Despite the hysteria, Government should think twice before rushing to vaccinate

THE hysteria I warned about in respect of bird flu outbreak in Europe has now become all too evident with the government’s intent to begin vaccination with an untried vaccine.

The dangers of vaccinating against flu if the vaccine is not a perfect match for the disease strain have been highlighted by a British horse study. Andrew Park’s team at the Animal Health Trust near Newmarket, Britain, tested vaccines that were either identical or slightly different to a strain of flu infecting ponies.

The ponies given mismatched vaccine were more likely to become infected and to excrete live flu virus, and also stayed infectious longer than ponies with a well-matched vaccine.

When the researchers put their results into an epidemic model, they found the risk of large outbreaks after using a mismatched vaccine to be up to 1,000 times higher than after a well-matched vaccination.

The work also raises further concerns about widespread poultry vaccination in China. It would be totally irresponsible for the government to ignore the above study, with its horrendous implications.

Patrick J Carroll

Lady Lane House

Waterford