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Strange Swine Flu Stat
Swine Flu... its not the pig's fault!
This article is considered a “musing for entertainment” as it is solely based on statistical information (and possibly poor information). The author takes no stance pro or con vaccination.
Whether or not the swine flu vaccine is safe or effective continues to be a debate and is the basis for many families deciding against receiving the vaccine. So here’s an interesting consideration for you all. (But please don’t forget that correlation do not equal causation)
Mongolia has a population of roughly 3,000,000 people. According to the World Health Organization, as of November 4th there has been 6 deaths associated with swine flu. That means that 1 out of every 500,000 Mongolians have died of the swine flu.
The United States has a population of 305,000,000 people. According to the CDC on November 1st, there have been 4000 swine flu related deaths. That means that 1 out of every 76,250 Americans have died of the swine flu.
The kicker… Mongolia does not have the vaccine, the USA does. Is it that Mongolian Hospitals are superior to the US? Hardly… Mongolia’s health-care system is considered the 147th of 190. The USA ranks at 37. Is it because Mongolia is less densely populated? Unlikely. 1/3 of the population lives in a single city alone.
One argument is that that swine flu figures are underreported, and this is likely the case… in non-severe infections. Most people who contract the swine flu are never tested. And the CDC acknowledges this fact and therefore the number of deaths cited above, turns out to be an estimation. The CDC estimates between 2500 and 6000 swine flu deaths. But there is an inherent problem here, when someone dies with flu-like symptoms they are checked for H1N1… even in ‘backwater’ Mongolia (the government has taken a very strict stand with swine flu and checks all cases in a hope to quarantine any possible outbreaks). But I’ll humor their statistics, 2500 deaths means 1 in 122000, or for 6000 deaths means 1 in 50000… again, much greater than Mongolia’s death rate.
Also makes me wonder, why isn’t the CDC reporting the confirmed cases anymore?
Are there extenuating variables involved here, I can guarantee it. But it does make you wonder…
What’s your thoughts? What is wrong with these statistics? Do you plan on getting vaccinated?
This article is considered a “musing for entertainment” as it is solely based on statistical information. The author takes no stance pro or con vaccination.
References
http://www.cdc.gov
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/11/health/11flu.html
http://www.photius.com/rankings/who_world_health_ranks.html
Of course I'm going to get vaccinated! Even if the odds of the swine flu killing me are low, they are still there!! Plus I don't want to be sick at any rate!
If these ridiculous statistics make you wonder, you should really focus more on critical thinking skills during your education. The entire field of epidemiology is proof that drawing faulty, partially accusatory, inflammatory, alarmist conclusions from this data is totally and completely invalid – whether it “makes you think” or not. Posting them on a chiropractic student website only furthers the stigma that chiropractors and chiropractic schools leave a lot to be desired in the critical thinking department. As a chiropractor and recent graduate, I can say that sadly, this is too often the truth. There are reasonable questions to ask on the subject – such as why two people live in the same house and only one gets sick (how can we talk about, affect, or enhance this 'immunity')
Mongolia has far, far fewer chiropractors than America does. Should we think about this correlation as well? There are no less than thousands of differences between Americans and Mongolians in general – are all of these “correlations” that should “make us think”?
You were on the right track when you said that correlation does not equal causation. It is a shame you did not stop typing with that sentence.
The facts as we know them about the safety of the swine flu vaccine ARE NOT the basis of decision for families choosing the pass on vaccination. Alarmist reactions in the media and special interest groups are. Sure, you get your holistic, vegetarian family who claims to have done all the research (and maybe they have) but they knew which decision they were going to make before they started. When you go looking for the outcome in the evidence, you'll usually find it – no matter what outcome you are looking for. I hope you'll remember that as a chiropractor you'll have patients in your office that are giving you the responsibility of educating them regarding matters such as these. I hope, for your patients' sake and the sake of your credibility, liability, and inter-professional relations that you will be much more measured in that communication than you were in this post.
Having said all of that, this is but a blog and this post was in a section called musings. By definition, one is allowed to muse over whatever one chooses – and encouraging debate is good for both your website traffic and the subject at hand.
As you had mentioned, this posting is nothing more than a 'musing', and it's designation of such means this post is not believed to be of any significant merit. A musing also contains information that is not well supported and thus I'd strongly recommend against giving it to patients.
I had also noted in the post that the vaccination alone is unlikely the causal agent, and if anything, the post is somewhat a parody on the abuse of statistics (i have a host of extra variable off the top of my head but i wanted to see if any readers had things to say). But, that said, “wondering” is the start of research. Logic and research both start with a question, often jumpstarted by a confusing revelation. This post suggests that we should look deep into the situation to piece out why these statistics are occurring, be it vaccination related or pure happenstance. Also as you said, the post is a subject of debate, not fact.
I agree, critical thinking is something that is often lacking, hence why most of my personal posts just present data while leaving my own personal opinions out of it. I feel people are smart enough to make their own decisions, and in either direction, and I don't care if it mirrors my own as long as its well informed.
Thank you for the comment!