“Getting
the flu vaccine is better than getting the flu,” said Dr. Deborah
Lehman, a professor of pediatrics at the David Geffen School of Medicine
at the University of California, Los Angeles. “As someone who has
watched children die from the flu and heard of adults dying from the
flu, it’s hard for me to reconcile.”
Here are some common misconceptions people have about the flu vaccine and the truth behind them.
Misconception: It doesn’t work so there’s no point getting it
Over the past decade, the flu shot has been 44 percent effective, on average, according to a review of CDC data.
Health
officials meet every February to choose which strains to include the
year’s flu shot. Even if they pick a good match, the virus often
mutates, so much so that the vaccine elicits immune responses that do
not recognize the illness and therefore struggle to fight it.
So
yes, you still can get the flu if you get a shot. But the vaccine is
still currently the best way to protect yourself. And even when people
who got the shot end up getting sick, their illnesses tend to be less
severe.
“It’s
not perfectly successful, but it does reduce your odds of getting it
and lessens your chance of being in the hospital or the morgue,” said
Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s
Hospital of Philadelphia and a vaccinology professor at the Perelman
School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
Yes, the shot is made from the flu virus — but it’s inactivated, making it impossible for the vaccine to give you the flu.
When
developing the vaccine, scientists include two surface proteins from
the virus, said Offit. That way, when a person gets the shot, his or her
immune system’s antibodies can learn how to fight the flu without ever
being exposed to it, he said.
The vaccine is essentially a
practice round for your immune system. Some people experience a sore arm
or low-grade fever after the shot because their bodies are learning to
fight.
“It’s much better to get a little bit of a sore arm than
spending three or four days stuck in bed not wanting to eat and drink
because you have the actual flu,” said Dr. Aaron Milstone, an associate
hospital epidemiologist at The Johns Hopkins Hospital .
Misconception: So what if I get the flu, I’m young and healthy
It’s
true that the very young and very old are most susceptible to dying
from the flu. However, that doesn’t make everyone in between invincible.
Influenza
can wreck havoc on the body. The upper respiratory illness can cause
people to experience a fever, cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose,
body aches, headache, chills, fatigue and sometimes diarrhea and
vomiting, according to the CDC.
It can lead to complications like
pneumonia, which can be serious. The combination of influenza and
pneumonia was the eighth leading cause of death in 2016, killing 51,537
people that year, according to the CDC.
Also,
even if you’re young and healthy, you can spread the flu to someone
who’s not. Seemingly healthy adults might be able to infect other people
one day before their symptoms develop and up to five to seven days
after becoming sick, according to the CDC.
“Often
one of the most convincing arguments is you’re healthy, but what about
grandma or a little baby?” said Dr. Richard Webby, a member of the
infectious diseases department at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
and the World Health Organization’s Vaccine Composition Team. “There’s a
chance you’ll transmit the virus to others that are high risk. By
vaccinating yourself, you may actually protect others, as well.”
Bottom line: Get a flu shot
Flu
activity tends to increase in October and November and can last as late
as May, according to the CDC. The agency recommends getting vaccinated
by the end of October because it takes two weeks for antibodies that
fight the flu to develop in your body. So at this point, you may be a
little late, but the CDC says it’s still beneficial to get the shot
later than not at all.
“The US has finally acknowledged that among those who had died of the
influenza previously were cases of the coronavirus. The true source of
the virus was the US!” one commentator said. “The US owes the world,
especially China, an apology,” another said. “American coronavirus,” one
wrote.
The theory has gained traction over the past few weeks, after a
respected epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan, said in a passing remark at a
press conference on 27 February that although the virus first appeared
in China “it may not have originated in China”.
I think it either:
A) started in the Wuhan fish market in China, China withheld that info & used it like the theories you had up there in your post, especially when attempts to stop travelers coming in from China were called racist
B was a failed bioweapon, I think it is said there's a facility near Wuhan
In either case that makes the Chinese some real jerks. My two pennies worth.
Just watched the White House press conference where they showed John Hopkins numbers of cases vs. deaths.
32000 to 400 deaths = 1.2% death rate in the US.
You can bet your ass there are more than 32000 people infected and not tested so the 1.2% number is probably high.
So we are essentially panicking and shutting down the country for something that kills less than the regular flu.
So, how does it end? Better question, why has all this madness even started?
What's the real reason for all this nonsense.....time will tell.
You cant work out the percentage that way as you are using cases still without an outcome against cases with an outcome, the only way you can work it out is by comparing people who have recovered against people who have died and its way too early in the development of the virus spread in the US to get any sensible data from this as its the weakest that succumb to the virus first.
So for example the in the US; 1163 cases with outcomes, 784 deaths, 379 recovered, would give a death rate of around 67% currently, though as stated above this will go down over time.
The closed cases death percentage rate is actually 15% worldwide but you also have to factor in that most countries (if not all) are not testing everyone.
“The US has finally acknowledged that among those who had died of the
influenza previously were cases of the coronavirus. The true source of
the virus was the US!” one commentator said. “The US owes the world,
especially China, an apology,” another said. “American coronavirus,” one
wrote.
The theory has gained traction over the past few weeks, after a
respected epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan, said in a passing remark at a
press conference on 27 February that although the virus first appeared
in China “it may not have originated in China”.
I think it either:
A) started in the Wuhan fish market in China, China withheld that info & used it like the theories you had up there in your post, especially when attempts to stop travelers coming in from China were called racist
B was a failed bioweapon, I think it is said there's a facility near Wuhan
In either case that makes the Chinese some real jerks. My two pennies worth.
