nabeepchen

It seems to be a convergence of cultures–Rosh Hashanah and Ramadan. Both are holy days, of two religious faiths that have been an odds with one another for a very long time.

For Jews, at sundown today begins Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and the beginning of a period of reflection leading up to the fast day of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.

For the Muslim community, tonight is the eve of Ramadan, also a period of daytime fasting and self-reflection, which ends with Eid al-Fitr, a day of feasting.

While both Judiasm and Islam follow lunar calendars, they follow two different calendars, so the odds of these two holidays falling on the same day is quite rare. The last time was several decades ago.

But maybe this convergence of faith can be seen as a beginning of coming together? That both will perhaps learn to accept the other and can come to a mutually acceptable agreement, particularly in the case of Israel and the occupied territories?

Now that we are well into the autumn season, all minds turn to influenza. Bird flu warnings are splattered all over the media, with dire warning of hundreds of millions dead (so far, only 60 people have died in a two year period and all have contracted the disease from contaminated chickens), and of course, the beginning of the hype to “get your flu vaccine.”

No shortages are expected this year, and the CDC maintains that vaccination is the best way to protect children younger than 2 and people age 65 years and older from flu and its complications. This remains their official protocol despite substantial evidence to the contrary.

The bottom line is that flu vaccines have not cut death rates or hospitalization rates in either the very young or very old. So why insist that these two groups are the most “at risk” and in need of a vaccine?

Here’s some data to mull over:

The British medical journal The Lancet in September published an analysis of 64 studies evaluating the effectiveness of flu vaccine for the elderly. The analysis found flu shots were only modestly effective, cutting flu-related hospitalizations by 30 percent to 42 percent.

•In February, The Lancet published a similar analysis of 25 studies of flu shots in children younger than 2, the other group targeted by CDC campaigns. There is no evidence vaccination reduces flu-related deaths or complications in that group, researchers concluded.

•A study published in February in the Archives of Internal Medicine examined decades of U.S. data and found no decrease in flu deaths among seniors despite increased vaccine coverage. “There was absolutely no decline in influenza-attributable mortality between 1980, when 15 percent of elderly were vaccinated, and 2000, when 65 percent of elderly were vaccinated,” said Boston flu researcher Dr. Tom Reichert, a co-author of the National Institutes of Health study.

And despite the vaccine shortage last year, there was no increase in the number of flu related deaths or hospitalizations.

Houston Chronicle

Curious as it sounds, that’s what happened. Two Aussie mates got this year’s Nobel Prize in Medicine for a discovery that was published back in 1982, and a discovery that has been firmly established as scientific fact for at least the past 10 years if not longer.

Two Australian researchers who discovered that stomach ulcers are caused by a bacterium, not by emotional stress or spicy foods, today won the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Dr. J. Robin Warren, 68, and Dr. Barry J. Marshall, 54, overturned a dogma that had been embraced by physicians for decades — that the stomach is far too acidic for any bacteria to grow there — by isolating a spiral-shaped bacterium called Helicobacter pylori from humans and ultimately demonstrating that it could produce serious lesions in the stomach.

While the article does mention (near the bottom) that their initial discovery of the bacteria took place in 1982, its written to appear like it has just been established that H. pylori causes ulcers. While I am sure that there were skeptics when they first discovered the bacteria, and hypothesized that it may be the culprit behind stomach lesions, they’re theory has been well established for many years.

So I’m sure that these two blokes are grinning from ear to ear about winning the Nobel Prize in Medicine, and are dreaming about all the toys they can buy with their share of the $1.3 million prize. But the question looms–why now? Why didn’t they get the award 10 or 15 years ago? The “greatness” of their discovery hasn’t grown, nor was it any less great a decade ago. Is it that no one could find a scientist or group of PhDs doing anything worthwhile, that is a little bit closer to the present time?

The Nobel Prize sort of loses its meaning if it’s just going to passed out haphazardly. One of the winners has been retired for the past five years, so it’s not like the award has anything to do with additional research that they’re working on. The award should have been given closer to the time of discovery, or at least, within a year or two of recognition that they were correct. Giving it now for an old discovery just makes it seem like they can’t find anyone else to give it to.

LA Times.com