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Comment by sfusato | Hacker News Reader

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In the second article that you cite, it says "once changes in the size and the age structure of the population are neutralized, a downward trend of influenza mortality appears".

i.e. adjusted for population size, influenza deaths went down significantly between 1959 and 2016.

If you call the downward trend "significant", how would you call the upward trend of flu shots given each year then?

> In other words, adjusting for age effects, influenza mortality risk significantly decreased by an average of 2.02 % per year between 1959 and 2016

Also, what would happen if we would normalize for better treatments, better vaccines available with each passing year? Or that shouldn't be taken into consideration?

> how would you call the upward trend of flu shots given each year then?

I guess I'd say that's significant as well? I don't need to analyze the numbers in much depth to see that there's an upward trend in people getting flu shots over the last few decades...

> Also, what would happen if we would normalize for better treatments, better vaccines available with each passing year? Or that shouldn't be taken into consideration?

Not sure what you are getting at here. Your original comment said "There is absolutely no relationship between the number of flu “vaccines” given and deaths from influenza." By the very sources that you gave, it's pretty clear that there is a significant correlation between the percentage of the population getting flu vaccines vs the rates of influenza mortality. In the time period you describe, the rate (which takes into account populationsize) of influenza deaths went down by almost half.

Now sure, correlation isn't causation, so it's entirely possible that there's some other factor leading to drops in flu deaths. Which is why the CDC has a pretty comprehensive page about how they determine the effectiveness of the flu vaccine [1] where they discuss methodologies, including shortcomings.

[1] https://www.cdc.gov/flu/vaccines-work/vaccineeffect.htm

You have a minuscule reduction in deaths over a massive increase of flu shots, percentage wise. Is the whole downward trend attributable to the flu shots? Certainly not unless you think that the better overall care over the years other than vaccines, improved knowledge of the disease was neutral at best. We could remove the flu shots entirely and it won't make much of a difference in the end result with regard to flu deaths.

> how would you call the upward trend of flu shots given each year then?

Good?

> Also, what would happen if we would normalize for better treatments, better vaccines available with each passing year?

Do you think they're not trying? We do update the flu shots annually.

I get the flu shot and get the flu each year. It's tradition.

Isn't it supposed to reduce the severity if you do get the flu?

Yes, and a lot of people call other diseases flu when they get them.

Yes and other people don't know about the Rapid test. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapid_influenza_diagnostic_tes...

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