If China gets too upset about calling it a Chinese coronavirus, we could just call it the Xi Jinping coronavirus. The Chinese officials who tried to censor acknowledgement that the virus existed wouldn't have done it if they didn't have good reason to believe that that was what their dictator wanted.
Just watched the White House press conference where they showed John Hopkins numbers of cases vs. deaths.
32000 to 400 deaths = 1.2% death rate in the US.
You can bet your ass there are more than 32000 people infected and not tested so the 1.2% number is probably high.
So we are essentially panicking and shutting down the country for something that kills less than the regular flu.
So, how does it end? Better question, why has all this madness even started?
What's the real reason for all this nonsense.....time will tell.
You cant work out the percentage that way as you are using cases still without an outcome against cases with an outcome, the only way you can work it out is by comparing people who have recovered against people who have died and its way too early in the development of the virus spread in the US to get any sensible data from this as its the weakest that succumb to the virus first.
So for example the in the US; 1163 cases with outcomes, 784 deaths, 379 recovered, would give a death rate of around 67% currently, though as stated above this will go down over time.
The closed cases death percentage rate is actually 15% worldwide but you also have to factor in that most countries (if not all) are not testing everyone.
Are you seriously suggesting that the current death rate is 67%?
New Orleans emerges as next coronavirus epicenter, threatening rest of South
March 25 (Reuters) - New Orleans is on track to become the next coronavirus epicenter in the United States, dimming hopes that less densely populated and warmer-climate cities would escape the worst of the pandemic, and that summer months could see it wane.
“The US has finally acknowledged that among those who had died of the
influenza previously were cases of the coronavirus. The true source of
the virus was the US!” one commentator said. “The US owes the world,
especially China, an apology,” another said. “American coronavirus,” one
wrote.
The theory has gained traction over the past few weeks, after a
respected epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan, said in a passing remark at a
press conference on 27 February that although the virus first appeared
in China “it may not have originated in China”.
I think it either:
A) started in the Wuhan fish market in China, China withheld that info & used it like the theories you had up there in your post, especially when attempts to stop travelers coming in from China were called racist
B was a failed bioweapon, I think it is said there's a facility near Wuhan
In either case that makes the Chinese some real jerks. My two pennies worth.
On December 31 last year, China
alerted WHO to several cases of unusual pneumonia in Wuhan, a port city
of 11 million people in the central Hubei province. The virus was
unknown.
Several of those infected worked at the city's Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, which was shut down on January 1.
As health experts worked to identify the virus amid growing alarm, the number of infections exceeded 40.
On January 5, Chinese officials ruled out the
possibility that this was a recurrence of the severe acute respiratory
syndrome (SARS) virus - an illness that originated in China and killed
more than 770 people worldwide in 2002-2003.
On January 7, officials announced they had
identified a new virus, according to the WHO. The novel virus was named
2019-nCoV and was identified as belonging to the coronavirus family,
which includes SARS and the common cold.
The
recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, brought to the forefront
longstanding concerns about the vulnerability of our ports. After Sept.
11, for example, U.S. seaports were closed for several days, an
acknowledgment that ships, like airplanes, could also serve as deadly
weapons. Coast Guard vessels were immediately dispatched to provide
security at all major American ports.[1]
Few would dispute that, if terrorists used a cargo container to
conceal a weapon of mass destruction and detonated it on arrival at a
U.S. port, the impact on global trade and the world economy could be
immediate and devastating.
A terrorist nuclear attack on a U.S. seaport could cause local devastation and affectthe global economy. Terrorists might obtain a bomb in several ways, though each posesdifficulties. Ability to detect a bomb appears limited. The United States is usingtechnology, intelligence, international cooperation, etc., to try to thwart an attack. Issuesfor Congress include safeguarding foreign nuclear material, mitigating economic effectsof an attack, and allocating funds between ports and other potential targets. This reportwill be updated as needed
It comes as Beijing and Washington have been embroiled in a power struggle over trade and technology.
South Korea, the US and the UK have all rolled out their next generation 5G networks this year.
5G
is the fifth-generation of mobile internet connectivity. It promises
much faster data download and upload speeds, wider coverage and more
stable connections.
The Chinese carriers had initially scheduled the launch for next year, but accelerated the rollout.
The
superfast service is now available to consumers in 50 Chinese cities,
including Beijing and Shanghai, with prices for monthly plans ranging
from 128 yuan ($18; £14) to 599 yuan, according to state media Xinhua.
This would make it one of the world's largest 5G deployments, it said.
China and the US have been fighting for leadership in the technology
sector in recent months, with Chinese tech giant Huawei at the centre of
their power struggle.
Huawei has supplied the largest amount of
network equipment for China's 5G rollout and has been in talks with
various other countries to help with their 5G networks.
However, the US has blacklisted the company, arguing it poses a national security risk and has lobbied allies to shun Huawei from their 5G networks.
Huawei
denies this, and many in China see the US actions as part of its
efforts to curb the rise of the world's second largest economy.
The US insists that its opposition
to Huawei technology being used in key information systems stems
entirely from security concerns: the fear of "back-doors" in the
software or the relationship between the Chinese State and its major
high-tech companies.
Of course, there may be a good dose of
old-fashioned commercial rivalry as well. These are the technologies
after all that will shape the world's economic future.
But is
there something more? Are we witnessing the first significant engagement
in something that is much more than simply a conventional trade war?
For years commentators have been talking about China's rise: a shift
of economic power to the East and the relative decline of the US. None
of this was likely to happen without friction - but now though, the US
is fighting back.
Spokesmen talk about preparing for a new era of
global competition. In the first instance the discussion is military -
re-orientating the US armed forces away from fighting insurgencies and
regional wars to prepare for state-on-state conflict, with Russia and
China as the peer competitors.
