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Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist
Which is funny, but the statistics show that vaccination is likely the biggest reason it wasn't even deadlier than it could've been. There's blow back because the very behaviour that was asked for did what it was supposed to.
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Possibly, but from what I read it is still uncertain exactly how much of a role it played in those first few months. At the same time the H1N1 frenzy was occurring, many people started taking other preventative measures regarding hygiene and self-quarantine which probably played a big role (I recall hand sanitizer popping up everywhere for example). The vaccine may have been a piece of the puzzle though, so don't get me wrong. I just recall stories at the time that stated the vaccine was only 20-40% effective when it was first rolled out, which kind of scares me to think that some people were likely getting a false sense of security which may have led to more riskier behavior. At some point, if the effectiveness of a vaccine is below a certain level, the returns are not necessarily positive.
Having said that, recent studies show that right now, the current H1N1 vaccine is upwards of 90% effective, which is quite amazing in my opinion, and that since 2009, the number of infections has likely been reduced by 70% due to flu vaccinations. So taken as a whole, the H1N1 vaccine was a success, but I still question how it was rolled out in the beginning, especially considering the effectiveness was unknown at the time.
Sort of OT but related, but I recall years ago reading an article about a potential HIV vaccine that worked, but had a really low rate of working (I think it was around 10% or something like that). They determined that because vaccinated people in a population tend to feel more secure and take fewer precautions, that in order to actually reduce HIV transmission in a population, the vaccine would need to be at least 40% effective before rolling out. It was a long time ago, so the numbers might be a little fuzzy now, but that was the gist of it. Obviously predicting human behavior is not easy and HIV is not the same as the flu (I would argue that HIV while more serious, is actually harder to catch), I think the same principle would apply.
I am sure you know more about this than I do though, so what is your take?