot is between 16 percent and 60 percent effective.
Other reports indicate that the flu shot isn’t effective at all, particularly for the elderly. Kind of ironic since the elderly are one of the groups that are pushed hardest every year to get a flu shot to “protect” them.
For the sake of argument, let’s just say that the flu shot is 50 percent effective. Those do not look like great odds to me. With a 50-50 chance of getting the flu even if you do get jabbed, does it seem like getting that shot is worth the risk? Although the risk may be small, there are risks involved in getting virtually anything injected into your body. And what are the long-term risks? Perhaps there are consequences decades down the line that the “experts” are not even aware of yet. Or willing to admit. For someone like me that does not have to worry much about too many decades in the future, that may not be a concern. However, it could be a big deal for someone who is 20 years old. Or six months old.
It must be abundantly clear by now that I don’t get flu shots. I’ve never had one in my life and have no plans to ever get one. I haven’t had the flu since 2004 and although this does not seem like the place to get into the reasons I believe that is the case, let’s just say that I am pretty confident that my personal health regimen is the main reason for that.
As I mentioned previously, this new trend that involves pushing flu shots so aggressively made me uneasy. It surely did not make me any more likely to go get a flu shot. Quite the contrary! However, it still felt like something was a little off. It felt like this new annual effort to get flu jabs in every arm was leading up to something but I had no idea what that might be.
Towards the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020 I found out.
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