I'm just going to label this one, "Stupid MAGA vaccine idiots"

It's not much fun here in the Sink since all the MAGA folks have left, cowardly one and all. 

Did anyone think the flu vaccine would be a political talking point? MAGA did.

Pentagon restores mandatory flu shots for all recruits as boot camp outbreak sickens nearly 300 - ABC News

"WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon said Wednesday that boot camps for all the military services are once again requiring the flu vaccination for all recruits after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made the shot optional for the military at the end of April."

"Hegseth showed no such caution in April. “Our new policy is simple: If you, an American warrior entrusted to defend this nation, believe that the flu vaccine is in your best interest, then you are free to take it; you should. But we will not force you,” he said, branding the old mandate “overly broad and not rational.”"

Not rational? Idiot.

"The development, confirmed to The Associated Press by a Pentagon official, comes amid a growing, weekslong, flu outbreak at the U.S. Air Force's boot camp at Lackland Air Force Base that has sickened nearly 300 people."

So predictable. The right-wing media and pundits frequently like to say, "follow the science", yet ignore 100 years of success based on science.

There's an mRNA flu vaccine coming. Where are the hospitalizations from the COVID mRNA vaccine that were supposed to happen? 

  Point #1 - the "MAGA" people who, as you say, "have left" not because they are "cowardly", they left because  they grew tired of your's and the other liberals who post here shit. Point #2 - giving people the option was and is a sensible thing to do - the shots may benefit some but others may have adverse reactions to the shots. I for one got terribly ill the only time I was talked into getting a flu shot. Never again will I subject my health to one of those damn things. Point# 3 - as usual YOU are always looking for something to bitch about, as you have done here. I can guarantee that if the flu shots were made mandatory in the armed forces and if some of those who were made to take the shot got ill, YOU would be right here bitching that this administration was wrong to make the flu shots mandatory. Point # 4 - That is who YOU are - a little bitch.

If a lot of people are going to be in close quarters--as in the military, as in schools--then mantadory flu vaccines are the only sensible policy.

MAGA, before, during, and after covid, made refusing flu shots an ideological talking point. That's like making road regulations "optional." Stop signs, one-way streets--only observe them if you're comfortable with them.

Little Davey's experience with flu shots isn't uncommon. They are in fact SUPPOSED to make you a little but sick--that's how they work. But some people are real softies, become drama queens when they're mildly ill, and then start raving about the horrors of vaccines and how they're being used to sap our precious bodily fluids.

I am very glad that I grew up during the time when people accepted the gift of vaccines without question.  I'd walk a mile on broken glass if necessary to get the annual flu shot. 

Compare the millions of flu shots given every year to how many actual severe reactions.  Not the rash, fever, body aches which for some is "terribly ill", and for most is a day or two of misery but we come out of it.  

One should discuss it with their MD who can assess your risk and develop a plan.  Some take a Tylenol or Aleve or something with the shot.   

The ongoing Lackland AFB experience is an example of what can happen when medical expertise is discounted.  Shame on the non-experts who supported not making it mandatory.  Most people (me included) don't like shots, but I/you knuckle down and take them anyway. 

Candy

  I would generally concur that vaccines are good and necessary, for the most part. Making vaccines mandatory is not always wise, as seen with the number of people who have had and continue to have severe medical complications with the Covid vaccines. 

There has to be a certain percentage of the population that is vaccinated in order to stop a pandemic, or to stop the proliferation of a common disease, and that percentage is pretty high. Candy can tell us more about that, I'm sure.

For covid, that percentage was deemed at various times to be 70-80% of the population. The reason was, with too many infected individuals remaining (greater than 30%),  the virus would not just proliferate but also mutate, rendering the existing vaccinations less effective, or, nightmare scenario, not effective at all.

We've seen this recently, with measles. The anti-vax crusade resulted in many families refusing to get their kids vaccinated--and court decisions sided with them. The result? Measles, recently all but eradicated, is back--big time. All because some people listened to nonsense.

So, mandatory vaccinations are in fact wise, especially to ward off highly infectious diseases. And the analogy I use is that some people aren't happy with vaccines, but some people aren't happy with traffic signs and speed limits, either. I don't think that people should have a choice regarding public safety. To extend the analogy, you have the right to get sick if you want, but you will infect others, just like you have the right to drive as fast as you want--except that you endanger others by doing so.

Unfortunately, vaccines do have side effects, and sometimes, they're lasting. But the number of people who suffered from that condition after receiving the covid vaccine was quite small. If everyone who feared complications had shied away from those vaccinations, then more people would have been killed by the virus.

The covid vaccinations were only mandatory in cases where people's employment placed them among large groups of people. I think that requirement was good and necessary.