People vaccinated against seasonal flu appeared to have been at increased risk of the H1N1 pandemic flu that killed thousands worldwide last year, Canadian researchers said on Tuesday.
However, they said in their findings published in the journal PLoS Medicine that the link between seasonal flu vaccinations and subsequent pandemic flu illness is tenuous.
Four studies led by Danuta Skowronski of the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control in Vancouver compared the frequency of prior vaccination in people with H1N1 influenza to people without evidence of infection.
The studies included approximately 2,700 people with and without H1N1.
The first study “confirmed that the seasonal vaccine provided protection against seasonal influenza, but found it to be associated with an increased risk of approximately 68 percent for H1N1 disease.”
A further three studies also found an “increased likelihood of H1N1 illness in people who had received the seasonal vaccine compared to those who had not.”
The researchers said these do not reveal a “true cause-and-effect relationship” between seasonal flu vaccination and subsequent H1N1 illness.
The observed association may also be “due to differences in some unidentified factor[s] among the groups being studied,” they said.
Six other studies produced “highly conflicting results,” peers Lone Simonsen and Cecile Viboud noted in an accompanying commentary in the magazine. Thus, it would be “premature to conclude” that seasonal flu vaccinations increased the risk of pandemic illness last year, they said.
The Canadian researchers also noted that the WHO has recommended that H1N1 be included in subsequent seasonal vaccine formulations.
This would provide protection against H1N1 and “thereby obviate any risk that might have been due to the seasonal vaccine in 2009, which did not include H1N1,” they said.
Also See: The pandemic that wasn’t
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese