U.S. panel recommends new adult vaccine against hepatitis B

[rcjordan]

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/feb/21/us-panel-recommends-new-adult-vaccine-against-hepa/


I've posted a few times about getting Hep A vaccine prior to going to Hanoi.  FWIW, since returning (and missing the beginning of a HEP A outbreak in HI) I've noticed a large increase in Hep A/B outbreaks across the US --usually fast food related.

[buckworks]

I've had every vaccination our travel clinic has available except for rabies which would have cost over $700.

Canada's Medicare doesn't cover exotic vaccinations related to foreign travel so they were out of my own pocket.

I figure that vaccinations are one of the best investments one can make, evah!!!!

[ergophobe]

Agreed, but to be fair, anti-vaxers notwithstanding, it's risk/reward question.

On well-known vaccines, the risk is tiny and the reward is potentially massive.

On experimental vaccines, sometimes the risk is unknown and the reward is questionable. Vaccines + antibiotics* have had a huge roll in creating the modern world.

Unless I have a good reason, I prefer to be trailing edge on most technologies, but especially pharmaceuticals.

*Did you know that penicillin was once so valuable that if you were on a course of antibiotics they collected your urine and pulled the penicillin out of it for reuse?

[grnidone]

> rabies which would have cost over $700.

Rabies vax is pretty brutal, as I've heard.  It's a pill and a shot for two or three weeks, and it knocks you OUT with exhaustion.

[rcjordan]

>rabies vax brutal

The cure is worse.  AND. WILDLY. EXPENSIVE. 

A family member with top-notch corporate insurance (Cisco exec) was out $30k out-of-pocket getting his 6 family members treated after exposure to a rabid raccoon.  JUST possible exposure, not actually bitten.

>$30k

Unless the max-out-of-pocket kicked in. Dunno the final outcome.

[buckworks]

>> the risk is tiny and the reward is potentially massive

There's a mass grave two or three hours south of here full of pioneer settler's children who died when scarlet fever swept their group.

http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/sites/ukrainianmassgrave.shtml

I've been there and it's an eerie feeling to look at that little hill and ponder the grief it represents. The aura is even darker than the battlefield at Little Big Horn.

Alas, even today there's no vaccine for scarlet fever although it can be treated with antibiotics.

[rcjordan]

https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Rabid-Coyote-Killed-Westchester-Yonkers-Police-Warn-Rabies-475744583.html