But in the struggle with China,
the economic dimension is fundamental. At one level the Trump
administration appears determined to use its economic muscle not just to
constrain a company like Huawei, but also to force Beijing to open up
its markets and change aspects of its economic behaviour that have
long-concerned western companies seeking to do business there.
Beijing, of course, sees something different going on - a developing campaign to contain China's rise. And it may be right.
This
battle is about much more than just business practices and commercial
markets, it is a struggle over the most basic underpinnings of national
power with huge strategic implications. To put it another way, the West
is slowly re-learning the simple fact - one that Beijing has assimilated
all too well - that economic muscle is the foundation of global power
and that economic strength is the precursor of military might.
UV Sterilization: Far-UVC light kills airborne flu viruses without danger to humans
Use
of overhead far-ultraviolet C light in public spaces could provide a
powerful check on seasonal influenza epidemics, as well as influenza
pandemics.
Continuous low doses of far-ultraviolet C (far-UVC) light can kill
airborne flu viruses without harming human tissues, according to a new
study at the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University
Irving Medical Center (New York, NY).1 The findings suggest
that use of overhead far-UVC light in hospitals, doctors’ offices,
schools, airports, airplanes, and other public spaces could provide a
powerful check on seasonal influenza epidemics, as well as influenza
pandemics.
Scientists have known for decades that broad-spectrum
UVC light, which has a wavelength between 200 and 400 nm, is highly
effective at killing bacteria and viruses by destroying the molecular
bonds that hold their DNA together. This conventional UV light is
routinely used to decontaminate surgical equipment. “Unfortunately,
conventional germicidal UV light is also a human health hazard and can
lead to skin cancer and cataracts, which prevents its use in public
spaces,” says study leader David Brenner.
Several years ago,
Brenner and his colleagues hypothesized that far-UVC could kill microbes
without damaging healthy tissue. “Far-UVC light has a very limited
range and cannot penetrate through the outer dead-cell layer of human
skin or the tear layer in the eye, so it’s not a human health hazard.
But because viruses and bacteria are much smaller than human cells,
far-UVC light can reach their DNA and kill them,” Brenner said.
Medify
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Italy’s Deal With China Signals a Shift as U.S. Influence Recedes
March 30, 2019
ROME
— For decades, Italy felt the brunt of the Chinese economic juggernaut
that the United States argues poses a threat to the financial and
political future of the West.
China’s
government-backed manufacturers, operating on a much larger scale with
much cheaper costs, devoured small Italian companies producing
machinery, textiles and pharmaceuticals. Chinese knockoffs infuriated
its high-fashion brands.
But this
month, as the United States continued to engage in a trade standoff with
China, and leaders of the European Union banded together to demand an
end to unfair Chinese business practices, Italy took another route —
China’s new Silk Road.
“This
is not being isolated from Europe, this is Italy leading,” Michele
Geraci, Italy’s under secretary for economic development, and the
driving force behind the deal, said in a telephone interview from
China’s southern Hainan province.
“And when you lead,” he added, “you do need to be alone for a split second. But this bit is going to be very short.”
Italy’s transactional tradition in trade
and foreign policy, its anti-establishment government’s antagonism
toward the European Union, the failure of the United States to intervene
effectively and China’s expertise in exploiting political dysfunction —
all of those things contributed to the making of the deal.
So, too, did Italy’s desperation for investment, access to China’s enormous markets and anything resembling an economic uptick.
Now as the United States has withdrawn from the world, China is front and center on Italy’s map again.
This
week, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte of Italy said that as China exerts a
stronger influence on the world’s economy, it is going to exert “an
increasing influence also at the political level.”
Mr.
Conte was speaking at an event in Rome held by a Jesuit magazine to
discuss the Vatican’s own breakthrough deal last year with China, in
which Pope Francis made concessions to the Chinese government in order
to bring all the Chinese bishops into communion with Rome, and to gain
more access to the world’s most populous country.
In
front of an audience of top diplomats, prelates and government
officials, all eager to learn more about China, Mr. Conte spoke
admiringly of China’s efforts to become a world leader in “technology
and in innovation, leadership that we know is very contested by the
United States.”
The United States, in fact, sought to stop Italy’s joining of the Silk Road.
This
week Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said he was “saddened” by the
development. On Thursday, Luigi Di Maio, Italy’s deputy prime minister
and the political leader of the Five Star Movement, met with National
Security Adviser John R. Bolton at the White House.
Mr. Di Maio told reporters that he
assured the Americans that the China deal was purely about commerce and
that Italy remained firmly in the political orbit of the United States,
which has vastly more money invested in the country than China does.
In
the months before the deal, Mr. Di Maio repeatedly visited China, and
nearly made a deal in November, Italian officials said. All along, the
Italians said, they heard barely a peep from top officials in the United
States, and by the time Mr. Bolton’s spokesman went public against the deal earlier this month, it was too late.
A
senior government official, speaking on background to discuss internal
deliberations, said Washington would have engaged sooner if it had
understood that Italy planned to officially join the new Silk Road,
which it sees as a strategic threat.
The
official said the chaotic nature of Italian politics and the fact that
visits to Beijing had become the norm for European leaders made it
harder to discern what the Italians were up to.
Indeed,
already 16 central and eastern European countries, including 11 members
of the European Union, have formal business relations with China.
China-France bilateral trade was just around $100 million in 1964;
now it has increased 600 times, and is worth $62.9 billion in 2018 — an
increase of more than 15 percent from 2017.
France is now China's fourth-largest trade partner in the EU, behind
Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. China is France’s largest trade
partner in Asia.
