[Chicago] Bears [footballers] get flu shots despite shortage

[Inland]

Okay, here's my last thing on the damn flu vaccine debacle. My editorial comment: Bears have won one out of four, and unless torn ligaments put them in an at risk category I don't know about, are the last people in America who should be saved from the flu. But football is money, and money is power, and if Congress can wrangle their shots, the Bears can wrangle their shots. Thanks, Bush, for showing such great foresight and courageous leadership in the arena of flu as you did in all the other aspects of your presidency.


http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/health/chi-0410220269oct22,1,6926013.story?coll=chi-news-hed
The executive director of the Lake County Health Department reacted with outrage Wednesday to news that Bears players have received flu vaccinations despite a shortage that has caused the shutdown of all 16 flu clinics in the area and has left countless senior citizens still waiting for shots.

[Inland]

1. Did I mention the Bears are one out of four?

[CookieD]

3. Maybe coach thought they needed a shot in the arm. (lol)

[RedEarth]

5. lol....love that picture...

[Southpaw Bookworm]

11. Great photo

This elderly woman all decked out in her patriotic colors, with her coiffe sprayed stiff, and THAT sign. Fabulous!

[kysrsoze]

19. Is there a vaccine against totally sucking?

Guess not.

[rocktivity]

9. Congress got theirs because they meet so many different people

I don't think a 1-4 team is subject to overpopularity problems!

:headbang:
rocknation

[Inland]

20. In fact, Bears offensive line barely touches opposing team

[skooooo]

2. Well, duh!! If they don't get their shots..

...some rich people might lose revenue. Makes perfect sense.

[durablend]

12. "RICH people are more important than YOU"

Just keep repeating that OVER and OVER until it sinks in.

Anyone who doesn't believe it is delusional.

[skooooo]

13. I've finally accepted this, and feel much better now..

[UpInArms]

4. I'm getting sick to death of sports and sports figures

being idolized and revered as some sort of gawdlike creatures.

Our media fauns all over them, they are put on primetime television so many times a week so that everyone thinks they are supposed to go nuts over them - they get hyped up and "fans" are created - then when they (the fans) do exactly as they are programmed to do (ala the Socks win)they are punished for being excited.

At some point someone is going to have to understand how to connect the freakin' dots and stop this entire round of madness.

(edited for grammar)

[GoldenOldie]

8. ISports figures make millions and get flu shots----

While our US Troops and medical personnel who actually serve on the front line for war and health do without.

Something is seriously wrong with our Nation and those that find Teresa and Laura or Kerry wearing hunting gear as the news of the day.

[havocmom]

16. Rich men's toys, football players in this case, get flu shots.

School teachers spend the flu/cold season getting sneezed and coughed on by kids showing up at school sick (often, working parents have no where to send them when they are ill) and most probably will not get flu vaccine this year.

Yeah, we have some damned twisted values in this society.

[Tony_Illinois]

6. Selfish Jocks Surprise You?

I totally agree that the immunization of football teams--all of them, not just the Bears--is an outrage in light of the shortage the nation is facing. But let's face it, most of these professional athletes are self-centered egomaniacs. They are not concerned about anything larger than themselves and the big money lifestyles the sport enables them to have. There are of course exceptions, and I admire those who do not allow themselves to slip into that "it's all about me" mode.

The real culprit here is the NFL. The league is responsible for not giving up those vaccines to more needy citizens. They had an opportunity to be magnanimous and put the truly needy first--but they chose not to do it. I wonder why??$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$??

[righteous1]

7. Illinois Fan

Geeeez......if it were anyone but the Bears

[mtnester]

10. Illustrative example - "haves" getting something the "have nots" can't

Just *'s base getting what they need.

Pathetic...these folks should be in PRIME condition...they are the LAST people that should get a flu shot during a shortage.

[Ilsa]

14. Dammit. They should take the flumist if they want protection

and leave the shots to the elderly and high risk groups. You get a very mild case with flumist, but at least you are protected. This is putrageous.

[Neshanic]

15. So, being a pampered rich football player gets you perks?

Wow, who would of thunk? I suspect the other teams are clamming up about now.

You know that playing football is more important than that Kidney replacement patient, or your elderly sickly grandmother.

It's the ownership society now, the "Great Society" is dead. It was soooo twentieth Century.

[KansDem]

17. Lighten up, folks! Do you REALLY want your entertainers to get sick?

Afterall, you can lose your house, your job, your healthcare, etc...but you'll always have entertainment! And that's the one thing we Americans can agree on...we must ALWAYS be entertained, so do you really want your entertainers to get sick? They're the "circus" in "bread and circuses..."
:spank:


(/sarcasm--to some degree)

[Child_Of_Isis]

18. If the players lose parents

or grandparents to the flu, they have no one to blame but themselves.

[RetroLounge]

21. I am a Bears fan and find this outrageous...

But it's not a Bears thing,

it's an NFL, rich-guys-who-own-sports-team kind of thing.

I'll bet other teams have done this too.

McCaskey is an asshole...

RL

p.s. Yes, they are 1-4 and suck...

[chookie]

22. So they won't miss a game?

Lets see -- these guys are fantastically rich, superbly conditioned physical specimens, who have an exceptional diet and sports doctors and trainers hovering over them all the time.

If one of these palookas gets the flu, he may, what, miss a game?

But these big babies get inoculated, whereas old folks, living on fixed incomes and barely making it between food and medicine costs, and now facing record high heating costs this winter -- in CHICAGO, not Miami -- they get sent back to the end of the line. THEY get sick, they die. Imagine what the fucking hospitals are going to look like -- filled to over-flowing, people in beds lining the corridors. And the Republicans have the audacity to mock health care in Canada, Britain and Cuba?

I'm kinda inna lynch mob state of mind.