Lawmakers got flu shots on medical advice

[Inland]

"By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

"WASHINGTON (AP) - Some members of Congress got flu shots before they headed home to campaign this month, despite the vaccine shortage. They were following the advice of the Capitol physician.
While new federal guidelines encourage healthy adults to skip a shot this year, dozens of lawmakers - 35 in the Senate alone - are 65 or older. Older people and very young children are most at risk for severe complications from the flu.

"Capitol physician John Eisold considers all lawmakers prime candidates for getting and spreading the flu because of all the time they spend visiting retirement homes, holding babies and shaking hands, said a spokesman for Eisold."

http://newsobserver.com/24hour/politics/story/1749517p-9585816c.html

Oh, please. Their shots came right out of the supply FOR the elderly and babies---not to mention the adults that care for them! Have to shake hands, my Aunt Fanny. Despicable, typical government. Screw it up but make sure that you aren't personally affected.

[kikiek]

1. MN is telling health care workers to not get them to save them for

people at risk. We have a lot more contact than they do with people sick and healty.

[Inland]

2. Well, clearly you need a different doctor, like the one Congress has.

Who prescribed for Elvis?

[kikiek]

5. Yeah..I chose to pass on it.

But I resent the position this has put me in from work perspective (I am an RN). My patients are home hospice so they are considered terminal. Some do better than others and may live longer..a year or more depending on their illness. I have already been questioned for giving one of them a flu shot. I would like one of them to look someone in the face and say sorry you're in the terminal phase of your disease so we can't waste one on you. They have put us between a rock and a hard place. Many are asking for it too.

[NC_Nurse]

4. It's gonna be too damn bad

when most of us are sick and there's no one to take care of anybody else!

Only ER nurses are getting them here in NC. What BS!

[kikiek]

6. Yes and the hospital will be full. It will cost the taxpayers plenty from

the financial perspective also.

[Ilsa]

10. I have a friend who does lab work at a hospital in MO.

She also has a baby, less than six months old. She said they can't get the vax at all for employees unless they agree to be gouged by the supplier.

PBS' The NewsHour interviewed the heads of the ER physicians group and they are referring to this as The Perfect Storm of epidemiology. What you said, "...when most of us are sick and there's no one to take care of anybody else..." is what they said, and also commented that not vaxing staff would lead to further spreading of the disease.

[OutsourceBush]

3. You should rename title..add ---> (Flu-Gate)

[Inland]

8. No, "Gate" gets hanged on everything

Here, its really simple: There is a matter of death and millions of lost productivity, reoccurring every year, preventable with a cheap, easy method---but mere lives and money isn't enough to get on the government's radar. A real problem with an easy solution isn't on the conservative checklist. Lower taxes, check; Iraq, check; rolling back environmental regulation, check; saving lives and money, nope, don't see it here.

It isn't a huge deal like a moon launch, it wouldn't require an army of bureacrats, but there aren't two smart guys the admin would bother to spare to work on something that, frankly, nobody lobbies for and won't be hailed from the pulpits of churches.

No "gate". Run of the mill, everyday incompetence from a lazy, ideologically driven administration.

[librechik]

7. Good news! If Kerry wins we can buy into the same plan they have! n/t

[PsN2Wind]

9. And,I bet, every spouse

of the congress critters and every child......................etc.

[Maddy McCall]

11. I HOPE JK and JE got flu shots. Who knows what the next three...

months will hold.

[diamond14]

12. Bill Frist: because they shake hands with people....so BILL....tell them

to stop shaking hands....it's such a horrible way to transmit diseases.....but why not save the shots for the WEAK??? didn't you ever read that in your bible, bill frist?


"Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (Tenn.), a heart surgeon, sent letters urging his 99 colleagues to get the shots because they mingle and shake hands with so many people, his spokeswoman, Amy Call, said. She said she did not know how many senators have taken his advice."

[Inland]

13. And Bill, being a doctor, knows all one has to do is wash your hands

before sucking your thumb. Dr. Frist must think we are all morons. Why is he making himself look like such a jerk? For a stinking flu shot!?! How low and self interted and selfish and conniving are these guys that they would make someone risk their lives?

[llmart]

14. Oh, please. Who is going to buy this crapola?

What about all of us who work with the public every day? Teachers who work with children in a closed classroom. People who work in doctor's offices. People like me who work in public libraries, etc. etc. etc. We come in contact with people every minute of every day. What makes him think he is so special???

[Rose Siding]

15. Frist and Hastert got shots, Pelosi and Daschle did not

snip>
Sen. Evan Bayh (news, bio, voting record), D-Ind., said neither he nor his family will get a flu shot this year. As for his colleagues, Bayh said, "That's a matter of conscience for them."

Bayh was among 10 Democrats and two Republicans who introduced legislation Oct. 8 to respond to the vaccine shortage. The measure would require Eisold to abide by the federal guidelines and to give what is left of the supply to the Health and Human Services (news - web sites) Department.

"If members of Congress and their staffs cannot reserve flu vaccine for those most in need, how can we ask the American public to do so?" Sen. Edward Kennedy (news, bio, voting record), D-Mass., said at the time. Kennedy, 72, got a flu shot.

Among congressional leaders, Frist, 52, and Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., 62, were vaccinated. The Democratic leaders — California Rep. Nancy Pelosi (news, bio, voting record), 64, and South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle, 56 — were not. Pelosi urged Eisold to donate the rest of the Capitol's vaccine to people in high-risk categories.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=512&ncid=696&e=9&u=/ap/20041020/ap_on_go_co/flu_vaccine_government

Only one dem is noted as having receive the vaccine but it was way back on the 6th. Such a small thing (in the bigger scheme) but this makes me proud. And a little worried.

[MaineDem]

16. Mike Michaud (D-ME 2) didn't get the vaccine

His staffer made sure we knew that tonight.