Two-way direct investments are also on the rise. China’s direct
investment into France increased 86 percent year-on-year to $1.8 billion
in 2018. A large amount of the investment flowed into the energy
sector. French investment in China can be characterized by large
bilateral contracts, especially in the aviation and nuclear energy
fields.
China is the largest single-country market for Airbus, representing
about one-quarter of global sales. In 2008, a joint venture of the A320
final assembly line was set up in Tianjin to meet surging demand from
Chinese customers.
It is the third single-aisle aircraft final assembly line location of
Airbus and first outside Europe. In June 2009, the Airbus A320 FALA in
Tianjin delivered its first aircraft.
In 2017, the value of industrial cooperation between Airbus and China
exceeded $640 million, and the figure is expected to reach one billion
dollars by 2020.
A third-generation European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) nuclear power
unit at Taishan power plant in South China's Guangdong province was
successfully linked to grid in 2018.
The Taishan nuclear power plant's No 1 power unit is the world's
first third-generation EPR nuclear power unit that has been linked to
grid.
The plant is the largest Sino-French project in the energy field. It
is run by a joint venture set up by China General Nuclear Power Corp, or
CGN, French energy supplier Electricite de France (EDF), and Guangdong
Yudean Group.
Third-country projects
China and France also cooperated on third-country projects, such as
the Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant in the UK, which is jointly
financed by the two countries.
It will be co-built by CGN and French energy company EDF.
Thanks to China's growing wealth, more Chinese can afford to study or
spend their holidays in France. With around 30,000 students in France,
China is the third-largest source of international students in France,
behind Morocco and Algeria.
The number of Chinese tourists in France surpassed 2.3 million in
2018. French visitors can stop over for up to 72 hours with no entry
visa required in Chinese cities including Beijing, Shanghai and
Guangzhou.
President Xi visited the southern French city of Lyon, one of the
final stops of the ancient Silk Road trade routes, in his state visit to
France in March 2014. Consequently in January of 2018, President Macron
visited Xi'an, one of the eastern ends of the ancient Silk Road, during
his first China visit as head of state.
During meetings, the two countries agreed to advance the joint
development of the Belt and Road Initiative and explore third-market
cooperation. France is one of the founding members of the Asian
Infrastructure Investment Bank.
The Lyon-Wuhan freight rail line was launched in April 2016. Since
then, thousands of bottles of Bordeaux wine, auto parts and French
agricultural products have been exported to China.
The rail freight service is now also available for refrigerated
agricultural products. Trains are loaded and unloaded in Venissieux, 16
kilometers far from Lyon. There are two trains per week in both
directions.
In 2017, Decathlon, one of France's leading sports goods retailers,
began transporting products made in its factory in Wuhan, capital of
Hubei province, to its warehouses in Dourges, northern France, direct by
rail.
The weekly 41-container freight train allowed Decathlon's products to
reach France in 16 to 18 days, compared with the 20 days previously
needed when transported by sea.
These businesses have turned the vision of Belt and Road connectivity into profitability.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s
famously pragmatic approach to foreign affairs is currently being
tested to its fullest as the country — and the wider European region —
contemplates whether to bar Chinese 5G equipment at the direction of the
United States.
“Germany faces a difficult choice: allow Huawei
in, and alienate the U.S., its most important security partner. Or keep
Huawei out, and alienate China, an important trading partner that some
German companies, including the country’s influential auto industry,
depend on for a significant chunk of their sales,” Kevin Allison,
director of Geo-technology at the research firm Eurasia, told CNBC
Wednesday.
In May, President Donald Trump
took steps to ban Huawei from selling its technology in the United
States. U.S. officials have expressed concern over the company’s links
to the Chinese government and the security threat it could pose,
something which the Shenzhen-based tech firm has denied. However, the
German chancellor has put forward a different view.
She’s decided not to outright block Huawei
from participating in the development of 5G in Germany — a
controversial option for some German lawmakers who also believe this
could put the country at risk of surveillance by Beijing. Huawei has
welcomed Merkel’s “fact and standards-based approach.”
More
recently, the two countries have been at odds over defense spending
under NATO, as well as on trade and climate change. This tense
relationship hit a new low earlier this week when the U.S. ambassador to
Germany criticized “senior German officials” for comparing the U.S. to
China.
Amid
its long-running conflict with the US, Iran has increasingly turned to
China for aid to boost its military and to help protect its economy from
trade sanctions imposed by Washington.
The
strong ties between Beijing and Tehran have been evident in recent days
as tensions have risen in the Middle East, triggered by
.
Zhai Jun, China’s special representative for the Middle East, visited
Tehran for a security dialogue on Monday and Tuesday, when he said some
“external nations” were stirring provocations, without naming the US.
China
remains Iran’s biggest trading partner, but its oil imports from the
country have fallen sharply as a result of US sanctions. In November
2019, the last available data, China imported 547,758 tonnes of Iranian
oil, down from 3.07 million tonnes in April, according to China’s
General Administration of Customs. Trade between China and Iran in 2018
totaled US$35.13 billion, with crude oil accounting for about half, or
US$15 billion.
In
2018, US President Donald Trump pulled out of an agreement aimed at
curtailing Iran’s nuclear development programme and reimposed crippling
sanctions on its economy.
While
the sanctions have dented oil trade between the two countries, they
remain strong partners on the military front. According to the Stockholm
International Peace Research Institute, China was among the top three
arms transfer partners for Iran, exporting US$269 million of weapons
from 2008 to 2018.
During
the eight-year Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, China was a provider of
military hardware to Iran, while the US, the then Soviet Union and other
major powers such as France supported Iraq, supplying it with military
equipment.
MADRID, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- China and Spain agreed on Wednesday to
build on the 45th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties to
jointly promote the development of the relationship and deliver more
benefit to the two peoples.
