• brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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    18 days ago

    So is the treatment.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inoculation

    For smallpox, they’d infect a break in your skin, deliberately. With actual smallpox. It was less likely to kill you, but absolutely possible and quite miserable.


    But principle is the same. Outbreaks dramatically weaken war fighting capabilities, even if it’s “just” influenza. The history of warfare is littered with thousands of examples. For instance:

    https://www.nationalww2museum.org/about-us/notes-museum/wwi-wwii-1918-influenza-pandemic-and-innovation

    https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/history-disease-outbreaks-vaccine-timeline/flu

    …Which is why this is so egregious. Vaccination (compared to smallpox inoculation) is trivially easy in comparison to the decision Washington faced, and influenza has a long, grim history in the US military. No sane general would throw away such an easy, and historic, warfighting advantage.

      • PugJesus@piefed.socialOPM
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        18 days ago

        Young, well fed, healthy troops do not suffer from the flu

        … are you being fucking serious right now.

      • boonhet@sopuli.xyz
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        18 days ago

        Yes, it’s a little known fact that viruses have an age range check. If you don’t pass, they legally can’t enter your body.

      • yuri@pawb.social
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        18 days ago

        it’d be really funny if you got hospitalized with regular ass influenza rn

      • ricecake@sh.itjust.works
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        18 days ago

        … Do you know what influenza even is? Are you mistaking it for the common cold? I’ve noticed a lot of people who disparage the flu and the flu vaccine think that it’s just another word for the common cold everyone gets every year.

        While unlikely to die, it can easily render them incapable of fighting or training for a week or so, and less effective for a around twice that long.

        Saying “healthy people don’t get sick” is either profoundly ignorant, or a self fulfilling tautology, since once you’re sick your quite obviously not healthy.

        In any case, there’s no dimension where the flu vaccine isn’t several order of magnitude less disruptive than the disease.

      • ayyy@sh.itjust.works
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        18 days ago

        Wow, congratulations, you managed to put both your socks on all by yourself this morning! You’re very smart.