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Britain
23 people die and 123 hospitalised after being given bad flu vaccine
2008-06-15
Twenty-three people have died in the past five years after a routine flu jab.

23 people have died from heart attacks, blood infections and pneumonia after having routine flu jabs

Official figures show that a further 123 people given the winter vaccine suffered a suspected reaction so severe they were taken to hospital.

Causes of death included heart attacks, blood infections and pneumonia, while asthma and kidney failure were among reported side-effects.

The statistics, revealed by Health Minister Dawn Primarolo, raise fears over the safety of the vaccine, which is taken by eight million people in Britain every year.

Government policy is to offer the jabs to everyone over 65 and those with existing conditions that could be worsened by flu.

Experts say the deaths could be coincidental and no direct link to the injection has been established.

But there are now calls for further research to identify whether some people could be put in danger by having the jab.

Ms Primarolo insisted the flu vaccine was safe and added: ‘The balance of benefits to risks remains overwhelmingly positive.’
Posted by:Anonymoose

#2  But then, I'm neither a statistician nor an epidemiologist, so perhaps I shouldn't venture an opinion

Neither is the author---and he can't do arithmethic, besides.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2008-06-15 22:28  

#1  146 in the last five years out of 8,000,000 per year is less than four ten-thousandths of a percent(0.00037%), a vanishingly small percentage it seems to me, especially given the weighting of that population toward advanced age and fragile health. But then, I'm neither a statistician nor an epidemiologist, so perhaps I shouldn't venture an opinion.
Posted by: trailing wife    2008-06-15 22:00  

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