The consensus was reached at a meeting between visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.
Xi said he was very glad to visit Spain for the first time after his re-election as Chinese president in March.
Since the establishment of China-Spain diplomatic ties, bilateral
relationship has withstood changes in the international landscape and
enjoyed a healthy and stable development, he said, noting that the
friendship has stayed as strong as ever.
Praising Sanchez's endeavor to develop bilateral relations and his
support for the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Xi said China always
cherishes the traditional friendship with Spain and highly values
Spain's important role in international affairs.
China is willing to "work with Spain to enrich the content of
China-Spain comprehensive strategic partnership, uplift the level of
cooperation in various fields," so as to set an example for different
civilizations to communicate and learn from each other and for countries
with different social systems to achieve win-win cooperation.
Xi stressed that the two sides should strengthen the "guiding and
driving" role of high-level exchanges in the development of ties, cement
exchanges and cooperation between the two government departments and
legislative bodies, deepen political mutual trust, and continue to
extend mutual support and understanding on issues concerning each
other's core interests and major concerns, so as to forge ahead the
steady development of bilateral ties.
"There are multiple advantages including historical and geographic
factors for China and Spain to conduct cooperation on the BRI," said Xi,
calling for greater synergy between the BRI and Spain's "Strategic
Vision for Spain in Asia" and the "Mediterranean Corridor", closer
economy and trade contacts, and more cooperation in such areas as ports,
shipping, aviation, new energy vehicles, finance.
Xi also called on the two sides to optimize technology and innovation
cooperation, deepen people-to-people exchanges, and strengthen
exchanges and cooperation in culture, local areas, tourism, journalism,
medical care, cultural heritage protection, and sports.
Comments
Every year, health officials warn people to get their flu shots. Every year, people ignore those calls.
Just 37 percent of U.S. adults were estimated to have been vaccinated last flu season, down 6 percentage points from the year before, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Meanwhile, the CDC estimates the flu killed more than 80,000 people and caused more than 900,000 hospitalizations last year.
“Getting the flu vaccine is better than getting the flu,” said Dr. Deborah Lehman, a professor of pediatrics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles. “As someone who has watched children die from the flu and heard of adults dying from the flu, it’s hard for me to reconcile.”
Here are some common misconceptions people have about the flu vaccine and the truth behind them.
Misconception: It doesn’t work so there’s no point getting it
Over the past decade, the flu shot has been 44 percent effective, on average, according to a review of CDC data.
Health officials meet every February to choose which strains to include the year’s flu shot. Even if they pick a good match, the virus often mutates, so much so that the vaccine elicits immune responses that do not recognize the illness and therefore struggle to fight it.
So yes, you still can get the flu if you get a shot. But the vaccine is still currently the best way to protect yourself. And even when people who got the shot end up getting sick, their illnesses tend to be less severe.
“It’s not perfectly successful, but it does reduce your odds of getting it and lessens your chance of being in the hospital or the morgue,” said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a vaccinology professor at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
Misconception: It will give me the flu
Yes, the shot is made from the flu virus — but it’s inactivated, making it impossible for the vaccine to give you the flu.
When developing the vaccine, scientists include two surface proteins from the virus, said Offit. That way, when a person gets the shot, his or her immune system’s antibodies can learn how to fight the flu without ever being exposed to it, he said.
The vaccine is essentially a practice round for your immune system. Some people experience a sore arm or low-grade fever after the shot because their bodies are learning to fight.
“It’s much better to get a little bit of a sore arm than spending three or four days stuck in bed not wanting to eat and drink because you have the actual flu,” said Dr. Aaron Milstone, an associate hospital epidemiologist at The Johns Hopkins Hospital .
Misconception: So what if I get the flu, I’m young and healthy
It’s true that the very young and very old are most susceptible to dying from the flu. However, that doesn’t make everyone in between invincible.
Influenza can wreck havoc on the body. The upper respiratory illness can cause people to experience a fever, cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose, body aches, headache, chills, fatigue and sometimes diarrhea and vomiting, according to the CDC.
It can lead to complications like pneumonia, which can be serious. The combination of influenza and pneumonia was the eighth leading cause of death in 2016, killing 51,537 people that year, according to the CDC.
Health researchers also have seen evidence that there is an increased risk of heart attack and stroke as people recover from the illness.
Also, even if you’re young and healthy, you can spread the flu to someone who’s not. Seemingly healthy adults might be able to infect other people one day before their symptoms develop and up to five to seven days after becoming sick, according to the CDC.
“Often one of the most convincing arguments is you’re healthy, but what about grandma or a little baby?” said Dr. Richard Webby, a member of the infectious diseases department at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and the World Health Organization’s Vaccine Composition Team. “There’s a chance you’ll transmit the virus to others that are high risk. By vaccinating yourself, you may actually protect others, as well.”
Bottom line: Get a flu shot
Flu activity tends to increase in October and November and can last as late as May, according to the CDC. The agency recommends getting vaccinated by the end of October because it takes two weeks for antibodies that fight the flu to develop in your body. So at this point, you may be a little late, but the CDC says it’s still beneficial to get the shot later than not at all.
A) started in the Wuhan fish market in China, China withheld that info & used it like the theories you had up there in your post, especially when attempts to stop travelers coming in from China were called racist
B was a failed bioweapon, I think it is said there's a facility near Wuhan
In either case that makes the Chinese some real jerks. My two pennies worth.
AC2 Player RIP Final Death Jan 31st 2017
Refugee of Auberean
Refugee of Dereth
AC2 Player RIP Final Death Jan 31st 2017
Refugee of Auberean
Refugee of Dereth
I really hope that you are not serious......
Well looks like that has sadly come to pass....
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/new-orleans-emerges-as-next-coronavirus-epicenter-threatening-rest-of-south/ar-BB11HRXa?ocid=msedgntp
AC2 Player RIP Final Death Jan 31st 2017
Refugee of Auberean
Refugee of Dereth
c. America put it their
On December 31 last year, China alerted WHO to several cases of unusual pneumonia in Wuhan, a port city of 11 million people in the central Hubei province. The virus was unknown.
Several of those infected worked at the city's Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, which was shut down on January 1.
As health experts worked to identify the virus amid growing alarm, the number of infections exceeded 40.
On January 5, Chinese officials ruled out the possibility that this was a recurrence of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) virus - an illness that originated in China and killed more than 770 people worldwide in 2002-2003.
On January 7, officials announced they had identified a new virus, according to the WHO. The novel virus was named 2019-nCoV and was identified as belonging to the coronavirus family, which includes SARS and the common cold.
The recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, brought to the forefront longstanding concerns about the vulnerability of our ports. After Sept. 11, for example, U.S. seaports were closed for several days, an acknowledgment that ships, like airplanes, could also serve as deadly weapons. Coast Guard vessels were immediately dispatched to provide security at all major American ports.[1]
Few would dispute that, if terrorists used a cargo container to conceal a weapon of mass destruction and detonated it on arrival at a U.S. port, the impact on global trade and the world economy could be immediate and devastating.
https://fas.org/irp/crs/RS21293.pdf
A terrorist nuclear attack on a U.S. seaport could cause local devastation and affectthe global economy. Terrorists might obtain a bomb in several ways, though each posesdifficulties. Ability to detect a bomb appears limited. The United States is usingtechnology, intelligence, international cooperation, etc., to try to thwart an attack. Issuesfor Congress include safeguarding foreign nuclear material, mitigating economic effectsof an attack, and allocating funds between ports and other potential targets. This reportwill be updated as needed
China's mobile operators have made 5G services available to consumers, as the country seeks to become a global technology leader.
State-owned carriers China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom unveiled their 5G data plans on Thursday.
It comes as Beijing and Washington have been embroiled in a power struggle over trade and technology.
South Korea, the US and the UK have all rolled out their next generation 5G networks this year.
5G is the fifth-generation of mobile internet connectivity. It promises much faster data download and upload speeds, wider coverage and more stable connections.
The Chinese carriers had initially scheduled the launch for next year, but accelerated the rollout.
The superfast service is now available to consumers in 50 Chinese cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, with prices for monthly plans ranging from 128 yuan ($18; £14) to 599 yuan, according to state media Xinhua.
More than 130,000 5G base stations will be activated by the end of the year to support the 5G network, the government said in the statement.
This would make it one of the world's largest 5G deployments, it said.
China and the US have been fighting for leadership in the technology sector in recent months, with Chinese tech giant Huawei at the centre of their power struggle.
Huawei has supplied the largest amount of network equipment for China's 5G rollout and has been in talks with various other countries to help with their 5G networks.
However, the US has blacklisted the company, arguing it poses a national security risk and has lobbied allies to shun Huawei from their 5G networks.
Huawei denies this, and many in China see the US actions as part of its efforts to curb the rise of the world's second largest economy.
The US insists that its opposition to Huawei technology being used in key information systems stems entirely from security concerns: the fear of "back-doors" in the software or the relationship between the Chinese State and its major high-tech companies.
Of course, there may be a good dose of old-fashioned commercial rivalry as well. These are the technologies after all that will shape the world's economic future.
But is there something more? Are we witnessing the first significant engagement in something that is much more than simply a conventional trade war?
For years commentators have been talking about China's rise: a shift of economic power to the East and the relative decline of the US. None of this was likely to happen without friction - but now though, the US is fighting back.
Spokesmen talk about preparing for a new era of global competition. In the first instance the discussion is military - re-orientating the US armed forces away from fighting insurgencies and regional wars to prepare for state-on-state conflict, with Russia and China as the peer competitors.
But in the struggle with China, the economic dimension is fundamental. At one level the Trump administration appears determined to use its economic muscle not just to constrain a company like Huawei, but also to force Beijing to open up its markets and change aspects of its economic behaviour that have long-concerned western companies seeking to do business there.
Beijing, of course, sees something different going on - a developing campaign to contain China's rise. And it may be right.
This battle is about much more than just business practices and commercial markets, it is a struggle over the most basic underpinnings of national power with huge strategic implications. To put it another way, the West is slowly re-learning the simple fact - one that Beijing has assimilated all too well - that economic muscle is the foundation of global power and that economic strength is the precursor of military might.
UV Sterilization: Far-UVC light kills airborne flu viruses without danger to humans
Use of overhead far-ultraviolet C light in public spaces could provide a powerful check on seasonal influenza epidemics, as well as influenza pandemics.
Continuous low doses of far-ultraviolet C (far-UVC) light can kill airborne flu viruses without harming human tissues, according to a new study at the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University Irving Medical Center (New York, NY).1 The findings suggest that use of overhead far-UVC light in hospitals, doctors’ offices, schools, airports, airplanes, and other public spaces could provide a powerful check on seasonal influenza epidemics, as well as influenza pandemics.
Scientists have known for decades that broad-spectrum UVC light, which has a wavelength between 200 and 400 nm, is highly effective at killing bacteria and viruses by destroying the molecular bonds that hold their DNA together. This conventional UV light is routinely used to decontaminate surgical equipment. “Unfortunately, conventional germicidal UV light is also a human health hazard and can lead to skin cancer and cataracts, which prevents its use in public spaces,” says study leader David Brenner.
Several years ago, Brenner and his colleagues hypothesized that far-UVC could kill microbes without damaging healthy tissue. “Far-UVC light has a very limited range and cannot penetrate through the outer dead-cell layer of human skin or the tear layer in the eye, so it’s not a human health hazard. But because viruses and bacteria are much smaller than human cells, far-UVC light can reach their DNA and kill them,” Brenner said.
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Italy - 74,386 cases, 7,503 deaths
Italy’s Deal With China Signals a Shift as U.S. Influence Recedes
ROME — For decades, Italy felt the brunt of the Chinese economic juggernaut that the United States argues poses a threat to the financial and political future of the West.
China’s government-backed manufacturers, operating on a much larger scale with much cheaper costs, devoured small Italian companies producing machinery, textiles and pharmaceuticals. Chinese knockoffs infuriated its high-fashion brands.
But this month, as the United States continued to engage in a trade standoff with China, and leaders of the European Union banded together to demand an end to unfair Chinese business practices, Italy took another route — China’s new Silk Road.
In a move that signaled geopolitical shifts from West to East, Italy broke with its European and American allies during last week’s visit by President Xi Jinping of China, and became the first member of the Group of 7 major economies to officially sign up to China’s vast new One Belt One Road global infrastructure project.
“This is not being isolated from Europe, this is Italy leading,” Michele Geraci, Italy’s under secretary for economic development, and the driving force behind the deal, said in a telephone interview from China’s southern Hainan province.
“And when you lead,” he added, “you do need to be alone for a split second. But this bit is going to be very short.”
Italy’s transactional tradition in trade and foreign policy, its anti-establishment government’s antagonism toward the European Union, the failure of the United States to intervene effectively and China’s expertise in exploiting political dysfunction — all of those things contributed to the making of the deal.
So, too, did Italy’s desperation for investment, access to China’s enormous markets and anything resembling an economic uptick.
Now as the United States has withdrawn from the world, China is front and center on Italy’s map again.
This week, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte of Italy said that as China exerts a stronger influence on the world’s economy, it is going to exert “an increasing influence also at the political level.”
Mr. Conte was speaking at an event in Rome held by a Jesuit magazine to discuss the Vatican’s own breakthrough deal last year with China, in which Pope Francis made concessions to the Chinese government in order to bring all the Chinese bishops into communion with Rome, and to gain more access to the world’s most populous country.
In front of an audience of top diplomats, prelates and government officials, all eager to learn more about China, Mr. Conte spoke admiringly of China’s efforts to become a world leader in “technology and in innovation, leadership that we know is very contested by the United States.”
The United States, in fact, sought to stop Italy’s joining of the Silk Road.
This week Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said he was “saddened” by the development. On Thursday, Luigi Di Maio, Italy’s deputy prime minister and the political leader of the Five Star Movement, met with National Security Adviser John R. Bolton at the White House.
Mr. Di Maio told reporters that he assured the Americans that the China deal was purely about commerce and that Italy remained firmly in the political orbit of the United States, which has vastly more money invested in the country than China does.
In the months before the deal, Mr. Di Maio repeatedly visited China, and nearly made a deal in November, Italian officials said. All along, the Italians said, they heard barely a peep from top officials in the United States, and by the time Mr. Bolton’s spokesman went public against the deal earlier this month, it was too late.
A senior government official, speaking on background to discuss internal deliberations, said Washington would have engaged sooner if it had understood that Italy planned to officially join the new Silk Road, which it sees as a strategic threat.
The official said the chaotic nature of Italian politics and the fact that visits to Beijing had become the norm for European leaders made it harder to discern what the Italians were up to.
Indeed, already 16 central and eastern European countries, including 11 members of the European Union, have formal business relations with China.
France - 25,600 cases, 1,333 deaths
https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/201911/06/WS5dc1fef0a310cf3e3557599e_3.htmlChina-France bilateral trade was just around $100 million in 1964; now it has increased 600 times, and is worth $62.9 billion in 2018 — an increase of more than 15 percent from 2017.
France is now China's fourth-largest trade partner in the EU, behind Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. China is France’s largest trade partner in Asia.
Two-way direct investments are also on the rise. China’s direct investment into France increased 86 percent year-on-year to $1.8 billion in 2018. A large amount of the investment flowed into the energy sector. French investment in China can be characterized by large bilateral contracts, especially in the aviation and nuclear energy fields.
China is the largest single-country market for Airbus, representing about one-quarter of global sales. In 2008, a joint venture of the A320 final assembly line was set up in Tianjin to meet surging demand from Chinese customers.
It is the third single-aisle aircraft final assembly line location of Airbus and first outside Europe. In June 2009, the Airbus A320 FALA in Tianjin delivered its first aircraft.
In 2017, the value of industrial cooperation between Airbus and China exceeded $640 million, and the figure is expected to reach one billion dollars by 2020.
A third-generation European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) nuclear power unit at Taishan power plant in South China's Guangdong province was successfully linked to grid in 2018.
The Taishan nuclear power plant's No 1 power unit is the world's first third-generation EPR nuclear power unit that has been linked to grid.
The plant is the largest Sino-French project in the energy field. It is run by a joint venture set up by China General Nuclear Power Corp, or CGN, French energy supplier Electricite de France (EDF), and Guangdong Yudean Group.
Third-country projects
China and France also cooperated on third-country projects, such as the Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant in the UK, which is jointly financed by the two countries.
It will be co-built by CGN and French energy company EDF.
Thanks to China's growing wealth, more Chinese can afford to study or spend their holidays in France. With around 30,000 students in France, China is the third-largest source of international students in France, behind Morocco and Algeria.
The number of Chinese tourists in France surpassed 2.3 million in 2018. French visitors can stop over for up to 72 hours with no entry visa required in Chinese cities including Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou.
President Xi visited the southern French city of Lyon, one of the final stops of the ancient Silk Road trade routes, in his state visit to France in March 2014. Consequently in January of 2018, President Macron visited Xi'an, one of the eastern ends of the ancient Silk Road, during his first China visit as head of state.
During meetings, the two countries agreed to advance the joint development of the Belt and Road Initiative and explore third-market cooperation. France is one of the founding members of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.
The Lyon-Wuhan freight rail line was launched in April 2016. Since then, thousands of bottles of Bordeaux wine, auto parts and French agricultural products have been exported to China.
The rail freight service is now also available for refrigerated agricultural products. Trains are loaded and unloaded in Venissieux, 16 kilometers far from Lyon. There are two trains per week in both directions.
In 2017, Decathlon, one of France's leading sports goods retailers, began transporting products made in its factory in Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, to its warehouses in Dourges, northern France, direct by rail.
The weekly 41-container freight train allowed Decathlon's products to reach France in 16 to 18 days, compared with the 20 days previously needed when transported by sea.
These businesses have turned the vision of Belt and Road connectivity into profitability.
Germany - 37,323 cases, 206 deaths
German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s famously pragmatic approach to foreign affairs is currently being tested to its fullest as the country — and the wider European region — contemplates whether to bar Chinese 5G equipment at the direction of the United States.
“Germany faces a difficult choice: allow Huawei in, and alienate the U.S., its most important security partner. Or keep Huawei out, and alienate China, an important trading partner that some German companies, including the country’s influential auto industry, depend on for a significant chunk of their sales,” Kevin Allison, director of Geo-technology at the research firm Eurasia, told CNBC Wednesday.
In May, President Donald Trump took steps to ban Huawei from selling its technology in the United States. U.S. officials have expressed concern over the company’s links to the Chinese government and the security threat it could pose, something which the Shenzhen-based tech firm has denied. However, the German chancellor has put forward a different view.
She’s decided not to outright block Huawei from participating in the development of 5G in Germany — a controversial option for some German lawmakers who also believe this could put the country at risk of surveillance by Beijing. Huawei has welcomed Merkel’s “fact and standards-based approach.”
The alliance between Berlin and Washington has been historically important and secure but has waned in recent years, even before Trump’s arrival in the White House. In 2013, allegations emerged that the U.S. National Security Agency had tapped Merkel’s phone.
More recently, the two countries have been at odds over defense spending under NATO, as well as on trade and climate change. This tense relationship hit a new low earlier this week when the U.S. ambassador to Germany criticized “senior German officials” for comparing the U.S. to China.
Iran - 27,017 cases, 2,077 deaths
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/military/article/3045253/china-and-iran-relationship-built-trade-weapons-and-oilAmid its long-running conflict with the US, Iran has increasingly turned to China for aid to boost its military and to help protect its economy from trade sanctions imposed by Washington.
China remains Iran’s biggest trading partner, but its oil imports from the country have fallen sharply as a result of US sanctions. In November 2019, the last available data, China imported 547,758 tonnes of Iranian oil, down from 3.07 million tonnes in April, according to China’s General Administration of Customs. Trade between China and Iran in 2018 totaled US$35.13 billion, with crude oil accounting for about half, or US$15 billion.
In 2018, US President Donald Trump pulled out of an agreement aimed at curtailing Iran’s nuclear development programme and reimposed crippling sanctions on its economy.
While the sanctions have dented oil trade between the two countries, they remain strong partners on the military front. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, China was among the top three arms transfer partners for Iran, exporting US$269 million of weapons from 2008 to 2018.
During the eight-year Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, China was a provider of military hardware to Iran, while the US, the then Soviet Union and other major powers such as France supported Iraq, supplying it with military equipment.
Spain - 49,515 cases, 3,647 deaths
MADRID, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- China and Spain agreed on Wednesday to build on the 45th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties to jointly promote the development of the relationship and deliver more benefit to the two peoples.
The consensus was reached at a meeting between visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.
Xi said he was very glad to visit Spain for the first time after his re-election as Chinese president in March.
Since the establishment of China-Spain diplomatic ties, bilateral relationship has withstood changes in the international landscape and enjoyed a healthy and stable development, he said, noting that the friendship has stayed as strong as ever.
Praising Sanchez's endeavor to develop bilateral relations and his support for the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Xi said China always cherishes the traditional friendship with Spain and highly values Spain's important role in international affairs.
China is willing to "work with Spain to enrich the content of China-Spain comprehensive strategic partnership, uplift the level of cooperation in various fields," so as to set an example for different civilizations to communicate and learn from each other and for countries with different social systems to achieve win-win cooperation.
Xi stressed that the two sides should strengthen the "guiding and driving" role of high-level exchanges in the development of ties, cement exchanges and cooperation between the two government departments and legislative bodies, deepen political mutual trust, and continue to extend mutual support and understanding on issues concerning each other's core interests and major concerns, so as to forge ahead the steady development of bilateral ties.
"There are multiple advantages including historical and geographic factors for China and Spain to conduct cooperation on the BRI," said Xi, calling for greater synergy between the BRI and Spain's "Strategic Vision for Spain in Asia" and the "Mediterranean Corridor", closer economy and trade contacts, and more cooperation in such areas as ports, shipping, aviation, new energy vehicles, finance.
Xi also called on the two sides to optimize technology and innovation cooperation, deepen people-to-people exchanges, and strengthen exchanges and cooperation in culture, local areas, tourism, journalism, medical care, cultural heritage protection, and sports.